Thanksgiving

Tis the season of short blogs I'm afraid.

Last Thursday we celebrated our second American Thanksgiving in Suzhou. We actually have more Canadian teachers on staff so it would make more sense to celebrate in October but last year and this we have had American volunteers to organize the event and as a result, the celebration has been held in November. Not that we Smiths are complaining, we have always celebrated both.
So the cafeteria at school was transformed with white table cloths and floral arrangements. Our usual stations of pizza, chinese food and sandwiches served mashed potatoes, stuffing, pumpkin and apple pie and of course turkey!

This is Eileen and one of her three daughters Ava enjoying the dinner. Some friends of ours from Peterborough, Ontario. Eileen is the elementary school librarian and her husband Andrew is the college counselor.

Ava is very entertaining to say the least.
Here's Abby writing what she is thankful for to go on the big poster the school has up to help people from other cultures understand what Thanksgiving is all about.

It was a nice evening. Unfortunately James missed it. He was in Shanghai at a cross country meet. His last one of the season. He ran really well in the 4k event and was happy to end the season on a high note.


So, as is tradition in America, we officially started the Christmas season the day after Thanksgiving. We pulled out the little table top tree we bought from the German superstore last year and hung a few of our favourite ornaments that we brought over with us.

On Sunday I was finally ready to send off Christmas presents so we headed to the post office. I actually got away with putting wrapped presents in the mail this year. I bought some really nice paper at the Christmas bazaar and wanted to wrap the gifts but wasn't sure how it was going to fly with the post office employees. I had heard stories about people having to unwrap before they were allowed to send things off. Luckily that didn't happen. The lady at the post office gave me a form to fill out in french! I guess to her there is no difference so I was a little stressed that I was writing the addresses in the wrong place, hopefully everything arrives where it is supposed to. This is me struggling to remember my high school french!


The biggest news of the week was of course from the other side of the world. The arrival of Lauchlan Jacobs! So we are sending hugs, kisses and congratulations to Laura, Richard and Ryker and can't wait to meet Lauchlan this summer in person.

Have a great week everyone, hope you are enjoying the holiday season!

Michael's visit

Just a quick mid-week blog. Michael and his friend Lisa left today after spending 4 days with us in Suzhou. We had a good time showing them around. It was cold and rainy their first day here but thank goodness the sun came out for the rest of their time here.

On Saturday we headed out to Lion's Grove Garden, one of our favourite places in Suzhou.


Can you see James on top of the rocks? He is in his own world when we go to Lion's Grove. Climbing the rocks and exploring the caves. He loves it.
We did a little shopping afterward and Mark bought me a new teapot. Lisa bought a chinese chess set for her son. We also went to the tailor and Lisa had a dress suit made.
So, we really enjoyed having visitors. The kids didn't have school Wednesday, Thursday and Friday so we are back into the swing of things now and it will be go, go, go until Christmas.

This is my new teapot.

That's all for now. Will blog again on the weekend.

Hi Everyone,
We had a weekend of skyping and running errands. We talked to Trudie and David on Saturday and then headed to walking street to pick up some special Christmas presents that I had ordered (can't say anymore just in case the wrong person reads this). On Sunday we skyped with Mum, Dad and Mason. I headed to the framer's with a friend to have some prints framed that I bought at the bazaar last week. Mark stayed home and watched James and Abigail as well as my friends' three daughters. He did quite well and apparently danced for them to much enthusiastic laughter.
On Sunday night we skyped with Mike, Treasa and Jack who told us it was "a fine day". Love it.

So since I didn't really take any pictures this weekend I thought I would post some pictures that I promised when we first moved in. This is my newly covered couch. The orange is gone!

The pillows I bought from Ikea that were in our window seat at our old apartment looked perfect with the new slip covers. I'm really happy with how it turned out.

This is my new plant stand that I picked up for about $15 US. One of a kind. I thought it was really interesting.

So tomorrow is parent/teacher conferences. The kids don't go to school because the conferences go from 8am until 6pm. Mark is heading to Shanghai tomorrow night for a Texas Instruments conference and will be there until Friday night.

Speaking of Mark, he had told his grade 12 students that if they raised 5000 rmb for a charity that fights AIDS in Africa he would let them shave his head. They informed him today that they had reached their mark. So this was the scene today at break time.


There was some talk about leaving it like this but Mark neglected to see the humor in that remark.

The scene in the hallway. There were quite a few gasps. At least it went to a good cause. Unfortunately he has also commited to shave all his facial hair and his eyebrows if they raise 10,000 rmb. Yikes!

That's all for now. It's a chilly, rainy night so I am off to get into my flannel pjs and curl up in bed!

Love from Suzhou!

trip to Luxiang

I think I'm finally getting back into the habit of blogging regularly. Hopefully I didn't just jinx myself by saying that.

