I occasionally check the news back home to see what is going on. For the most part it’s normal. Car accident, shooting, stabbing, blah, blah and blah. But then there are days when I get to see headlines like these . . . I think these are all self explanatory. I at first thought they were all from South Carolina and thought “go figure” – but instead it is retarded news from all over the country. The last one in bold did happen in Columbia, South Carolina. It doesn’t surprise me at all.

• Body Found in McDonald’s Bathroom Died of Brain Hemmorhage
• Trooper Hit on the Job
• Man Attacked By Gator After Smoking Crack
• 7 Day Forecast Discussion
• Fairview Road Accident Kills Two
• Spurrier Accepts Contract Extension, Raise
• Dog Saves Family, Then Gets Put Up for Adoption
• Orangeburg Crash Leaves One Dead
• Grandma Sold Pot to Feed Bingo Addiction
• Deputies: Man Wanted for Intent to Sell $250,000 of Cocaine at Waffle House

If you think that is bad, I heard that some drunk rednecks bet $20 on the Carolina Clemson game. When the one that won didn’t get his money, he walked out to his truck(cause all rednecks have trucks) grabbed his gun and shot his best friend to death. Only in South Carolina, I say. Only in South Carolina.

I don’t know how permanent it is, or if a Chinese official hit the wrong button on his computer, but after several weeks of my blog residing on what seemed to be a Forbidden Planet, the days of reading phrases like “The connection has been reset” and “The page cannot be displayed” are NO more. Please sing with me and do a little jig – China ain’t blocking me no more – do da do da!!!

I know this doesn’t really matter for me so much because I was able to access my blog despite China’s attempt to sensor me, but now anyone in China who might stumble upon my blog CAN. I guess the investigation of Blogger has come to an end(for the time being) and they don’t find me or my fellow Bloggers all that troublesome after all. Of course, tomorrow is a new day, and the Chinese might change their minds. And they probably will.

As for Thanksgiving, I haven’t seen a turkey anywhere. There are plenty of chickens and ducks to be had(with their heads and necks still attached) – and we might actually have to buy one if we want to have any sort of American Thanksgiving here in China. Without the simple existence of an oven though, it makes it a bit more difficult to make a variety of foods other than boiled or fried. The one thing I really want and know I won’t find is a Honey Baked Ham. My tongue wants to roll out of my mouth like a cartoon character just thinking about one. Hmm Mmm good. Eat some for me will you? Or better yet – send me one. I’d love you forever and ever! If any part of your soul wishes do such a thing and you really want to make my day – contact me and I will pass on my mailing address. Heh. Hey, it could happen.

So, Happy Thanksgiving to all. And thank you China for taking me off that awful planet. It was a dull and musty place. And if you could avoid sending me there in the future, I would be a very happy expat in your lovely country. And even happier if you could put some Honey Baked Ham in the Da Ran Fa by 5:00pm tonight. Thanks! 😉

I did a search for a Halloween cat in Yahoo and this is one of the pictures that turned up. I thought it was pretty cute. It’s great when people manipulate animals and make them do outrageous things like this.(Horray Photoshop) For some reason, it totally brightens my day.

Well, if you didn’t know, Halloween doesn’t exist here in China. Sad face. I am slowly trying to bring it over though. This week I am teaching my little devils about Halloween and the whole art of Trick or Treating. Like normal, some think that it is cool, and the rest of the 700 brats think it is boring, stupid and as uninteresting as me. I actually had a student tell me to my face that he didn’t think I was interesting. How wonderful is it to hear that?

For the good students, I bought some Milk Candy. It’s pretty cheap and good if I must say so myself. I find myself sticking my hand in the bag to nick a piece a bit to often. It’s all going to my hips. I can feel it.

The fun part about teaching Halloween is that I get to scare the living heebie jeebies out of my students and feel justified doing it. When I tell them about haunted houses, I tell them that they are scary and then pick a random bored student who looks like he or she is sleeping and then scream SCARY in the ear while slamming my hands on their desk. Even the boys look like they are about to faint sometimes. The girls look like they might cry. And that really, really, makes my day a good day. I’m evil. I know. But you’d be evil too if you had to put up with their crap.

