祝我生日快乐!!

(It's always feels a bit self-indulgent to write about yourself all the time, but for some reason it feels even more so talking about your own birthday. But here it is anyways.)

The Quarter Century Mark was certainly a momentous occasion here in the Middle Kingdom. The celebrations seemed to last all week. The Sunday before I had lunch with some of my fresh(wo)men, at a brand new little restaurant at the back of the campus.

(l-r: Yellow, Lorelai, Birch, Sunny, Ruby, Phoenix)
The guys who ran the place were really excited to have a foreigner eat at their cafe...

...so excited, in fact, that they insisted we flash gang symbols for our photo (don't ask). And yes, that is a G-Unit music video playing in the background that they put on especially for me.

Tuesday I don't normally teach, but since John was in Hong Kong becoming a pirate I volunteered to pick up a few of his classes. We watched the tail end of "The Joy Luck Club," and then to kill time I let them watch the first 40 minutes of "Elf." Am I a great teacher or what? ;-)

For dinner we decided to go to the one of the nicest restaurants in Zhanjiang...

You know it!

Swanky, huh?

And speaking of elves, check out the Maitre d'!!
(and yes, Pizza Huts in China have a maitre d')

Everyone loves pizza!

Some of my students even bought me a cake! I like the cakes in China because they are usually filled with fruit and they all have whipped cream frosting instead of just sweetened shortening. Roxanne would not be pleased...

The older I get, the more wax I ingest with my cake...

After pizza David, Ben and I took Angel and Lyva bowling. It was their first time, so it was pretty special. Here's a shot of David perfecting his "curling" method of bowling.

This is Ben's preferred method, also known as "the granny shot."

The man has it down to a science.

Angel loves bowling!

So does Lyva!!

Just remember folks: these two young individuals are responsible for the education of the future leaders of the next world power. *shudder*

The next day John came back, so MJ got everyone together for a group shot. (The flowers are from my angel, Ben.)

Like I said, it was a very memorable occasion, and I received many beautiful gifts from friends and students. Probably the most surprising of all was the gift from some of my freshmen...

Sadly, all six fish are now swimming with the fishes. ;-)

Another year wiser,
Aaron