This week has been another fun one, including Karis' 6th birthday celebration! On Wednesday, there was a Chinese national holiday (Dragon Boat Festival), so we didn't have class. Instead, we had several of our friends and teachers over for dinner (and of course, the wii afterwards). The picture is of our friends teaching the kids how to fold paper to make little boxes. (We later used some of the boxes at the dinner table to discard our chicken bones into! In China, lots of the meat dishes still have the bones in them; different from the States where almost all the meat we eat is boneless. And we must admit, not our favorite thing to get used to, especially for Kevin who doesn't like to be slowed down when he's at the table trying to fill up asap.) Then Karis' birthday was on Thursday. So we decided to skip our homeschool time, and her friend Adah came over to spend the day with us. That evening, Kevin's friend from baseball (Lief) wanted to come over and bring Karis a birthday cake, so he, along with Adah's parents and sister Claire, joined us for dinner and then cake and ice cream. Karis had a great day and felt well-loved. She had been requesting her favorite meals for some time, and got both of them. For lunch, we made our own homemade pizzas, with black olives, which are her absolute favorites! And then for dinner, we got rotisserie chickens from our favorite market and I made green beans, roasted potatoes, and salad. I'm thankful that she has simple taste when it comes to meal preferences!
I did have a funny experience while jogging this week. There is a new track that has just been made around Trash Moutain, which is only about an 8 minute jog from our apartment. So on Tuesday morning, I took off with my iPod in hand for a quick run before the kids awakened and Kevin had to leave for class. I was amazed at how many older people were out exercising, as jogging in particular is not at all commonplace like it is in the States. The other thing that amazed me was the shoes that the older people were wearing. Almost all of the women were wearing sandals or flats--definitely NOT the thing women wear during intentional exercise in the States! I was hoping that their poor joints weren't going to pay the price later that day. . .
Anyway, I was running past an older gentleman and kind of chuckling to myself because of his attire. He had HUGE legs for a Chinese man (muscular, not fat), and was showing off every bit of them in his short and tight biking shorts! As I pulled up along side him, he looked at me quickly, then shocked me by saying (in English!), "One circle--how fast?" Surprised, I looked at him and said "Shenme?!" (which means What?) He repeated, again in English, "You run one circle, how fast?" I answered (this time in English), "About 8 minutes or so?". He replied with, "Good. Me too. We run together. We talk." (Notice the lack of question marks. Each sentence was definitely punctuated as an imperative. Kind, but yet an imperative!) Realizing that I didn't have a lot of choice in the matter, I took out my earphones and proceeded to run with this older guy for the next 5 minutes or so. (And by the way, there's no way he was running at the pace I was. His laps MUST have been a lot quicker than 8 minutes for me to get so winded during our time of jogging side-by-side!) We had a great time talking! He spoke pretty good English (which is VERY rare, especially for someone older), and ends up that he runs there at the mountain every morning--and goes the equivalent of about 8 or 10 miles per day! So I suppose he's earned the right to his short, tight shorts! We left it that we would meet again some day for a jog (and no doubt, a visit in English!)!
