My first holiday season abroad is drawing to a close....and I must say, while I did miss my family and friends back home, I am thankful for my friends here who made sure the holidays were festive and fun instead of lonely and depressing. I was able to celebrate Thanksgiving with a (mostly) traditional meal and a reflection on what I was thankful for this year. I decided that I was most thankful for the support from my placement agency that made my transition to China relatively smooth. For Christmas, I enjoyed an amazing brunch with some friends who live near campus, who are fabulous cooks as and well as musicians. So in addition to stuffing my face, I also sang renditions of Christmas carols accompanied by 2 violins, a guitar, and a recorder. It was pretty sweet! So far I have received one box of Christmas/birthday loot and I know that 2 more are on their way. Getting packages from home makes me feel warm inside!
Here are some photos from the past two months (whew, has it been that long??). I took a trip to De Tian, a waterfall at the Chinese/Vietnamese border, which was lovely. This weekend a high school friend of mine who now teaches English in Japan will come and stay with me, and I am planning a trip to a nearby historical city called Guilin. (Pronounced like Gway-linn). More photos to follow!
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| Students at a Christmas party given by the student union. Those are glowing antlers, not devil horns. The party included sexy dancers doing the Macarena and The Bunny Hop, as well as a fashion show. I told my students it was the most interesting Christmas party I had ever seen. |
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| A student at my make-up party. |
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| A make-up party at my house, facilitated by Elaine, my Mary Kay friend. |
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| My students. I baked 120 sugar cookies for Christmas, and we did a little cookie decorating party in class. |
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| This little lady always fixes my bike. She and her husband run a little business on campus. They think I'm funny when I try to speak Chinese. |
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| A bashful shrimp at Walmart, with the lovely and fabulous Kimberly. |
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| My friend Elaine cooked me a delicious fish dinner. A side note: though the fish was gutted and carried in a plastic bag for 40 minutes, his tail would still flip a little as we were putting spices on him. I guess that means it was really fresh. |
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| Edible gator! |
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| De Tian Waterfall |
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| Chinglish! |
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| Mary and Isaac. Awww, so cute! |
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| Close up of the waterfall from the raft |
