Suzhou, the Venice of Asia

Josie and I decided it was time to get out of town. We went to the train station and bought tickets to a little tourist town called Suzhou (population 5.7 million) about a 45 minute train ride from here. It has lots of gardens and waterways for streets. We didn't have time to take a boat through them, but hope to next time. We could take the 9:00 am train there, but the earliest tickets they had for the evening were for 9:30 that night. I asked Josie if she really wanted to do this and she did, so early Saturday morning we packed a day of supplies and off we went. This is Josie in the train station waiting area, one of the many waiting areas, plus all the people outside....people everywhere!

I had researched a few places to visit and had a map and figured we would figure it out from there. I had planned on taking the tourist buses they have to get from sight to sight. That proved to be much more complicated than I thought and so what is the next best plan? How about hop on a little moped with a trailer to get there. You have to bargain for these too, I probably paid more than the Chinese would, but the girls loved it! The first guy told me 40 RMB and I was able to get another guy for 10 RMB. Some people must think all foreigners are idiots, why would I pay him 40 RMB when I could take a taxi for 10 RMB.

The first garden we went to was beautiful, but had way to many people there and was barely enjoyable. There were tourist guides with their megaphones yelling everywhere and the paths were quite tight. Another day this place would be a great get away. Next time we may go there for a peaceful stroll and take more pics of the actual gardens. Here are just a few of the pics from the Humble Administrators Garden.

We then headed for a Buddhist temple, not really that exciting, but something new for Josie. We left there I told the taxi driver we would like to go to a place called Tiger Hill. It was recommended to me by my Chinese teacher. I thought we were heading there and he started to tell me that there would be way too much climbing with my small kids and he had a better place for me to go. I told him thanks, but that is where I wanted to go. He again said there is lots of climbing, I told him I understood what he is saying, but that is where I wanted to go. (This was all in Chinese with my mad Chinese skills!) He pulls up to a place and I didn't know what it was supposed to look like. I quickly figure out he didn't listen to me and then we start to argue about it. I told him that is what HE thinks, but I can decide for myself. I had already unloaded the girls and strollers (of course with Josie's help) out of the car. I told him I was very unhappy with him and then he tells me get back in and he will take me there. I told him no way, I then tried to pay him, and he wouldn't take it. I threw it in his car and I told him we would figure out another way to get there.

At this point the girls were very tired and they really needed to nap. They had been up since 7:30 and it was about 2:00 pm. We read a few signs and decided to go ahead and check this

place out. There were very few people there and maybe only 2 foreigners, so we were able to get the girls to sleep for about an hour while we hung out on one of the paths. The place actually

turned out to be quite beautiful (maybe mostly because it was fairly quiet), but we definitely enjoyed it. Our entrance ticket included a short ride in a boat on the river, the girls thought it was great!

The funniest part was the the following picture of kids on the water in giant beach balls rolling around like gerbils. When we first arrived, there were probably 10 kids out there playing bumper balls! How fun, dangerous, Chinese, whatever it was quite a sight!

On our way out, this little old lady attacked us to have us buy her toys for the girls. They try to just give it to the girls, hoping I will give in. I have started telling them thank you for the present and will start to walk off. They quickly walk away and take the toys with them. I left Josie with the girls to see what kind of ride we could get to the next stop. I came back and there are a few Chinese surrounding her (5 or so). Tally had started to cry and is standing up in the stroller trying to get away. The old lady that was trying to sell her toys started to tell me how dangerous this is. Using my mad Chinese skills again, I told her that if she wasn't in her face scaring her that we wouldn't be having this problem! She turned around and left. The small Chinese that I know is very useful!

We then had time for one last site and ended up at another Buddhist temple, because I wanted to be in a decent area to get a taxi and be somewhat close to the train station. These temples seem to be the same to me, a pagoda and then various statues all over. It was nothing too exciting, but the following picture made it totally worth it. Tally has what we call her Buddha Belly....the Chinese got a kick out of it too!

All day, Adayla had noticed these "lion" trashcans. I told her not to touch them because they were so dirty. We did find some trash for her to put it in it and she was so scared, she thought it was going to bite her! She didn't want to shove the trash in the rest of the way.

