Happy Chinese Valentine's Day

Today, I finished my last class for my TEFL certification in Beijing. I've loved being in Beijing. I learned so much in classes, and had some fun cultural experiences on my days off. I have one more day in Beijing, and then I'll take a train ride and be in Zhengzhou by Saturday night! I'll have about a week before classes start.

In honor of our last day of class, some friends and I went out for dinner.

Want to know where we went for Chinese Valentine's Day?

Here:

Yep, The Modern Toilet. It is inside what we like the call the Three Canned Hams:

In the modern toilet, everything is decorated like a bathroom. The seats at most tables are toilets with a cushion on top. Dishes come out in plates and bowls shaped like toilets or bathtubs or sinks. The drinks come in cups shaped like urinals. It's crazy. I split an order of spaghetti with my friend Andrea and had a coke, and my whole meal was less than $4 US! It was a fun experience. Here are some more photos:

Michelle, Sunny, and Erika in the entrance of the restaurant.

The group!

Haha!!! Since we were a big group, they didn't set us at one of the tables with toilets. But, we took pictures with one anyway. If you can see, they are sitting on toilets. In the middle of the table are sinks with fake 'poo' in the middle. Kind of gross, but whimsical.

Our drinks were in 'urinals'

Sunny with a sink for a plate (and smiling 'poo' on the wall behind her

My spaghetti came in a bathtub. :)

Non-Twin Twins at the Great Wall

I need to introduce all of you to Erika:

She is on my team in Zhengzhou, and has been with me at orientation. She is great, and we are getting along very well. She is from the beautiful state of North Dakota I'm very thankful that we'll be in the same city this year. We have been dubbed the "non-twin twins" by one of her friends. We have many things in common, and I know it was the Father's grace to put us together. We've both lost our moms to cancer. And, our dads got remarried within one week of each other this summer. We both love reading and writing. We're both ambiverts (both introverted and extroverted).

Erika and I decided to make videos every once in a while, and we made our first one today. Warning: it is very silly. Also, the video at the beginning is a little blurry, due to camera problems. Without further ado, here is the first installment of the Non-Twin Twins in China:

Great Wall

We had a break from classes and climbed the Great Wall, and then had a picnic at the top! The end was amazing. The getting there was hard, harder physically than most challenges I have had in my life. Imagine 5 miles of stairs and inclines and declines, and more stairs, and more stairs, and even more stairs. I hope to write more in my coming newsletter about the climb, and the lessons I learned along the way. For now, here are some pictures from the journey:

With friends in the lobby before we left. See how pretty we all look? We did not look this pretty after. :)

With friends before we started

More friends with our entrance tickets!

On a cable car

At the beginning. Hair is still down. Reppin' Texas Tech!

With my lovely friend and encourager, Emily. I wouldn't have made it to the top without her.

On the way.

Getting close. Going step by step.

Just a little more to go!!!!!

After finishing the challenge. I'm finally at the top, at the highest point tourists can go.

After all of that climbing, I was thrilled to take an Alpine Shoot down the Mountain. It was SO MUCH FUN!

The Amazing Race Beijing

After two and a half days of traveling, I arrived in the infinitely interesting city of Beijing. The skies were cloudy, the weather cool. I boarded a bus from the airport and watched this new city go by on the way to the hotel. It is a fascinating place. East meets West.

The first night, we were served an absolutely delicious meal in the restaurant of our hotel. Real Chinese food is amazing, and I mean AMAZING! My favorites so far: walnut chicken, three treasures, spicy green beans, eggplant, and dumplings. I hope I can learn to make these dishes.

Fast forward to day two. We were assigned a group and two Chinese University student guides to go around the city of Beijing on a scavenger hunt-type excursion. We had a big list of things to see and take pictures of. My group chose to go to the Houhai neighborhood of Beijing which has the Drum and Bell Towers and the Hutong Alleys.

Here were the tasks we were given:

1. Observe Traffic Patterns

This is a street near my hotel. Traffic in Beijing is fairly orderly, although buses can do whatever they want and get away with it.

2. Observe fashion

The women in Beijing are always dressed to the hilt, and so are the dogs!

3. Buy a transportation card

We went to the subway station to buy a transportation card. These are amazing. You can use them to ride the bus, ride the subway, and make public phone calls. They are the only card you need to make it around the city.

4. Buy the "most different" potato chip flavor you see.

We got the pecan flavored chips. These were just like sun chips, and were actually quite good.

5. Visit a Chinese Tea Shop. What is the most expensive tea?

We found a beautiful Chinese Tea Shop. The most expensive pot of tea was about 900RMB (about $150) And, no, we did NOT buy it. :)

6. Join a game of chess or hackey-sack with the locals. We did BOTH!

I actually didn't "join-in" per se, because I had no idea how to play.

I tried to hit the hackey-sack, but was unsuccessful. Here is my friend Edwina playing.

7. Visit the Drum and Bell Towers

It was too expensive to go inside, but the towers were pretty neat from the outside too

 Some bonus pictures:

At dinner the first night. The food was delicious!

With my Chinese student guides, Rachel and Katherine

Eating mango ice cream by the lake

Beautiful lake near the Drum and Bell towers

Starbucks! I didn't order anything though. Don't you wish Starbucks looked like this in Lubbock? How cool would that be!