I'm walking on sunshine!

Whoa-oh!

I was just so excited to wake up this morning and not see rain!  Check out this beautiful morning:

Pretty darn exciting, even if it's not your traditional "beautiful morning."

:o)

Also exciting: after bothering our landlord to fix out main A/C unit 4 times and surviving with only the bedroom A/C unit since we got back to Shanghai, they finally agreed to replace it! The old one left today, and we're supposed to get the new one tomorrow. Here's hoping that it works better!  

Holy Bao, Batman! It's a post!

(a Bao is a bun or dumping, something "put together." Also, getting something "to go" at a restaurant is "da bao.")

HEY!  I'm back!  Maybe?

We had a wild and wonderful spring and summer, and I'm hoping that this is that start of "back to normal" postings. Heads up: I'm hearing rumblings that VPN's aren't quite doing the job that they used to do, and posting on this blog needs a VPN that works!  Cross your fingers that this is just a blip.

 To recap....

Last spring saw the lower school put on "School Daze" with the 2nd-5th graders. 

We also moved and paid 3 months' rent + 1 month deposit + .5 month for realtor fees in cash!! 

 That's 21,100 RMB right there.

Our new place also needed repairs done on the AC unit.

Why, yes, that's a repair guy climbing on the outside of our balcony with just a rope around his waist.

Why, yes, we do live on the 12th floor.

Yikes!

Mark also put on a music festival at the upper school. Way successful!!

We got to hang with some of our most favorite professors. 

I also got to conduct middle schoolers. 

Way fun!

This summer, we had a new addition to the family....

Meet Maggie!  She's the blonde one in the middle. 

I'm already being replaced... My parents are giving the squirt my stuffed animals!!

Coming back to Shanghai was bittersweet. 

I, for one, didn't like having to travel the long haul by myself. My seat mate didn't let me sleep on him. Imagine that!!

On the other hand, we got to come back and have dumplings. 

YUM!

Now if only it'd stop raining...

Day number 6 of constant rain!

We're missing you at home and wishing for some sun!

XOXO

Finally Sleeping Easy

We have an ayi who comes three times a week to do laundry and general tidying while we're working. She also makes dinner for us on Monday and Wednesdays.
One of the things that she does is make the bed for us. We never had that on her to-do list, but it's just something that she does.

Usually, we come home to this:


See the white under the pillow on the left? That's our comforter. Yep. Under the sheet.
Three times a week, for the last two months.

We've always just giggled and redo it, untucking and retucking as needed. We've even gone so far as to make the bed before we leave for the day to show her what's normal for us. Every time, though, we come back and the sheet is on the comforter.

That really makes you wonder: what thoughts are going on? Is she thinking that these are the craziest sleepers she has ever met to totally flip the coverings around? Is she showing us that the comforter under the sheet makes it so that the comforter would never fall off? Did she like the darker color of the sheet more?


We may never know.


Last week, we've had a breakthrough:



No idea as to the cause of this phenomenon, but definitely a weird highlight of our week!

Sweet dreams!

I'm Walking on Sunshine!

Whoa-oh!

My friend, Sara, called on Sunday to ask if I wanted to go for a picture walk in the neighborhood next to our complex. Seeing as I had yet to leave the couch, I figured that I should probably go for it.

Here's what I came up with:

Houses and some of their gardens.  

Down a few alleys.  Say hi to Sara!

These cutie boys wanted their picture taken and then ran away giggling.  

A super friendly little kitty with tiger stripes.  

Construction in China looks a bit different.  I'm digging all of the bamboo. 

By the way, when you come visit, make sure you fit in by using an umbrella.  You don't want the sun to touch you!  Also, be on the look out for scooters with 3 kids on it, plus the driver.  The kids are usually sleeping.  

Interesting building materials.

Those silvery, crown bits are the tops of a few buildings in my apartment complex.  

Speaking of tops of buildings, they always seem to have interesting bits.

A kitchen-cycle up close!

The more modern part of the neighborhood. 

Sara asked...?  

Walking back home!  Look both ways before you cross the street...  Left, 

Right, 

Back home! Let me in!  

(**It's the back entrance, I swear.  Yes, there are guards at the entrances, but the front is a lot nicer.)

I'm a big kid now!

Gotta love commercial jingles.
;)

Over the weekend, we ventured to M50, or 50 Moganshan Road if you want to be un-hip.  It's the art district in Shanghai (like fancy art), and it's on the complete opposite side of Shanghai from where we currently live.
We had to walk a bit from the metro stop, but there was a cool building or two.  If that little rocky part is an apartment building, I'm totally moving there.

Right when you enter the industrial park that is this art district, you see a cute little coffee shop.  We'll have to try it sometime since there aren't too many coffee shops around that aren't Starbucks (and unfortunately, I've yet to have anything that tastes good at a Chinese Starbucks).   

Hey, look!  Even the ground reminds you where you are!

 Now you can see why drivers here are so bad: all of the necessary signs are in this tree!

With all of the art work around (and "no photo" signs), I had to try my hand at artsy iphone pictures.  Voila! The most interesting one.

Yeah...

;)

So anyways, we must have gone through 20 different shops and studios of different types and totally loved this one.  After about an hour of debating with ourselves, we decided to pull the trigger on this one:

Then came the bit of haggling before we were ok with it and had it wrapped up for the loooong journey home.  With all of the cash gone from our wallets, we walked the four blocks back to the metro and boarded the train.  You've never lived until you've had crowds of Chinese staring at the crazy white people carrying the bubble-wrapped package.  

In the train.

Smooshed inside the cab with an irate driver. *thumbs up!*

Finally home with our kinda-matching cushions!

We're super thrilled with it!  We finally have some art that isn't a poster. :o)  Also interesting: everyone else in our newbie group bought a scooter; we bought a painting... Silly, right?

Come by and see it sometime!