I've been getting bugged about updating this blog for quite some time now. It all comes down to my dislike of writing. It isn't fun. That's it. People tell me, "but your blog is so much fun to read. You have to keep it going." To that I say of course it's fun to read, you don't have to write it. Do you go to a book store and buy a book when you want to read or do you write your own? I'm guessing neither because you probably just download one, but my point is you probably don't write your own. Listen here loyal readers, I'm sorry I'm so good at something I don't really like. Call it my curse. I'm willing to set these differences aside every now and again because I'm first and foremost extremely humble, and I care about my fans. So here you go.
I'm writing this on a flight from Kunming to Hong Kong en-route to Singapore. Kate and the boys are in Dallas. I was supposed to to be two weeks into a hiking trip through the Nujiang Valley, but after being delayed for a week and then waiting another four days for my friend to arrive on stand-by flights, the trip was finally canceled. Rather than hanging around in an empty house for an additional two weeks, I took a friend's advice and decided to hop a flight to Singapore to visit a friend from the Rugby team. If it all works out, I'll even have a chance to swing by Arby's in Hong Kong during my layover. That's the real reason for the trip. I'll be considered a success in the Olmsted program if I learn to say "Cheddar Melt with horsey sauce" in Chinese.
One benefit of this trip is that I was able to give the new Kunming International Airport (KIA?) a test run. It just opened on the 28th of June after months of delays. It's a pretty impressive structure. It now ranks as China's fourth-largest airport. The new baggage claim area is bigger than the entire structure at the old airport. Unfortunately, it gives a bit of a false first impression of Kunming. The new airport is ultra-modern, clean, and well-planned. Kunming, however, is still working towards hyphenated adjective status beyond that of "in-progress" and "under-construction." Additionally, there are still very few mass transit options to the new airport. You can take a bus for 20 RMB, but be prepared for the 40km trip to take up to two hours. You can take the first leg of the Kunming metro to open, but that only gets you to a bus station 20 minutes outside of town. Private drivers that used to charge 50 RMB to the old airport now charge 170 RMB for a trip to the new location. I've also heard that cab drivers refuse to use their meters for trips to the new airport. If I had kept up with this blog, you would know by now that crooked cab drivers who refuse to use their meters are my arch-nemesis here in China.
Anyway, the new airport is pretty impressive if not still extremely Chinese. What makes it Chinese? The international has almost nothing in it. It has about ten different duty free shops, three off-brand coffee shops, and one tiny restaurant called the "Lucky Shamrock" that claims to specialize in steak and coffee. In the U.S., I would say that's awesome, but in China it sounds more like a week-long love affair with a toilet. Additionally, and I don't know why I expected it to be different, but a new airport doesn't mean new behavior. People continue to crowd into as small a space as possible and call it "standing in line." I'm on a plane with about 30 people that are part of some sort of tourist group. They're all wearing yellow vests, armbands, and hats like they're part of some sort of road cleanup crew. Additionally, it appeared that they were all given a plastic bag with a hard-boiled egg when they arrived at the airport which they all chose to eat slowly, and sloppily while waiting for the plane to arrive. Nothing makes waiting for a late plane bearable like a bunch of old Chinese people slobbering stinky hard-boiled eggs all over themselves.
So that's where I am right now. Maybe I'll write more, and maybe I won't. I have an Olmsted Scholar report due at the end of next week so that will probably make me hate writing again for another few months. However, you never know. With the school year over maybe I'll write more. Now I know how Harper Lee felt after writing To Kill a Mockingbird. Such is my gift.....and my curse. Oh the irony.
Thursday, July 5, 2012
Tuesday, November 22, 2011
Airline Thanksgiving, Rugby, and the Attack of the 22 lb. Fire-Chicken
Happy Thanksgiving from China! We hope everybody had a great holiday weekend, and I know we have quite a bit to be thankful for. Most of all (after family, health, etc.) we have our household goods. The boys have been thoroughly enjoying all of the toys they forgot they had. Thanks to the fact that the only children's movie we had with us for almost 3 full months was Cars, Stephen has been carrying his toy cars with him everywhere. He even started naming them after people we've met since we arrived. His other favorite toy is anything that David happens to be playing with. David seems to be the more reasonable of the two. Once Stephen takes his toy, he cries for a little bit just to make sure we know what happened so Stephen gets in trouble, and then he grabs one of the other million toys we have. Please understand we don't spoil our children. At times, we have even told Stephen's and David's grandparents and aunts and uncles to stop buying them toys. Apparently though, a grandparent has as hard of a time understanding that as I do understanding my classes over here. In some cases they instead hear, "please go buy our son the loudest toy you can find that doesn't have an 'off' switch." David is particularly fond of a little plastic parrot that he found in a Go Diego Go play set. He's been carrying it around the house like a little Coco-B-Ware since it got here. If you get that reference, you get free membership to this blog's premium content. If you didn't get the reference, you still get access to the premium content, but you have to live with feeling like you didn't really earn it.
Anyway, we pulled off Thanksgiving on Thursday and it went pretty well. With a few exceptions such as purple sweet potatoes, a pumpkin pie that was more crust than filling, and none of the cranberries that keep the shape of the can they were in, we had a pretty traditional Western Thanksgiving. We did a late dinner because one of our friends had to work and didn't get done teaching until 6pm. We were hoping to get some of my classmates involved, but none were too keen on partaking of our fire-chicken. The Chinese word for turkey is huoji (火鸡) which literally translates to "fire chicken" which makes it sounds awesome. You would think with a name that awesome, everybody would want a taste, but I think there are several issues. The first is the majority of my classmates are mostly girls who are 10 to 12 years younger than me. Secondly, at least here in Kunming, there is very little interaction between students outside of class. We had one social event in the anthropology department where the Chinese Communist Youth League sponsored a picnic. Technically I guess that makes it less a social event and more of a socialist event, but it still counts. Other than that everybody seems to pretty much keep to themselves. Another factor was that the one class I have with classmates that are more outgoing and who would be interested in having Thanksgiving dinner meets on Thursday afternoons from 2pm to 6pm and the campus an hour outside of town. I went ahead and played the American Card and took a 4-day weekend, but most other students here don't have that option. Lack of cross-cultural interaction aside, we still had a pretty good dinner. I was able to find a store where you could sign up and order a frozen turkey imported from the United States. Initially I didn't realize it was going to be shipped in from the U.S. so I had visions of a turkey showing up with feathers and all (think the duck from A Christmas Story) so I factored that into the weight. Everybody else had signed up for 12 to 13kg birds so I took a more conservative route and ordered a 10kg bird. Turns out the birds were imported from the U.S. and were the same as the ones you'd pick up at any supermarket, meaning we ended up with a bird weighing somewhere around 22 pounds. Even after giving our friends quite a bit to take home, we still have close to 10 pounds left so it looks like we have a lot of turkey sandwiches in our future. Luckily, imported turkey is more reasonably priced than cheese so I still feel like we got a pretty good deal. Additionally I'll get to eat leftovers for quite a while so I get cold turkey sandwiches for lunch as long as it lasts. The only downside will be having to quit cold turkey once it runs out.
