Every month we have an activity for them. This past month we took them to a local Western style restaurant. We bought some pizzas and nachos for them to eat (some who had never had it before) and then we talked about some of the etiquette of eating “Western style”.

Here’s a photo of the group!

We’ve even had a few students asking more questions about why we’re here in China which gives us a chance to share about that aspect of our lives. Some of those same kids have been asking really deep questions like “what’s the meaning of life?” “is there more to life?” etc.

It really has been one of the huge highlights for me. My weekends are busy with going to the orphanage and hosting English corner but I love it.

Lup

Hopefully you’ve all seen previous stories about WeiWei. For those who are newer to this blog WeiWei is basically my little sister. I have gone to her village four times (mostly during Chinese New Year). I lived with her oldest sister for almost 2 years in Kunming. So I can easily say that her family is my Chinese family.

Recently I’ve been playing more of a “Mom” role than anything. I’ve been able to see real quick just how tough it is to raise a child. WeiWei (along with her parents) in March, moved down to Wenshan for work reasons. So we enrolled WeiWei in a preschool which not only helps her learn but is also a great babysitter. Preschool here is 7:30-5:00. None of that half day nonsense like in the States. Her parents often get off work around 6ish so that leaves me to go pick her up and play for awhile. On the weekends I turn into a full time sister/mom. We often go down to the orphanage together on Saturday and then to fellowship on Sundays! She’s a great kid. Listens really well and the only time she gets whinny is when she needs a nap. It’s been a lot of work even including a few sessions of her testing me. Luckily I was a kid who thought (emphasis on THOUGHT) I could outsmart my patents and manipulate them to get what I wanted, so I’m on to her when she’s “trying” me. With the great example from my parents I am able to hold firm and WIN! Haha! So now she knows when I’m serious. (with no throat clearing needed…). This whole experience has definitely given me a better perspective on what it takes to be a parent. I can now confirm that I am responsible for aging my mother! Sorry Mom!

Last week WeiWei’s big sister came down to Wenshan for a visit. Her sister had promised that if she was well behaved that she would buy her a princess dress. Here is the result of our shopping adventure.

Apparently with the dress comes the princess attitude. A day after, while she was still wearing her dress, she’s walking along the road demanding someone to throw something away for her. At the end of the sentence she adds, “Because I’m a princess!”. Haha.

Princess number 2 comes to us from the orphanage.

This little girl is an orphan potentially with syphilis. At least that is what all the ladies at the orphanage say. Every time someone goes over to her bed they all tell people to not go over there cause she’s sick. Our friend Katy has taken a liking to her an decided that if it is syphilis it’s nothing to worry about. So she started playing and holding her all to the skeptical eye of the ladies. She was sharing with me that loving this child outweighs any risk of syphilis or anything else that the baby could have. So I’m sure that when Katy is around this little girl feels like a real princess!

Now every story about a princess needs a “bad guy” so this blog is no exception.

May I present REAL snake oil? This was taken at my local pharmacy. Could you imagine a CVS or Walgreens selling this?

Yum.

Next update should be about my English corner!

Lup

This last time I was on the plane there was a lady sitting next to me and her daughter. Slightly after the cabin crew informed us that we were about to land the little girl tells her mother that she has to go to the bathroom. Number 2 no less. And without any type of adverse reaction or even asking her if she could possibly wait, Mom whips out of her bag a plastic grocery bag and has her daughter come over to squat in front of her. Luckily we really were landing soon and I was able to get off the plane without having to really know all that went on over there. Thank goodness I was in the aisle seat. Oh China.

Lup

May I present the propane delivery guy. He is often strapped down with at least 4 tanks of propane and protected by a hardhat. I could understand trusting your own driving skills but when you live in China you never know what the other cars are going to do thats a crazy risk! What happens if you wipe out and tanks are opened and sparks are flying? Boom?

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I know a few posts back I posted about a little orphan with six toes on one foot, but I just wanted to write a little more about her. Xiao Yi (shh -oww then “e” like the letter name) and I have a really fun relationship.

Our relationship started simply because she was one of the few kids who’s name I could actually remember! I suck at remember names in English but names in Chinese are like a hundred times harder to remember! So it was cool that her name was “Little Yi”. Simple. So because I could call her name it meant that I could be anywhere in the orphanage and call her and she would come.

Now when I call her name this huge smile comes across her face and it just makes me so happy! We play chase and she loves to be throw into the air (and of course being caught). She is definitely one of the highlights about going to the orphanage.

The other week I got to hold a not even one month old baby! So precious. These babies are so sweet and your heart just wants to adopt them all!

So what happens when you’re counting fingers and then decide that having one less finger might mean that you don’t have to spend so much time counting them?

