Night Street Vendor

If you wake up on the floor of a random bathroom, and you see a trashcan with a strainer attached to it, odds are you are in China.

I don’t feel like writing, so I’ll just post pictures instead.  Here’s to making it 365 days in a row.

Bring Your Baby Bike to Work Day

Blogging . . . it used to be a part of my daily routine and then I got lazy.  Well, now I don’t have any excuses.  I’m not bouncing around the globe, I’m not attending a funeral or mourning my loss anymore, I’m not standing at an alter saying, “I do”, and I am most certainly not working.  So, what else do I have time for?  Pretty much anything that I want. And for the most part that has included sleeping late, watching season and after season of whatever TV show I downloaded, and making sure that dinner is cooked for my hubby when he finally gets home after a long day behind the desk.  But those aren’t the only things going on in here in Shanghai.

Since I have moved to Shanghai, China, a lot has happened.

On my second day here, my flipping wallet was stolen.  All in all they didn’t get much, but they did get five crisp 100 yuan bills, my US and Chinese debit card, credit card, traveler check receipts, a whole section of business cards of people I don’t really know, the USC staff card I liked to use to get discounts at movie theaters and the like, my driver license(that had a good picture on it!) and random mementos that I’ve carried in my wallet for way too long.  Most of what was stolen can be replaced.  The major pain was having to call and get everything canceled and knowing that it was probably going to be a complete bitch getting access to 8000 yuan I still had left from Linyi.  Why, would that be difficult you ask?  Well, it’s simple really.  China wouldn’t be China if everything was easy.  As much as the lack of ease irks me here in China, I do suppose that it is part of the reason it keeps me here.  I know, I am completely retarded.

As soon as I realized that my wallet had been stolen, the first thought that popped into my head besides, “Oh, shit, oh, shit”, was the Ben Ross post I read several years ago.  His wallet wasn’t stolen, but it might have well have been.  He just forgot his pass code.  You can read all about it here, here, here, and here.  It’s a lot of reading, but worth it.  The memory of this post put the fear of God in me.  I was almost certain I was gonna be screwed eight ways to Sunday.

I did the proper thing after I realized my wallet was gone.  Teary-eyed(me, not Phil), Phil and I found a police officer and in broken Chinese told him what had happened.  He told us to follow him and so we did.  I don’t think he told us where he was taking us and if he did the Chinese was lost on us.   All I knew was that he was walking us away from the possible scene of the crime.  He guided us, silently, across several busy streets and eventually turned down a very dark and quite alley.  For one paranoid, horror-esque moment, I thought he was guiding us to our doom.  I’ve seen to many movies for my own good.  In my defense, I was tired, angry as a bee hive that has been poked with a stick, and worried sick about how I was going to survive in Shanghai until all this was resolved.  You need money to live after all.

The police officer finally parked his bicycle in front of building and pointed that we should go in.  Surprise, surprise, he had taken us to a police station.  He told us to wait while he went and talked to a few of the other officers.  In a small, windowless back room, I could see about 7 officers chain smoking.  A wall of smoke continuously wafted out.  When one officer put out his cigarette and left, another officer would replace him.  Not a single one of them stepped through the door frame holding a cigarette.  It was obviously the designated smoking area.  I didn’t know China had designated smoking areas.

Finally, a guy came over to me and asked in Chinese if I had a Chinese friend that he could call.  Apparently, of all the officers present, not a one of them spoke enough English for me to file a report.  If this had happened in Linyi or Fuyang, or any other small city I have lived in or visited, I would have expected as much.  I guess I thought Shanghai would have more officers that could communicate with foreigners on some level at least, and especially so soon after the Expo had finished.    I thought wrong.  I was very lucky that I did indeed have a local Chinese friend to call.  Amanda(Zhang Yun Jing) has been so very helpful to both me and Phil since we have arrived.  I hated to call her so late, but it was the only way the officers were going to be able to communicate with me.  I figured they would just use Amanda as a translator, so I waited patiently while they talked to one another.   When the guy hung up the phone without handing it back to me, I was confused.  I immediately called Amanda back and asked her what was going on.

