Okay, we all know that I am a bumbling idiot, so what is new you ask?  Well, nothing much really, except I need to much a correction.  A few days ago I posted a little story about how Holy, a friend who we had met in Fuyang, China, had come to visit us during his fall break. In that post I said that his name was pronounced like Holly.  While he was here though, and after I had made that post, I found out it, after nearly two years of knowing Holy, that is name is indeed pronounced Holy – as in holy shit, your kidding me! 🙂

You can imagine how stupid I felt.  I then tried to figure out how the confusion started.  Some point when he Holy met Phil, he told him his name and showed Phil how to spell it.  I am pretty sure Phil double checked and made sure it was what he meant, but I guess our English minds wanted to hear Holly, and so that is what we called him.  I asked Holy why he never corrected us and he said he didn’t know.   Perhaps it is was the same reason I never made the scores of Chinese people say my name correctly.  I knew calling me Gabrielle would be difficult, so I opted for Gabe.  To most people in China that year, I was known as Gabe-a.  I should have simplified it even more and gone by G.

I told Holy how hard it was going to be to retrain myself to actually say his name correctly.  The last few days he was here, I had to catch myself mid-name so many times.  Hopefully, it won’t take too long to learn.

I’ve heard a lot of strange names in my life, but I think this story tops them all.

At work the other day, I had to call and see if an applicant would be interested in applying to a position similar to one she had applied to before.  The name was normal enough – Tiffany.  I called the number and let it ring a few times.  A moment later, a man with a rather deep voice answered the phone.

“Hello?”

“Hi, may I speak to Tiffany?”

“This is he.”

I nearly fell out of my chair.  Never in all my life have I met a male Tiffany.  I’m still trying to figure out if it his parent’s hated him, or if he changed his name as he got older.  Either way, it’s weird.  Very weird.

Another thing that I never imagined happening occurred this week.  Holy(pronounced Holly), who attened the high school that Phil taught at in Fuyang, China, decided to take his fall break and visit us for the week.  He is attending Troy University in Alabama this semester.  Well, instead of taking the bus to get to us, like we would have in China, he actually drove.   Holy bought himself a car and passed the Alabama driver’s license test.  I must say, it was very strange to be driven around my city, by a guy I met in China and who has only lived in the States for 9 months.  I guess it would be like me moving to China, buying a car, and driving Holy around where he grew up.  I dunno, I guess i just find it weird – and a bit funny.

One of the afternoons we were in Yangshuo, a quick storm rolled through.  We could see the bands of rain coming through the mountains before it actually got to us.  It was ever so beautiful, and afterward a big rainbow appeared.  We were lucky not to have a lot of rain the week we were there.  This particular storm only lasted about 15 minutes, and then all was back to normal – hot and humid.

In the video, we are standing on the balcony of our hostel.  Yes, that was our view every day for a week.  It was so awesome waking up to that every day.  If you ever manage to go to Yangshuo, you should stay where we did – Riverside Retreat.  You can click here for more details about the hostel/hotel.  It truly was a wonderful place, and the staff was simply amazing.  They were very helpful.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dy-YyJalIMg[/youtube]

I can’t believe I have never told the story of when Phil and I stayed in the super fancy, 5 star hotel right next to our apartment in Fuyang. You can click to see the picture of the hotel here.  The outside doesn’t look that great, but the inside looked really nice.  I can’t remember if I took pictures of the room, but I know I have a brochure of the hotel somewhere.  I’ll try to find it.

Phil and I couldn’t decide what to get each other for Christmas, so we decided to treat ourselves to our first ever 5 star hotel – South China Hotel Fuyang.  We walked past it nearly everyday and got sick and tired of dreaming what it would be like to stay there.  So, about a week before Christmas, we walked into the lobby to find out how much money we would have to burn through to enjoy ourselves.  Apparently, several weeks prior to this, we had been at the same bar with the lady behind the desk.  She remembered us, and decided to drop our room charge in half.  We couldn’t decided if we wanted the regular room or the suite for a few more dollars until she let us see what latter looked like.  We had seen the other one several weeks earlier, when Tim’s(another teacher) parents came and stayed there.

As soon as we walked through the door we were wowed.  It was huge. It had two bathrooms. The one with the bath tub was almost as big as the bedroom – the room not the tub.  🙂  The bed was equally as huge and super soft.  In addition to that there was another large room with a couch and a table – the kind you eat at.  It was sorta like a living room, and I think there may have been a TV(there was another TV in our bedroom.)   I guess it was your typical suite layout, but since I had never seen one before, it looked super awesome.

The room ended up costing us 870 RMB – at the time that was about $108 – not bad for a night in a five star hotel suite.  Without the discount it would have cost us 1500 RMB – more than I would have paid to sleep in a bed anywhere, even if I could take a bath for 24 hours.  And that leads me into what this story is all about.

A week later we showed back up at the hotel and were given our respective keys.  The first thing either one of us wanted to do was take advantage of the huge garden tub.  Our apartment didn’t have a tub, just a shower, so it had been nearly 3 months since we had had a nice American bath.  When you don’t have access to a tub, you really start to miss them.  Our shower was pretty kick ass though.  It was a sauna/shower, and had it worked 100% like it was supposed to, we would have had jets of water coming out of the walls to clean us.  We never could figure out how to get them to work though.  🙁

Well, anyway, Phil and I were standing in the bathroom, taking in everything it had to offer us.  There were all sorts of bath related items that you could use for a price, of course, big lush towels, heat lamps, and a button.

We both looked at it, curious as to what it did.  There was no sign or anything.  It was just a button, sitting pretty as it pleased in the wall, next to the bath tub.

“Should I push it?” Phil asked.

“I dunno.  We don’t know what it does.” I replied.  I saw Phil’s eyes grow wide with wonder and excitement.

Phil has a history with buttons.  In a DnD game that I dragged him to a long time ago, he decided in his inebriated state of mind, that it would be a good idea to push the button that read 13, when we all clearly knew that pushing a button would make a monster appear.  Number one had made some stupid kobold appear and we killed it in all but two seconds flat.  Anyone should have been able to understand that pushing a higher number would make an even larger monster appear, but Phil didn’t care.  He wanted excitement.  So, he pushed it, and the biggest, meanest, ugliest, most difficult creature to kill appeared.  We ran for our lives, and barely survived.

Phil doesn’t play with us anymore.

So, yeah, Phil was standing in the bathroom, staring at the button.  For a brief second he was five years old again. I could tell by the way his eyes were glowing and twitching – like he had found the mother load of mischief .  Oh, he was going to push that button.

And that is exactly what he did.  With his index finger he stabbed the button.

There was silence for a moment and then I started to think that maybe it is like our light switch in the hallway back in our apartment.  Maybe it doesn’t do it’s job anymore.  And then there is a voice.  An English voice.  Talking to us in our five star hotel bathroom. In China.  In Fuyang.  Where 9 times out of 10, people can’t understand what the hell I’m saying. And vice versa.  But I understand this.

“Gentleman, are you in trouble?” (I can’t remember exactly what he said.  I just remember it sounding awkward.)

I looked at Phil and Phil looked at me.

“Oh, we are fine,” Phil said

“Are you sure?”

“Yes, we are fine. Just accidentally pushed the button.”  (Accidentally my ass.)

“Ok. Have a good evening.”

“Thanks, you too.”

As soon as the voice was gone, Phil and I bust out laughing.

Apparently, Phil had pushed the emergency button.  It made total since afterwards, but you still would think that an emergency button would have emergency written somewhere on or near it.  Hey, at least they didn’t come barging into our bathroom.  I can only imagine what kind of comedy would have ensued if they had.

When Phil and I lived in Fuyang, we really wanted some syrup to go with the pancakes we were trying to make.  Our attempts at making the syrup ourselves never produced Butterworth results.  So, we did the next best thing – we asked my mom to send us a bottle of maple extract to help give our concoction some maple flare.  We didn’t ask for a bottle of syrup because it would have made the box weigh too much and a heavy box sent to China isn’t cheap.  Sending just the syrup probably wouldn’t have cost that much, but our wish list always seemed to grow when we found out someone was going to be sending us some western goodies.  🙂

The extract did help with the taste of the syrup, but we could never get the consistency we wanted.  Eventually, we gave up and decided we would just have to wait until we returned back home to get the good stuf.  When it came time to move to Shenyang, we packed it up with all of our other stuff.  We weren’t about to scarifice any of our western goods.

A week after we got to Shenyang, we were told we would be moving again.  Phil and I weren’t particularly pleased that we would be uprooting ourselves again, but we repacked all of our goods up anyway, including our maple extract, and headed to the beautiful city of Xiamen.

In Xiamen, we unpacked everything and refused to pack again unless we were traveling or moving back home.  And for the next three months our maple extract sat quietly on our shelf, unused.  When it came time for us to go back to the States, we offered up all of our western goods to our dear friends, Patty, Eddie, and their daughter Elisa.  We knew they could get some good use out it. Elisa swore it was Christmas when we brought all of our stuff over to them.  🙂

Well, up until a few days ago, I would have thought that our maple extract had finally run out of gas and found a permanent home in a landfill in China or some other needy westerner’s cabinet.  Interestingly enough though, neither happened.

Instead, our maple extract jumped on a plane back to the States stashed away in a suitcase – destination Miami – when Patty and her family decided to leave China.  After a short stay there, it decided that it wanted to do some more traveling, and hopped on the next flight to Colombia – the country, not the city where I live.  For the next four weeks our maple extract took in the sights and then decided it wanted to settle down for a spell – somewhere else.  So, off it trotted to the airport and booked passage to Argentina, where for  at this moment in time, it still resides.  At least until Phil and I travel to Argentina next November, pick it up, and bring it back to the States with us.  🙂

I don’t know how many miles our little maple extract has traveled, I just know it’s a lot.  Perhaps, there is a section in the Guinness World Records that it would qualify for.