Thanksgiving was so good on Thursday that we decided to do it again on Friday. Kate got an invitation from some of the families in a mothers' group she attends to eat Thanksgiving with them also. This was great until a few days after she accepted when she received an e-mail telling her that aside from having to bring a side dish, we would also be expected to pay for a share of the turkey they bought. Now, these families are all really nice people, and I understand that we're a little better off over here than most American families because of the military benefits we receive. I also understand that imported turkey is expensive (we paid almost $100 U.S. dollars for ours) and a lot for one family to pay if there aren't going to be any leftovers, but I also think that's the kind of thing you tell somebody when you invite them, not several days after they've accepted the invitation. It felt a little like the time I took a red-eye flight from Hawaii and found out after I got on the plane that American Airlines was now charging $10 for pillows and blankets. Much to Kate's dismay, I spent the next several days thinking of ways to offset the costs like charging them because we used imported green beans in the green bean casserole that Kate made. I also tried to add a surcharge for bringing the casserole in a fancy dish instead of a Tupperware container. I also checked to make sure that there weren't any more hidden costs such as beverage surcharges or overage charges if we ate more than our allotted weight of turkey. I also made Kate put everything in one diaper bag so we wouldn't get hit with excess baggage fees and had Stephen stuff some extra turkey in his pockets before we left. What's more, after we got there, we found out that one family backed out and that we would all have to absorb the cost of the turkey that they were no longer paying for. I feel like there is some sort of lesson about economics in this that can be juxtaposed with the current situation in the U.S. and/or global economies, but I'm an Artillery officer with a degree in Chemistry who is studying art anthropology in Chinese so I'm not going to be the one to find it. Overall, we had a very good time with great food and great company, but in the future I'll know to read the fine print so we don't get involved in some kind of crazy pyramid-scheme Christmas party. Although, how cool would a blog post titled A Bernie Madoff Christmas be?
In an effort to get more local interaction I joined a rugby team. I played rugby for part of a semester 12 years ago at West Point as part of my intramural requirement so I'm as equally qualified to play rugby as I am to study anything other than Chinese in Chinese. So far we have had one practice which was the inaugural practice for the team. The impetus behind our team is a guy from New Zealand who lives here who met some guys from teams in Chengdu and Chongqing who are looking for more teams across China to play. His hope is to get a club going that will continue to perpetuate through the years and eventually be more Chinese than it is foreign. So far we have 3 Americans, 1 Irishman, and 1 New Zealander. Somehow, I was designated the team interpreter. Our first practice went pretty well and after about an hour we had about 50 people standing by and watching us. One group even brought a bucket of KFC to eat while they watched. After a while we took a break and I asked a few of the guys watching if they wanted to play too and we got three of them to participate so it was a pretty good first attempt. My attempts to explain the rules were even pretty successful. The highlight of the day was when the guy from New Zealand tried to explain that one team member was from Ireland. After a few attempts in Chinese, he finally gave up and said, "Ireland, you know, oi, deedle di dee, potatoes!" in his best Irish accent while doing a jig. The best part, though, was the fact that the guy from Ireland just shrugged his shoulders and said, "That's pretty accurate." I think this promises to be quite the interesting adventure.
Finally, we started putting up Christmas decorations this weekend. Kate has been busy spreading Christmas cheer around the apartment while David has been going around checking to see which ornaments and decorations taste the most like Christmas. Stephen has been keeping busy staging epic battles between snowmen, manger scenes, nutcrackers, and a dinosaur he's been fond of for the past several days. So far the velociraptor always seems to come out on top. Continue to enjoy the holidays and don't forget to read the fine print! 再见!
Anyway, we pulled off Thanksgiving on Thursday and it went pretty well. With a few exceptions such as purple sweet potatoes, a pumpkin pie that was more crust than filling, and none of the cranberries that keep the shape of the can they were in, we had a pretty traditional Western Thanksgiving. We did a late dinner because one of our friends had to work and didn't get done teaching until 6pm. We were hoping to get some of my classmates involved, but none were too keen on partaking of our fire-chicken. The Chinese word for turkey is huoji (火鸡) which literally translates to "fire chicken" which makes it sounds awesome. You would think with a name that awesome, everybody would want a taste, but I think there are several issues. The first is the majority of my classmates are mostly girls who are 10 to 12 years younger than me. Secondly, at least here in Kunming, there is very little interaction between students outside of class. We had one social event in the anthropology department where the Chinese Communist Youth League sponsored a picnic. Technically I guess that makes it less a social event and more of a socialist event, but it still counts. Other than that everybody seems to pretty much keep to themselves. Another factor was that the one class I have with classmates that are more outgoing and who would be interested in having Thanksgiving dinner meets on Thursday afternoons from 2pm to 6pm and the campus an hour outside of town. I went ahead and played the American Card and took a 4-day weekend, but most other students here don't have that option. Lack of cross-cultural interaction aside, we still had a pretty good dinner. I was able to find a store where you could sign up and order a frozen turkey imported from the United States. Initially I didn't realize it was going to be shipped in from the U.S. so I had visions of a turkey showing up with feathers and all (think the duck from A Christmas Story) so I factored that into the weight. Everybody else had signed up for 12 to 13kg birds so I took a more conservative route and ordered a 10kg bird. Turns out the birds were imported from the U.S. and were the same as the ones you'd pick up at any supermarket, meaning we ended up with a bird weighing somewhere around 22 pounds. Even after giving our friends quite a bit to take home, we still have close to 10 pounds left so it looks like we have a lot of turkey sandwiches in our future. Luckily, imported turkey is more reasonably priced than cheese so I still feel like we got a pretty good deal. Additionally I'll get to eat leftovers for quite a while so I get cold turkey sandwiches for lunch as long as it lasts. The only downside will be having to quit cold turkey once it runs out.
