Where's the salt n pepper?

Notice anything missing in the picture?  No salt or pepper!

How long have we been here?! 

Not that we haven't noticed, or missed.....it's just funny that unless you are at a truly Western restaurant, tables are bare - expect for chopsticks of course ;)

And the two cups, hot water.  The Chinese LOVE their hot water!  No thanks.

Meiguorens hen pang le!

In mandarin class this week, we were learning new words associated with 'enough' and 'not enough'.

To our 'surprise/shock' (but then not really) the below slide appeared:

First, it was the American women eating a Big Mac.

The sentence translates to:  It's too small, not enough.

But then when a second Big Mac appears, the sentence translates to:  Now enough.

We busted out laughing saying the fat, American stereotype is definitely true when abroad!

Our sweet, sweet teacher didn't fully understand and stated, "yes, she is fat!"

We tried to explain we don't really say that about someone directly but she continued to say yes, American's fat.  Just shocked that this was actually in a deck for a class!  Oh China....

Week 47 in Pics

 

 

"Bange jirou" (half a chicken)

We ate lunch today at "Grandma's Kitchen" restaurant in the mall attached to our apartment building.  It's one of the few 'local' restaurants we will go to - doesn't smell weird, is very clean, and the food is actually pretty good!  Then come to find out it's not truly 'local' since the chain is from Hong Kong, close enough....

This was our third time eating there so we tried some new dishes, one of which was a 'bange jirou' or Grandma's Famous (half) chicken.  Lucky us we got the half with the head still attached!  Ack!

I made B cover it up every time it was exposed figured I'd rather look at the foot than the head and neck - just too gross for me.  As for B, he actually tried the chicken foot! 

 B feeding the bird some rice....

B knawin' on that chicken foot!  If you look close, you can see a toe under his finger!  Ahhh!

Empty Seats

Ever find yourself in a crowded restaurant with no available seats??

Well, here in China, if you need an empty seat, look for the white people!

Okay, this could really be foreigners in general, but we always feel like it's because we're white....

Chinese people will WAIT for another table to open up so they don't sit next to us!

Or the hostess will show them the open table next to us and they will point to another table wherever other available seats are located and go there.

It bothered us more when we moved here but now after a year, we appreciate the amount of elbow room and space around us while we enjoy a meal :)

 

Week 46 in Pics

Spring is in the air - Updates from Shanghai!

Spring is definitely in the air here in Shanghai.  With Spring comes nasty colds in China and I mean nasty.  B and I have been down for the count for a couple of weeks.  I stayed home from work for 3 days before going to the doctor because I just felt awful.  I saw an American doctor who told me I just have the virus that's going around but because he heard wheezing in my chest, I have to use an inhaler for a little while due to asthmatic symptoms, uh.  Thanks, Shanghai!

Updates have been slow here on the blog, many apologies!

I've been having issues with access to Blogger and being able to actually get on to update.  Not sure if maybe their server has been down or I just live in China and get what I get!  There's also been a rumor going around that some fiber optic internet line was dredged up out of the ocean and cut in half making internet access here even more difficult.  Not so sure about that one but everyone's talking about it and using it as an excuse.  I again say, we live in China.

My work schedule is steadily climbing and getting crazier by the week.  Sad part is, we aren't even at the known crazy part yet of opening new parks!  We are anticipated to being working 6 days a week this summer with 3 to 4 shifts!  Told ya, crazy!

Luckily that will be after we return from HOME LEAVE!  That's right!  We are headed back to US soil to both LA and ATL this July!  Hooray!  I'll work out of the office in Glendale the first week of July while getting in some doctor appointments and then we'll fly to ATL for one week before heading back to China.  Tickets are in our emails and we are ready!

In GREAT NEWS, B got a job here in Shanghai!  He is teaching swim lessons to expat kids.  From a mommy and babies class all the way up to 12 year olds.  An Australian lady B plays Majhong with owns the company and offered him the gig.  They will even end up flying him to Hong Kong or Beijing for official training (hoping I can tag along ;).  It's great!  Extra money and more purpose here in Shanghai.  We're both happy about it :)

Other random facts about life lately:

I got my hair cut for the second time here by Sky and am about 4 inches lighter!

We found a new chicken-n-waffles restaurant that's called Captain Rooster and it's really good!

I've got the travel bug and am beginning to plan trips - stay tuned for where we'll head!

Oh and, we moved!

That's a biggie - same apartment building but new apartment.

We had a smoker living next door to us and smoke would come in through our ventilation.  It was over a two month battle with the property, Disney, and our relocation company to come to an agreement about what to do.  Extreme stressful time!  But our new place is great, no smoke!

It's actually the same layout only mirrored.  Ask me how many things I've run into....uh.

But actually, the light switches are the worst because they are wired differently than the other apartment - we still can't figure them all out!  ;)



Be sure to browse backwards in the blog - there are some new posts hidden besides this update.
Even back to our honeymoon!