More news and updates from the Smiths! Sunday's pool party went great, we had a nice time chatting with other staff members from SSIS and the kids enjoyed the pools (1 for laps and 1 for play). James actually met a girl who is a year ahead of him who is just as into pokemon as he is - I couldn't believe it! Monday morning bright and early we were taken into old Suzhou to a medical clinic in an office building for our physicals. I thought only Mark needed to have one but apparently I was required to have one as well. So we were poked and proded by chinese men and women who did not speak english, for about 45 minutes. Again this was as a big group, the school picked us all up. All in all we had our blood drawn, vision tested, ultrasound (of the abdomen), EKG, dental check up, and a chest x-ray. All in 45 minutes! We literally walked from one room to another. When we were finished it was off to the school. They have a big multipurpose room set up full of things for the kids to do while the parents work this week, so that's nice. We went to Carrefoure (sp?) last night which was so much better than Auchan. Among other things we bought lo mein, dumplings and nan bread for dinner, which fed us all and we had left overs in the fridge. The total cost for dinner was $1.50 US! Today was a work day at school, I helped Mark set up his new room and met with the director of the school. It looks like I will be taking on a position full-time but won't find out what until the end of the week. Sometime close to Christmas, I should be subbing a high school english class while a staff member is on Mat leave. So I'm excited about that.
We braved the wet market tonight and I prepared my first meal in the apartment kitchen. Stir-fry and rice, not bad. We also had satellite installed in the apartment so we have more that 2 english channels to watch now. Tomorrow we are back to the school and James will be testing all morning to get placed at the proper levels. There is a staff social tomorrow night. So we are off to bed. Lots of love to all from China!
