Thanksgiving Thoughts

Wow - it is so nice to be able to post again. It doesn't seem like it should be time for Thanksgiving! School days seem to move very quickly and yet are very draining. I've kind of gotten used to moving in 2-week blocks of time. As I mentioned in the last blog, we were suposed to teach on Thanksgiving day, but our students are being taken on a field trip to an island near Suzhou and then to a Science and Technology museum in Shanghai. So tomorrow we will be thinking of home and all the Thanksgiving doings. I sure hope the family enjoys the wild turkey and dressing and all those pies mom is making.
We will probably try to go downtown and find a Pizza Hut or McDonalds to get a little back home flavor. Although we still haven't gotten used to the green bean pies or the side dishes of corn.





It is raining here now and pretty cool, but who knows what it will be like tomorrow.


This is a picture of some of the 3-wheeled carts at the corner by our apartment. This day it happened to be sunny. We don't get very many of those.


I also thought you might enjoy getting a little preview of what it is like when we go to the grocery store. This one is called RT Mart in downtown Changzhou. There is always a lot of live meat that a person can buy including crabs, eel, fish, snakes, turtles, etc. These two ladies were pleased when I took their picture. If you click on the pictures you will get a much better view of the details.



Sometimes when we travel, the fog is pretty thick like at this intersection when we were going to Suzhou. The fog was so thik the bus driver had to drive 40 km an hour for a lot of the way.
Well enough posting for now. It's time to try some of those delicious tiny oranges that are in season now.

Back on the blog - at least for now

Hey everyone! We're back!!

It has been a long time since Oct. 16th. We have been trying hard to get back to the blog, but was locked out. It seems that we will be able to publish - at least for now. A quick update on how things are going.
Here is a pic of our group at the 3 gorges dam. Doesn't Jim look like he is having fun with all us teachers? These are some of the pics I was trying to put on the post from the 3 Gorges trip. Here is one of the dam. This is the largest water constructions project in the world. It was awesome.

We took a trip to Suzhou and visited the silk museum, silk street, where we purchased some neat things, and found a birds, plants, and crafts market. We had a great time wandering around and even found some great bargains.
We rode in a modern rickshaw.

The next long weekend we went to Hangzhou and met Zhao who took us to his office and showed us some of the neat things his factories are making for Pawnee Bills Trading Post (in our home town). We also went on a tour of the West Lake which was very beautiful. It was a great weekend. These two pics were of West Lake.

This last weekend we went to Changshu to a little villa that was so beautiful. The weather was pretty dismal and we didn't get to do much, but it was great to just relax. I did some knitting on a scarf (some of us ladies at work are knitting or crocheting our own scarves). The villa had an indoor heated pool, jacuzi, and sauna. (I didn't take my bathing suit, so didn't get to try them out) but two of the ladies did and said it was wonderful. I did get a new coat though, and just in time - it turned off pretty chilly and the coat felt wonderful.

This pic is of me at one of the gardens at Suzhou.

We found out today that our students will be going on a field trip this Thursday and Friday to Suzhou and Shanghai. We may be invited to go along. If we choose to, I will try to post from our adventures. That means we will be off for Thanksgiving Day, but will have to teach on Sunday (mine and Jim's anniversary). I guess we will have to celebrate on Saturday. All you guys in America will have to eat some extra turkey and dressing for us since I'm sure we won't find any here. :-)

I won't write much for now so I can try to get this post out with some pics.

I'll try to post again tomorrow and put out some more pics. Happy Thanksgiving everyone!