“I am coming to you,” she said.

“But it is 11:00 p.m. and you live so far away.  You don’t need to come all the way here.  I just want them to know my wallet was stolen, so that if it is somehow found that they can give it back to me.”

“No, it is okay.  We are friends.”

At this point, I had only met with her three times.  We spent two days together looking for an apartment in December and then earlier that day, I had seen her at Phil’s work.  She was helping us get our paperwork in order.  I tried very hard to convince her that she really didn’t need to travel 30 minutes across town, but it was no use.  She was my friend, and friends help friends in times of need.

Phil and I sat and waited while our ice cream cones melted.  We had forgotten we had bought them with all the insanity.  I refused to let mine go to waste and slurped mine out of its wrapper.  It dripped all over me and I didn’t care.

When Amanda arrived about 45 minutes later, we found a police officer who sat down with us to write up a report.  He asked the normal questions – where did I think I was when my wallet was stolen, when did I realize it was missing, what was in my wallet, and how to contact me if my wallet was found or if they had any further questions.  This took about 30 minutes.  They told me if I was sure it was taken at Carrefour, a store a lot like Wal-Mart, they would review the tapes, but there was no way I could know for sure if it was or not.  It could have happened in several different places.  They took all of my information, typed it up and gave me a copy.  It was my first and hopefully, last Chinese police report.

As we walked back down the dark and now even quieter alley, I thanked Amanda repeatedly for all she had done.  I even got a little emotional when I told her how happy I was to have a friend like her because g0od friends, not just in China, are hard to come by.  She told me that I did not have to thank her because I was her friend and that she was very happy to be there for me.  I hugged her and off she went.

Phil and I went home and promptly crashed.  It had been a long day.  I probably should have looked for the number to my bank then, but I was just too tired to think about it.  It was the first thing I did when I woke up the next day, though.

After finding the English hot-line number to the China Construction Bank and telling them that my wallet was stolen(fairly easy), they froze my account so that the stupid pick pocket couldn’t attempt to withdraw my small chunk of change, after verifying who I was.  They wanted to know how much money I thought I had, when the last time I used it, and my name of course.  Since I did not know my card number, I had to provide my passport number.

I asked the guy on the phone how I would be able to get what money I had left out and he told me what I feared. He said that I would have to go back to the China Construction Bank branch where I opened my account to unfreeze my account and to have a new card issued.  I told him I didn’t care about the card, that I just wanted my money, but he said that was what I had to do.  This wouldn’t be much of a problem if I was still living in Linyi, but I wasn’t.  Linyi is about 10 hours away by bus and depending on when you buy a plane ticket, it can cost anywhere between 370 to 800 yuan to fly there – one way.  Of course, to fly I would need my passport, and Phil’s work was still in possession of it at the time, and without the ability to get to my money, it would be difficult to pay for the stupid ticket.  I could have used what money Phil had left on his Chinese debit card or had him take money out his US accounts, but I refused to go that route.

The next day, I decided to call the hot-line number again, to see if there was someone else I could talk to – maybe there was another way.  I talked to a woman and told her my situation.  She asked where I was living and gave me the address to a near by branch that should be able to able to help me.  This seemed promising and made me happy.

Almost a month later, I finally made my way to the branch the woman had told me to go to.  Why did it take me so long?  Well, Chinese New Year happened, it took almost three weeks to get my passport back, we were really busy getting settled, I kept forgetting about it, and perhaps it was that I didn’t want to have to deal with what was most likely to come.  But if I wanted my money, I would just have walk the walk and deal with it.

With my passport in hand, Phil and I jumped in a taxi and rode to the bank.   I think the taxi guy took us to the wrong branch because the numbers on the building didn’t match the ones I had written down.  We walked in anyway.  In a lot of banks here, they have a machine that gives you a number and you have to wait until your number is called.  There were 25 people in front of us.  Not too bad, really.