It was now only 6pm and we had about 3 hours to kill. We decided to just walk until we found something good to eat. We came to a McDonald's, how convenient! The girls ate a bit and were able to play on the slide. We then found a smaller version of Nanjing Lu, a huge pedestrian zone in Shanghai. We hit up a couple of the local shops selling junk that we probably didn't need, but it was fun!

The girls did quite well all day, considering all things involved, and did okay on the train. Finally about 2 metro stops before getting home they were out! What a day!

National Day....Week

Monday is National Day in China (October 1, 1949 is the day the People's Republic of China was officially founded). Beginning in 1999, China celebrates this holiday with a week off of work so that the People can be with the People in the People's Republic of China, got it?
It's a busy time with most of the 1.5 billion people travelling during the week, so I decided to go with another Olmsted Scholar to travel to Taiwan (since Taiwan obviously doesn't celebrate China's National Day, right?!). In preparation for my 8-day trip to Taiwan, I've been busy this week trying to get all of my and my group's homework/projects done so that I wouldn't have to worry about it while I was in Taiwan.

So meanwhile, Tim heads for a nice relaxing vacation and leaves his wife and kids Ayi-less (thankfully Josie was here) to face I think the 500 million that came to visit Shanghai. Monday morning we, I don't remember, but we hadn't seen the extra people at this point. (I just remembered, I took Josie to see what a Walmart in China was like.) We decided Monday evening we will take the ferry across the river and head to a small street in Puxi that happens to sell all sorts of hair/nail products. Once we arrived at the ferry station, our plans changed. There was a festival of people there selling food and carnival type items. Usually this area this late at night has only a few people walking and a few more on bikes or mopeds. Totally crazy! The ferry usually leaves every 10 minutes, this time it was every 3 or so minutes and it was packed!

People were literally everywhere. They were doing there typical "lets run ahead of the stroller and then stop while the stroller is still moving and stare at the little Western kids." I have learned just to run them over. This was just to get on the ferry, why did they need to run, there was enough room for them, and they weren't going anywhere for a few minutes. I was a bit grumpy for a minute and then I was over it (until the next day......)

The next day we went to Yuyuan where we had been before, see previous pictures of how it could be on a typical week day, this time it was crawling with people. Seriously, barely room for all people to keep moving. On the way there was the best part though, I decided I must go to the bathroom. This was my first time in China, that I had to use the public squatter. I usually plan my bathroom trips around when I will be home or hold it until I get there. This didn't happen, I will spare all the details, it was disgusting to say the least!






I left Josie for a minute as we decided to try a bit of Chinese food, these days I am just not into it and usually opt for McDonalds..... I left Josie with the girls and they had no place to go to get away from the people. Pretty soon I look back and Josie is just mobbed with people. She stood there while they ask her questions she can't understand and realized that the foreigners are taking pictures of the Chinese taking pictures of her. Understand?? I made it back and found a small corner we could hide a bit and "enjoy" our Chinese cuisine. We ate a bit of it and then found a McDonalds and happily ate a burger and fries! Even though the people are a bit annoying and if it was like that everyday I would hide in my house, but for one week a few times a year I find it fascinating and exciting.

Here's a quick story on Adayla. So one night we went to a German pasta place and then planned to go shopping at a local favorite market. I told Adayla that she could have some new dancing pants (little sweat pants that she wore to dance class)....the ones I bought back in the states are quite short on her. The stores closed early and we didn't have time to get them. She threw a fit! There were tons of people at the metro station and one guy thought that while she was in the middle of her fit would be a good time for him to go touch her. She smacked him! Go Adayla! I
can't punish her for that one, I don't blame her.



Random pic of Tally to show that just like Adayla, she has a mullet....that will some day grow into long beautiful hair. It curls and curls here in the Shanghai humidity!

For you Football Fans

Here are some of Tim's more recent comments:

Another year, another BYU victory over Air Force. That's just life for Air Force, for whatever reason.It's interesting how teams match up against each other. Air Force owns a winning record over every conference foe except BYU. BYU owns a winning record over every conference foe except Utah. This year has stayed true to history thus far with Air Force beating Utah and BYU beating Air Force. All-time records

BYU vs Air Force: 22-6

AFA vs Utah: 15-10

BYU vs Utah: 28-49-4

Air Force just didn't show up to play this week against BYU. Still, Air Force has to be happy with being 2-1 against the league's preseason top three teams (TCU, BYU and Utah). And what happened to Utah this week? How can you blow out the #12 team in the country 44-6 and then the next week get shutout by UNLV 27-0?! What's going on there? I said it after Wyoming beat Virginia (who is now 3-0 in ACC conference play) and I'm saying it again now after Wyo's victory over Ohio, Wyo is a tough team this year and will have a major role in determining the conference champ.- I feel sorry for BYU having to travel to Laramie to play on Nov 17th. Whoever scheduled that for BYU should be fired!Cincinnati: nice 4-0 start for Bryan's alma mater

And for this weeks:

As for last week's "other" action:Air Force got sunk by NavyAFA led 20-17 in the fourth quarter, then Navy scored two unanswered touchdowns. Air Force had 474 yards of total offense and 25 first downs, but did not score three times when they were within the 20 yard line. That's five in a row for Navy now (sigh). Overall I think the Falcons are ahead of where most people had put them. I had thought they would be 1-4 (see my opening game e-mail), so I'll still take 3-2 at this point. BYU was tied with New Mexico after three quarters, and won by a touchdown. As I thought, BYU would when, and it was not a pretty game.#20/24 Cincy rolled over SDSU as expected- ranked for the first time since 1976! Wyoming had the week off. They did such a good job taking the week off that they picked up a vote in the polls! Maybe they should take more weeks off? Go WYO!



There isn't much better than a good upset, and this past Saturday we had a ton of upsets. In fact, #3-#7 all lost and 6 of the Top 10 lost! I love chaos. The BCS-mafia keeps trying to come up with a perfect plan to keep their money in the the BCS bowls, but a tournament is becoming more and more necessary. Parity is becoming the norm, and a tournament is needed to really decide who the best is.

Women's World Cup Final

Tim's Pre Game Chatter

At 5 pm we'll cheer on Team USA against Norway in the consolation game, then at 8 pm we'll cheer on Germany over Brazil in the final (but hope that Marta gets a couple of goals, too!). Argentina was South America's champion, Brazil its runner-up. We went to the game and watched Germany destroy Argentina 11-0 in the first game of the tournament. Even though we know that the theory of transitivity doesn't work in sports, Germany wins the World Cup tomorrow!

Some interesting comments by ESPN on US women's soccer:"It's time to face facts. Brazil and Germany, who'll contest Sunday's final, have caught up and overtaken the American women.
The bigger question to be addressed is this. Can the USA change course and placing the emphasis on technique, or will it be more of the same robust, but ultimately uninspiring football, come the next Women's World Cup?" Ouch! More on women's soccer after the World Cup...Enjoy the weekend of games, we will!

We let the girls take a long nap knowing we would be a little late to the USA vs Norway game, but figured it would be worth it as we knew it would be a late night. We headed to the Metro station to catch a train to the game. We had no idea how packed the trains would be...see the pics, a sea of black hair! It was the night before the National holiday where most people are off for 7 days. Oh well, we made it and were ready to cheer on the USA!

Can you find the foreigners??

We arrived about the end of the 1st half with USA up 1-0. The team looked great and we were excited to have them win (4-0). Adayla cheered and Tally ate, taking after her mom, I think she put away nearly a whole bag of microwave popcorn! She was happy. Adayla was excited to go see "Abby" play, she is #20 on the team and we had told her at the previous games that she was Josie's friend. All week she kept asking if Abby to come to her house and play. After the USA game was finished, the party started. Those CRAZY Germans were everywhere and boy were they having fun.

The stadium was packed and what a great game! Brazil actually dominated the game, but just couldn't finish it off. Tim was definitely rooting for Germany, but I think wanted to see Brazil take it. Germany ended up winning 2-0 and we headed home for Tim to finish, I mean start packing, so he could be on his was at 7 am the next morning to Taiwan.

The Game of the Year is Here

Can you believe, it's here, it's here! The game of the year is here!!!This is the game of the year as it always is, it's AFA @ BYU! Undefeated Air Force heads to Provo to take on a BYU team that has to be thinking, what's going on?

Anybody remember the theory of transitivity? It goes something like this:
Given:A>B and B>C
Therefore:A>C

Remember?Ok, how about this one:
Given:Air Force beat Utah, Utah beat UCLA, UCLA beat BYU.
Therefore:Air Force beats BYU this weekend
Isn't that simple?

I can't believe that this is only being broadcast by the Mountain - I can't watch it, but I'll be listening to a radio broadcast over the internet. It will be interesting to see (hear) how BYU responds after losing two-in-a-row, especially that stinger loss to Tulsa. Who? Yup, Tulsa.

In other football action:Wyoming heads to Ohio for a showdown of the Wyo folks vs the Ohio folks. Remember last year in the NCAA basketball tournament how Bryan touted his Ohio teams over BYU? Well now he's coming directly after you Big Grandpa.

Two days left to the Showdown in Provo. BYU fans, are you "fully invested?"
In the words of Adayla, "Go Air Force!"

Women's World Cup - Pre and Post Game Report

Tim's View (a few emails he had sent to some family)

Hey there football fans (ok, soccer fans for you Americans),In case you're watching TV tomorrow morning (Tuesday morning, ESPN, 6 am mountain time), we (Morgs, Josie, Adayla, Tally and I) are all going to the Team USA vs Nigeria World Cup Soccer game here in Shanghai. If the US wins tomorrow, they will advance out of group play, if they tie or lose they'll need help from the Korea-Sweden game.The camera is across the stadium from where we'll be sitting, and since our tickets are in the sixth row near midfield, there will be times that we'll be on TV. On the camera view, we'll be just to the left of of midfield, next to where you can see the entrance/exit doors at midfield.At any rate, just wanted to let you know, in case you were watching between 6-8 am tomorrow, where you should look to see us!U-S-A, U-S-A!

Who is Wipha?

Typhoon Wipha is a typhoon that is aimed directly at Shanghai. It was upgraded to a super typhoon this morning and is expected to be the biggest typhoon since 1997 to hit Shanghai. It has been heavily raining all day today, and the eye of the storm is expected to hit at 6 pm tomorrow.

The Shanghai Daily reported the following in their newspaper this morning:
The following is a notice released by Shanghai Flood Control Headquarters today.* Pay attention to weather information and confine your activities mainly indoors.

If fact, the school where Josie is teaching has cancelled school for tomorrow. So what are we doing with the impending typhoon? Hint: It's not confining our activities to mainly indoors. We're still going to watch World Cup Soccer with Team USA vs Nigeria this evening.

Lucky?
The game in Shanghai tomorrow evening has been moved to the city of Hangzhou 100 km away the following evening. I guess we are lucky they are allowing us to still watch our game in Shanghai in the torrential rain!

Being humbled?
I was so happy that I was able to swing tickets near midfield in the sixth row. But now those seats we had for the Germany-Argentina game are looking better. For that game we bought scalped tickets on the way into the game that were six rows from the top of the stadium. The advantage of those is that the stadium is a partially covered stadium, where the field is open, but the seats are generally covered. Our great seats close to the field will not benefit from the cover above. So the expensive seats get wet while the cheap seats stay dry how's that for irony?

Sorry about the blurry picture, I just think they looked so cute in their little ponchos!

The game last night was a memorable one. It rained all day yesterday, so Morgan went to the store and bought the last five ponchos that they had. We took the subway to the game (very convenient) and it was pouring down when we arrived at the stadium. We put on our ponchos, and cut two ponchos down to fit Adayla and Tally, and into the downpour we went!

Fair Weather Fans:
Even though the game was sold out (30,000 seats), we found that most people decided to not watch the game in rain. The announced attendance for the game was 6,000, compared to the 28,000+ that were at the Germany-Argentina game we went to. We're not fair weather fans, no, we rejected the warnings to stay at home figuring if they are still going to play the game, it can't be that bad, right?

As we started to walk down to our great seats there on the sixth row, we saw that nobody was sitting in the rain. We saw some seats in the 17th row that were under the overhang of the stadium and so the seats were still dry. We figured we would sit there until somebody kicked us out (you can see our best friend, the overhang, in the first picture of Josie & Adayla).

After we sat down, there were three guys sitting in front of us that turned around to ask us in where we were from. After a couple of minutes, we found out that there were Air Force Academy cadets in their senior years, doing a semester exchange at the university in Nanjing (a small city of only 6 million, a 1 ½ hour train ride away). When I told them I was an Academy grad, still on active duty they couldn't believe it!

We also found out that two of the three cadets were returned missionaries that served in Taiwan. It was funny to see their confused faces when I told them I served my mission in Germany, what are you doing in China they asked! What the heck, at least Josie now has some connections of single adults that perhaps she can go hang out with for a while. I included a picture of Tally and me with them - Tally is wearing an Air Force Academy shirt!

Oh yeah, the game. The US won 1-0 and now advances out of group play. The only goal of the game happened in the first minute of the game with the extra time we needed because of the rain, we missed the goal. Say what you want, but I prefer the 11-0 scoring fest of the Germany-Argentina game over a 1-0 struggle, but at least you can't call me a fair weather fan! The third picture I included is of the game, but of particular interest is if you look at the seats in the stadium. Besides the fact that they're empty, you'll see military guys sitting in the second row - at attention with their hands on their laps. These folks are there for crowd/riot control. It was a good thing they were there, if not, the attendance would have only been 3,000!

Update - with a few random pictures

I am getting worse at this writing time, but this time I have a good excuse. For the past week, I have been Ayi Morgan...not so fun. Feel bad for me, I know, but things here in China just take forever. The smallest trip to the grocery store for just a few things often takes over 2 hours. We don't have a dish washer, other than me, and we cook most things from scratch. The amount of dishes we use in one day is enormous. Plus, I must run the washer and dryer most of the day, or I get behind on my laundry. The washer is tiny and then the dryer takes nearly 2 hours to complete a load. We fired our Ayi last Friday, it just wasn't working out. She preferred to take a nap or watch TV for nearly half the time she was at our house. Which was fine, if there wasn't any thing else to do, but there was. We didn't search very hard this week, as it was nice to be the only people in our house. A neighbor Ayi had a friend she recommended and she starts tomorrow. We interviewed her and she seemed okay, we will give her a week to see if it will work out. I am happy about not doing dishes, but not looking forward to explaining everything again....how to separate the laundry, how to wash your hands after you touch raw meat, etc. So a new week
Tally started nursery at church last week because as Tim and I have been teaching the 3 year olds, we couldn't do it with her. She only fussed for a few minutes then I am sure she enjoyed the toys and Adayla was there to keep tabs on her. Today Adayla in churched looked back and saw an older gentleman sitting near the back row. She got very excited and said, “Gramps!!” She then smiled and tried to wave to get his attention. I had to sadly tell her that it wasn't him. I think it is cute she is looking/hoping to see her family here in China. She has some good people though here in China. One of the lady's that we go to church with is here with just her husband. Her kids all are grown and has a few grandkids of her own. Adayla has really taken a liking to her. Last week she was sitting in the living room playing and she said to Tim, “You know Ms Jeanine, she is beautiful.” Her little face lights up when she sees her. Today Ms Jeanine brought her a present, some homemade playdough. We played with it when we got home and she loves it.
Tim had his first weekend of classes, I will let him fill you in on that.
Adayla on the other hand wanted to take a nap at school on Tuesday with the other kids. We told her that next time she could. So on Thursday, she stayed the entire day at school. She took a nap like the other kids and finished her lunch after her nap. When she is hungry she will eat. She will tell you, I like my school. She also has started singing her Chinese songs. It is quite cute. They also play some kind of train game where they all hold on to each other and say, “Katzi”. She comes home and grabs Tally and tries to get her to play.

