My No-Turkey Turkey Day

Happy Thanksgiving to you all.

I didn't quite know how my Thanksgiving was going to turn out since every one had a different idea about what was going to happen. Some went to the beer festival, and some went to Mrs. Liew's house opening. I didn't want to do either of these on Thanksgiving. Brenda said she was just going to stay home and make something to eat. So I said I'd join her, and we prepared Mexican food! It was so great, cuz my totally awesome sister sent me a package that arrived exactly on time. I got it the day of. And it contained taco seasoning and a little can of cranberry sauce! So we had beans, rice, tomatoes, onions, peppers, and a dash of lime. For wrappers we used fried dumpling wrappers! We invited Nigel, the Englishman. He had never celebrated Thanksgiving before, so was interested to see what it was all about. And he's not really familiar with Mexican food either, so it was an interesting experience for all of us! It's not turkey or pumpkin pie, but it was a nice change from the everyday Chinese cuisine. The cranberry sauce for desert was like a tast of home. So delightful... once we got it open that is! Yeah, it's really hard to come by a can opener here. They rarely eat anything out of a can, so it's uncommon. We pryed it open with a dull knife! I have pictures of the mangled can, illustrating our desperation to open that small taste of home!

It was great after dinner. We watched a "Friends" episode about Thanksgiving, then played games... just like home. I taught them how to play pounce! Yay! It was difficult with just the three of us. Plus the only table we had was really small. So we gave up on that and played Cribbage instead, which was just as fun. Oddly enough it is an English game, I'm sure, but Nigel had never played. He loved it. We don't have a peg board, so we drew one, and marked dots along the way as we made points. It was such fun. Not as fun as it wouldn't been at home, of course, but it was better then I expected.

Today after classes, the students had English performances. We were to be the judges. Their performances before were Chinese, these were centered around English, and we judged them on their pronunciation, performance, content, etc. Performances included skits, poems, songs, and dramas. My students did a version of Snow White. It was halarious. A boy played snow white, and the dialogue was so goofy. They did a great job with their English. Their other attempt was not so great. They did a Beijing Opera version in English, but couldn't understand a thing. Once again my batteries failed half way through on my camera so I couldn't take many pictures. I had a friend buy some during, but they were so cheap. Didn't work. So if any one wants to send me anything for Christmas I'd love another pair of Energizer rechargeable AA batteries!

After the performance four of us went to eat some good western style food. I had some pork chops. I ate so much! Later we were just walking a talking along the "walking street." There are many elderly people doing TaiChi there. Many beggars. Some children do acrobatics begging for money. Every where we go, every place we stop, we gather a crowd. It's like we are the main attraction. You'd think after being here for three months already people would get over it. But it's always the same. People just have to stop and stare. Arg. Anyway, so Martin sees this guy doing TaiChi all by himself. He's got the whole Chinese gettup goin on, and he really looks like he knows his stuff. So Martin wants to ask this guy for TaiChi lessons. The guy accepts, and we chat with him through an interpreter about how he has like 50 students, and how they participate in TaiChi competitions all over China, and he's got pictures on the walls in his shop. The coolest part is his lessons are free for the first few lessons incase we decide it's not for us. Then he tells us that lessons are at 6:30am... A M !!! Ok, some of you may not realize... but this is stinkin early for me. It's really hard for me to do this. But it sounds so cool. So, tomorrow morning, I'm going to be up early and do this thing. I'm going to try to get some pictures for those of you who don't know what TaiChi is.

So, speaking of 6:30 AM... I'm going to crash. G'night!