I do have a few good students, but not enough. I actually had a few of them call me Miss Cook last week and today one called me by my Chinese name – Zi Wei. I rarely hear Gabe. Mostly it is just Teacher! Teacher! I should start screaming Student! Student! and see how they like it.

But anyway, Happy Halloween. Hope some of you got my share of candy because I will be waiting patiently to get it when I finally come home in about 8 or so months – if China will let me leave that is . . .

Oh, and will someone eat a piece of Pumpkin Pie for me. I have been thinking about it all week. Nangua is Chinese for pumpkin, by-the-way. Some of Phil students gave him one. He needs to carve it soon before it starts to rot and we have to throw it out. Anyone have a funny suggestion on what to carve into it?

Post you ideas in the comment section, and if Phil likes your suggestion – I will post a picture of it after he is done.

FREEZE!! REMOVE YOUR HANDS FROM YOUR MOUSE!!

Alright, hopefully my big font caught your attention and you haven’t left my little blog quite yet.

If you are still here. Thanks. For those of you who left after the word stop, I have one word for you. Grr.

Now that you are here and settling in on the nice big blue couch I bought a couple of days ago, I have a question for you. A few questions actually. And if you could answer them for me, I would be very happy.

I always wonder who is coming to my blog and how they found it. I have trackers, but that only gives me an IP address(sometimes), a country, and some other random information that doesn’t really matter. What I want to know is who you really are, how you came across my blog, and what other information you want divulge to me and the rest of the blogging universe.

Drop the information in the comment box, please. I would appreciate it very much. It is nice to know who in the world actually reads the words I write.

When Tim’s parents came to visit him about two weeks ago, Phil and I went to see how their hotel accommodations were. They were staying in a four star hotel that was trying to become a 5 star. It is located right at the foot of the hill that leads to our apartment and the school where Phil teaches. We eye it constantly and jokingly say that we are going to stay there one night just to say we did. Who knows, we may actually do it. It would only cost us about $69.00 to do so. How often can you say that you stayed in the lap of luxury for $69.00 . . . not very often would be my guess. It it is a very nice hotel with a staff that is constantly on your heels to see if you have any needs. Even better – some of the staff can speak English. But anyway, I digress.

We went to see what their rooms were like because Phil’s parents are probably going to come visit us as well before we leave and we wanted to make sure it was suitable for them. Before we got on the elevator(one of man’s greatest inventions – thank you Mr. Otis) I asked Tim what floor his parents were staying on. I was thinking to myself that it couldn’t be the 13th – because hotels don’t have . . . and that is where I stopped in my thought process because I suddenly remembered that I was no longer in the States and that the fear of the number 13 was some 7,000 miles away. But I went ahead and asked Tim anyway, expecting any number but the 13th to roll off his tongue.

“They are on the 13th,” he said.
I laughed. “Your joking?”
“Nope.”
“They really put them on the 13th floor?”
“Yeah, why is . . .(lightbulb) oh, yeah, I almost forgot about that.”

I thought it was funny, but of course, stupid things like that always make me giggle. It may have been some cruel joke put on by the hotel staff because they knew they were Americans but it was probably just a random occurrence. I like the cruel joke idea better.

The hotel room ended up being pretty nice with a good view of the city from their window. The beds were actually sorta soft. In China, hard beds are the norm and they suck, but these weren’t half bad. The room itself wasn’t as big as I expected for a 4 star hotel. It was about the same size as a normal cheap room back in the States, but it was nice. The room came equipped with a western toilet(hooray) and a bathtub(double hooray). It was the first bathtub that I have seen since we got to China almost 2 months ago. I so wanted to hop in and take a long hot bath so bad. That would have felt so good. More reasons why we really should go there and stay a night.

In China, and this is the reason for this post, they have similar superstitions to ours. For instance, we fear the number 13 because we think it is bad luck, although I couldn’t tell you why, and I doubt any number of people could either. As far as I know, the Chinese could care less about the number 13. It doesn’t mean jack-diddley to them, but the the numbers 4 and 14 sure do.