Thanksgiving was so good on Thursday that we decided to do it again on Friday. Kate got an invitation from some of the families in a mothers' group she attends to eat Thanksgiving with them also. This was great until a few days after she accepted when she received an e-mail telling her that aside from having to bring a side dish, we would also be expected to pay for a share of the turkey they bought. Now, these families are all really nice people, and I understand that we're a little better off over here than most American families because of the military benefits we receive. I also understand that imported turkey is expensive (we paid almost $100 U.S. dollars for ours) and a lot for one family to pay if there aren't going to be any leftovers, but I also think that's the kind of thing you tell somebody when you invite them, not several days after they've accepted the invitation. It felt a little like the time I took a red-eye flight from Hawaii and found out after I got on the plane that American Airlines was now charging $10 for pillows and blankets. Much to Kate's dismay, I spent the next several days thinking of ways to offset the costs like charging them because we used imported green beans in the green bean casserole that Kate made. I also tried to add a surcharge for bringing the casserole in a fancy dish instead of a Tupperware container. I also checked to make sure that there weren't any more hidden costs such as beverage surcharges or overage charges if we ate more than our allotted weight of turkey. I also made Kate put everything in one diaper bag so we wouldn't get hit with excess baggage fees and had Stephen stuff some extra turkey in his pockets before we left. What's more, after we got there, we found out that one family backed out and that we would all have to absorb the cost of the turkey that they were no longer paying for. I feel like there is some sort of lesson about economics in this that can be juxtaposed with the current situation in the U.S. and/or global economies, but I'm an Artillery officer with a degree in Chemistry who is studying art anthropology in Chinese so I'm not going to be the one to find it. Overall, we had a very good time with great food and great company, but in the future I'll know to read the fine print so we don't get involved in some kind of crazy pyramid-scheme Christmas party. Although, how cool would a blog post titled A Bernie Madoff Christmas be?
In an effort to get more local interaction I joined a rugby team. I played rugby for part of a semester 12 years ago at West Point as part of my intramural requirement so I'm as equally qualified to play rugby as I am to study anything other than Chinese in Chinese. So far we have had one practice which was the inaugural practice for the team. The impetus behind our team is a guy from New Zealand who lives here who met some guys from teams in Chengdu and Chongqing who are looking for more teams across China to play. His hope is to get a club going that will continue to perpetuate through the years and eventually be more Chinese than it is foreign. So far we have 3 Americans, 1 Irishman, and 1 New Zealander. Somehow, I was designated the team interpreter. Our first practice went pretty well and after about an hour we had about 50 people standing by and watching us. One group even brought a bucket of KFC to eat while they watched. After a while we took a break and I asked a few of the guys watching if they wanted to play too and we got three of them to participate so it was a pretty good first attempt. My attempts to explain the rules were even pretty successful. The highlight of the day was when the guy from New Zealand tried to explain that one team member was from Ireland. After a few attempts in Chinese, he finally gave up and said, "Ireland, you know, oi, deedle di dee, potatoes!" in his best Irish accent while doing a jig. The best part, though, was the fact that the guy from Ireland just shrugged his shoulders and said, "That's pretty accurate." I think this promises to be quite the interesting adventure.
Finally, we started putting up Christmas decorations this weekend. Kate has been busy spreading Christmas cheer around the apartment while David has been going around checking to see which ornaments and decorations taste the most like Christmas. Stephen has been keeping busy staging epic battles between snowmen, manger scenes, nutcrackers, and a dinosaur he's been fond of for the past several days. So far the velociraptor always seems to come out on top. Continue to enjoy the holidays and don't forget to read the fine print! 再见!
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| 22 lbs of Turkey Ready to Start Cooking |
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| Same Turkey Almost 6 Hours Later |
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| David, Stephen, and Jeanne Mei Anxious to Start Eating |
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| Happy Thanksgiving from China! |
Sunday, November 6, 2011
Around China: Chengdu - 成都
At the beginning of October, we decided it was finally time to get out of Kunming and see some more of China. Actually, I had a break from school due to the Chinese National Day holiday and we hadn't been able to check in with the Consulate we fall under yet so we decided to head to Chengdu (成都). Chengdu is about an hour north of Kunming by airplane which isn't too bad of a trip. It is the capital of China's Sichuan province (四川省) and was founded around 1200 B.C.
I'm going to take a quick aside and explain China's National Day holiday (国庆节). It celebrates when the People's Republic of China was founded on 1 October, 1949 at Tiananmen Square in Beijing. The actual holiday is 3 days, but the observed holiday is 7 days, making it last from 1 to 7 October. This year, 1 October was a Saturday so we effectively had a week off of school, or so I thought. It turns out, only Monday through Wednesday were "official holiday days" and that they just give everybody Thursday and Friday off as well so they'll be able to travel longer/stimulate the economy more. However, to make up for that, the classes that are originally held on Thursday and Friday are then held on Saturday and Sunday instead. This was all discovered after the fact. On Saturday afternoon, I got a text message from a classmate from Vietnam asking me if we had our Thursday class that day. Turns out we did, but at that point the class was going to start in 10 minutes and was at the new campus over 45 minutes away so we weren't going anyway. We decided that we wouldn't be affected too much since we didn't understand what was being said and went about enjoying our weekend. Our teachers thought it was pretty funny and were probably glad that we had a somewhat legitimate excuse since most of our other classmates randomly skip weeks of class at a time for no reason at all.
So there we are in Chengdu. We had two full days before our schedule meeting at the Consulate so we took the opportunity to see some of the sights.
I'm going to take a quick aside and explain China's National Day holiday (国庆节). It celebrates when the People's Republic of China was founded on 1 October, 1949 at Tiananmen Square in Beijing. The actual holiday is 3 days, but the observed holiday is 7 days, making it last from 1 to 7 October. This year, 1 October was a Saturday so we effectively had a week off of school, or so I thought. It turns out, only Monday through Wednesday were "official holiday days" and that they just give everybody Thursday and Friday off as well so they'll be able to travel longer/stimulate the economy more. However, to make up for that, the classes that are originally held on Thursday and Friday are then held on Saturday and Sunday instead. This was all discovered after the fact. On Saturday afternoon, I got a text message from a classmate from Vietnam asking me if we had our Thursday class that day. Turns out we did, but at that point the class was going to start in 10 minutes and was at the new campus over 45 minutes away so we weren't going anyway. We decided that we wouldn't be affected too much since we didn't understand what was being said and went about enjoying our weekend. Our teachers thought it was pretty funny and were probably glad that we had a somewhat legitimate excuse since most of our other classmates randomly skip weeks of class at a time for no reason at all.
So there we are in Chengdu. We had two full days before our schedule meeting at the Consulate so we took the opportunity to see some of the sights.
From our hotel, we took a short walk to the subway station. Currently there is just one line, but they're working on a second. Our first stop was Tianfu Square (天府广场). Eventually this will be the site of the main subway station in Chengdu, but currently it is just a fairly unremarkable public square. One item of note is the water fountains which are pretty impressive and come one several times a day synchronized to music. The second is a large (about 90ft) statue of Mao Zedong. We spent about 10 minutes here looking around and watching the fountains and then continued on when Stephen and David started to attract a crowd. Normally, in Kunming, people will tell us how cute they are and then be on their way, but here, they were superstars and quickly had crowds of people around them all wanting to hold them, take pictures of them, or just touch their faces. I have decided that the next time I see a Chinese tourist in the U.S. with a small child, I'm going to run up and start groping their child's face and telling them how beautiful their child is. Take that Chinese lack of boundaries and/or personal space!
Next up, we walked over to the People's Park (人民公园). This is a fairly large park in the middle of the town with a lake, lots of walking paths, and some rides for the kids. Like most of the better parks in China, it offers a good break from the city and lets you forget, for a while, that you're in a city of almost 15 million people where you can't see the sky through the smog.
Stephen, of course, took advantage of the opportunity to stretch his legs and climb on anything and everything. At one point, when we were walking around the lake, I turned around to find Stephen at a fence along the bank, talking to a group of girls who had floated over in their paddle boat to get a better look at him. He's quite the ladies' man over here.
Our next stop on the first day was at the Wenshu Temple and Monastery (文殊院寺). This is an ancient Buddhist temple and monastery and is home to many ancient relics and artifacts. The temple itself is pretty impressive and the decorations are beautiful. Throughout the day, you can visit and see people burning incense and offering prayers.
The grounds surrounding the temple are full of trees, walking paths, and quiet places. At one point, an old man came up and asked us if we were American. When we told him yes, he began reciting the history of the Flying Tigers and the 10th and 14th Army Air Corps from World War II when they were based in China. He did all of this in English which was pretty impressive. The Chinese people's reverence for the American servicemen during WWII always impresses me. In this area at least, there are very few people who do not know the history of the Flying Tigers and the Army Air Corps and what they did for China during WWII.
On Day 2, we made the trek north of the city to check out the panda reserve and research center. I'm still not sure that the big deal about pandas is. They're basically a bunch of vegan bears that are black and white. It was nice to finally see one in person after we were disappointed at the zoo in D.C. and the highlight of Kate's day was getting to see about a dozen baby pandas all sleeping in the nursery. It was the definition of cute. In addition to the regular pandas, they also had red pandas. These seemed much more active than regular pandas and were more fun to watch. All of the panda enclosures had big signs in English reminding visitors to be quiet. It also had a Chinese translation, which appeared to say the same thing, but apparently translated into "Please scream at the pandas, bang on the walls of the enclosures and throw sticks at them in order to get their attention so you can take a picture because nothing gets a wild animal to come close to you like being a loud, obnoxious, jackass." Chalk it up to "cultural differences."
In addition to their pandas, the research base also boasted a pretty nice park with some good walking paths. One of the better ones was a boardwalk that went around a lake which was a particular favorite of the boys.
On our last day, after our meeting at the Consulate, we went over to Jinli Street (金利路) which is a pretty well-kept historical shopping district. Here you can find all sorts of little food stands, souvenirs, and theater houses. As you can see from the picture, it is pretty popular and not too easy to navigate with a stroller, but it was a good place to have lunch and you can even find some less-crowded side paths that offer access to some pretty scenic areas.
That night, we hopped back on a plane and headed home. The nice thing about having our post office box in Chengdu is that we'll have the opportunity to go back and see some more of the many attractions, although the pandas better get their act together if they want us to visit again......vegan hippies.
Ten Pounds of Reasonably Priced Cheese
Apparently I'm as good at blogging as I am at keeping a diary. I think I have one or two lying around somewhere in storage each with no more than 10 days of entries from various stages of my life, all offering proof that I would rather go out and do something rather than write about it. However, I figure I need to do a better job with the blogs for two reasons. The first is that when it comes time to write my first-year report for the Olmsted Foundation, I plan on putting it off for so long that I have no other choice but to come to this blog so I can copy and paste all of the entries into the report and call it a day (for any foundation staff reading this blog, I'm almost completely kidding). The second reason is that we have a lot of friends and family who read this and probably got hooked on my literary prowess after only a few paragraphs. I feel like I owe it to them for not forewarning them about how addictive reading about my life can be.
Anyway, if you're still reading at this point, I stand firm behind the validity of my second reason. This will be a short update about what has been going on with us and then I plan on two more rapid-fire entries to update you on some of our travels and provide a few pictures because my photography skills are right up there on par with my writing skills...and my ninja skills.
As far as school is concerned, I'm still feeling like I'm in over my head. I'm keeping up with what is going on in class and I'm usually aware of the topics being discussed if not the details, but we're about two months away from the end of the semester now and I still haven't had a homework assignment yet. Actually that's not true. In one class, we were told to translate two entries from an anthropology dictionary into Chinese. I spent some late nights getting it done, only to show up at the next class and find out I was the only one who did it. Additionally, the professor never asked for us to turn it in. In another class, we had to write an essay (5000 characters or roughly 2500 words in English) about one of four topics. All of the reference material is in Chinese and a week before the assignment was due, I still had not received my library card for the campus library. I went to the teacher and explained my situation as well as the fact that Chinese is hard. He said no problem (he also knows that I'm a master's student in his PhD class for reasons we still have yet to figure out) and that I could turn it in whenever I get it done. The next week, I expected to see everybody else turning in their papers. They either turned them in directly to his office or they didn't do them either because nobody had papers. It seems that our entire grades will come down to final exams or final essays (the teacher gets to decide) which means I'm pretty much screwed.
One the home front, Kate and the boys are both doing well. Stephen is starting to speak more and more Chinese (he also understands more than he lets on) and David is walking up a storm and has even ventured into climbing. David celebrated his 1st birthday with a cake and a few days later, a trip to Chengdu. Also, after only a little over three months (guys from the embassy thought that was pretty fast) our household goods finally arrived. We got the arrival date about 5 days in advance so we were pretty excited. On the date the shipment was supposed to arrive, we got a call from the mover about 15 minutes before the scheduled delivery time and were told that the truck was too big to drive into our part of town during that day, and that they had to wait until after 8pm to make the delivery. I asked if they could simply put the delivery on to several smaller trucks and they said no. I told them they were full of crap (not really because I don't know how to say that in Chinese) because our other shipment came in the middle of the day in a smaller truck, but they assured me, they couldn't do that. What followed was an agonizingly long 9-hour wait. At 8:30pm, when the movers finally arrived, they had broken everything down into three smaller moving trucks, all of which could have come into our part of town during the day. At about 12:30am (for every one person that carried a box, there were two that stood around) all the boxes were unloaded and in our apartment and at 1:30am, we finally told them to stop unpacking and go home. Kate then spent the next three-and-a-half days in some kind of heightened state of organizing and got everything unpacked and put away. Think Beautiful Mind but with unpacking instead of math and only slightly less craziness. I don't know how she did it (she's amazing) but I do know that I can now scratch "watch a guy in a dirty sport coat and loafers move household goods into my apartment at midnight" off of my bucket list.