I remember faintly, while standing in the cold, dark corridor of Beijing WECL, Mandy, one of Yuli Guo’s(Richard Guo) lackeys, telling us how WECL had forged one of our coworker’s resume.  She said that it didn’t look very professional.   I thought at the time that maybe they had just added teaching experience or something like that and that it was rather hilarious that our school was lying to the Chinese government.  It made me wonder what they had done to my resume.

Well, a few days ago, I got a message from a guy who had contacted me about teaching at WECL.  He thought he would share some amusing information with me.

“Hey, I thought you would find this amusing.  I actually turned down the WECL job the other day but someone at the Qingdao office keeps bugging me for visa stuff.  Well they decided to “embellish” my resume and added an entire job as a behavorial therapist in Glendale, California back in 2007 while I was in college in Washington, DC.  I can’t believe they would just flat out lie to the Chinese government!  Talk about such a sketchy job!”

And now I know what probably ended up on my coworker’s resume.  Very interesting.

During our May Week vacation in Xiamen, China, Phil and I went to the Taiwanese Folk Village. If you missed the original post about it – you can go here . There are several pictures of the place, but much like the video I am about to show you, many of them have that wretched cloud in the center. Somehow moisture got into my camera. I did everything to dry it out, but Xiamen’s humidity won.

We really had no idea what the show was about, but since the admission to see it was included in our ticket price, we decided to watch it even though we probably wouldn’t understand anything they said. Phil told me that we shouldn’t sit on the front row because we’d be easy targets and probably get asked to participate in something. I wanted a good view, so we sat on the front row anyway.

A few minutes into the show, a man came over to Phil and asked him to participate – in Chinese of course. They tried to get me to go too, but I wanted to stay behind so that I could record it. I laughed so hard that I had I tears streaming down my face.

I really have no idea what important story they were acting out , or why they had Phil drink three shots of liquor.  Phil later said that it reminded him of Everclear. I just thought it was funny, and that you might enjoy watching it. You gotta love China. They think of the craziest ways to amuse people. They really do.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nTMauhqVaZ0[/youtube]

Finally, a little vacation. I haven’t been anywhere really since I got back from China.

As long as the weather gods are nice to us, Phil and I should enjoy a lovely weekend.  First we are going to take in a long over due Atlanta Braves game.  I haven’t been to one since Mother’s Day 2005.  At least, I think that was the last time I was able to go.  Since the game is on July 4th, we will get treated to fireworks after the game.  I know it won’t even hold a flame to the fireworks I saw in Hangzhou, but I’m sure they will be pretty nonetheless.  You can click here if you want to see what I am talking about.  Even that video doesn’t do the display justice.  I wish those buildings hadn’t been in the way, though.

I really hope the Braves can pull off a win for me. They haven’t had the best season so far, so I am not going to hold my breath or anything.  There is still a chance that they could go on an impressive winning streak and take back their division.  That would be nice. Perhaps my presence will spark a season turn around or something.  🙂

On Saturday, we are going to head over to Stone Mountain.  We are going to get the Adventure Pass for $25 bucks.  It will allow us to do just about everything that the park offers. I’ve been to Stone Mountain several times, but the only thing I can remember doing is taking the tram, climbing the mountain, and watching the laser light show. There is a lot more to do now, inculding this thing called Sky Hike.  It looks like a lot of fun.

On Sunday, we are going to China Town.  There are a lot of China shops in Columbia, but not like there is in Atlanta.  We’ll stock up on all the goodies we haven’t had in a long time, and then come back home.  I’m really excited.  This weekend should be fun.

I was looking through some of the videos of my past visits to Turner Field, and I found this one.  90 feet is a lot longer than it looks like on TV.  And yes, I was the only one over 10 participating.  🙂

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hdMqkKaLdp8[/youtube]

I’ve written about the paper making village I visited while I lived in Fuyang, China, before, but I never put up the videos. You can see those posts about the village here, here, and here(but the slide show died – sorry).

Enjoy!

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I0mrD80MelA[/youtube]

Here we have step one.  My voice over should cover all the bases.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=goD2PdHFlBo[/youtube]

Here we have part two. They take the smashed bits of paper and throw it into the water to be filtered out one sheet at a time. I wonder how much those guys get paid.  Surely, not enough.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wCEKbDIa3Bk[/youtube]

Here we have part three.  After they have made the sheets, they have to dry them.  They put them up on a very hot surface and “iron” them until they are dry.  Later, they cut it and then either paint on it or turn it into books. Pretty interesting process.

I was invited to my school to judge an English competition on my birthday. At the end several students and teachers sang songs. They asked me to sing, too. I don’t know any songs by heart, especially with out the music, so I sang Take Me Out to the Ball Game. Laugh if you will, I was just having some fun.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jdTdQCchyIk[/youtube]