From Grits to Chopsticks

Even though we’ve been in China for over a year and a half, some things still catch our attention or seem a bit unusual.  When we returned from Taiwan last weekend, we enjoyed the wording of this sign next to the escalator at our international airport:

While walking by a local business, it was interesting to see the combination of religious perspectives in the newly decorated lobby: Christmas on the left and an idol shrine on the right:

Mold has not been as much of an issue as last year, but Susan still recently needed to clean our bathroom ceiling:

The weather so far hasn’t been as cold as last year, either, but I knew that the temperature was getting low when I saw Susan brushing her teeth at bedtime wearing a coat and scarf (like most people here, we don’t have heat in our apartment):

Before eating lunch with a student recently, I snapped a photo with my camera phone:

This restaurant, like many others, allows you to order from its rack of vegetables and raw meats.  It’s a good idea to ignore the kitchen while selecting your meal …

Restaurants are usually wide open to the street (brrr!) allowing anyone and anything to enter and check out the quality of the food.  This little stray stared at the offerings for a long time as we were eating with some friends today after our Sunday fellowship:

During English corner last week, we played games with our students (in English).  Here are some kids at the beginning of “Monopoly” and at the end of “Ticket to Ride”:

When a new student comes to English Corner for the first time, we ask them to put a sticker on our map to show the location of their home town.  If multiple students are from the same town, we begin to stack up the numbers.  Here is a photo of the map which has been on the wall for the past year, showing that we’ve had over 140 different students come one or more times during the past three semesters:

Transportation here is quite different than in the west, with a million electric scooters flooding the roads and sidewalks.  I’ve seen them carry huge loads, including a queen-sized bedroom set.   This is the first one that I’ve seen equipped with a western toilet: