Hello. Today has been a good day. I wouldn't say stupendous, but it's been good. I'm writing today, not in my usual 'tell you about my day/week/trip/etc', but rather to share some things with you.
First, I have a video about the heart to share. I get an email from this website called 'The Daily Positive'. I found this fellow blogger thru instagram, and everyday he shares something positive/interesting. Some days the content isn't real attention grabbing, but today it was. It made me think, and made me smile. So please go watch.... The Human Heart (But come right back =] )
Are you back? What did you think? It was interesting, no? It really made me think. It's so easy to get wrapped up in the everyday, the things you wish were different. It takes work to notice the little things. To make every beat of your heart worth something. A heart beats more than 100 times a minute. Try to make them important.
Now, side step a bit. I'm not one to leave a good source unexplored, so I went see what else this YouTube channel, SoulPancake, had to offer. That's where I stumbled upon a video of people writing to their ten year old self. How interesting.... I guess I've heard of this concept before, but never really took notice. Now I did. Mostly because all of the experiences I've had since the age of ten.
(Here is that video too, Letter to my ten year old self)
It got me thinking about what I would say to my ten year old self. So, I thought I'd write a letter.
Hello Meg,
This is you... but 12 years from now. You are at the fabulous age of 10. What a great age. You just got a GameBoy Advance for your birthday, and MarioKart racing is pretty much the best thing ever.
I thought writing this letter might lead to a list of advice, or telling you what is going to happen in the future to prepare you. However, as I'm writing, I realize that you'll do just fine without my help. But if I can help in anyway, it will be to encourage you. Don't ever doubt yourself, don't you dare. You make decisions with your head and your heart, using your instincts, and often very quickly. Sometimes they don't work out just as planned, but sometimes they do. And boy, when they do, they are quite fabulous. Trust me. Also, hang on to your ambition and curiosity. They work real well together. Your curiosity will lead you on adventures, and your ambition will carry you through. Never be afraid of something because it is new, or because you think you can't. How will you know if you don't try. Nothing can ever hold you back except yourself. Luckily, we are not afraid of new things. I really love that about you and I. You haven't even imagined the adventures we go on, and the things we do. It might seem like a long ways off, but for me...it was just yesterday when I was you.
Be patient (we still aren't very good at that) and keep being amazing. I'll see you in about twelve years... It'll take you until then to guess where I'm writing this from. ;)
All my love, Meg
Until next time.
Tuesday, April 29, 2014
Sunday, April 20, 2014
Happy Easter
This posting will serve two purposes today. The first is to wish you all a Happy Easter!
The funny thing that is time zones, and rotating earth and all is that my Easter Sunday festivities are ended and I'm relaxing at home again. But all of you haven't even woken up for your sunday yet. Crazy.... Here we had an event for our friends on Saturday making eggs and crafts and telling the story of Easter. Then today (Sun.) we had breakfast at 9 followed by service at 10. We had 14 of us in attendance. It was good. =)
And.... He is Risen!
The second is to answer a question from one of my readers! A few posts prior to this I asked if you had any questions about China or my life over here. I got one response, and I'm gonna own up to my promise and answer it.
"How well are you able to communicate with the Chinese? Do most know a little English?"
Excellent question! I'm going to answer the last one first. Do most people know a little English? The answer is no. But I'm spoiled because I live on a college campus where many of the students are english majors or have a small grasp on english. However, out in town English is hard to find. There are a few people who know a word or two but many know nothing. Which brings us to the first question... How well do I communicate? It depends on the situation. In some cases there is a lot of pointing and gesturing. For example, when I first arrived in China and wanted to order food I would point to what I wanted. Then I learned the word 'jigga' which means 'this' or 'that.' So I point and say jigga. Now I can speak a bit of Chinese. Some of the Chinese words I know are egg, bacon, noodles, rice, potato, beef, fried bread, dumplings.... and that's just food.
