KTV, Michael, Aaron and a Walk Around Town

The other night after school, the new Chinese teacher, Gary asked me if I wanted to go to KTV with him and meet some of his friends.
What do you think I said?

By the way...This is Gary. He's a new english teacher at the Hope International School of language.



So we went to this KTV(Karaoke) place around the block from the school and went into our room and guess who I saw...Jaer.


She's a pretty good singer...who knew?


It seems that Jaer and Gary went to school together growing up.
Once again...small world(even here in China).

Gary also had another old school chum there...I forgot his name?
But he could sing like a bird and drink like a fish.


And his girlfriend showed up a little later too.
Her name is Angel.
Nice one Gary...She's a keeper!!

Ok, I have NEVER really sung at a KTV bar before...I posed with a mic once but they didn't have any English songs at that place so I never really sang.
Here they did, mostly old Beatles, Elvis and and bad 70's type songs.
After a beer or two I was peer pressured into picking out some songs and thrilling my Chinese audience with my incredible voice.
I think I found Hotel California by the Eagles...I wasn't half bad.(or half good)


Gary and Angel doing a beautiful Chinese duet.



Before long Jaer was getting tired and had to leave...Or maybe my voice scared her away?



But not before Mr. Birdfish picked out one more song for her.



These guys were having a lot of fun...Angel's not too sure about the whole thing.


The next day I called up a new American teacher that we teaching in another school here in Changxing.
His name is Michael and he is from Texas...nice guy!
He studied Chinese for a year before he came here so his Chinese was pretty good.





















He also brought along another guy named Aaron. He's from San Fransisco.
They are both teaching at Changxing Experimental School...HUGE school!!





















They knew of this great little place that made incredible soup. You just pick out what you want in it and the guy whips it up in a few minutes...I love this place. It's kind of like individual hot-pot. Plus it's just right around the corner from where I live.
A big bowl of soup with noodles and mushrooms and...OK lots of stuff I have never seen before.
All for 8 yuan...$1.00. I'll be eating there a lot in the future...Heck, I went back last night for dinner after my Chinese massage.














I invited them to join Jaer and myself for a couple of days in the country during the National Holiday. They weren't sure if the would be able to make it or not...they were getting lots of invitations to do things during that week.

Today

The next day (today) I took a walk around town and took a few pictures of the little markets and people. It was such a nice day out that I just wanted to walk around.


























Knife sharpener.
I love wandering these streets!


















I saw this pet store and contemplated buying a pet.

Maybe a Goldfish?



Or a bird?














This guy was picking out the dead worms from the live ones...They were like little mealy worms. My guess is that they were for feeding the animals...or lunch?













And this old woman who can fix anything with her sewing machine.












I also saw the biggest wok I have ever seen in my life!!












I'm not sure what was cooking inside there but it smelled great!!















Well...that's a few more days of my life in China.


Jim

Indiana Jim and the Temple of Buddha

Wow...What a day!!

Jaer (the other donkey) was back in Changxing this week.
Her school in Hangzhou didn't start for another week so she was back in town with nothing to do.
We went riding bikes Monday and she told me about a Buddhist Temple not far away so we made plans to visit it today.

What a day trip!

We met at KFC and got a taxi to take us to the countryside.
I took my bike because there was a few other places to see besides the temple.

As soon as the taxi dropped us off we ran into this guy on a three wheeled motorcycle type thing and he asked if we wanted to visit his place about 15 mins. away.


Kind of like a bed-in-breakfast in the making.



Jim....say no? I don't think so!

Jaer hopped on his motorbike and I followed on my bike.
It was kind of hilly so at one point I just grabbed onto the side and had him pull me.

When we got there you could see it was still under some construction...



Hard at work.



Great view!!



It was situated in a hillside with a beautiful view of a lake that had been created by a dam.

The view was stunning!!



They asked if we had eaten and we said "No".
They said they had a chicken out back and would fix it (kill it) for us if we wanted to stay for lunch.
Another chicken bites the dust in the name of lunch.

While they got about to fixing lunch we took a walk on the dam and enjoyed the view.
It kind of reminded me of southern Indiana...Brown County.