To sum it all up, school is hard, the boys are crazy, we still like China, and we have our stuff. Enjoy the travel stories that should follow shortly. Also, Kate would like me to point out that today we spent about $75 on a block of cheese. Granted, it was an over 10-pound block of cheese (jealous Stew?) and for cheese in China it was pretty reasonably priced, but seriously? It wasn't even fancy cheese, just regular old Irish cheddar. It did however, just give me the inspiration for the title of this article so I'll finish by saying, "That'll do cheese, that'll do."
Anyway, if you're still reading at this point, I stand firm behind the validity of my second reason. This will be a short update about what has been going on with us and then I plan on two more rapid-fire entries to update you on some of our travels and provide a few pictures because my photography skills are right up there on par with my writing skills...and my ninja skills.
As far as school is concerned, I'm still feeling like I'm in over my head. I'm keeping up with what is going on in class and I'm usually aware of the topics being discussed if not the details, but we're about two months away from the end of the semester now and I still haven't had a homework assignment yet. Actually that's not true. In one class, we were told to translate two entries from an anthropology dictionary into Chinese. I spent some late nights getting it done, only to show up at the next class and find out I was the only one who did it. Additionally, the professor never asked for us to turn it in. In another class, we had to write an essay (5000 characters or roughly 2500 words in English) about one of four topics. All of the reference material is in Chinese and a week before the assignment was due, I still had not received my library card for the campus library. I went to the teacher and explained my situation as well as the fact that Chinese is hard. He said no problem (he also knows that I'm a master's student in his PhD class for reasons we still have yet to figure out) and that I could turn it in whenever I get it done. The next week, I expected to see everybody else turning in their papers. They either turned them in directly to his office or they didn't do them either because nobody had papers. It seems that our entire grades will come down to final exams or final essays (the teacher gets to decide) which means I'm pretty much screwed.
One the home front, Kate and the boys are both doing well. Stephen is starting to speak more and more Chinese (he also understands more than he lets on) and David is walking up a storm and has even ventured into climbing. David celebrated his 1st birthday with a cake and a few days later, a trip to Chengdu. Also, after only a little over three months (guys from the embassy thought that was pretty fast) our household goods finally arrived. We got the arrival date about 5 days in advance so we were pretty excited. On the date the shipment was supposed to arrive, we got a call from the mover about 15 minutes before the scheduled delivery time and were told that the truck was too big to drive into our part of town during that day, and that they had to wait until after 8pm to make the delivery. I asked if they could simply put the delivery on to several smaller trucks and they said no. I told them they were full of crap (not really because I don't know how to say that in Chinese) because our other shipment came in the middle of the day in a smaller truck, but they assured me, they couldn't do that. What followed was an agonizingly long 9-hour wait. At 8:30pm, when the movers finally arrived, they had broken everything down into three smaller moving trucks, all of which could have come into our part of town during the day. At about 12:30am (for every one person that carried a box, there were two that stood around) all the boxes were unloaded and in our apartment and at 1:30am, we finally told them to stop unpacking and go home. Kate then spent the next three-and-a-half days in some kind of heightened state of organizing and got everything unpacked and put away. Think Beautiful Mind but with unpacking instead of math and only slightly less craziness. I don't know how she did it (she's amazing) but I do know that I can now scratch "watch a guy in a dirty sport coat and loafers move household goods into my apartment at midnight" off of my bucket list.
To sum it all up, school is hard, the boys are crazy, we still like China, and we have our stuff. Enjoy the travel stories that should follow shortly. Also, Kate would like me to point out that today we spent about $75 on a block of cheese. Granted, it was an over 10-pound block of cheese (jealous Stew?) and for cheese in China it was pretty reasonably priced, but seriously? It wasn't even fancy cheese, just regular old Irish cheddar. It did however, just give me the inspiration for the title of this article so I'll finish by saying, "That'll do cheese, that'll do."
Thursday, October 6, 2011
The First Month of School
The first month of school is now over and it has been quite an experience that started off with registration. The initial acceptance letter I received stated that registration would take place between 1 and 15 September and recommended that I show up to the school during that period to get signed in. I found out, when we first got here, that most of the registration for foreign students is taking care of student visas, residence permits, and student IDs. I figured that explained why the registration period was so long. Since I had already gotten all of the residence permit stuff taken care of, I figured I could show up on the first day or registration, get all of the other paperwork taken care of, and then have almost 2 weeks off before classes started. Chinese college registration is much different than at an American college. More specifically, it is much different than West Point which is really my only college registration experience.
I later found out, before the registration period started, the guidelines were much more broadly defined. I stopped by the office to make sure I had everything correct. I asked if registration was still set to take place the 1st through the 15th. I was told yes. I asked if we would need to come in every one of those days. I was told I could come in any day during that period. "You mean I just have to come in sometime between the first and the 15th?" "Yes, any day is fine as long as it isn't a weekend." "Ok, I'll come in to register on the 1st. What time should I be here?" "Whenever we're open is fine." Needless to say, this was quite strange to me after 14 years of military life where everything has a set date and time for when it starts. However, it looked like I would have quite a bit of time off between registration and the start of classes which was a good thing.
Jump forward to the 1st of September, a Thursday. I show up to the office about 30 minutes after it opens with all of my pertinent documents on hand, ready to register for classes. Instead, I'm handed a student-university agreement to read and sign, asked to fill out a survey for the international students office, and told to provide two pictures for my library card and student ID. That done, I ask what I should do next and I'm told I can go get a meal card which can also be used to pay for bus fare. That took about 10 minutes and I again found myself in the foreign student office asking what the next step was. At this point, the lady helping me told me that maybe I should ask my professor/dean which classes they recommended I take since they would begin the following Monday, the 5th of September.
