snacking, sight seeing and shopping

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My dad is coming to visit (for the second time!) next Thursday. We are all very excited here at Slavens in Shanghai headquarters. Not only are we thrilled to spend more time with Papa, we are looking forward to our mini-vacation to a rural village near Yangshuo in southern China.

Meanwhile, we are just doing more of our usual life in China tasks. As we are nearing our end date (late June/early July) I am starting to have more of those "I won't miss this" and "I will miss that" moments. In the I will miss category: going up the street to eat baozi (steamed buns will various fillings) for 1 Yuan each (fifteen cents). The other day, Mark had the brilliant idea to ask the guard at our front gate for a recommendation on where to get some baozi nearby. Turns out (almost 2 years later) there's a great place up the street. We'd seen it before but it's very street. But,we figured it steamed, so therefore germ free, and went for it. Emily, Mark and I feasted on baozi for breakfast while Nathan stayed back at the condo and ate from our stash of Trader Joe's cereal. To make it even more memorable, we brought our own thermoses of coffee (Peet's for me, hazelnut for Mark). We stood on the street and gobbled up our breakfast.

After the street eats, Emily and I hopped in a taxi and went to a free reading at M on the Bund. It was part of the Shanghai Literary Festival. We were planning to see more authors, but at least Emily and I made it to one. We heard Dr. Margaret Read McDonald read her folktales, She was a great public reader/performer and we bought one of her books and got it autographed. After the reading, when we were walking to People's Park, Emily said "thanks mom. that was really cool. Sorry I wasn't more excited to go and I'm glad we went!" (I smiled and filed the moment away under worth the effort).

I realized I share much more about Emily than Nathan and it's probably just a result of their age difference. I am with Emily a lot more these days too. While E & I were at the reading, Nathan was with Mark at his Kung Fu lesson. Having the lesson on Saturday is not the best for family time but it is something he's really enjoying and so we are making the effort to get him there and devote part of our weekend to that activity. Nathan is on level 2 of his Kung Fu and is now using a sword (!) as part of his practice. I was with him this weekend when he was given his sword. The teachers were very stern in instructing him not to use it at home. It's not sharp, but I like the fact that he is aware of the symbolic danger that a sword represents and isn't waving it in Emily's face. It's pretty cool looking and he looked as though he felt special walking out of the studio with his sword bag after class.

I went on a field trip with Emily's class last week at Yu Gardens. I've spent a lot of time in this area over the past 2 years but this trip took us into the temple and the actual gardens--something we'd never done. Unloading 6 buses of second graders (3 classes) was an event in and of itself. We hearded the children to the temple gate first. While the teachers figured out the tickets, the rest of the adult chaperons worked on keeping track of the kids. Huge wheelbarrows of flaming ash were being wheeled out of the temple gate to a back alley. Turns out, it was a big prayer day--not sure why--and the place was packed. The incense was burning at a very high rate and the resulting ash and smoke was really intense. After entering the temple, the kids wandered about and did their scavenger hunt-like activity sheets.

Next, we moved on to the less crowded gardens with water full of fish, pagodas with dragons, bridges, rock structures and ancient trees. It was a lovely sunny day and it was nice to be away from the smoke and crowds of the temple. The kids had fun running free and exploring the gardens. We had lunch there too and then went on to a silk museum where the kids had fun pulling on bunches of silk and seeing the silk worm cocoons. The teacher bought them each a cocoon (with dead worm rattling around inside) for 1 Yuan and the kids were thrilled to the point of yelping for joy as they were each handed the hard little ball of silk thread.

These urban field trips are the best. After the class went back on the bus, I kept Emily with me and we spent time exploring one of the craft markets around the area. We bargained for some jewelry making beads and marveled at the treasures you could find for any craft or activity you might imagine. Giant bags of plastic googly eyes, stacks and stacks of felt, bins of pom-poms and Styrofoam balls in various shapes and sizes. Needles, threads and cross-stitch patterns filled stall after stall. We didn't even leave the first floor.

In other news, I also went back to the fabric market last week with a friend. I had a dress made for the wedding we are attending this weekend (kids and Mark are IN the wedding). I found a dress online and printed it out, took it to a woman at the market and she said she could make it for me. I go back today to try it on and hopefully pick it up, so the result will likely be displayed in the post-wedding blog. I got a few other things--hee hee--because if not now, when? I need to collect a few more treasures before heading back to real life.

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Photos

fresh Chicago donuts
donuts were actually quite good

at the Donut Republic
Chicago themed donut shop

Comments

[BD]

Chicago
I find the Chicago-themed donut place amusing. Wonder why they don't have one here? Also, the sword is hellacool.

[Geeze]

s,s,s and s
I just read that donuts with salmon are a fav over there. Hrmp! So goodbye maple bars.. Wow that is some sword indeed. Dude! Nathan bring that one back to the states. Fed Ex? Have a great week with your Dad and crew!