My main worry was that I wouldn’t be able to communicate with anyone at the bank and that I would just be screwed.  I brought my police report hoping that would help.  I showed it to the guy who greeted me at the door and he gave me a paper to fill out.  Of course, it was all in Chinese, so I had a really difficult time filling in all the blanks.  Another guy tried to help a little, but most of the form was left blank.

We sat down and waited, watching the numbers tick away.  About 20 minutes later, a guard came over and tapped me on the shoulder.  He reached down and took the number I was holding in my hand.  I was confused why he was taking it because my number had not been called yet.  He pointed over to the side where some other consulting areas were located and I saw a woman getting her area ready.  I put two and two together and walked over and sat in the chair in front of the desk.

Since I hadn’t heard her talk yet, I wasn’t sure if I should speak  in English or my broken Chinese.  I went with the good ole’, “Ni hao”(hello in Chinese).

“Hello,” she said back to me in perfect English.  “How may I help you.”  This made me smile.  Maybe it wouldn’t be that hard after all.

I explained my situation to her and handed over my passport and my police report just in case.  It seemed that she had experience in this and started pulling out several forms that I would need to fill out.  I must have signed my name no less than ten times.  Just like on the phone, I had to answer questions about my account to prove that is was me.  She was just about down with all the paperwork when Phil suggested that I mentioned that the card I lost was issued to me in Linyi and ask if it was still possible.  So, I did.

As soon as I asked, her eyes seemed to get bigger or maybe it was just my imagination.

“Linyi?” She repeated.  “No, that is not possible.”

My heart sank.

“It has to be from Shanghai.”

“Well, it’s not,” I said.  “Can I at least get my money?”

She looked at me and you could tell she was thinking really hard by the way her eyes moved.  “I don’t know.  We have never done that before.  Please wait while I talk to my manager.”  I felt like I had been put on hold and that any minute a stupid ditty would start playing.

As she walked away, I crossed my fingers and prayed to every Chinese God there ever was, specifically, Guanyin, the goddess of mercy.

After she talked to her manager, they disappeared around a corner for a while.  The woman came back with what seemed to be more paperwork and handed it to another man sitting behind one of the main desks.  They talked for awhile and then he sat the paperwork aside.  He fiddled with something on his computer screen and then waved me over.  I looked over at all the other people waiting patiently and wondered if they were mad that I had skipped ahead a few places.  No one threw anything at me or yelled any insults my way, so I guess they didn’t mind all that much.

The man before me asked me a bunch of the same questions about my account, making sure once again that I was indeed who I said I was.  Hey, at least they are cautious.  His fingers danced across his key board for a long while before he spoke to me again.

“Okay,” he said.  “Forget about your account.  It does not exist anymore.”  My heart stopped.  “If you want you can open a new account later.”  Still no heart beat.  I was beginning to get  a little light headed.  “I can give you the money remaining in your account,” he said, and my heart fluttered back to life.  “But,” he continued, and my heart flat lined again, “I will need to charge you 25 yuan for losing your card.”

“Oh, that is fine!”  I probably sounded hysterical, but I was so happy.  My heart almost leapt out of my chest and hugged him.

He just looked at me and then said, “That will be 20 yuan, please.”

“Oh, yeah, sure.”  I opened up my purse to look for some money, but all I had was a few yuan and some lint.  I looked over my shoulder at Phil waiting patiently on a metal stool.  “Please tell me you have 20 yuan.”

Phil reached into his wallet and handed me the most beautiful 20 yuan note I have ever seen in my entire life.  I snatched hit out of his hand and quickly shoved it into the metal tray so the guy could get it.

“But just forget about your account,” he said, taking the 20 yuan bill into his possession.  “It doesn’t exist anymore.”

Ten minutes later, after counting and recounting, I had my money and I didn’t have to go all the way to Linyi to get it.  I danced out the bank’s doors.  Everyone thought I was nuts, but I really didn’t care.

Life may not always be easy in China, but man, when things go smoother than you expect, it makes you giggle like a school girl.  And now that I have written a short story and bored all of you to tears, I am going to jet.  And since the secret it is out and I don’t have any more excuses, I’ll be more of a regular here from now on.  Next time, I’ll try to post some pictures or something.

