Random Events in No Particular Order

I realized that I have a lot of random photos of little events that have taken place during my time here. So I lumped them all together to make one blog and here it is.

First, dumpling making. A few weekends ago the ninth grade teachers were stuck at school on a Saturday for some unknown reason and had to teach. So along with some of the teachers we made dumplings for lunch at my apartment. We made about 250 dumplings to serve 7 people. It was very fun but I didn't learn how to make the filling so we will have to do it again in order to make them when I get home.

For New Year's Eve each class had a party. These are pictures from that night. Students gave speeches, read poem, sang songs, played instruments and more. They had oranges, apples, peanuts, and sunflower seeds to eat. Each of the classrooms was decorated with balloons, streamers, and posters. I went to most of the classrooms and had to sing a song for most of them (this was not enjoyable or fun!). I hate singing!!

Our new cafeteria. We finally got to move out of the small, dirty old cafeteria into our brand new, but still dirty, cafeteria. It has two floors, only one of which we are using now. It was painted a lovely shade of orange/red which makes it the most colorful thing around for miles.

Inside the cafeteria.

This is were we line up to get served our food.

This is were we wash our dishes after we are done eating.

Here are a few pictures from Christmas Eve. We had to teach that day so we wore our Santa hats which we bought in Hanzhong.

This is our FAO and his daughter

To celebrate our teachers took us out to dinner and KTV/Karaoke. These were the ladies working that night. They were wearing Santa hats too so we took a picture with them.

This is the travelling market which came to town for a couple of weeks. One part was shopping and the other was an amusement park of sorts. The shopping part was okay, mostly the same stuff over and over again. The amusement park on the other hand was quite a sight.

It had some of the usual carnival games: shoot the balloons, throw the ball into the bottles, etc.

The real entertainment of the park was a choice between a dance/music show or a motorcycle circle of doom thing. We choose the circle of doom thing. A couple of guys rode motorcycles and cars around this wooden circle. It was interesting.

I thought it was hilarious and the wobbly standing area about three stories up added to the fun. Michelle on the other hand did not enjoy this and promptly left the tent.

There was also a petting zoo of sorts. We found what we believe to be the only turkey in China. It was around Thanksgiving so we were very excited. They also had foxes, an ostrich, and lots of snakes.

This is the cute little monkey that was outside.

The shopping area did have one very interesting thing. I found the Chinese Dollar Store or in this case the Yuan Store. Similar to ours it was full of junk.

These are pictures from my birthday.This ridiculous hat came with my cake and so I had to wear it.

The cake we had was actually pretty good. Lots of frosting.

These are the flowers I got.

So there are my odds 'n' ends stories.

Chinese Weddings

Since being in China I have had the fortunate opportunity to attend two weddings. First, the wedding of one of the 9th grade English teachers, who is also my Chinese teacher, to one of the P.E. teachers at my school. The second was of another teacher at the school. I have no pictures from the second wedding but it was very similar to the first.



The wedding took place on a Friday, the second was on a Monday, so there is no set or regular day on which weddings are held. The date of the wedding is more important than the day. Chinese couples usually go to some shaman/witch doctor/fortune teller who tells them what day will be lucky/good for them to get married on.



The school rented a bus so take all of the teachers to the wedding. So at 8 am we piled in and started on our way.





Our first stop was at the bride's parents house. They served a ton of food and liquor. People just kept walking in and sitting down to eat.

We left the house following the bride and groom. The first car in the line set off firecrackers out of the trunk which was followed by the bride and groom's car.

We arrived at a restaurant in the home town of the groom. Prior to bride and groom's entrance they set off 2 minutes worth of firecrackers. The bride and groom entered, walking down the center of the tables and were sprayed with silly string and covered with confetti.

I don't think the bride was very happy to be covered in shit as she walked to the front of the room but it's what they do. The officiator of the ceremony was a friend of the family. There is no religious part of the ceremony. The symbol on the wall behind them is of double happiness.

They do repeat some kind of vows, present rings, and the officiator asks them questions.

The give each other wine to drink.

This was the weirdest part. When you would normal just kiss the bride they always seem to hesitate. I don't know if it's some kind of power struggle thing or what. So to bait them into kissing they dangle something, maybe candy, on a string in between them until they kiss.

The parents of the groom come up and the bride offers them wine to drink so that them will welcome her into their family. The parents sometimes are dressed up to look very funny. This day they were only made to put thick blush on their cheeks and forehead. After giving them wine the parents present the bride with envelopes with money in them.

The bride is accepted into the groom's family.

After the ceremony is over they walk out, change their clothes, and everyone starts eating/drinking. I, of course, was asked to give a toast at the wedding. So I stood up in front of a room filled with people and gave a toast, in English, which was translated to the guest. Hilarious and very easy but very it is very impressive to have a foreigner at your wedding. After we ate and drank ourselves silly we piled back on the bus and returned to the school.

A very enlightening experience.