Here we pause for a moment. Now, the letter of invitation stated that registration period lasted the 1st through the 15th, and I was later told I could show up to register any day during that period. Why would the registration period last a full 10 days after classes started and why could a student show up 10 days after the start of classes and still be able to register? We'll call this, "Mystery #1."
Mystery #1 still unsolved, I headed to the dean's office and asked which classes I should take. He asked me a few questions about my goals and experience with anthropology. I told him I would like to get a MA if possible and that I had no prior experience in anthropology so if he thought I should take a few undergrad classes the first semester, I was fine with that. He asked if I wanted to take classes in English. I told him that the Olmsted Foundation discouraged it, but one or two were okay, especially the first semester. He then took my schedule, circled 5 classes and told me when they started. After this, I asked him where I needed to go to register for the classes. He looked at me a little funny and then took me down to the anthropology department's foreign affairs office. There he introduced me to a nice lady and told me that she would be able to help. I explained the Olmsted Scholarship and what my goals were and showed her the classes the dean had recommended. She then introduced me to a student who would show me around campus and explain where all my classes were, as well as show me where I could get a bus for my one class that is on the college's new campus about an hour away. Before we left, I asked if I needed to sign up anywhere and asked where I could pick up books. I was told that I didn't need to sign up anywhere, I could just show up to the class and that I wouldn't need any books because all of the classes were taught through lectures from the professors and didn't use books.
Pause once again. After explaining to the dean that I have no prior experience with anthropology and aptly demonstrating my listening issues through the use of my favorite phrase "请你再说一遍" or "Could you please say that again," why would he choose to put me only in classes that rely on listening? I also forgot to mention that 3 of my classes are graduate classes and that the other 2 are post-graduate classes. No undergrad classes at all. This is "Mystery #2."
After that experience I headed back to the foreign students office, all the while wondering what in the world I had gotten myself into. I told the office I was done and asked when I could pick up my library card and student ID. I was told that everything would be ready once all of the students had registered somewhere around the middle of the month. No issues there, I already had a memo from the school stating that I was studying there so I could get my household goods through customs and all the books in the library are in Chinese so who needs a library card anyway.
The next four weeks are pretty much a blur of 3 to six hours a day of being lectured in Chinese. I have had a few days where I actually feel like I understand the majority of what is being said, but most of class consists of me writing down every tenth word (which is about all I understand) and trying to look up the words that I don't understand as fast as possible. The two PhD level classes I have are fairly interesting. Both have a student who used to teach English and she has volunteered to help me out. During class, she'll write notes down in English so I can keep up with what's going on. The other three are still a little rough but the other grad students help me out so I'm not completely lost. Everybody was a little perplexed as to why I would want to study a foreign subject in a foreign language until I explained the goals of the Olmsted Scholarship. After that they were much more understanding, but still wondered why I would want to torture myself like that. The professors are all pretty optimistic. They keep telling me to stick with it and by the end of the semester, my Chinese will be great, even if my grades aren't.
As for Mystery #1 and Mystery #2, I don't know if those will every be solved, but I still have almost 2 years to figure it out. Now that I'm settling into a little more of a rhythm with my schedule, I'll try to keep a little more diligent about keeping the blog updated. We just got back from a 3-day trip to Chengdu so expect more (with pictures) soon! 再见！
I later found out, before the registration period started, the guidelines were much more broadly defined. I stopped by the office to make sure I had everything correct. I asked if registration was still set to take place the 1st through the 15th. I was told yes. I asked if we would need to come in every one of those days. I was told I could come in any day during that period. "You mean I just have to come in sometime between the first and the 15th?" "Yes, any day is fine as long as it isn't a weekend." "Ok, I'll come in to register on the 1st. What time should I be here?" "Whenever we're open is fine." Needless to say, this was quite strange to me after 14 years of military life where everything has a set date and time for when it starts. However, it looked like I would have quite a bit of time off between registration and the start of classes which was a good thing.
Jump forward to the 1st of September, a Thursday. I show up to the office about 30 minutes after it opens with all of my pertinent documents on hand, ready to register for classes. Instead, I'm handed a student-university agreement to read and sign, asked to fill out a survey for the international students office, and told to provide two pictures for my library card and student ID. That done, I ask what I should do next and I'm told I can go get a meal card which can also be used to pay for bus fare. That took about 10 minutes and I again found myself in the foreign student office asking what the next step was. At this point, the lady helping me told me that maybe I should ask my professor/dean which classes they recommended I take since they would begin the following Monday, the 5th of September.
Here we pause for a moment. Now, the letter of invitation stated that registration period lasted the 1st through the 15th, and I was later told I could show up to register any day during that period. Why would the registration period last a full 10 days after classes started and why could a student show up 10 days after the start of classes and still be able to register? We'll call this, "Mystery #1."
Mystery #1 still unsolved, I headed to the dean's office and asked which classes I should take. He asked me a few questions about my goals and experience with anthropology. I told him I would like to get a MA if possible and that I had no prior experience in anthropology so if he thought I should take a few undergrad classes the first semester, I was fine with that. He asked if I wanted to take classes in English. I told him that the Olmsted Foundation discouraged it, but one or two were okay, especially the first semester. He then took my schedule, circled 5 classes and told me when they started. After this, I asked him where I needed to go to register for the classes. He looked at me a little funny and then took me down to the anthropology department's foreign affairs office. There he introduced me to a nice lady and told me that she would be able to help. I explained the Olmsted Scholarship and what my goals were and showed her the classes the dean had recommended. She then introduced me to a student who would show me around campus and explain where all my classes were, as well as show me where I could get a bus for my one class that is on the college's new campus about an hour away. Before we left, I asked if I needed to sign up anywhere and asked where I could pick up books. I was told that I didn't need to sign up anywhere, I could just show up to the class and that I wouldn't need any books because all of the classes were taught through lectures from the professors and didn't use books.
Pause once again. After explaining to the dean that I have no prior experience with anthropology and aptly demonstrating my listening issues through the use of my favorite phrase "请你再说一遍" or "Could you please say that again," why would he choose to put me only in classes that rely on listening? I also forgot to mention that 3 of my classes are graduate classes and that the other 2 are post-graduate classes. No undergrad classes at all. This is "Mystery #2."
After that experience I headed back to the foreign students office, all the while wondering what in the world I had gotten myself into. I told the office I was done and asked when I could pick up my library card and student ID. I was told that everything would be ready once all of the students had registered somewhere around the middle of the month. No issues there, I already had a memo from the school stating that I was studying there so I could get my household goods through customs and all the books in the library are in Chinese so who needs a library card anyway.