Anyway, another busy weekend comes to an end. Yesterday Abigail and I went with some friends to the annual Expat Christmas Bazaar. I blogged about it last year. It is quite early this year but I was glad because it gave me the chance to buy some things and still have enough time to send them home for Christmas gifts. All the stuff was beautiful. Local artists, custom made jewelry, cashmere, and home made baked goods. Abigail bought some Christmas presents for her friends too. Mark and James went to the dentist to have James' braces looked at, we walked to the sports equipment store to get some warm weather gear for Mark because he is biking into school and back everyday now. At bedtime Abigail talked to her best friend Tabitha who moved to Qatar last year on skype (lots of giggling).

Today we went on a trip out to the country to an area called Luxiang. The trip was organized by the school's social committee so we went with other teachers. James chose to stay home and hang out with his friend Hannah. Here are some of my favourite pictures from the day.


This is what you can see when you walk through the gates. The village is on water. You can't see it very well because it was quite overcast today but there are mountains in the background.

Look at this guy! He reminds me of Gollum from Lord of the Rings.

Roof tops



We climbed up the mountain a bit to look out at the town. This picture really doesn't do it justice because it was so foggy. The mountain is covered in orange groves.

The path back downI saw this on the side of a building down a deserted alleyway. Notice it has the word "Tibet" scrawled at the bottom.

That's all for this week. We have a full week of school and then only 2 days the following week due to parent-teacher conferences and 2 teacher PD days back to back. Michael is coming to visit on the 20th with his friend Lisa. It is going to be quite busy until Christmas.
Have a great week everyone!

Halloween 2009

We are cuddling up in bed watching Top Chef tonight. The weather has turned cold and it is time to turn our a/c's into heaters.

I thought I would post some pictures from last weekend (Halloween). Mark and the kids had a slow morning while I took off to the orphanage. I have joined a group of female teachers who take turns going to help out with the babies. This was my second time. It works out to a commitment of one Saturday morning a month. I was a little nervous the first time I went because I had heard that a lot of the babies have down syndrome and other developmental problems. I pictured a really dark and depressing place. I'm not going to say it's not difficult and it doesn't break my heart but the facility is clean, they obviously receive a lot of donations because the babies all have new matching sleepers and new blankets on their beds. The ayis work very hard and are always smiling, they are saints to do what they do every day. We are only allowed in the baby room and are not allowed to take pictures. I did take this picture as we were leaving the first Saturday I went.
So basically what we do is spend 2 hours in the baby room just holding as many of the babies as possible. There are usually around 20, mostly girls, quite a few with down syndrome, cleft palates and other handicaps. I thought it would be really uncomfortable but they are as sweet as can be. It really just gets sad when I start to think about what a difficult road lies ahead of them.



Ok, on to happier times. I took Abigail trick or treating on Saturday night with the other staff kids. It doesn't look like it from the picture but our group has dwindled down quite a bit since last year. They had about 12 places to trick or treat and the weather was wonderful, some friends of ours had a party so we met up with Mark and James there.
Here we are before we set out for trick or treating. Abigail was a gypsy, I was a mime. I was a horrible mime though, I talked all night. I couldn't exactly stop being a mom!

This is James and his friend John. He was a magician. I don't know why they refused to smile for me.


This is a group of the kids bobbing for apples at the Halloween party. You can see Abby in her hairnet (she had to take her wig off).

So October has flown by and here we are in November. We have a busy weekend starting tomorrow and I will blog about it next week. I have been busy subbing almost every day and chipping away at the online course I'm taking. I am leading a middle school girl scout troop and that started up this week as well. I have a feeling November is going to fly by just as fast as October.

That's all for now. Lots of love from Suzhou............

Second day in Singapore

Time to write about our second day in Singapore. The Smiths are very much zoo people. Whenever we are in a new place we always have to check out the zoo. Singapore was no exception since it is known for being one of the best zoos in the world. I had read about the Breakfast with Oragutans program that you could buy tickets for. It was highly recommended so I went ahead and reserved some spots. So we got to go have a nice breakfast buffet and after about 20 minutes the zookeepers brought out a family of orangutans that sat directly in front of our table and they ate their breakfast right along with us. They were close enough for us to touch. It was really neat.

After our breakfast we started to explore the zoo. The Singapore zoo is an "open concept" zoo. When I read about it the explanation was, there is minimal space and barriers between visitors and the animals (except for dangerous animals of course). I assumed that meant no bars on cages and no glass but it goes beyond that. When we first walked into the zoo, this monkey was sitting on the welcome sign above us.
He was not behind anything, he was not attached to anything and there was no zookeeper keeping an eye on him. The further we walked the more we realized there were monkeys loose all over the zoo! Gibbons, spider monkeys, tamarins, all sorts! There were also ropes crisscrossing above throughout the zoo where the orangutans climbed overhead all day long, free to go wherever they wanted. It was unbelievable.
The Singapore zoo also has shows throughout the day, kind of like sea world. So we caught the sea lion show, the elephant show and the monkey show. They also have animal rides so James and Abigail wanted to ride an elephant.
The other part of the zoo that we really enjoyed were the "walk-throughs". In the Australian "walk-through" there was a winding path and as you walked there were kangaroos hoping along right next to you as well as various species of deer and pigs. I'm not sure it was allowed but we saw a boy reaching down to pet a small kangaroo so James decided he would try while I held my breath and quickly took a picture.

My favourite walk through was called the "fragile forest" and had wildlife from southeast asia. We had lemurs, sloths, monitor lizards and bats right next to us. It was so hard not to reach out and touch them because there is nothing between you. Mark was in monkey heaven, but I really loved the bats (Malaysian flying foxes).



So, another great day in Singapore.

It has taken me way to long to get these posts done. I am going to post a link to see more pictures of our week if anyone is interested.

We have a busy weekend ahead of us and I will blog on Sunday so that I am all caught up and posting about current stuff instead of what we did almost a month ago.

Love from Suzhou until next time.

Singapore

I am sheepishly posting this blog with my tail between my legs and promising that I will return to weekly blogging and not monthly, as would be the assumption based on my recent activity.

Although I do not want to give excuses, I just haven't settled into the Sunday night "sit down and blog about the week" habit since we've been back from the summer.

So I think instead of catching everyone up on everything that has happened in the past month, I will blog about our most recent adventure in Singapore for the Chinese National Week (or Golden week as it is known here)

My first choice for this vacation was Malaysia. I wanted to have a couple of days in Kuala Lumpur where I lived for 3 years when I was in elementary school and then hop over to an island for sun and snorkeling. My children have experienced warm ocean water in the Gulf of Mexico, but the water in Galveston is filthy. They swim in the Atlantic Ocean every summer in Canada which is clean but is it ever cold! So I wanted them to have the best of both and enjoy warm and clean water which you can find in Southeast Asia.

Anyway, due to lack of aeroplan seats on flights to KL, we settled for flying to Singapore. Same area, similar culture and weather. I had been to Singapore as a kid and remembered it to be a clean, safe city with a lot to see. Although I was not looking forward to another big city vacation since we had been to Hong Kong last February I was pleasantly surprised at what Singapore had to offer.

I had done some research online and found a national park where you could experience a treetop suspended bridge over the rainforest. The only catch was, the hike to the bridge is 2.5 hours and another 1.5 hours afterward. I wasn't sure how the kids would do but we headed out with snacks and water and hoped for the best.

Right before we entered the hiking trail I spotted some monkeys playing in a clearing. Mark was, of course, extremely excited since he loves monkeys and has never seen one out in the wild. So he walked over to see how close he could get and asked me to take his picture with the monkeys. I proceeded to put my backpack on the grass, grab my camera out and approach Mark and the monkeys. As I turned my back James said "mom, I wouldn't do that if I were you". I asked why without turning around and heard a noise coming from behind me. Sure enough, a little monkey (must have been a baby) was stealing snacks out of my backpack!! By the time I ran back he was way up in the tree above me trying to open a bag of doritos! Of course at that time my 12 year muttered "that's why".

This is the picture I was taking.

So off we went with 1 fewer bag of doritos. It was quite warm and extremely humid but we really enjoyed the quiet and the beauty around us.

I thought this tree was so cool. Had to take a picture for Uncle Claude and Aunt Lynn. I'm sure they know exactly what kind of tree this is, why is grows this way and what it's proper name is. What can I say, weird vegetation makes me miss my aunt and uncle.


After much huffing and puffing we made it to the canopy treetop bridge.
We had the whole place to ourselves and were able to enjoy the view and take a breather.






So over all, a great first day. We returned to the hotel to cool off in the swimming pool and were quite exhausted. We had dinner at an interesting place. It was a sort of indoor food stall area where foods from all over the world were offered. The kids had mexican! Mark decided to be a little more adventurous and tried a Singapore delicacy called bo-bo-cha-cha. It's basically shaved ice with syrup, some kind of sweet cream, cubes of some kind of jelly and a scoop of ice cream on the top.

I think the overall review was..."not so great".

Stay tuned for day 2!

The blog returns!

