Livejournal returns

I've enjoyed my stint at Blogger, but now that I'm back in the States I'm going to switch back to Livejournal. I'll keep my Blogger for the next time we head back to China (as LiveJournal is blocked in China.) I have no idea if I picked up any readers here, but if so, feel free to go to my livejournal site to read. I'll update it much more often than I did Blogger. Hope to see you there!

The Monkey king

There are always plenty of opportunities to pose with some sort of wild/tame animal at these touristy spots in China. This little guy is dressed as the fabled monkey king. After the boys posed with him, we noticed that his butt looked red and swollen. Yuck, funky monkey butt! Luckily I carry anti-bacterial hand santizer in my purse, so everyone slathered up with it.

I had a wonderful Mother's day. Zack folded the laundry for me, and Petey built me 3 lego spaceships as well as drew me some Kirby pictures. Chris made sure I got a long nap (my favorite Mother's day tradition). It was a peaceful day, all and all.

We are still waiting to get our ticket situation straightened out. We're wanting to return to the States earlier then planned, and hope to change our tickets today. I'm trying to sort through our stuff, what to take back and what to get rid of. How did we amass so much stuff in only 10 months time!! Amazing.

rural bathrooms

Although this bathroom may strike you as primitive, it was very, very clean. The stalls are only about waist high, and door-less. With the combination of no roof, one gets the unmistakable feeling that anyone walking by outside can simply peek over the wall and take a glimpse of you doing your business. The way this works is to straddle the trench and squat. Simple and effective. I don't mind squatting anymore.


We stopped at this bathroom on our drive from Dali to Lijiong. It was at the top of a mountain, overlooking a very scenic spot. Perhaps you can tell from the pic that there were no English signs or pictures depicting which was the women's side and which was the men's. I'd learned the characters for both in my Chinese class, but well, they hadn't quite stuck in my mind like they should have. I was fairly certain which was which, but not certain enough to boldly walk into the one that I thought was women's. I just sort of wandered-drifted towards the one I suspected to be women's and looked back at the bathroom attendant, hoping she'd point me in the right directions. She did :)

Speaking of the attendant, there was a lone woman sitting outside by the bathroom. We suspect her job was to make sure people didn't come and help themselves to the water intended for handwashing. This was a rural area, and somewhat arid. Water is a valuable commodity, and she's there to make sure people don't steal it. I wanted to take her picture, but I felt silly enough as she watched me photograph the bathroom.

I really enjoy playing Mahjong, although my understanding of it is pretty elementary. Nanny Zou says that I play the "old people's" version :) That's ok, because it's still pretty complex. I've been learning additional rules little by little. I'll miss playing it when we leave China. Perhaps I can find a Mahjong group wherever we end up next? This guy in the picture actually has a really good hand.

strolling in dali

Although Dali largely caters to tourists, it was still a wonderful place to visit. I really enjoyed my time there. I'm trying to overcome my shyness about photographing strangers. After all, we , as foreigners, are often photographed by people who don't ask our permission. These are a few of my attempts at such.