I've found that listening to the language is getting easier, and I'm beginning to understand more and more... it's finding the right words to respond that is hard. I can usually figure out when someone is asking me where I'm from and what I do... And I can respond in Chinese with teacher, America, and if they ask I can say where I teach ... the Shimao kindergarten. I can say where I live and where the other team members live which comes in handy when I need to take a taxi.
Some other things I can say are hello, how are you?, is it good?, I love you, and a few other simple phrases... I mostly pick up words here and there as I need them. Like I learned 'lemonade' because I wanted to be able to order it... and I've learned the names of most of the fruits available here because I like to ask if something is what I think it is... Because the fruit doesn't always look like I think it should. Haha.
I think I'm spewing now... I hope that answered the question. Sometimes I think I don't know much, but then I'll realize that I spoke in Chinese just as much as in English for the day. If I didn't teach in English I would probably speak more Chinese in a day. And it is definitely a major triumph when I can communicate for something I need and don't need help. (But I have a chinese dictionary on my phone just in case).
Until next time. =)
The funny thing that is time zones, and rotating earth and all is that my Easter Sunday festivities are ended and I'm relaxing at home again. But all of you haven't even woken up for your sunday yet. Crazy.... Here we had an event for our friends on Saturday making eggs and crafts and telling the story of Easter. Then today (Sun.) we had breakfast at 9 followed by service at 10. We had 14 of us in attendance. It was good. =)
And.... He is Risen!
The second is to answer a question from one of my readers! A few posts prior to this I asked if you had any questions about China or my life over here. I got one response, and I'm gonna own up to my promise and answer it.
"How well are you able to communicate with the Chinese? Do most know a little English?"
Excellent question! I'm going to answer the last one first. Do most people know a little English? The answer is no. But I'm spoiled because I live on a college campus where many of the students are english majors or have a small grasp on english. However, out in town English is hard to find. There are a few people who know a word or two but many know nothing. Which brings us to the first question... How well do I communicate? It depends on the situation. In some cases there is a lot of pointing and gesturing. For example, when I first arrived in China and wanted to order food I would point to what I wanted. Then I learned the word 'jigga' which means 'this' or 'that.' So I point and say jigga. Now I can speak a bit of Chinese. Some of the Chinese words I know are egg, bacon, noodles, rice, potato, beef, fried bread, dumplings.... and that's just food.
I've found that listening to the language is getting easier, and I'm beginning to understand more and more... it's finding the right words to respond that is hard. I can usually figure out when someone is asking me where I'm from and what I do... And I can respond in Chinese with teacher, America, and if they ask I can say where I teach ... the Shimao kindergarten. I can say where I live and where the other team members live which comes in handy when I need to take a taxi.
Some other things I can say are hello, how are you?, is it good?, I love you, and a few other simple phrases... I mostly pick up words here and there as I need them. Like I learned 'lemonade' because I wanted to be able to order it... and I've learned the names of most of the fruits available here because I like to ask if something is what I think it is... Because the fruit doesn't always look like I think it should. Haha.
I think I'm spewing now... I hope that answered the question. Sometimes I think I don't know much, but then I'll realize that I spoke in Chinese just as much as in English for the day. If I didn't teach in English I would probably speak more Chinese in a day. And it is definitely a major triumph when I can communicate for something I need and don't need help. (But I have a chinese dictionary on my phone just in case).
Until next time. =)
Monday, April 7, 2014
a tomb sweeping we will go...
This last weekend was a national holiday, Tomb Sweeping festival. Don't ask, I don't really know. I've asked my two best Chinese friends, and they could only tell me that it was to honor the dead/ancestors.
But for me, and the rest of the country, it meant Monday off of school. (dance it out!) I went to Hangzhou with a few team members and two Chinese friends. We left on Friday afternoon, and upon arrival in HZ we promptly napped. Haha... It was a long week. That evening we went to two western restaurants, one for appetizers and one for dinner. Both excellent choices. Then, on Saturday morning we set off for the silk market. This is a whole street, and many of the side streets dedicated to silk, and products made of silk. Crazy! And so much to choose from! I was a little overwhelmed at first. But then I spotted a box of 10kuai scarves....SCORE!! (that's about $1.40) So, I bought two. One of them I am wearing now, and have been all weekend. The other might be for my mother.... maybe. =) I looked at lots of shops, considered many a scarf, debated a skirt or two, and finally made it to the end. I ended up leaving silk market with the four scarves, the two mentioned before, and one for each of my grandmothers. And then at the very end our group wandered into one last shop and I bought two lovely embroidered scenes. Very nice, and I love them. I'm all about art these days.
