Pictures!

Are you ready for some pictures?!? I hope that you are. Here are just a few of the pictures thus far of my adventures in China.

Today, David and I spend the day with Sarah at school It was very cool and interesting to see her school during school hours and to see how an American school in China works. Her third graders are all so cute! They were all excited that today was the last day of school and that they could now go on a summer vacation. The school is a mix of Japanese, Korean, Tawianese, Malasian, and American (yes, American) children. Talk about cultural diversity in the classroom! :)

Tonight we're going to the Bund, which is right on the river. Here you'll find the Pearl Tower, on of the world's largest TV towers. Then we're going to do some shopping in a famous Chinese shopping district...Nanjing (spelling?) Road. I'm excited! :) Can't wait to see what there is and to get some hopefully good deals on some real authentic Chinese goods!

We are leaving Sunday night for Beijing via a night train. Trying to purchase our train tickets was an interesting experience. Before we left school, Sarah had someone write in Chinese what we all wanted, hower, the person who was selling train tickets really didn't understand what we wanted. Thankfully, China has this phone number that you can call and have someone translate for you. So, I think that we'll be spending a lot of time calling this number in order to get anywhere! This will be my first time traveling first class. According to the western locals, first class is the best way to travel in China...you get less people staring at you. Speaking of staring, I had a lady today at the mall walk past me and just stare the entire time. Talk about slightly unnerving! I'm slowly getting accustom to people staring at me because of my white skin and brown hair. There are a lot of other white and black westerners here. I really wasn't expecting to see so many westerners and to hear them all speak English and either be from the States or Canada.

Another thing that has really suprised me to see in China, and I don't know why I wasn't expecting this, was the amount of western resturants. Within a few blocks of Sarah's apt you can find a Starbucks, KFC, Dairy Queen, Papa John's, Pizza Hut, and a McDonald's. Talk about being able to eat American food while away from home. The movie theatres here all have western movies from Hollywood. I even saw a movie poster for C.S. Lewis's "Prince Caspian." I took a pictures because I couldn't believe my eyes! I wasn't expecting China to allow a "Christian" movie into the country.

Pizza Hut

27 Dresses and Prince Caspian

Luggage update

Good news everyone! My luggage has safely arrived in China and is in my possession! :) How exciting is that! :) Our luggage was suppose to arrive at 1 am local time, however the driver had the hardest time finding the school, so after numerous taxi cab rides later, he finally showed up at 3 am and wouldn't let the school security guard sign for it after we asked the guard to and after we had told the airport that it really was okay for him to sign for the luggage. Oh well...its back in my hands and that is all that really matters.
Today is Sarah's last day of school and it is a half day. David and I are going with her to check it out and to watch the school's graduation ceremony. Not really sure what we're going to do this afternoon, but I'm sure that we'll figure something out.
Hopefully tonight I'll be posting some pictures of our adventures thus far in Shanghai.

China Day 2

Well, I'm almost adjusted to Chinese time! :) Today Sarah had her last full day of school, so David and I bummed around Shanghai. We tried to eat breakfast at KFC, but it didn't turn out so hot, so we ended up going to Starbucks across the hallway and eatting there. We did quite a bit of shopping...there are lots of interesting clothing stores and options here. We found a Pepis clothing and shoe store. It was kinda tempting to buy a pair of shoes that I knew no one in the States had.
We did the Metro on our own, thankfully there is an English translation in the Metro, so we were able to find things relativly easy. While we were in downtown some locals wanted to try out their English skills on us, and we were kind enough to let them...seeing how we needed directions from them. Toured the Shanghai Museum. If you know me, you know how much I love them. They had a special exhibit in from the London British Museum on the Greek Olympics. It was amazing to see some of the statues and pottery pieces that I've seen in textbooks up close and in person. Unfortunatly this was the only section of the entire museum that we weren't allowed to take pictures in. They had a lot of security guards in place making sure that people didn't take pictures. There were many cool and interesting exhibits also that I have pictures of. We ran into a few other Americans at the museum and it was interesting to hear where they've all been and what they recomind seeing.
David and I also did a local tea ceremony, it was very interesting. It was definately a once in a life time experience. But, I don't think that I'll repeat it anytime soon. Once is definately more than enough. Some of the teas were really good, and some weren't so hot.
We arrived back at Sarah's apt under the impression/hope that our luggage would be with her. I thankfully had a copy of her school address and her Chinese telephone number for our claim with lost luggage. Well...when we arrived back at Sarah's apt complex she's sitting outside with no luggage. :( Not good.
So, what do we do now? Well, being the typical hot-headed American that I am, we called up Pudong Airport and asked why our luggage hadn't arrived. They claimed that Vancouver never sent it over! Silly airport! So, we went shopping since we can't wear the same outfit two days in a row we went shopping! :) This is fun, but not when you need to buy a lot of clothes. As we're getting ready to leave the second store (there are no Targets, Wal-Marts etc. in China), Sarah recieves a phone call from the airport saying our luggage made the evening flight (which we were told yesterday there is no evening flight...but there is!). So, our luggage will hopefully arrive at school early in the morning. So, we get to experience our first Chinese taxi cab experience, and from what I've been told, it is an experience I won't soon forget! So, keep your fingers crossed that our luggae arrives at school!

China -- Day 1 -- I'm still alive! :)

Well, we made it safely to Shanghai in for the most part in one piece. Yesterday morning started out for me at about 4 am with about 2 hours of sleep. We arrived in Shanghai at about midnight PST...and it is now 11 pm on Wednesday. I am totally feeling the jet lag! Our luggage didn't make it, but we knew about that in Seattle when we had a bunch of stuff going wrong with our tickets...totally not cool! So, hopefully our luggage is safely in Vancouver, B.C., and will board the next flight to Shanghai and will be delivered to Sarah's school in the afternoon. I'm really glad that I had Sarah's school address and her Chinese phone number for our lost luggage claim!
China so far is going well. Not really sure what we're going to do tomorrow...hopefully just take it nice and easy! :)
Have a great day, and pictures and more information when the luggage arrives!

Denise

"For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angles nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord."Romans 9:38-39

It's a girls night out!

On Saturday and Sunday I was in Salem for about 24 hours to meet up with some friends from college. It was wonderful to see Nikki, Sarah, & Neil (photographer of this picture). I was starting to get a little "Dordt-sick," so seeing them helped a lot! :) Only 5.5 days left of school! Yikes!