The pronunciation of the number 4 and the word “die” sound very, very similar. So much in fact, that the Chinese avoid it as much as humanly possible. Like our 13, they don’t like to stay on the 4th floor of buildings and they really don’t like days, months or years that contain the number either. It’s just plain unlucky. The same goes for the number 14. It sounds a lot like the words “must die” and so they avoid it, too. If an apartment building has a 4th or 14th floor – the apartments on that particular floor are usually cheaper. I wouldn’t mind living on a unlucky floor if it meant I could save some money. But then again, I am a cheap bastard. Heh. I’m already unlucky naturally, so maybe the unluckiness would cancel each other out or something.

I don’t find these particular superstitions odd, but I’m still not quiet used to the idea of a lucky hairy mole, lucky long pinky nail, or a lucky cricket. Hopefully, I will make it through the rest of the day for I do have a lucky cricket to ward off the unlucky 13th day of October.

Heh, I’ll tell you about the two additions to our little family later. Gloria and Edwardo, our new pet crickets, are super annoying, but cute – so they are forgiven any wrong doing.

Have a Happy Friday the 13th.

I saw this walking home the other day, and had to stop to take a picture. He probably thought I was nuts, but oh well, I got the picture didn’t I?

Back home if you see anyone trying to fix a power line there is always a big truck with a man sitting in a bucket and that bucket is on an arm extending upwards toward the power line.

Not in China.

I don’t know how the Chinese man got onto the power lines. I didn’t see a truck, a latter, or a stool, but he was there – sitting as pretty as he pleased on a little strip of wood that was tied to the wires. As he sat there he kept tugging on another wire that I figure he was adding to the present wires, but heck, he could have been doing anything. I was a meter reader, not an electrician. I just thought it was interesting to see how another country fixes problems like these. You would never, and I mean ever, see a SCEG employee doing this. No sir. Not in a million years. Can you imagine the lawsuits that would arise? I can.

I won’t ever know how the man got down either because after I snapped my picture, I scurried off. I know that China is developed in a lot of ways, but when I see things like this, and I see them more often than you think I would, I wonder how far back China is – in the sense of becoming a developed country. I guess China has a way to go in cities like Fuyang. Shanghai has to be more developed than this, right? I would hope so.

Alright. I know. This goes against everything and anything I learned while working at Bermex. I am supposed to hate dogs, and a part of my soul always will – Bermex Honor – but this puppy was so cute that I could eat him. I better not say that too loud or he may end up on my plate. Heh.

For the most part, I haven’t seen any big dogs here – ie Pitt Bulls and what not. I don’t think people can afford to feed them. Dog and cat food is expensive – even for a little bag. I have noticed that there are no leash laws here either. Dogs just run around where ever they please. They are pretty smart, though. They look both ways before they cross the street. They usually travel in twos for some strange reason as well.

But anyway, back to the cutest puppy ever.

He was sitting on the curb right out side his owner’s shop watching me as though he knew I was a foreigner. I know that look all to well because I get it all the freaking time. Most animals run when I try to approach them maybe because they think that I am coming to eat them, but he sat very still. When I sat down next to him his little tail started wagging. His little eyes glistened with glee as I reached out and patted his head. He seemed so very happy. Behind him his owner was smiling ear to ear probably thinking, “Oh, my dog is being petted by a foreigner – how lucky am I?” I snapped his picture, waved to the lady as thank you and patted his head one last time. As I walked away, I turned and saw the little dog running back to his owner like a primary school student runs back to his parents after saying hello to a Whitey. It made me smile. I walked a little further, hopped on my bus, and went home for the day.

It is days like this one that make me happy. The little things have always been the most important. If I saw this little guy every day, I would be able to forgive my evil students and live happily in Fuyang for the rest of my life. Heh. I still think he is the cutest puppy dog ever. I may just have to kidnap him.

It is the closest thing to a Ace Hardware Store that we could find.