Josie is continuing to adjust. She is quite venturesome, now all we need to find her is some more friends. I mean Tim, I, and the girls are fun, but I think she needs some cool people to hang out with. She started Chinese with our tutor for a ½ hour at a time. Just a bit of understanding of the language makes a big difference.
Beware of the mosquitos in China, poor Tally is highly allergic to them. She gets one and it looks like a regular mosquito bite, but about 24 hours later it is a swollen mess. Here is a picture of her yesterday morning. She had a bite on her temple and it did this to her eye. (Either that or all the rice is causing her to have one Chinese eye!)
Adayla is my little mess maker, I know when it is quiet, I am in trouble.
The other day, I used the bathroom and noticed the seat seemed to be a bit
wet. I then washed my hands and when I picked up the towel to dry them, the towel was soaking wet. Adayla,why is the towel wet? I put it in the toilet. This morning, mom I helped you do laundry. I put stuff in the washer and the dryer. Ok thanks! Later I washed some sheets, when I put them in the washer I noticed a
scoop of soap already in there. Oh well, and started the washer. When I went to put the sheets in the dryer I noticed more than just a scoop in the dryer. She had dumped an entire container of oxy clean in there along with quite a few scoops of tide. I think I yelled a little bit then. She truly just wants to help and I need to remember that. She is quick to help me clean up or cook. They are growing up and getting big too fast. I won't let them ever to big to let me hold them as they sit on my lap!
The weather has cooled off here, the days are quite nice. We venture out day or night and it is quite nice. Our favorite here is a little vegetable and a fruit store that we visit quite regularly. The girls enjoy going and I enjoy visiting with the locals. Some vendors also sell fish and meat, but we prefer just to buy vegetables and fruit. We just are very careful to wash and peel the fruit. The vegetables we mostly wash and cooked, but we do sneak in an occasionally salad. As for most of the rest of our food, we buy at the local supermarkets. We have discovered the import market and have found a few foods there that are quite comforting. My most recent favorite, sandwich meat!!!
We are looking forward to Chinese New Year, we have had a very small taste of the fireworks. Twice a day, there is someone shooting them off. It may be 7 in the morning or 10:30 at night. I guess I am glad that in the states there are some restrictions on them. But that is nothing compared to the sound of construction, which is all night long. They are building a tunnel underneath the river using the road right next to our building. They work 24 hours a day, banging, pounding, and blowing up things. Tim said it is just another fond memory of our time her in Shanghai. As I wrote this, some neighbors from a neighboring complex were shooting of fireworks from their balcony.
I have decided that Tim, no matter how busy he is, he will always make time for keeping up on college football. He is in full swing these days. Here are some of his latest reports, for those who don't quite keep up.
What a WAC-ky week. Here's what we learned:Utah isn't a bad as everyone thoughtBYU isn't as good as everyone thoughtAnd nobody knows what to think of Air ForceAs much as the Mountain West tries to paint itself as the best non-BCS conference, this week proved otherwise:MWC vs WAC teams: 0-2 - Boise State beat Wyo, Hawaii beat UNLVMWC vs former WAC team: 0-1 - Tulsa over BYUThe conference has only one win over a ranked opponent this year.Starting with this week's stars: Utah, can you say WOW!Talk about adversity, the Utes started the season 0-2, and lost five of its top players to long-term injuries. But the Utes were able to put this all aside and execute a perfect game to blow out the #11 UCLA Bruins, the same UCLA team that beat BYU last week.Runner up for this week's stars: Air ForceAFA's win over TCU has already been discussed. They are definitely the surprise team thus far in the season.Wyo @ Boise State - kind of expected this (reference below) with Boise State coming off a loss at Washington. Despite the loss, it looks like Wyo will still have a significant impact on the conference this year.This week's disappointment: BYU With lowly New Mexico beating Arizona this week and Utah thumping UCLA, BYU's only win over Arizona looks weaker and their loss to UCLA, while a good showing, also looks weaker. But this loss to Tulsa is going to hurt for a long time. BYU needs to figure out how it allowed Tulsa to light up the scoreboard. I think ESPN must be embarrassed for naming BYU's defense one of the top 10 defenses in college football.This week's biggest disappointment: the Oklahoma relatives That one BYU alum and one former BYU student, both living in Oklahoma, had nothing to say about their team being in Oklahoma. I'm sure the many people from the stake went to the football game - Brigham & Shayla, where are you?
The week ahead:Air Force @ BYU - always the game of the year!Wyoming @ Ohio (C & B, who's going to win this one?)#3 Oklahoma @ Tulsa - will be interesting to see how bad BYU's loss really isA preview on those games will come later this week, along with a proof of the theory of transitivity...Have a great week college football fans!

Other than that, we are mostly into a routine. The girls are comfortable here. Adayla has started speaking Adaylanese. When she feels like it, she responds in a mumble of words, especially when the Chinese on the streets talk to her. It is not English and not Chinese. Tally on the other hand will hide completely in the stroller and just keep her face away. I just let them do their thing and move on.
Josie, the girls, and I have found some time to make it to the local markets. Josie has learned to bargain and I like practicing my Chinese. It is fun to relax and have a good time. She has bought a new coat, a back pack, a new purse, a few watches, and several pair of sunglasses. I am finding that there are plenty of shoes here, if you wear a size 8 or below. I am an 8 ½ and I just don't like to squeeze my feet into shoes. The funny thing is that some of Chinese girls here have feet my size or bigger. They have there toes hanging off their shoes. I guess that is fine in the summer, but what do they do in the winter?
Tuesday night, we head to watch the Americans in the World Cup play Nigeria. It should be lots of fun, we'll post later!

Women's World Cup Opening Game / Ceremony

Tim and Josie went to the Women's World Cup opening ceremony and 1st game. Here is the report with pictures.

Josie finally figured out that they were going to some of the games, she was quite excited. We went to the opening game this evening - defending World Cup champs Germany vs Argentina. What a blowout: 11-0! It was actually enjoyable to watch because the goals were pretty. Germany just destroyed them. It was a fun atmosphere with 28,098 people there, and lots of Germans! The German fans were having a ton of fun, and rightfully so.I've attached some pictures from this evening: a picture of Josie on the metro to the game (look how squished she is with all the people) a pic of Josie outside of the stadium and one of me in my Universitaet Goettingen shirt - it was the only thing German that I have here! The one of me is at the end of the game - you can see how many people had left the game already because of the blowout...At any rate, it was a fun evening, we look forward to Sept 18th to see the American women in action!

FIFA World Cup

Shanghai is transforming itself into a soccer town – the 2007 FIFA Women’s World Cup being hosted in China from 10-30 September. Shanghai is the main city for the event, with the opening and championship games being played here as well as other games throughout the tournament. Besides Shanghai, four other cities will host games throughout the tournament.
http://www.fifa.com/womenworldcup/index.html
We have already purchased our tickets for September 18th, when Team USA takes on Nigeria in group play here in Shanghai, and for September 30th, when we’ll be treated to a double header of the consolation game and the World Cup championship game.
We’ve included a scan of one of our championship tickets, but we have blocked out any info that may be used to identify our ticket or the seat. Suffice it to say that all of our tickets are close enough to see clearly if Team USA’s Heather Mitts is really soccer’s sexiest player!
Morgan’s sister Josie arrived here in Shanghai last week and is a huge soccer fan. She will be here in Shanghai during the World Cup, but Tim has told her that there’s no way to get tickets as they’ve long been sold out. It will be interesting to see how long it takes from posting this on the blog until she finds out (our guess is that she still won’t know until we go to the game!)

Quick Blurbs!

The weather is finally cooling down and the days are quite comfortable. It has rained quite a bit, but at least you don't sweat to death every time you step out the door.
Tally has been a little grumpy bumb, she is getting her 1 year molars. I saw the first one break through a few days ago. She continues to be a sleepy head. She goes down between 8 and 9 at night and then sleeps until 10 am. Today she went down again at 12 pm and woke up 3 ½ hours later. She would have gone down tonight at 7:30, but since we were out shopping she just threw a few fits. She would throw herself on the ground....yuck.
We know Adayla is picking up on some Chinese! Tim said to her yesterday in Chinese, do you want to start taking a nap while you are at school. She scowled at him and said in English, I don't want to sleep at school.
We continue to work on her letters, she is now working on the lower case letters. She recognizes quite a few. The other day, I was writing random letters on a piece of paper and she was telling me them. Josie came along a few hours later and picked up the paper. I had coincidentally written on one line b s h i t. Good thing she can't ready yet!
Tim has his opening ceremony all day Saturday and will finally start classes next weekend.
Ayis aren't all they are cracked up to be, but we just can't seem to get motivated enough to fire her and find a new one.
Josie and I made homemade tortillas for dinner Sunday! If anyone has a good recipe (or two or three) please pass it along. I am definitely learning to cook a few things over here.

New shoes....

Tonight we took Josie to one of our favorite markets for shopping. She didn't end up buying anything as we ran out of time because Ms. Adayla talked herself into a new pair of shoes. They are quite cute. She tried them on and they were hers. Bad idea since we had not yet negotiated a price. Of course, they tried to rip us off completely and so we told them no way. Then we tried to get the shoes off Adayla's feet and she threw a fit! We had pretty much told her she could have them, but I thought I good get a decent price. The girl told me 120 RMB and I said no way! She goes into explaining how this is a good price, blah blah. Adayla starts screaming and I told her we would only pay 60 RMB and they were ours. I don't know if this was the best price for them, but we paid it and Adayla has some new shoes! It was very quick negotiating. Tally had her new pair of Nikes that I bought a year ago for 7 bucks and thought she was quite fast in her new shoes! Most of the Chinese asked if they were "real" and I told them and then told them how much I paid for them. They didn't believe me.

Jerk.....

Tim and I are taking advantage of Josie already! Last night we had a few errands to run and so Josie took the girls to the park while we were gone. We found a little business card printing shop on the way home and decided to stop in. Most people here have business cards that they hand out because they are inexpensive and very handy when somebody needs directions to your house. (They have a nice map in Chinese on the back for taxi drivers, maybe Josie's boss could be let in on this little secret!) Tim needed personal ones for his MBA program. He didn't have them at his orientation and felt kind of dumb. So anyways, he designed some on the computer, so we were ready to have some made. We went into this tiny little computer shop and this guy had replicated Tim's card in like 5 minutes on his computer. We ordered 200 for 50 RMB (about $7.50) and were told we could pick them up in two days. We were happy to find this great place so close to our house....until the guy called today. He said that the money that we gave him was fake. Yeah right. If you wanted to inspect it you should of in front of us, but how can we argue with him. So when we pick up the cards tomorrow Tim will pay another 50 RMB and then hopefully tell the guy off! We won't be going back there and we won't be telling anyone else to use this place. Jerk!

Josie's in town!

What's new in Shanghai? We have a visitor!! I think she is more than a visitor, she is going to stay with us and teach English here in China. My sister, Josie, that just graduated high school arrived one week ago. Adayla was quite excited to see her and just giggled. Tally has warmed up quite well and is very comfortable with her. We had told the girls she was coming, but the afternoon Tim picked her up from the airport, we didn't tell them where he was going. Adayla later asked where dad was and I told her he had to go to work. When Josie and he arrived home, she was tickled! After a few minutes, she said, “Tim go back to work and bring home Little Grandma and Big Grandpa!” She figured that since every time we saw Josie, we saw them, that they must be here also. Quite a hoot!
We have a good times together. Josie quickly interviewed with some places and started a job on Monday teaching English to preschoolers at a Korean school. So she gets quite the mix of food. Korean for lunch and Chinese for dinner....her tummy might catch up with her one of these days! She is adjusting to life here in Shanghai and is learning you can get around without speaking Chinese, but some days are rough.....
To get to school she takes the subway 2 stops and then has been taking a taxi from the station to her school. She only has a card with the address on it and then she shows the taxi driver. She has done this before and seems to get there. Today the driver took a different route and she was a bit confused as to where she was. They were driving up and down the streets and couldn't find her school. The driver starts to get mad and starts yelling at her in Chinese. She tried calling her boss, but she didn't answer her cell phone. He keeps yelling at her, she doesn't understand a bit, and then starts to cry. I think he felt a bit bad then, but was still mad. They finally arrive at the school and her boss asks her why she is so upset. Josie explains and so they worked out that her boss' driver will be picking her up from the subway station. So a few moments of misery will save her a few bucks a day...good job.