I love to write/type and talk about how interesting/crazy my life is or can be, but for the longest time, I have had zero desire to say anything about China.  I have had a lot of great experiences, seen a lot of cool stuff, eaten very strange foods and taken a lot of pretty pictures, but I just can’t seem to get myself in front of the computer long enough to write something for the amusement of the world.

Is the world even still there?

I am hoping I can get over this stupid blog flu soon, as there are a lot of new and exciting things about to happen in my life.  For one, Phil and I are moving to Shanghai in January, and to top things off, we are making a quick stop back home to get hitched.  I’ll get in to all that later . . . but for now what do you guys think about using the following picture as the engagement photo in the newspaper? 🙂  I think it is perfect! It would make people reading The State Newspaper say, “What?!”

FYI, that is the stupid horse that decided it would be cool to roll me.  It wasn’t.  Thankfully, he didn’t hurt me.

I’ll be sure to sleep a lot and drink a lot of fluids so that I can get over this blog flu soon.  World, if you are there, don’t delete me from you bookmarks just yet. I’ll be back and be better than ever before too long.

There is no use in apologizing, so I’m not even going to try.  Let’s face it.  I suck at blogging.

I will however play the blame game.  The internet here just blows.  Some days it works and other days, well, it doesn’t.  What is a blogger to do?

Well, tomorrow is our last day and then it is VACATION TIME!!  A whole two months worth.  Why can’t we have awesome vacations like that in the States?  Oh, wait, we do, but you have to be teacher.  Hrm.  I suppose possibly being knifed or shot could almost be worth two months of vacation, but not quite.  🙂

Our vacation is going to go something like this:

Linyi to Shanghai – Stay in Shanghai for 3 days, possibly see the Expo, get some good food.

Shanghai to Hangzhou – Spend a few days in Hangzhou, reminisce, eat some Dairy Queen.  Yum.

Hangzhou to Fuyang – Hang out with our good friend Jin for a few days and reminisce some more.  I am sure Fuyang has changed a lot since we left.

Fuyang back to Hangzhou – Catch a train or bus to Nanjing and see what Bo and Nashville have been talking about.

Nanjing to Guilin – We have to take a plane.  There is no way I am spending 24 hours on a train, even if it is a few hundred yuan cheaper.  Stay a night or hop on the first bus to Yangshuo.

Guilin to Yangshuo – Relax for a week and take in the sights.  Yanghshuo is mostly definitely the most beautiful place I have ever seen in China. Phil did say he would foot the bill if we stayed longer . . . so who knows how long we will stay.

Yangshuo back to Guilin – Catch a train, bus or plane to Kunming. I hear it is a pretty nice place.  It will be the first time Phil and I have been there.

Kunming to Dali – Once again, I have heard nice things and we have never been there before. It is always nice to adventure and see new places.

If at this point we aren’t completely broke, we may try to make our way to Qingdao, spend a few days there, experience Beer Street and then come back home to ever so wonderful Linyi.  If everything costs what we think it is going to cost, we are going to have to eat rice and noodles and nothing else for an entire month before we get paid again.  🙂

Okay, moving on . . . Last weekend Phil decided it was time to have a new Chinese experience.  So, we went to the massage parlor down the street and while I got a standard oil massage, he got ba guan.  Ba guan is when the chinese take glass cups, light them on fire, and then stick them to your back – 16 of them to be exact.  They suck up your skin and break every blood vessel known to man.  After 5 or 10 minutes, they take them off.  It looks something like this . . .

Since I was getting a massage, I couldn’t take a picture of the glass cups on Phil’s back, but I took a picture of a friend who did it a week or so ago.  It was her first and last time.  I have no idea how she got the courage to do it.  There is no way in a happy hell that I would ever submit to it.

And this is what it looked like after Phil had his little procedure.  It looks likes someone either sucker punched him over and over again or took a purple marker and went to town.

A close up of the damage . . .

And another . . .