Phil and I were walking the streets of Fuyang one day trying to find a place to eat. We were starving. We were tired. And we were hot. (This is before we started teaching by the way.)

I would have never imagined it would be hard to find food in a city that houses 600,000, but apparently it is. In Hangzhou, all you had to do was walk down an alley way and see a tasty and interesting shop you might feel brave enough eating at. Here in Fuyang it is a little bit different. If you can’t read the signs – you probably won’t know it is a restaurant – unless of course there is a window and you see people eating. A lot of places are upstairs, and unless you know that it is there, you probably won’t be a paying customer. Finding a restaurant can be hard, but it is even more difficult finding food that you can eat – or rather food you know you want to eat. If you find a picture menu – you have found heaven. If you find a restaurant that understands your broken Chinese and doesn’t rip you off because you are foreign, you better thank your Guardian Angel. A part of me feels I am back in Portugal – meaning that there are about 100 billion more shoes, clothes, cell phones, and snack shops than there are actually restaurants. But anyway, that is beyond the point. Onto the key master. . .

In the very beginning, Mr. Zhou,the Foreign Affairs Director of the school, gave us one key to our apartment. One key. There are two of us. Two. And one key. Which means that either we had to go everywhere together or chance leaving the one or the other stranded on the door step. Quite by chance, while trying to put food in our tummies, we came across a key making street vendor. We had asked for another key prior to this, but in China, things are never certain, so we decided to take a chance and get one made ourselves.

I took the key out of my pocket and walked over to the man. I pointed at it, hoping he would understand, and then said how much in Chinese. He held up his fingers in a cross shape which means 10 yuan. Seemed like a good deal to me, so I said sure, why not?

The Chinese Key Master proceeded to make a key more or less by hand right in front of us. It wasn’t like anything you would see at Wal-Mart or a Hardware store. He had to measure and gauge every little notch and then reproduce it on the new key. If this computer wasn’t being such a retard, I would post more pictures, but it will only let me upload the one. Grr. But anyway, about 5 or so minutes later he handed us the key back – we looked at it, thought it seemed ok and handed over the 10 yuan. We had a key. The question was whether it was going to work or not.

We got back to the apartment after trying a noodle shop – where we ate noodles and avoided the intestines. Gross. Phil put the key in the door and it wouldn’t turn. Well, I thought, at least it wasn’t Y100. Phil twisted it a bit more. Still nothing. I went to give him my key, but he told me to wait. He jiggled it a little more and the door opened. The key isn’t perfect, but hey, we both have a key now. And now we have a key that Mr. Zhou and company don’t know exists. Maybe in a few years, we can come back to Fuyang, and take a nap or come in to watch TV or something crazy like that, although I doubt the new people living there would like that very much. Heh.

I’ll post again soon. Maybe tonight. But the school computer hates me and won’t let me do much.

I have not gone into much of our flight over here, so I guess I will take the opportunity to do that now.

The flight was about 14.5 hours long. I don’t care what anyone says. 14.5 hours is a long time to spend on a plane – too long. I was doing ok for the first 6 or so hours, but then I just started going crazy. Crazy is a word I introduced to my students this past week. The way I describe it to them is how I felt for the last long leg of our journey.

Picture someone standing silent and very still and looking very happy right in front of your face. Imagine yourself standing right in front of this person and thinking he or she appears to be the most sane person you have ever seen. Ok? Do you have a good image stuck there behind your eyes? Alright, good. KWAMABMO!!! The person now starts screaming and running around like a mad monkey, throwing his or her arms in the air and then finally puts his or her hands on your shoulder and starts shaking you. ~ Shake shake, shake shake, shake your booty. ~

That is exactly how I felt, except I also had an urge to puke on the pretty attendant that would walk by offering me random stupid things that I really didn’t need. Toward the very end I went pretty nuts and came really close to using the barf bag that I have always seen but never needed. I couldn’t even bring myself to eat my last meal. The thought of it made my tummy turn.

When I act out crazy, my student’s flip out and nearly have a heart attack – especially the girls, but I get the boys sometimes, too. I love scaring the crap out of them. It brings much joy to my life. It helps me sleep at night knowing I have forever scarred them. Insert evil laughter. Hehe.

