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On the 25th October, Lucie turned 18 and so with a little help from Ivy, we arranged to spend the weekend in Fuzhou (福州).
I started the morning by improvising a cake and candles (see pic) and giving Lucie her birthday presents from me (a packet of her favourite Chinese crackers, and some new Converse equivalents).
Ivy had arranged for us to stay with her friend Earla (pronounced Ella) and Earla's daughter, Beryl (pronounced Berry) in their flat on the Saturday night. The taxi from Yihuang took us to a large department store/ walmart/ shopping centre place and it was in there that we found a Pizza Hut, a KFC, a Haagen Daas Ice Cream place, and a McDonalds. As it was Lucie's birthday, she chose where to go for lunch and so we headed into Pizza Hut. The food was amazing and we were both so full by the time we had finished.
We wandered the street for a while - it was a shopping street with lots of clothes and shoe shops - and then we phoned Earla who came and met us, then took us on the bus to her home. The flat was lovely and we were to share Beryl's room with her. Once we had dropped off her bag, Earla asked us what we planned to do for Lucie's birthday and we told her we would like to go to the cinema. Earla was a great help, she booked us tickets online so they were really cheap and then walked us to the cinema and sorted everything at the desk. Finally after over 2 months of waiting, we saw Guardians of the Galaxy!
In the evening we had a nice meal prepared by Earla and then we retired for the night. The next morning we were up early (it'sa Chinese thing) and Beryl took us to a park in Fuzhou that has statues of all the famous people who were from Fuzhou. The park was really nice, but the temperature had soared back up to 30C that day so we were all struggling. When we left the park Beryl suggested a different park, a 'forest park' thinking that trees would equate to shade we agreed. Unfortunately, on the way to this park, Beryl's e-bike ran out of electricity (she and Lucie were on the e-bike, and I was following on a normal bike). Luckily we were only a 5 minute walk from the park. Upon arriving Beryl attempted to phone Earla to tell her about our situation whilst we wandered the park, this park was nice and there was a little more shade where we rested.
Earla had arranged for us to go to a western steak restaurant for lunch, and so we started to make our way in that direction and were intercepted by Earla who gave Beryl her e-bike and took the other one home to charge. The restaurant was absolutely amazing! You buy a ticket and get a steak, which you choose how it is cooked (mine was rather pink :P), and then you can also help yourself to the buffet.
We really enjoyed our weekend, and both Beryl and Earla were lovely, apparently it was the first time Beryl had ever been in proper contact with a foreigner, so we swapped wechat details (we really need to get QQ) so we could stay in touch.
This week has been a week of teaching about Halloween. The classes absolutely love it, especially as there was a prize of ''Candy!!'' (as they all screamed when I produced the lolly) for the best designed Jack O'Lantern, and we also played some Halloween party games - The Mummy Game and Pin the Tail on the Cat - and listened to some Halloween music such as Thriller and the Witch Doctor (and let me tell you, there is something strangely satisfying about having 60 kids belting Oo, Ee, Oo Ah Ah at the top of their lungs :P). People seem to know about Halloween in China, other volunteers have been invited to parties and have been able to buy stuff for costumes, and when we went to Nanchang (more on that in just a moment) the cake shops and some bars had Halloween decorations in the windows.
On Tuesday, my last class of the day, Class 12, invited me to come and watch a basketball game between their class and Class 10. I agreed and sent Lucie a quick text (she was at home) inviting her along too. When we arrived at the basketball courts, half of Senior 1 were there. There were 3 basketball games going on - 10 vs 12, 11 vs 14 and 9 vs 13. The game I was watching was really good, it was 5 aside and it was interesting to see that most of the boys playing played in jeans and normal tshirts, there were only 2 who had put kits on. Whenever their team got the ball, the rest of the class would shout, "打架! 打架! 打架!" ("dǎ jià! dǎ jià! dǎ jià!" - "Fight! Fight! Fight!") not entirely sure why they were shouting this as there was no fighting going on, but I joined in and had a really good time. When Lucie arrived she had a rather interesting reception. I had forgotten that my Senior 1 students had never seen Lucie properly and so when she arrived all the girls were very excited. When they could see her approaching they asked "What is her name?" when I told them they all screamed "LUCIE!!" at the top of their lungs and charged towards her. It was quite funny to watch from where I was standing as she was surrounded by my students being told she was beautiful and lots of hellos. She eventually made her way over to me, and after agreeing to lots of photos, we turned and enjoyed the rest of the game. It was a fun hour!
Now for the Very Long Day:
On Thursday evening I received a phonecall from Sophia telling us that we would be going to Nanchang the next day to sort out some paperwork that we needed before we could get our visas that would last us until we went home (our current visas expire on Nov 20th, so Lucie and I have been a bit anxious to get this done).
So at 6am on Friday we dragged ourselves out of bed and after buying some baozi from across the (little meat filled parcels which we knew existed but have only recently found a place that sells ones we like) we were collected by Sophia and the driver at 6.40am. The journey to where we were going took 3 hours and Lucie and I slept for most of it. We arrived at a very fancy building and were taken up to the 19th floor. Lucie and I were delighted to find only Chinese newspaper which prints in English - The China Daily - so we sat and read that for an hour as Sophia filled in some paperwork, we were only required once to sign our names at the bottom. We then had to head to a different building about 40 minutes away to get the forms 'read' before we could go back to the first building to collect the documents we needed.
When we arrived at the second building we were informed that the 'reader' would not be in until the afternoon, so we left our forms and Sophia took us out for lunch. The food was really nice, there was just so much of it! The Chinese always seem to worry when we don't eat that much, but Lucie and I always eat till we can eat no more when we are out with them as we know even then we barely eat enough in their eyes. We sat in this restaurant for about 2 hours before we decided to head back to the building where are forms were, but on arriving discovered everybody had gone for lunch, so we sat in the waiting room for an hour. Lucie fell asleep and I went for a walk, in the pouring rain (I forgot to mention, the weather was horrible all day and for the first time the temperature dropped below 20C) and discovered a supermarket where I bought us all a drink and a snack. We eventually got our forms back and headed back across the city to collect the documents.
Well... I should say 'document,' because there was only one. We had spent an entire day for one peice of paper! Ah well, it is the most important piece of paper required for our visas Sophia informed us. Sophia and the driver then took us to a very, very fancy hotel for dinner. The food was absolutely amazing, and we even got to bring the leftovers home (even in the poshest places you can ask ''打包'' (''da bao'' - take away)). On the way home Sophia told us that next week we will go to Fuzhou one day so we finally get our visas, which means Lucie and I will only be teaching one day next week!
Novemeber is a really odd month for us:
Next week we get 4 days off (1 day to Fuzhou, and 3 for the Sports Meeting - Shnaghai here we come!)
The following week we get 2/3 days off for the monthly exams (maybe a trip somewhere else??)
The week after that we get one day off because our PT Desk Officer, Tom, is visiting us!!
So November will be a busy month for us, it is also the Month of Blog Posting, so I will attempt to post a little something every day - though that might not always be achievable due to our travels.
Hope you had a Happy Halloween! And have a great November!
Until next time,
再见 x
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