I saw a few guys on the other side of the lake so I thought I would investigate...I figured they were fishing.

Jaer was tired so she just sat on the dam and enjoyed the view.

I was right....they had been fishing but had stopped for lunch by the time I had arrived.



Lunch break.



It was getting too hot to fish and they said they were only catching small ones.
One guy spoke a little bit of English and between my limited Chinese and his limited English we had a nice conversation about how beautiful the lake was and what a nice day it was.
And what the heck was an American doing out in this neck of the bamboo woods?

So I headed back to where Jaer was and took a few pictures.
The sun was out so Jaer had to don her umbrella so as not get sun burnt.





By then I figured lunch should be ready and it wouldn't be kind to keep our hosts waiting.

I was wrong...Takes a little while to kill and pluck a chicken.
They figured we might need a rest so the took us up to a room and gave us some tea and told us to relax until lunch was ready...Such nice people!!



Jaer hung out in the room and sent a few text messages while I ran around taking pictures.
By the way...A room for the night (drum roll please) $4.00.
Take that Motel 6!

Fancy place...a western toilet.
I really expected a squatter!



The view from the window of the room.



Great bamboo forests.



I saw this guy from the room and couldn't resist going out and taking a picture of him working.
I love taking pictures of old people...their faces have so much character.



After a bit I came down to the kitchen and watched (heck....I don't remember her name) the boss lady, preparing lunch.






It was another wonderful Chinese meal...Duck, chicken, veggies, sausages, and a lot of other things I had never seen before in my life.....All good!


Great food and new friends....what could be better?



I'm not sure who this guy was...he just stopped in to check out the foreigners.



They had never met a fforeigner before and they figured it would be great advertisement to have pictures of there very first guest....An American!!
So they took lots of pictures of Jaer and myself having lunch and kicking about the place.
I hope it helps!!

The Chinese have have a national holiday from October 1st. through the 7th. I don't have any plans for that week so Jaer and myself thought it would be great to bring some friends up here for a couple of days and hang out. They said we could fish in the lake and walk around the bamboo forest...You know...Just relax.

After a while I mentioned to Jaer that we had better get to the temple before it got too late.
That's why we came here in the first place.

So we said out goodbyes and gave them our telephone numbers and told them we would see them in a couple of weeks.

The ride to the temple was a lot easier...all down hill!!


Jaer rode on the three wheeler and I followed on bike.




What a great time!!



The Temple

This is my first visit to a Buddhist temple and I wasn't quite sure what to expect.



Jaer had been here before some years back and was very familiar with all the Buddha's and Gods.



Then I realised how familiar she was as she began praying at all the different Buddhas.



I met some monks and walked around looking at all of the magnificent artwork.


And there was a LOT of artwork!!



And a lot of temples.



And a lot of monks!







I never knew there were so many Gods and Buddhas.



Now I'm not a Buddhist...But when in Rome...So to speak.

Candles burning.



Incense burning.



Then we went into one temple and met this monk....He was so great!!



He was 70 years old and was shocked when I told him I was 43...He thought I was 23.
Flattered by a monk...that just made my day!!
He showed us lots pictures of when he was a young man.
Quite a dashing young fellow he was!

He invited us to stay for dinner but it was getting late and I had to teach at 6pm.
I told him (with the help of Jaer) of our plans to come back to the countryside in October.
He made me promise to come back and visit with him and have a meal with him and the rest of the monks.

I'm really looking forward to this meal.
I never dreamed that I would be invited to have dinner with a monk in a Buddhist Temple.
You just never know!!

Once again we said our goodbyes to our new Chinese friends....The Monks...
And Jaer hopped on the back of my bike and we made our way down the road (about a half an hour ride) to a little town were the bus could take us the rest of the way back to Changxing.

It was a great bike ride...wonderful scenery!



Well the bus showed up and the guy said" No bikes on the bus".

So we ended up taking hiring a mini-van to take us back to town...$4.00....no problem!



But he would only take us so far so Jaer hopped on the back again and we made our way back to KFC and had dinner. I would have rather had dinner with my friend the monk!!
On the way to KFC we had a rickshaw driver take a picture of us on the bike...

What a couple of goof balls!!

But we had a great time!!


Jim