Here are a few more pictures of our flight over. The screen on the seat in front of me really helped me through the 14.5 hours of insanity. I never fell asleep. When we go home, I am so taking some sleeping pills, damnit.

Just seeing the word Shanghai got me excited. Although, it also made this part of the trip drag, and drag, and drag. I thought after 3 hours that our plane had maybe gone 2 inches. I was probably just delirious. I probably was. All in all I was up for about 30 some hours. And we all know that a tired Gabe is not a happy Gabe. I have been nicknamed Grumpy on occasion for a reason. I think I would have been happy landing in Beijing at one point and living there. Anything just to off that damn plane.

After sitting in the airport for 30 minutes waiting for more teachers to arrive we got on bus that took us to a bus station where we got on another bus that took us Hangzhou. I remember at least 3 things vividly. 1 – I wanted to die because I felt like crap. 2 – I thought I was going to die because we had the craziest bus driver in the entire world. It was like we were in a game of Crazy Taxi, but worse. 3 – Are we there, YET?! I didn’t think we would ever get to Hangzhou. It was the longest 70 KM I had ever driven.

We stayed at a place called the Babel Language Center for a few days. Besides the beds being harder then the floor (no I am not lying – it truly was like sleeping on the floor) it wasn’t all that bad. After getting some sleep, though, and some food and water, I was much happier. The picture to the left shows the excitement of my first day in China. The heat of China soon came, though, and wiped that happy smile off my face. As you can see from the picture below, the heat did not make me happy. I should have paid more attention to this day, though. It was one of the last days that I saw a blue sky. I miss my blue skies.

These pictures were taken at West Lake, as was the one taken of me above. West Lake was beautiful. Beautiful and hot. I need to go back when it is cooler. I would enjoy it more that way.

West Lake was covered in Lotus flowers in bloom.

Here are some Chinese tourists enjoying West Lake, the view, and the heat that could of fried an egg on the pavement. I would pay someone to send me a piece of a South Carolina sky or any western sky for that matter. I didn’t know how important a blue sky was until I didn’t have one anymore. I guess that is how things work.

This picture was actually taken long before my farewell dinner with my family, but I just got my hands on it. Thank you, Sarah! I have had my share of jobs in my short 24 years of life (almost 25), but until I got my job at Bermex Inc., I had never really had co-workers. Bermex is the place I keep referring to as the place you should only work if you enjoy pain – aka Hell. And that is still true. But there were some redeeming qualities of that job. Mainly the people. The people you see in the picture above are just a few who made working at Bermex fun and bearable even on the days when I thought I was going to die, kill myself or go insane . And I am not exaggerating that in the least. I will surely miss that bunch of people. They were all unique and made me smile. Here are a few pictures from when we all went to Inakaya’s to eat. They asked me why I had chosen a Japanese restaurant when I was going to China. I said it was simply because they had really good food and a table that we all could sit at. Inakaya’s is probably one of the cooler, reasonable priced places in town. You should check it out.

Sarah enjoying some sake. Maybe a bit too much. Heh.

Kurt. A name dogs will fear forever more.

Robbie. There are no words to describe you. : )

Watch as Van fades away. I don’t know how the camera made it happen, but I like it.

The one and only Peter. Hope Anderson treats you right!

And now the FOOD! It was so pretty, we almost couldn’t eat it. But, we did. And boy, was it good. I would also like to note that Peter is the contributor of many of the pictures in this post. And Van contributed some too. Thanks, you guys. I know that this does not look that appetizing, but I was surprised how sweet it was. I actually enjoyed it. It is sea weed salad by the way.

I love miso soup. If I was a little crazier, I would put it in a thermos during the winter and drink it.

The Boat of Yummy Goodness. It was huge!

Much too raw for me – but that is fish and some fish eggs. Not what I ordered.

Last but not least – Sushi. I just love this stuff. I don’t why it took me so many years to try it. Thank God for Publix, though. They offer pretty cheap and good sushi all the time!