After the silk market we jumped across the street to an 'everything market'.... which is just as it sounds, it has everything in it. Nate was on a mission to find a belt, and the rest of us were just tagging along. But I ended up buy two pairs of boy shorts underwear. They are actually boy underwear, but they looked comfy and I wanted to try em. By the way, they are comfy and only cost me 20kuai or $3 for the two of them.
Following the everything market, we headed to pedestrian street, or 'huh-fung-lu' to see the little shops there. This road is like an American flea market mashed with fair ground food and has the occasional historical statue. The real downside was the amount of people because it was a holiday. It was a struggle to keep our group of 7 together. There was room to move, but traffic was crazy and it was only people! I made a purchase or two on pedestrian street. The best was a coffee mug (I know, I know, how can you have too many, right?) that I got just before we hit the crowd of the street. It's made of a rougher clay on the outside, and the inside is a smooth light blue ceramic that comes over the rim of the glass and appears to drip down the cup. It's a great mug. I also ended up buying a spiraled potato on a stick. I don't know how they do it, but this shop spiral cuts a whole potato and skewers it so its like a giant starch slinky. Then, they cook it (deep fry I think) and you can pick a flavor of seasoning. I got spicy with ketchup. It wasn't as amazing as my mind seemed to think it would be, but it was still pretty good.
By this point we've walked a ton, and taken a bus or two. But we weren't finished. Just beyond pedestrian street is the famous west lake. This lake is claimed by HZ to be the most romantic place in all of China. And it is pretty beautiful. As a bonus, Starbucks is right next to the lake where we were viewing. (I happen to like Starbucks a little more than a little :] ) After enjoying the lake, and Starbucks we grabbed dinner and hung out at the apartment. It was a very busy day with a large amount of walking.
Sunday was ch.rch, lunch, bus/subway/train/bus back to Shaoxing and hanging out at Tony/Seth's apartment for the evening. I made scrambled eggs, and breakfast potatoes. They were almost as good as the camping breakfast potatoes (I was pretty darn proud of them).
Today, Monday, we decided to hit the town of Shaoxing like we hit Hangzhou. So, we went to the market called Ta-shan, and I bought a painting of a Shaoxing canal. Now, I have art from everywhere I've been. Then after lunch Seth and I took Marie and Emma (our zhong gua ren friends /chinese friends) to look for glasses. My initial thought was 'this is China, everything is cheaper here'. Well, that lasted for a little while. Turns out glasses are cheap in China..... if you're not blind. I am blind. Because I've got such a high prescription the cost went up steeply for me. UGH!!! Finally at our third store, I was thinking I'd get some, but needed to figure out a price I could afford. And I wanted to get frames that weren't super duper cheap looking/quality. No easy task I quickly found out. Thankfully, Emma and Marie are stellar bargainers and I was able to get a new pair of regular glasses, and a pair of prescription sunglasses for 800kuai. Which was a lot for me to pay, but that's down from the 1200 original price. And when converted, it's only about $130.... so basically a steal. But it was quite the trial to get to that point. Oi! I have the regular glasses now (picture going up after I'm done typing this) and the sunglasses will be done in about a week.
And that's how we sweep tombs here in the Orient. =) It was a long, exhausting weekend, but a lot of fun, and a good break to the routine. I also spent a ton of money, but to quote my good friend, Olaf, "All good things, all good things"
Until next time.