I don’t think that Phil will be getting it done again any time soon.  And not because it hurt, at least he said it didn’t, but because he didn’t really feel he benefited from it.  It is supposed to suck out the toxins from your body.  They tell you not to take a shower for 24 hours afterward, but I am not totally sure of the reason.

Oh, and although this has nothing to do with vacation or self-induced pain, I thought I would post it any way.

There is an Australian in our building who has decided to turn the roof into his very own garden/farm.  He recently just added 4 baby chicks that he will either use for eggs or if they suck at that, he’s gonna eat them.  I really hope they are great egg layers.

Here they are . . .

When he tends to the garden, he lets them out of their cage so they can run around.  They run so fast.  He says they are easy to catch and put back, but I don’t know if I believe him.

And the garden . . .

If I have internet connection during our travels, I will try my best to keep whoever it that reads this blog of mine up-to-date.  I can hardly wait.  This vacation is going to be a blast!

I started going through some of my old videos tonight, and sadly, there just aren’t many worth showing.  There is this one video of Phil and I singing the Ghostbuster’s theme song at KTV in Shanghai, but Phil won’t let me post it. Maybe if enough of you ask nicely, he’ll cave and allow me to embarrass the both of us.

I was however able to find a video that showcases the largest lit up Coca-Cola bottle that I have ever seen.  The angle of course blows.  Phil forgot that his camera didn’t adjust, at least, that is what I am assuming.

I’ll keep looking for some videos to share and try thinking of something interesting to say here in the next few days.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SxD-SyOQoNc[/youtube]

While we are on the subject of pets, I want to mention two certain someones I have failed to ever talk about on this little blog of mine. Why has it taken me this long? I don’t know. In the beginning I guess I was too upset. After that I guess I just had other things to talk about and eventually their pictures just got lost in the sea of all the others somewhere on my C drive. I think that is where they are stashed. So, here is there long over due featurette – the short story of my beloved Gloria and Eduardo.

For our National Week vacation in 2006, we decided to go to Shanghai since it was so close and on our to-do-list. I have several posts that mention our week there. You can go here, here, here, or even here to read about them. Even before I got to Shanghai, there was one thing I wanted to do because of something I had seen on ETV right before leaving. On the episode, they talked about all the things you could do in and around Shanghai and also mentioned some of the old traditions still popular.

And that was how I found out that it was possible to buy crickets as pets or as prize fighters. Yes, prize fighters. And yes, when I say crickets, I’m talking about the insect that chirps us through summer and the little guys that you see hopping through your front yard as you try to mow down the mile high grass you let grow far beyond what it should. Well, these are more of the green variety(not the common black ones that we are familiar with), but you understand.

I guess one could compare this act of aggression to dog fighting, except neither one of the cricket dies in the act of fighting. The weakest just gives up and cowers in the corner. This is what the TV show told me anyhow. Somehow or another, this sport became very popular and the crickets also became a symbol of luck for the Chinese.

Now wait, don’t go getting your ahead of yourself. I didn’t want to go buy a cricket to fight. I would never ever want to do that. But, you see, I’ve owned just about every kind of animal you can buy at a local pet shop, but I’ve never been able to buy a cricket, so I had to use this opportunity to add another weird creature to the big ol‘ long list of pets I’ve had during my interesting life. And that is exactly what I did.

After a day or so of being in Shanghai, I met up with fellow blogger, Louise, and she showed me around Shanghai and took me to some cool places that I other wise would have never found. After a fabulous lunch in expat central, where I had my first BLT in what at the time felt like ages, she took me to a pet market where they indeed had crickets as well as half a dozen other creatures for sell.

It wasn’t long until I found what I was looking for. Several vendors had stands set up with individual crickets in clear jars. It was pretty cool to hear so many crickets, with so many different songs, at one time. But man, they were noisy.

You wouldn’t think it would be so difficult picking out a cricket, but it was. I investigated each jar at several of the vendors to make sure I got the best, most healthy cricket. In the end though, it was the cricket that one of the vendors took out of a roll of newspaper and tossed on the table that I decided to buy. After Louise used the Chinese that she knew, which is so much more than mine, I agreed to pay the 30 yuan for the silent green cricket sitting ever so still on the counter. I had hoped that the vendor would have let us bargain, but she/he, I can’t remember now, wouldn’t budge. I paid the 30 yuan anyway and took off with my new cricket in hand.