Last week I had quite an interesting day. My roommate Rachel (my twin) and I decided to go home for lunch. We had a rather nice lunch and realized that we still had some time before we needed to head out, so we decided to do a bit of cleaning. Above our stove we have one of those fan things that suck up the greasy steam smoke that comes when you’re cooking (Chinese cooking involves pan frying or using a wok to cook everything so there’s a lot of smoke grease stuff). So this thing has these panel things to catch the grease and they were getting kinda gross so we decided to take them out and clean them. All was going great we were able to remove the panels, open them and start the cleaning process. Because they were so greasy I figured soaking them in hot soapy water would help the process along. As I’m flipping over one of the panels it starts to slip. Apparently in China it’s a good idea to make these things sharp so as its slipping I try to catch it. It’s about as smart as catching a knife. So slice. Oww. So I quickly grab my finger to help stop the bleeding. I am trying to tell Rachel what I need and I start to get dizzy. So I tell her I think I need to sit down for a second. I go to the kitchen table and ask for some water. But then that whole weird can’t hear, light head, pale face feeling is all around me. Rachel says that she turns around to get some more water and when she turns to give it to me I’m starting to slump out of the chair passed out! I hear someone calling my name waking me up from some weird dream. I immediately think that I’ve overslept for work and start to wonder why my alarm didn’t wake me up! Then I open my eyes to find her panicked face in my face and her hand holding my finger with a bunch a blood in her hand! It all comes back to me what’s going on and I ask how long I was out and she says just a few seconds. Yikes! So then I’m all nauseous and have a headache from all of the adrenaline that was running through my body. I get rid of my lunch and finally start to feel a little better. Luckily my mom had sent over a huge supply of band aids in one package and this last time I brought back Gorilla Tape (like Duct tape but better). I band-aid-ed my finger then covered it with tape to get the compression effect. Painful but so necessary (especially if I wanted to avoid going to a Chinese hospital for stitches!). By the early evening I was basically back to normal. But what a ride. It’s always an adventure here!

Lup

Also for anyone who wants to know why the “Asian squat” was invented. Who would want to sit on that chair next?

Maybe not quite as dangerous as the baby on the car, but maybe it’s a prodigy baby! Go Baby Go!

But a situation here has really brought this whole thing into perspective.

Imagine this:

Growing up no one really cared if you went to school or not. Maybe you even quit school early so that your parents wouldn’t have to pay school fees for both you and your younger sister. Your parents never went to school so they can’t teach you much, nor are they really interested in teaching you whatever they know. They don’t see school things as life skills and therefore you’ve never really had any opportunity to learn to read or write. Even when it comes to writing your own name you don’t even know where to start.

Fast forward to a point when you’re ready to start a new job. It’s in a bakery and your job is to operate the giant ovens. Your job is to properly bake the breads and cakes at the right temperature and for the right amount of time. You quickly realize that you’ve never seen this many different types of breads, cookies, cakes and things before. Before, this bread was just bread and cakes were just cakes. There were no fancy names to them! But now each bread item has its’ own rules and its’ own name! How on earth are you going to be able to keep all of them straight? You go to grab a paper to start writing down the instructions but how! You don’t know how to write words and too many of the breads are too similar to be able draw pictures! There’s a list on the wall that tells you exactly how to prepare all the different breads but it’s all unreadable to you.

I couldn’t imagine how hard this could be!

Just stop and think about how much you actually use your ability to read and write! From making a shopping list to reading a street sign to reading my blog! Reading really is everywhere!

Just think about how limited your job options really become when you can’t read or write. But illiteracy really is something that can be fixed. Its a cycle that can be broken.

So go out and read a book, the news, write an email to a friend. Enjoy the blessings of literacy. Because if you couldn’t read, then this picture wouldn’t have anything funny in it!

Lup

Doug I’m know after seeing this you NEED one for the crv. Who else needs one? Robert I haven’t seen the Malibu version yet, but I’ll let you know when I do!

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Chef LupLup at her finest! A typical meal especially when I’m the one cooking. Eggs and tomatoes and then a tofu dish in brown sauce and of course a bowl of rice!

Here in WenShan the rice noodles are amazing and amazingly cheap! This rather large bowl (which includes meat, mushrooms, cabbage, and some other veggies) is six Chinese dollars or less than one US dollar! It’s usually pretty tough to finish the whole bowl without feeling stuffed to the brim. It’s made fresh right in front of you and makes it pretty hard to want to cook at home when you know that this is an alternate option!

Here are some dishes from when I was in TianJin. They include things like bamboo shoots, white turnips, and black fungus. In TianJin every dish was a little sweet. Every area in China tends to have a little bit different flavor. Kind of like how in the south everything has a fried butter flavor or everything at my cousin’s house has a bacon flavor. In Kunming or WenShan things are usually salty or spicy and sometimes sour.

Snacks here are also different. Kids are often seen snacking on chewy spicy oily tofu sticks. In TianJin I was given this honey sugar substance on a stick. It was um….. sweet and very sticky. You are given two sticks so that you can spin it and help to prevent it from slowly dropping down.

Well if none of those are appealing to you I guess you can always go with the other option….

Throw your pig in the river.

I’ll try to throw in more food photos in the future!

Lup