The next four weeks are pretty much a blur of 3 to six hours a day of being lectured in Chinese. I have had a few days where I actually feel like I understand the majority of what is being said, but most of class consists of me writing down every tenth word (which is about all I understand) and trying to look up the words that I don't understand as fast as possible. The two PhD level classes I have are fairly interesting. Both have a student who used to teach English and she has volunteered to help me out. During class, she'll write notes down in English so I can keep up with what's going on. The other three are still a little rough but the other grad students help me out so I'm not completely lost. Everybody was a little perplexed as to why I would want to study a foreign subject in a foreign language until I explained the goals of the Olmsted Scholarship. After that they were much more understanding, but still wondered why I would want to torture myself like that. The professors are all pretty optimistic. They keep telling me to stick with it and by the end of the semester, my Chinese will be great, even if my grades aren't.
As for Mystery #1 and Mystery #2, I don't know if those will every be solved, but I still have almost 2 years to figure it out. Now that I'm settling into a little more of a rhythm with my schedule, I'll try to keep a little more diligent about keeping the blog updated. We just got back from a 3-day trip to Chengdu so expect more (with pictures) soon! 再见！
Sunday, September 4, 2011
The New Apartment or "It's Always Christmas in the Laundry Room"
It has, admittedly, been quite a while since my last post. In my defense, we've been pretty busy. On the 26th, we finally were able to move into our apartment. The night before I called a driver and scheduled him to arrive shortly after breakfast the next morning. Afterwards, we packed up as much as was possible and went to sleep for the last time (for now) at the Green Lake Hotel. The next morning, we paid our bill, loaded up the van, and here we are. The day we arrived, the driver helped us up carry everything up the four flights of stairs. We had previously ordered a new refrigerator, washer/dryer (the have one machine here that does both) a new water cooler and a new stove top. We had it all delivered ahead of time so the driver, whom we have known since our visitation trip here in March, helped us get everything moved into place and hooked up, with the exception of the stove.
Excited about the ability to wash our clothes in our own residence without having to use the sink, we immediately started a load of laundry. We were so excited when it was over that we started a second load later that night. We started the second load around 10pm that night after we put the boys to sleep, and a few minutes later, we had the landlord's mother (she lives downstairs and is a really nice old lady who really likes Stephen even though he runs away from her) and another old lady who lives across the hall. She told us that her apartment was leaking and wanted to check the room above the leak. Of course it was the bathroom with the washing machine in it. I showed her the drain the washing machine was using and then she took me downstairs to her neighbor's apartment to show me the leak, and sure enough, it was raining in the bathroom below us. One thing I found strange was, despite the fact that the old lady living in the apartment below is living there with her younger son and his family, they decided to send the old lady up to talk to the new American family and not somebody younger. Anyway, I switched the washing machine's hose to a different drain which fixed the problem, and the landlord's mother said they would send a plumber by the next day. A few days later the plumber arrived and discovered that the drain we were using wasn't actually connected to anything (i.e. pipes) below it. That was eventually fixed and luckily we didn't have to pay for it so it was a relatively minor issue, but thank goodness we live on the top floor.
The next day, we had two big events taking place. The first was the man coming by to install the stove top (free with purchase) and the second was a man coming by to change the lock on the front door. Now, a part of being over here as an active duty Soldier is that military has to put somebody in charge of us. In our case, it is kind of the Consulate in Chengdu even though they have pretty much said they won't help us with anything. Anyway, one of their requirements is that a security inspector come and look at our house. His job is to make sure the place is safe and secure and make recommendations as to how security could be improved. This is really just checking the block because the Consulate will not pay for any security upgrades and since we don't work for the consulate, they can't really tell us to rent a different place. The inspector's only suggestion was that we have the lock on the front door changed so we could be sure we were the only ones with keys. Since this was a simple, inexpensive thing to do and it sounded like a good idea, I decided to take his recommendation. That was my first mistake. The locksmith finally came by around 7pm that night. It only took him about 5 minutes to change the lock and cost less than thirty dollars. I paid him and he handed me 7 keys. Five were in a plastic case and two were separate which he used to test the lock after installing it. Before he left, he said what I thought sounded like something to the effect of, "Only use the ones in the plastic, these two won't work, you can throw them away or I can throw them away for you." I thought there's no way he could have actually said that and why would I give him two of my keys so I kept them and sent him on his way. That was my second mistake. It turns out, what I thought I heard him say was exactly what he said. I put the two keys that were already out in my pocket, put the other five in a drawer, and then left the apartment to go help Kate who was on her way back from WalMart. At that point, it was about 7:30pm and when we got everything up the stairs to our door, we found we were locked out and that the keys I had didn't work. Luckily I had the locksmith's number and was able to call him and ask him to come back and help, at that point, he was about 10 minutes away. So there we are, with a pile of groceries on the landing while David is crying because he's hungry, and Stephen is crying because he thinks we won't be able to get back into the apartment when the locksmith arrives. Turns out, he's just a guy who installs locks and doesn't have any way of picking it, but he still volunteered to stay and try to reach through a window to jimmy the window lock open so we can crawl in and open the door. At this point, it is about 9pm and the locksmith is precariously hanging on to a very shady look ladder that is half on the stairs and half leaning against a wall trying to get the window open. Turns out we have very good and very safe windows. Eventually the landlord, who was downstairs visiting her mother, comes up and asks what is going on and then offers to help. Eventually, after she called and arranged a repair man to come on Monday (this all happened on Saturday) she told us to go ahead and break the window as long as I was willing to pay ($10 for glass in installation) to have it repaired. We broke the window, opened the door, and before leaving and refusing to take any money as compensation for his time (this guy was really nice or really felt sorry for us) once again told me not to use the two keys he used when installing the locks. I threw them away while he watched.
One peculiarity about our apartment is that in on of nearby buildings is somebody who likes to play the piano. Now this person is a very skilled piano player, but most of the time, they only play and elaborate version of Jingle Bells. Not only that, but they'll keep playing it for hours straight. It's like a Liberace Christmas 7 days a week here. On days when we lock ourselves out of the apartment, it is kind of nice to have cheery music in the background. You can imagine that any minute, Clark Griswold is going to plug in his Christmas lights and brighten up the entire neighborhood while Cousin Eddy empties his RV's chemical toilet across the street. Anyway, to make matters worse, our new washing machine plays a tune every time the cycle is complete, and wouldn't you know it.......Jingle Bells. 再见！
Excited about the ability to wash our clothes in our own residence without having to use the sink, we immediately started a load of laundry. We were so excited when it was over that we started a second load later that night. We started the second load around 10pm that night after we put the boys to sleep, and a few minutes later, we had the landlord's mother (she lives downstairs and is a really nice old lady who really likes Stephen even though he runs away from her) and another old lady who lives across the hall. She told us that her apartment was leaking and wanted to check the room above the leak. Of course it was the bathroom with the washing machine in it. I showed her the drain the washing machine was using and then she took me downstairs to her neighbor's apartment to show me the leak, and sure enough, it was raining in the bathroom below us. One thing I found strange was, despite the fact that the old lady living in the apartment below is living there with her younger son and his family, they decided to send the old lady up to talk to the new American family and not somebody younger. Anyway, I switched the washing machine's hose to a different drain which fixed the problem, and the landlord's mother said they would send a plumber by the next day. A few days later the plumber arrived and discovered that the drain we were using wasn't actually connected to anything (i.e. pipes) below it. That was eventually fixed and luckily we didn't have to pay for it so it was a relatively minor issue, but thank goodness we live on the top floor.
The next day, we had two big events taking place. The first was the man coming by to install the stove top (free with purchase) and the second was a man coming by to change the lock on the front door. Now, a part of being over here as an active duty Soldier is that military has to put somebody in charge of us. In our case, it is kind of the Consulate in Chengdu even though they have pretty much said they won't help us with anything. Anyway, one of their requirements is that a security inspector come and look at our house. His job is to make sure the place is safe and secure and make recommendations as to how security could be improved. This is really just checking the block because the Consulate will not pay for any security upgrades and since we don't work for the consulate, they can't really tell us to rent a different place. The inspector's only suggestion was that we have the lock on the front door changed so we could be sure we were the only ones with keys. Since this was a simple, inexpensive thing to do and it sounded like a good idea, I decided to take his recommendation. That was my first mistake. The locksmith finally came by around 7pm that night. It only took him about 5 minutes to change the lock and cost less than thirty dollars. I paid him and he handed me 7 keys. Five were in a plastic case and two were separate which he used to test the lock after installing it. Before he left, he said what I thought sounded like something to the effect of, "Only use the ones in the plastic, these two won't work, you can throw them away or I can throw them away for you." I thought there's no way he could have actually said that and why would I give him two of my keys so I kept them and sent him on his way. That was my second mistake. It turns out, what I thought I heard him say was exactly what he said. I put the two keys that were already out in my pocket, put the other five in a drawer, and then left the apartment to go help Kate who was on her way back from WalMart. At that point, it was about 7:30pm and when we got everything up the stairs to our door, we found we were locked out and that the keys I had didn't work. Luckily I had the locksmith's number and was able to call him and ask him to come back and help, at that point, he was about 10 minutes away. So there we are, with a pile of groceries on the landing while David is crying because he's hungry, and Stephen is crying because he thinks we won't be able to get back into the apartment when the locksmith arrives. Turns out, he's just a guy who installs locks and doesn't have any way of picking it, but he still volunteered to stay and try to reach through a window to jimmy the window lock open so we can crawl in and open the door. At this point, it is about 9pm and the locksmith is precariously hanging on to a very shady look ladder that is half on the stairs and half leaning against a wall trying to get the window open. Turns out we have very good and very safe windows. Eventually the landlord, who was downstairs visiting her mother, comes up and asks what is going on and then offers to help. Eventually, after she called and arranged a repair man to come on Monday (this all happened on Saturday) she told us to go ahead and break the window as long as I was willing to pay ($10 for glass in installation) to have it repaired. We broke the window, opened the door, and before leaving and refusing to take any money as compensation for his time (this guy was really nice or really felt sorry for us) once again told me not to use the two keys he used when installing the locks. I threw them away while he watched.
One peculiarity about our apartment is that in on of nearby buildings is somebody who likes to play the piano. Now this person is a very skilled piano player, but most of the time, they only play and elaborate version of Jingle Bells. Not only that, but they'll keep playing it for hours straight. It's like a Liberace Christmas 7 days a week here. On days when we lock ourselves out of the apartment, it is kind of nice to have cheery music in the background. You can imagine that any minute, Clark Griswold is going to plug in his Christmas lights and brighten up the entire neighborhood while Cousin Eddy empties his RV's chemical toilet across the street. Anyway, to make matters worse, our new washing machine plays a tune every time the cycle is complete, and wouldn't you know it.......Jingle Bells. 再见！
Sunday, August 21, 2011
Around Kunming: The Kunming Zoo - 昆明动物园
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| One of Several Entrances to the Zoo |
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| This Rabbit Greets Guests at the Entrance |
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| This is Some Sort of Haunted Dinosaur Adventure. According to the Sign, it Has Zombies Which Were a Leading Factor in Dinosaurs' Going Extinct. |
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| This is Part of the Zoo that Doesn't Have Any Animals |
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| One of the Many Varieties of Birds on Display |
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| Baby Asian Elephants |
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| Adult Asian Elephants |
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| This is One of the Bigger Cages. The Raccoons Have a Bigger Pen than the Siberian Tigers |
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| I'm Pretty Sure This Bear was Begging to be Set Free |
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| Camels in Their Natural Habitat |
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| Of All the Animals, the Monkeys Seemed to be the Happiest. This is a Huge Monkey Pen. |
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| The Peacock Garden |
One of the interesting parts was the peacock garden. This was a kind-of-fenced-off area with hundreds of peacocks just wandering around. They had ropes to keep people off the grass, but nothing to keep the people away from the peacocks. Those birds are suffering no shortage of junk food which is used to entice them for pictures. Kate tried to get Stephen in a few close-encounter pictures and all the while I kept imagining how the headline, "American Boy Mauled by Angry Peacock" would translate into Chinese. Luckily, the mass quantities of popcorn keeps all of the birds pretty lethargic so we made it out safely.
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| "A Photo of the Victims Taken Shortly Before the Peacock Flew into a Popcorn-Induced Rage" |
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| People Feeding Junk Food to the Peacocks |
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| This is a Standard Tank at the Aquarium. No Plants, Just Rocks and Concrete. This Tank Didn't Even Have Any Fish. |
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| Another Fish Tank in the Aquarium |
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| This Was the Closest We Got to the Sharks Advertised Out Front. |
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| No Happy Feet in This Penguin Exhibit. |
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| Look at Those Sad Eyes. |
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| As Far as Parks Go, the Zoo Wasn't Too Bad. |
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| There is a Sign Nearby That Marks This as an Historical Landmark, but it is Now Used for Photos and is Controlled by a Guy With a Stand and a Camera. |
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| This is an Old Tomb at the Zoo Outside of the Peacock Garden. |
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