Hi everyone!
After 4 months of being blocked I am finally blogging again! The blogger website is still being blocked but we have found a way to bypass it. Well,..... Mark found a way to bypass it :)
So we are in the middle of our 4th week of school. James is in 7th grade this year and Abigail is in 3rd. They seem to be quite happy to be back in China which is wonderful. James is on the student council this year and Abigail just started swim team. Mark is busy as ever and has started teaching a theater tech course this year (on top of his regular math). I am keeping busy substitute teaching and will take another maternity leave for elementary PE after the new year.
The day before we left for Canada we moved apartments so everything was in boxes when we got back on August 16th. It was quite overwhelming and took me about 3 weeks to get everything set up the way I want it. Abigail and I went to IKEA with the rest of the SSIS staff last weekend and picked up a few things for the new place so we are starting to feel at home. I won't post pictures until everything is just right ;) Our new place is a little bigger and newer. James has a big bed and Abigail now has bunk beds. She loves that because she sleeps on the bottom and has big, comfy pillows and blankets on the top bunk where she climbs up and reads. We are on the 8th floor and have somewhat of a view of the lake. The kids have friends that live in the same complex so they can call on friends whenever they want.
I will post again this weekend. I'm volunteering at the orphanage in Suzhou this year and will go for the first time this Saturday. So we'll see how that goes. I'm expecting it to be hard.

To everyone we saw this summer - thanks again. We had a wonderful time in Oakville, Houston, New Brunswick, Nova Scotia and New York (no wonder it went by so fast). It was great to see everyone and we were really touched by everyone's generous hospitality (especially the Pauleys who let us live with them for 5 weeks!)
More to come.... sending lots of love from China.

Bird and Flower + Pearl Market

I thought I would do a mid-week blog since we have the week off.
On Sunday we headed to the bird and flower market. Also called Pet Street by the expats. Like so many other marketplaces here, the bird and flower market is a labyrinth of alleyways. The reason it is dubbed pet street is if you go down certain alleyways there are puppies, kittens, birds, fish, lizards, even hamsters for sale. Once I figured out which alleyways sold live merchandise (which isn't difficult - it is quite noisy) I learned to steer my children in the opposite direction.
Anyway, the weather in Suzhou has been lovely and we are wanting to be outside more and more so I wanted to buy some plants for the balcony. Abigail has been wanting to plant her "fairy garden" and James had a kit Mum and Dad gave him that has seeds to plant "pre-historic" vegetation so we were trying out our green thumbs. For those of you who have never heard of or seen a "fairy garden" it is basically a small scale garden (perfect for the balcony) where, if you look closely, you can see the evidence of fairies living amongst the plants. A "build it and they will come" sort of idea. So when you look at the garden from a fairy's perspective it starts to look like a forest of sorts. Yes, I do realize some of you are reading this and raising your eyebrows. This is what I get for raising 2 children with fantastic imaginations. Here are some scenes from the bird and flower market.

Birds for sale


Everything from bamboo to hydrangeas to cacti for sale.

Piles and piles of beautiful pots to choose from.

Abigail trying to pick out the right bonsai for her garden.
Her choices.


This isn't the greatest picture but we saw this from the taxi on our way to the market. As spring has arrived more and more flower sculptures are popping up around town. This is a rubic's cube made completely of flowers. It's really neat. There are many new ones all over our neighborhood.
This is Abigail's new fairy garden. If you look closely you can see a fairy sitting in a leaf boat having a sip of tea with a bumblebee and a little stone path that leads to a tiny bird bath. It came out really nice actually.

On Monday we headed out of town a bit to the pearl market. This was my second time since I went with some other teachers last November but Mark and the kids hadn't been. Abigail had saved up some money from her allowance and was determined to buy some jewellry. She had 50RMB (8 US$) and left with 3 bracelets, a necklace she had custom made, a sea-glass necklace and a pearl necklace. She loved every minute of it.

The exterior of the Pearl Market. It is 2 storeys. There is a central area with stalls on the main floor and then shops along the perimeter. Each space is owned by different people. The more expensive shops are on the second floor. You can bargain but you really don't need to because most prices are already really low. You can also have jewellry custom made within minutes at no extra cost. Amazing!
Two ladies making necklaces in one of the shops. The one further back is making one of Abigail's necklaces.

Strings and strings of stones, shells and pearls to choose from in every colour you could want. So you just choose what you like and tell the shop owner how long you want it and they cut it and put a clasp on it. These strings are 3 RMB each (less than 50 cents).

Mark bought a pair of both jade and onyx cuff links. He also got a black pearl earring for free. The shop owner rolled her eyes and said "I give" when she realized he only wanted one.

I really liked this bracelet so the shop owner made me a necklace to go with it. I'm not sure if you can see it in the picture but the blue and white balls have the Chinese symbol for longevity on them.

So that's all for now. We have a relaxing day planned but will hopefully get some much needed spring cleaning done. Tomorrow morning Mark and I are taking the train to Shanghai. We have one of his grade 11 girls staying with the kids for the day. Should be fun. Shanghai is always an adventure!
Have a great week!