Where's my cake batter?

China has many things. It has 1.375 billion people. Obviously, it needs options.

You can get KFC, Papa John's*, McDonalds, Subway*, Cold Stone Creamery*, Dairy Queen, and Starbucks to name a few. (*indicates places I have eaten at) This at first glance might seem amazing. When we lived in Mussoorie, KFC became our escape from the mountain and quality controlled french fry indulgence. It also eventually became the enemy.

When India got Starbucks, I was thrilled! The Indian comparison was Cafe Coffee Day, and it was disappointing on multiple levels: food, seating, drink quality, and service. When Starbucks showed up, the game changed. You could not find a cozy place to sit, a frappuccino, and some New York style Cheesecake. The Chinese Starbucks is sooo expensive, I have not justified a visit yet. It's about $6 for a drink. I'll pass. And there's no pumpkin anything there? What's the point?!

Imagine my delight when I discovered Cold Stone in a mall here. I was like, come on Anwer, this will change your life! Prices were a bit high, but I was convinced. Then disappoint came. No cake batter ice cream? Ok, we'll try something else. Then they served it up with half the energy and force that I expect from a Cold Stone employee. Our mix was hardly blended at all! And then I got this shovel for my ice cream.

Another lesson learned. It's not the same. You can't recreate your feelings and emotions that you have when you stop at Cold Stone on State Street during the sunny warm days in Madison where you hope that the worker will accidentally take too much ice cream, and they will have to give you the next size up. Dream over.

Another thing: China loves to copy stuff. There are probably over 100 "Apple" stores in the city that claim to be authorized. False. A couple days ago, Grace and I decided to make an adventure and go find the fake IKEA. The real IKEA is about 1 hour away and requires either a train or a taxi that has to drop you at the territory border, and you have to get in a new taxi, or something crazy like that. My first visit to the real one was arranged by the school, and I rode a coach bus to get there and got dropped to my front door. The fake IKEA was just a $2 taxi ride.

The fake IKEA was everything I dreamed and more. I regret not taking more photos of the inside, but I can assure you that Grace repeatedly said, "Oh my god. This is the same as the IKEA store. I've seen this pattern." Yes, it's all the same. Except, there were only about 4 other shoppers in whole store. Have you ever been to an IKEA where there wasn't an enormous migrant herd shuffling through with carts colliding? I haven't. There were a few things where fake IKEA slipped. Some of the signs had a totally different font or products were of a lower quality. The options were a bit more limited, but it was so nice and easy. Until we tried to leave and get a taxi. Not a big deal. We only had to stand on the corner of a busy intersection with big blue bags for about 20 minutes before we found a taxi to take us home.

We're headed to Beijing tomorrow. Remember it's a Chinese National Holiday, and there are going to be approximately 1 billion people traveling. Yes, this is a terrible idea. It will be our first bullet train experience, and we're going to see our dear neighbors from Mussoorie! Stay posted for a blog about Beijing: city of 19 million gets 100 million visitors!

Just because you can hold a pair of scissors doesn't mean you should cut hair.

I am very happy to be reporting my desk in my apartment on this Monday morning because I'm on HOLIDAY! We have a week off of school due to the Chinese National Holiday. Also called: Golden Week.

"Three days of paid holiday are given, and the surrounding weekends are re-arranged so that workers in Chinese companies always have seven continuous days of holiday. These national holidays were first started by the government for the PRC's National Day in 1999 and are primarily intended to help expand the domestic tourism market and improve the national standard of living, as well as allowing people to make long-distance family visits. The Golden Weeks are consequently periods of greatly heightened travel activity." Wikipedia

So what does this mean? In short, don't go running on Sunday morning. I knew there was a holiday, and I knew Anwer had his Chinese classes on Sunday. Knowing these things, I still neglected the thought that other people might also be working. I wasn't. I headed out on my Sunday morning run and mistakenly decided to go a new direction to help find some new things. Terrible idea. I ended up running into the hoards of people who were in fact still working or heading to work. 

Then I went and got my hair done at a foreigner-approved hair salon. I had previously heard of the salon from other people at school. It also had some publicity on the Suzhou Expat Facebook group. I felt further assured when four other foreigners showed up in the salon while I was there. Why do I need so much foreigner assurance?? Well, I've experienced plenty of bad and mediocre hair cuts in India to know that you can't just trust anyone with scissors. I can remember vividly a traumatic experience in New Delhi where I felt like crying. Once a person screws up your hair, how do you tell them they suck but ensure they don't do further damage? It's a fine line.

I certainly didn't want to end up in some place where no one spoke English, and they never learned the colors and thought brown meant pink. Nope. Nobody wants that. 
        

Before

After

Camp 2014: It's raining 7th graders.

Similarly to WS, SSIS has a sort of activity week in which the students head outside of the classroom and presumably into the wild. WS definitely had an advantage here because we lived in the wild. It was an adventure just walking to school. Monkeys, torrential rains, rabid dogs, and steep, slippery slopes kept you alert at all times.

Here at SSIS, my students are hauled in by buses or driven in cars from various locations and walk on paved streets to get to school. EASY! Our "camp" was similar in nature. It was three days, two nights about an hour from school. We were sleeping in tents, but the rest of our time was quite far from a camp scenario. Even more ironically, due to the continuous rain and shabby tents, several students slept inside on the second night. We went to a marina and slept on the lawn. All other activities were very summer campy and team building themed.

I had a ton of fun hanging out with the seventh graders. They are funny people! They are high maintenance at times but know how to have a good time.

Oreo on your face-->get it in your mouth! No hands!

Classic.

There was a fashion show.

And then the boys tried to do this...

...while the girls did this

Dragon Boating

And now, one more week of school, and then a week holiday! We're headed to Beijing to visit our neighbors from Woodstock! 

Moon Festival

Happy Moon Festival!

The Moon Festival of Mid-Autumn Festival is the celebration of the end of the harvest.

"The Mid-Autumn Festival is an official harvest festival celebrated by Chinese, Taiwanese and Vietnamese peoples.^[1][2] The festival is held on the 15th day of the eighth month in the Chinese calendar and Vietnamese calendar, during a full moon, which is in September or early October in the Gregorian calendar, within 15 days of the autumnal equinox.^[1] The holiday coincides with the Korean holidayChuseok and Japanese holiday Tsukimi." (said Wikipedia)

What does this mean? No School! Fireworks and firecrackers! Moon cakes! Tons of people shopping! 

Unfortunately, I think I am welcoming another sinus infection and did not officially celebrate or go out today. Yesterday, we joined some friends and went to Panmen Gate. It is one of the oldest parts of the city. Without a guide, we could only guess which parts were old and which were added for our enjoyment.

Small example of the love and kindness the Chinese people have shown us.

Photo: MAK

Bought this for the cow. The dessert was mediocre.

Fed the fish...

This is what happened next.