The only thing my new cricket needed was a name. We talked about it for several minutes. Louise said that she(we decided that it was a she) it needed to be named after a good female artist since she was a natural singer after all. It was Louise who thought of it. And that is how my little cricket got the name Gloria. Louise got me a taxi and off she went in the other direction.

The entire way back to the Koala Youth Hostel where Phil and I were staying, Gloria didn’t make a sound. I figured she was just scared and that she would sing when she was ready. I didn’t think much of it at the time. Phil was still at the hostel because he was sick. I was going to give him Gloria as a part gag gift and a get well even though I knew it would be me taking care of her. When I got there I had Phil try to guess what I had bought him. When he asked if it was a live and I said yes, he looked all worried and said, “You didn’t buy me a cat did you?” He’s allergic.

“No, silly, I bought you a cricket!” I said pulling out Gloria from behind my back.

“A what?”

“A cricket. Meet Gloria.”

And that is when I decided to do something stupid. I decided to take Gloria out of her little jar.

“OWWWW!” I screamed.

“What?” Phil asked.

“She bit me!”

I had no idea that crickets could bite and actually hurt, but man, I found out really quick. Crickets have strong little jaws. It didn’t break the skin or anything. But OW! It hurt! Poor little Gloria got flung across the room. Phil and I spent the next hour holding her and trying to get her used to us so that she wouldn’t try to bite me again. We even fed her. Crickets eat beans that look a lot like Lima beans and come in long fuzzy pods. She must have been starving because she woofed down her bean in no time flat.

Gloria sitting on my arm.

Only once or twice did Gloria try to jump away. Beside that, she sat very still in the palm of my hand. A few times she tried crawling up to my shoulder. It was if she didn’t know how to jump. I guess if I had lived in a rolled up piece of paper all my life, I wouldn’t know how to either. She was a tame cricket. The only tame cricket I had ever seen.

For the next 24 or 48 hours(I can’t recall how long it was now), Gloria didn’t make a sound. I was beginning to think that I had bought a broken cricket. So, to make sure she wasn’t completely broken, I convinced Phil that I wanted to buy her a friend and see if she just needed a companion.

Lucky for us, Phil’s friend and old roommate from college was in Shanghai the same week we were and was able to take us back to the pet market before we had to leave. And that is when we bought our second cricket, Eduardo. I actually got him for cheaper, for some reason, maybe perhaps because he came with his own little jar or maybe he was older or a different type of cricket. Who knows. I think I paid either 10 or 20 yuan for him. It’s been too long to remember exactly. I knew for a fact that he knew how to chirp. I heard him.

It wasn’t more than a few hours of putting the two of them together that the chirping began. It went on and on and on and on and didn’t seem like it would ever stop. Buying two crickets to talk to one another was probably the stupidest thing I could of thought of doing. The rest of the time in Shanghai and for the rest of their short lives- we didn’t get a lot of sleep. I can remember screaming “Shut up” a lot during their lives. It’s amazing how loud they could be.

Taking them back on the train was particularly funny. Before we had got on, I had told Gloria and Edwardo that they had to be quiet as if they could understand me. I didn’t want to get kicked of the train because of bringing crickets on board. To make sure they didn’t chirp I rattled the cages a little bit every once in a while. They were pretty quiet there for the first thirty minutes or so and then they started.

“Shhhh,” I whispered into their cages. “Please be quiet.”

Ah, but it didn’t matter. The other Chinese passengers had heard and now they wanted to see what the laowai had with her. I reluctantly pulled them out of the bag I was carrying them in and placed their little cages on the table. The Chinese ewwwed and awwwed. Some asked how much I paid for them and where I got them. They thought it was really cool, so I no longer feared my crickets being taken away from me.