But for me, and the rest of the country, it meant Monday off of school. (dance it out!) I went to Hangzhou with a few team members and two Chinese friends. We left on Friday afternoon, and upon arrival in HZ we promptly napped. Haha... It was a long week. That evening we went to two western restaurants, one for appetizers and one for dinner. Both excellent choices. Then, on Saturday morning we set off for the silk market. This is a whole street, and many of the side streets dedicated to silk, and products made of silk. Crazy! And so much to choose from! I was a little overwhelmed at first. But then I spotted a box of 10kuai scarves....SCORE!! (that's about $1.40) So, I bought two. One of them I am wearing now, and have been all weekend. The other might be for my mother.... maybe. =) I looked at lots of shops, considered many a scarf, debated a skirt or two, and finally made it to the end. I ended up leaving silk market with the four scarves, the two mentioned before, and one for each of my grandmothers. And then at the very end our group wandered into one last shop and I bought two lovely embroidered scenes. Very nice, and I love them. I'm all about art these days.
After the silk market we jumped across the street to an 'everything market'.... which is just as it sounds, it has everything in it. Nate was on a mission to find a belt, and the rest of us were just tagging along. But I ended up buy two pairs of boy shorts underwear. They are actually boy underwear, but they looked comfy and I wanted to try em. By the way, they are comfy and only cost me 20kuai or $3 for the two of them.
Following the everything market, we headed to pedestrian street, or 'huh-fung-lu' to see the little shops there. This road is like an American flea market mashed with fair ground food and has the occasional historical statue. The real downside was the amount of people because it was a holiday. It was a struggle to keep our group of 7 together. There was room to move, but traffic was crazy and it was only people! I made a purchase or two on pedestrian street. The best was a coffee mug (I know, I know, how can you have too many, right?) that I got just before we hit the crowd of the street. It's made of a rougher clay on the outside, and the inside is a smooth light blue ceramic that comes over the rim of the glass and appears to drip down the cup. It's a great mug. I also ended up buying a spiraled potato on a stick. I don't know how they do it, but this shop spiral cuts a whole potato and skewers it so its like a giant starch slinky. Then, they cook it (deep fry I think) and you can pick a flavor of seasoning. I got spicy with ketchup. It wasn't as amazing as my mind seemed to think it would be, but it was still pretty good.
By this point we've walked a ton, and taken a bus or two. But we weren't finished. Just beyond pedestrian street is the famous west lake. This lake is claimed by HZ to be the most romantic place in all of China. And it is pretty beautiful. As a bonus, Starbucks is right next to the lake where we were viewing. (I happen to like Starbucks a little more than a little :] ) After enjoying the lake, and Starbucks we grabbed dinner and hung out at the apartment. It was a very busy day with a large amount of walking.
Sunday was ch.rch, lunch, bus/subway/train/bus back to Shaoxing and hanging out at Tony/Seth's apartment for the evening. I made scrambled eggs, and breakfast potatoes. They were almost as good as the camping breakfast potatoes (I was pretty darn proud of them).
Today, Monday, we decided to hit the town of Shaoxing like we hit Hangzhou. So, we went to the market called Ta-shan, and I bought a painting of a Shaoxing canal. Now, I have art from everywhere I've been. Then after lunch Seth and I took Marie and Emma (our zhong gua ren friends /chinese friends) to look for glasses. My initial thought was 'this is China, everything is cheaper here'. Well, that lasted for a little while. Turns out glasses are cheap in China..... if you're not blind. I am blind. Because I've got such a high prescription the cost went up steeply for me. UGH!!! Finally at our third store, I was thinking I'd get some, but needed to figure out a price I could afford. And I wanted to get frames that weren't super duper cheap looking/quality. No easy task I quickly found out. Thankfully, Emma and Marie are stellar bargainers and I was able to get a new pair of regular glasses, and a pair of prescription sunglasses for 800kuai. Which was a lot for me to pay, but that's down from the 1200 original price. And when converted, it's only about $130.... so basically a steal. But it was quite the trial to get to that point. Oi! I have the regular glasses now (picture going up after I'm done typing this) and the sunglasses will be done in about a week.
