Christmas in 江油

Happy Holidays dear friends and family! I just passed into the New Year (To celebrate in a fitting fashion, Teddy and I had some ox tongue for dinner). So far, it looks like a good one. You may want to give it a shot in the next day or so!
I have been busy with exploring the city, bumbling my way around Mandarin, trying new foods, building relationships, watching pirated movies, and sleeping in.
Here are some pictures of our (I went to Jiangyou to visit Mark and Janice) Christmas exploits.
We found a mostly intact creche in a forgotten closet of the apartment. I tried to tuck this unfortunate 3rd king behind the Christmas tree...


Apparently during Christmas in Chengdu it is traditional for hordes of people to mob and fight in the city with blow-up bats (they often sport an American flag). However this mode of celebration has been banned as of this year due to the inherent dangers accompanying such a Yuletide riot. (Here's a blog with good pictures: Chengdu Christmas Tradition). Despite the new legislation this new Christmas tradition is too good to be forgotten!



Here are some neat things that we found while wondering the streets of Jiangyou:

Self-explanatory


poultry & produce!


Pretty colors


(pig? sheep?) hearts--the blood keeps them fresh!


Edible foliage

Woops!

I would like to take a moment to respond to this thoughtful comment:

"I enjoy the pictures of the surroundings. Reminds me of the travelogs your Grandma used to take me to when I was a kid. Do you ever have trouble making purchases there if there are only characters and not words? Have you for instance ever had to go back to a store and say "Even though this plant food was delicious with a little milk and sugar, I would like to get coffee this time."

Hah!!! You bet I have trouble making purchases. Usually I just nod, smile, say an affirmative 'uhh,' and resign myself to the knowledge that I am about to have an adventure. So far I have purchased date flavored yogurt instead of strawberry yogurt, bought some lemongrass-mint gum, and attempted to buy a bunch of bananas that were intended to be individually deep-fried and sold. However with a bit of persistence, hand-motions, crude drawings, and laughter even the novice can successfully score a nice dish of korean-style squid!

Slowly getting better at China

My friend Betty had me going that we were about to experience a tasty Sichuan treat called 龟苓膏 (Gui1 ling2 gao1) made from turtle blood . She said that we would each choose a turtle from the pool and then smash the shell and collect the juice.
I was only a little disappointed when it turned out to be 'herbal jelly.' However, even herbal jelly can be fun sometimes!






I had my first test today for my language class. I think it went ok. Check out some of my homework! So far, whenever I show my work to them, my teachers ask me to stop drawing pictures in class...I'm not sure how to say 'chicken scratch' in Chinese.


Oh! Almost forgot-if you're interested I've been dumping more pictures here: http://picasaweb.google.com/postcentral.gyrus

Jinli street plus some other things

When all else fails, post a lot of pictures!

This is Jinli Street in Chengdu. It's pretty much a tourist thing, but I liked it!

We tried some neat foods! Teddy wouldn't let me bring the bamboo home; it was too greasy.

She was making a silk rug! Wow! Can't find those in IKEA.

I have one Chinese friend (Hi, Teddy)!

I liked the contrast of the grey and yellow.

Mild street action

What else would you post on a bus?

Home for the month

I moved out of my room on the first floor of the guest house into a new room on the fifth floor. I should be staying here for the rest of the month. I'm also posting some pictures of the scenery on the way to my class.



My new room on the 5th floor



This is nicer than my last one!



Scary hole in my bathroom wall



Kitty on the way to class



Stairs to class