For the next three months, all was great. I fed Gloria and Eduardo their beans, gave them little treats I had picked up in Shanghai, and gave them fresh water every day. When we would have parties, I would take out Gloria and make her the smash hit of the party. She would sit in the small of my fist and make her rounds like a good cricket. Everyone thought I was crazy to have a cricket as pet, but they all wanted to hold her just the same.

Toward the end of the three months, I could tell they were getting old. They weren’t chirping as loud or as long. Their songs weren’t as vibrant as when I first got them. I knew that they wouldn’t be with me much longer.

One morning, late in December, Phil and I got up a little early because we wanted to go to Longmen Village, an old Chinese city built in the Ming dynasty. The night before, there was a party held at our place – I forget the occasion. It was probably someones birthday or something like that. I had done my normal thing and carried Gloria around introducing her to all the guests. All seemed normal at the time. But when I got up that morning and went into her room, I could tell something was wrong. She was laying a little on her side and there was a little blood on the paper towel lining the bottom of her cage. When I picked her up I knew immediately that she was dying. She bit me. Not nearly as hard as the first time three months ago, but enough to get my attention. She was scared and confused. She didn’t know who I was.

I spent the next two hours letting her sit on my hand and I’ll admit it, I cried. I know that she was just a cricket, but I still felt helpless that I couldn’t help her fell better. So, I let her sit out in the sun with two little beans beside her and put on a collection of music for her to listen to. I made sure that it would continue playing no matter how late we got back from Longmen Village.

When we got back, she was lifeless. She was dead. I cried some more.

A day later, Eduardo died too. I like to think that he died of a broken heart.

With both of their bodies in a box, we carried them over to a pretty park with lots of trees behind the high school. It was a pretty park, and mostly quiet due to few people walking through it. The park was hilly, if not a little mountainous for Fuyang, so we found the highest peak, Phil dug the hole, and then we put both of them in together.

I said farewell to Gloria and Eduardo and cried all the way back home.

I never thought I would be able to say this, but I was the proud owner of the sweetest, cutest, crickets, a person could ever have. I often think of them when I’m falling asleep at night and can here their cousins chirp me to sleep. I’ll probably never think or see crickets the same way again. Go ahead and think me crazy if you wish, but I can’t help loving all animals and insects. It’s just who I am.

I miss them.

This is a bit on the late side of things, but hey, late is better than never. These pictures of course come from the time we spent in Shanghai during the National Holiday – aka The Golden Week. Since pictures say a thousand words – I’ll keep this nice and short.

A common thing you’ll see in China is the way garbage is carted away. If it isn’t the little garbage truck that sings “Happy Birthday” over and over again it’s the cart/bike you see stacked as high as possible with trash. When I took this picture, the guy peddling it down the street was aware that I was about burn his image into my memory card for all eternity, so I had wait until he was blocked by the cardboard box. People make me nervous when they know I’m taking their picture and I’m sure that feeling is vice versa. On average, I see about ten of these a day. I always think they are going to topple over because they have so much stuff on them.

It doesn’t matter where you go in Shanghai – this is the scene you will encounter on every street corner. Shanghai is something like 8 times bigger than New York City. If I ever make my way there, NYC will look like a small but busy ant hill.

Nanjing Road, and all of its madness, is a long pedestrian road in Shanghai. Once was really enough for me because it’s just one big, expensive name brand store after another and more people bombarding you than you can shake a stick at. It was a sea of black heads all around me. I’m just glad that I was taller than most of them so I could see what was to come. If you look closely you can see the KFC sign on the right.

It was a little like being in Vegas. This is just one of the buildings on Nanjing Road. At night, the entire road is lit up and it’s very beautiful. At about 10 or so at night they turn off all of the lights to save energy. I wonder if they do the same in Vegas. I had some pictures of the Bund(another touristy place in Shangahai) as well, but they came out all fuzzy and blurry. My camera doesn’t like taking night photos. This one didn’t turn out so bad, though.

And this here is how the Chinese keep out people they don’t want coming onto their property. I ran into a lot of things jumping fences when I was meter reader, but I never came across glass shards. I’ve actually seen this quite a bit in China. Hey, if it works, use it.