And that's how we sweep tombs here in the Orient. =) It was a long, exhausting weekend, but a lot of fun, and a good break to the routine. I also spent a ton of money, but to quote my good friend, Olaf, "All good things, all good things"
Until next time.
Tuesday, April 1, 2014
Bikeventures!
Many of you know that my main mode of transportation is my bike. It's used, and a little rusty, and the gears don't always like to cooperate. Okay, they seldom like to cooperate, but I can bike on 3rd and 7th or 6th just fine.
Well, today I put my bike to the test. Seth (my team mate) and I went on a dawn bike ride around the mountain outside my campus. Out my window you can see this statue of Daiyu. He's a famous Chinese Emperor who held back a flooding river in Zhejiang province. Anyway, I learned last week that it didn't take too long to bike around said mountain. I was itching to bike it, so I recruited Seth, and we made a plan.
We woke up at 5:30am... Dawn/sunrise is at 5:40 (and getting earlier). We can some cereal for breakfast, packed water and were off by 6. We stopped to see some statues or monuments, paused by the river for a bit, and checked out this Jade museum. It was huge and awesome, but we weren't allowed to go in. (May have to go back sometime) We were back to our starting point by 7:20 and grabbed second breakfast. Back to the apartment just before 8. I downed some water and rested a bit, and then biked the 20 minutes to school. Thankfully today is my P.E. day with the kids so we just did some games/follow the leader stuff outside. But, I'll tell you now, that I'm gonna sleep sooooooo well tonight. I still have 5 miles to bike yet, to and from school for the afternoon session.
The best part about the bike trip was the scenery. We traveled for an hour and saw dozens of different types of homes, villages, foliage and people. Plus, it didn't feel like the 6am hour. It felt normal to be out biking. I am really glad we made the plan, and stuck to it. I think it will be happening again.... actually, it will definitely happen again. Who knows where we'll go next time.
Oh, and after school this morning, I biked home, showered and went to lunch. We went to this awesome huun-tuun place (soup/dumplings) and then got burrito man after, and I grabbed some dough balls/waffle thing.... So basically, I was super duper hungry after our bike. =)
Until next time.
P.S. We've broken 4000 page views. WOW! Thanks for reading. And don't forget to email me or comment your questions about china or teaching or life over here. Can't wait to hear from you :)
Well, today I put my bike to the test. Seth (my team mate) and I went on a dawn bike ride around the mountain outside my campus. Out my window you can see this statue of Daiyu. He's a famous Chinese Emperor who held back a flooding river in Zhejiang province. Anyway, I learned last week that it didn't take too long to bike around said mountain. I was itching to bike it, so I recruited Seth, and we made a plan.
We woke up at 5:30am... Dawn/sunrise is at 5:40 (and getting earlier). We can some cereal for breakfast, packed water and were off by 6. We stopped to see some statues or monuments, paused by the river for a bit, and checked out this Jade museum. It was huge and awesome, but we weren't allowed to go in. (May have to go back sometime) We were back to our starting point by 7:20 and grabbed second breakfast. Back to the apartment just before 8. I downed some water and rested a bit, and then biked the 20 minutes to school. Thankfully today is my P.E. day with the kids so we just did some games/follow the leader stuff outside. But, I'll tell you now, that I'm gonna sleep sooooooo well tonight. I still have 5 miles to bike yet, to and from school for the afternoon session.
The best part about the bike trip was the scenery. We traveled for an hour and saw dozens of different types of homes, villages, foliage and people. Plus, it didn't feel like the 6am hour. It felt normal to be out biking. I am really glad we made the plan, and stuck to it. I think it will be happening again.... actually, it will definitely happen again. Who knows where we'll go next time.
Oh, and after school this morning, I biked home, showered and went to lunch. We went to this awesome huun-tuun place (soup/dumplings) and then got burrito man after, and I grabbed some dough balls/waffle thing.... So basically, I was super duper hungry after our bike. =)
Until next time.
P.S. We've broken 4000 page views. WOW! Thanks for reading. And don't forget to email me or comment your questions about china or teaching or life over here. Can't wait to hear from you :)
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