A long weekend

At the Science Museum on Saturday.
I'm being tortured on a bed of nails. Below on the left the young girl who was with us at the science museum making herself disappear.

The crowd the day we were at Ancient Culture Street.

All the teapots in China
A man making a stamp.

A sculptor working on Yao Ming.

A man making a painted scroll for us. Linda snacking and watching.

Friday was a holiday so we took advantage of the long weekend to schedule several activities and added a few more along the way and that has kept us pretty busy this weekend. Friday we went to a place called Ancient Culture Street. It is a walking street that has stores of things that supposedly have something to do with the ancient culture of Tianjin and China in general. Many stores do have things that are very interesting; stones that can be made into stamps, many art stores with brushes and paints and inks, clothing, embroidery, kites, paintings, vases, clay figurines. Just a lot of stuff. I spent quite a bit of time taking pictures and wandering around. This place was a great place to bring visitors. This is the place we will buy some gifts to bring back when we visit. The prices are extremely low and the merchandise is good quality. They have silk scarves for $5, hand painted while you watch names on a scroll for about $3, jewelry, some clothing, hand dyed cloth, some traditional dresses and jackets. The area is clean and fairly new and about 3-4 blocks long. The layout reminds me somewhat of Branson Landing. Friday afternoon I met with a man who I met several times at English Corner. We talked about life after death almost immediately. The holiday on Friday was Tomb Sweepers Day. Traditionally a day to visit the tombs of dead ancestors and burn fake money in the hope of giving them some resources to spend in the afterlife, or maybe buying them some slack from the Gods in the next world. So this gentleman wanted to know what I thought about life after death. It seems amazing to me that even someone in their 50s might think that my answers would reflect the thoughts and feelings of all Americans. I can see several of you cringing in your chairs when you read that. So we chatted about religion for awhile, what I believe, what he believes, what others believe. It was an interesting conversation. It turns out that his family has been in Tianjin for several generations. So he knows the town very well. He also offered to help us find used bikes so we can begin to ride around town soon. He thought we might be able to find something for 100RMB which is very reasonable. We'll see what happens today. These friends of ours that are leaving in June offered us their bikes then so we have to see what they are like and if we want to wait another 2 or 3 months to get bikes.

Saturday we went to the Museum of Science and Technology with a Chinese family, husband and wife and 11 year old daughter who live above us and with Monkey. It is a museum with lots of hands on things for people to do. We spent the morning going through 3 floors of exhibits. Some were old and no longer working, the museum was built in the early 90s and doesn't look like it has been updated since it was built and many of the exhibits show their age. Everyone made the best of it. We also watched a movie about Alaska which must be at least 30 years old. The film is fading. It is projected onto the ceiling of this domed structure at the top of the museum which gives a 180 degree domed view. Sometimes it is interesting, sometimes there is almost a sense of vertigo. After the film we stayed at the museum a little longer, then went back and took Monkey out to lunch. As soon as we walked back in the door John and Priscilla from the 3rd floor of our building called to see if we wanted to go for a walk. We had a nice walk with them. They showed us some little stores around that are useful for buying a few things. One thing we found was dried tofu. We bought some, reconstituted it in some broth and had a curry dish for dinner Sunday evening. It tastes just like chicken (ha, ha). Ha, ha.

I wanted to tell you about all the ways tofu is available. The dried kind that James mentioned. It is about 12 inches long and about 1/2 inch wide and thin with several strips in a package. It also comes with the liquid like we are used to and in 2 inch squares about 1/4 inch thick, firm and brown on the outside. This also comes thicker. Some of these are marinated in various things which I don't like. You can get strips of it about 4 inches wide and flat and little puffs of it and I think even noodles. They sell fresh warm soymilk. I haven't tried that yet but it is supposed to be good. I will miss this variety plus it is so much easier to use in stir frys because you don't have to drain it and press it to dry. It is already done. It is called dofe and took me awhile to learn the right pronounciation so I could actually get to it in a store. It is actually cheaper in the market and probably fresher so I buy it there now.

We are feeling like we are getting kind of boring over here. We will work on doing something exciting to share. I am thinking these things happen daily but we are getting so accustomed to the life that we don't notice anymore.

I was asked by a student from English corner to speak for a few minutes before an English film was shown to a large group of students. It was "Leon", haven't heard of it. She said you don't have to know about the movie, just tell who you are and what you do and why you came to China and about anything else you want to talk about. It was a class assignment for her to ask a foreign teacher to do this and also she told the students I would be there to get more of them to come. We get to be celebs for awhile until after we talk and they figure out that we are just like them! I told them about when Jim and I watch movies we eat a huge bowl of popcorn. This is NOT a custom in China as you already probably know. They laughed anyway.

We met a man who works in Yellowknife, NWT Canada. He is here visiting friends and has agreed to talk to some of the nursing students here about the nursing shortage and how they are dealing with it by using nurses from the Philipines. It is very hard to get anyone to work there so the benefits are good. He and his wife worked 4 years taking 80% of their salary per year and the 5th year they get paid the 80% they did not take and are taking the year off. They are traveling around the world. They have been to India and now China and will go to Japan and Australia. They spent about 4 months staying with friends in BC because to be close to their daughter who is in her first year in college there. It is such a switch from the life I have lived working an 8 hr day, 40 hour week etc. I guess living in China is a bit different too, eh? He is a nurse and really loves it and has recently become more active as an advocate for nurses. He said he is willing to sponsor a nurse to come there to work. I am looking forward to his talk on Wednesday.

Sunday at English corner it rained the hardest I have experienced in China - for about 2 minutes. There was also a crack of thunder that rivalled any I have heard in the States. The rain was over pretty quickly. The crowd at English corner thinned considerably when it started to rain hard. The rest of us took shelter under an eave of one of the college campus buildings.