Hao jiu, bu jian!!

...long time no see! I'm sorry it's been so long since my last post. Things get a little busy around here from time to time, but that's a good thing, right? Just assume that if it's been awhile since I've posted anything, it must means that I'm just too busy having lots of fun to write! :-)

But luckily for you, I have managed to chronicle some of the events that have kept me so busy these last few weeks. If you scroll down, you'll find a number of posts that I've back-dated for your reading/viewing pleasure. Lots of pictures folks!

This last Saturday the power was out across the whole neighborhood. I think they were doing work on the grid or something. This happens from time to time in China, so when Ben called and informed me, I wasn't too surprised. All the more reason to sleep in till noon!

Since there was nothing else to do I corrected a bunch of student essays (usually reserved for Sunday afternoons), cleaned the apartment (usually done every other week, but again, nothing else to do), and tried to ignore the silence (usually I like having music playing all day). A very constructive, yet uneventful day.

Around 6:00pm it started getting too dark to stay indoors, so we went out to eat. Like I said, it wasn't just our building that was without power, it was the whole neighborhood. But luckily the restaurant we picked had candles out on all the tables, which was actually pretty cool.


After our candle-light dinner, John and David and I caught a bus downtown to attend "The Every Year Annual International Zhanjiang City Fun Delicious Variety Food Festival Party" (everyone I talk to gives it a different name, so rather than list them all individually, I just kind of combined them into one. Ridiculously long names for things are common here in China :-). It was essentially like a "Taste of Minnesota" event, with many, many outdoor booths set up selling a wide variety of over-priced "delicacies." It was a lot of fun walking around and seeing the different wares.

Our favorite were definitely the massive lamb kebabs that are a specialty up in Xinajiang Province. They were the biggest kebabs I've ever seen in my life, and super delish. We also tried venison kebabs and ostrich kebabs. The ostrich was pretty good, but the venison was nothing like the meat that comes from Klair Farm. ;-) The strangest food was probably the whole cat they had roasting on a spit. Yeah, I know. I'm not a big cat person, but it was still strange seeing roast cat. It probably looked something like this before it died:

R.I.P. Mao mao

In other news, the weather has finally begun to resemble autumn here. Well, sort of. It rained a whole lot last week, and I think that helped usher in the cold weather. And by "cold" I mean 75 during the day and 50 at night with 50% humidity. Not exactly the Minnesota falls I'm used to, but trust me - it's a welcome change. I actually wore blue jeans the other night for the first time since I got here. I thought that day would never come. I admit it feels strange talking about how cool a 70 degree days feels like when I know everyone back home is experiencing 30s with snow. Oh well.

At least I'm not like the locals here. All of our students have been wearing pants and sweaters or jackets all month. I'm pretty sure if they could actually experience a Minnesota winter, they would die. They keep telling us "You need to wear more clothes, it is very cold now." It will be 75 and sunny and if I wear short sleeves they all want to know if I'm cold, and when I tell them no, they all reply, "Wow, you are so strong!"

China's a strange place. It's a good thing I'm a strange guy. ;-)

-高占阳