Christmas Time is Here!

I purchased this awesome tinsel tree from a friend of mine who is sadly leaving the country soon. I am so happy she was willing to part with it.

The cloves and oranges make the house smell amazing!

Our tree!

I did not make this. Sadly, I am not this talented. One of my students folded this and the star in the next picture. 

Another student creation.

My cyclamen is thriving.

New addition to the tree. This was purchased Christmas Day 2012 at Hong Kong Disneyland. 

Domestic Day: Thanksgiving Edition

Once a month my friend, Michelle, and I host Domestic Day at her house. We invite all of the seniors over and cook/bake/hang out. This past Friday we held the Thanksgiving edition of Domestic Day focusing our food making energies on Thanksgiving favorites: apple pie, pumpkin pie, Oreo cheesecake (this may be a China expat thing), mashed potatoes, and sweet potatoes (we also had curry, but that really doesn’t fit into the Thanksgiving favorites category). The students genuinely enjoy making dinner/dessert for each other and hanging out with us, their teachers! Crazy kids. Earlier this year I introduced them to the game Pit and this has been regularly played at each of our get-togethers ever since. I think it has something to do with the necessary shrieking/yelling that is involved. Every time I play I have a hard time talking the next day!

Domestic Day students getting ready to dig into pies and cheesecake!

Gan Eng Jie Kaui Le! Happy Thanksgiving!

This is how we started our Thanksgiving Day- with the first annual Kunming Thanksgiving Day 5K.

We rushed home from the race to get our pie making on! This is apple.

Apple and pumpkin!

Dinner with the Rodgers family. Zoe, Macy, Sam, Sophie, Eric, Eric, and I. Missing were Eliza and Amy, who were in the other room, and Emmy, our photographer.

Baby, It’s Cold Outside

The cold has come to Kunming. So maybe it’s only 45 degrees Fahrenheit, but for a place without central heating it seems downright frigid! Thanksgiving morning dawned grey and cold out and it hasn’t warmed up since. While last year we used our space heater one time, for three hours, on December 31st, this year we have already used it in an effort to ward off the chill. Wo hen leung! (I am cold!)

Rob Visits!

Rob flew in early Friday morning from Calcutta and we did our best to keep him busy the entire time he was here. Friday we went downtown and walked through the Bird and Flower Market, saw the big map of Kunming in the city center, and had banana pie at McDonald's (yes, that is a must do!) before heading back to our neighborhood and touring KIA and experiencing a little bit of what youth group here looks like. We had dinner at a sqatty and had an ice cream bar in the neighborhood for dessert. 

Checking out the Chinese exercise equipment in our xiao qu.

 Saturday we biked to Dianchi Lake and rode a gondola and then a ski lift up Xi Shan and hiked to the Dragon Gate. The Dragon Gate is a Daoist temple that was carved in the 1500's into the side of the mountain. We spent most of our afternoon hiking the path down from the gate. That night we had a bunch of friends over for dinner and then we headed out to Shao Kao! 

Sunday was not much more laid back with Fellowship in the morning, lunch at an awesome Chinese place across the street and a slow bike ride back home via Carrefour and a little village in the city. He flew out at 7 something so we called a driver who picked him up at 4:30 and he was off!

We had an awesome weekend and were thrilled to share a little bit of our lives with him. 

Taking the ski lift to the top of Xi Shan and the Dragon Gate.

The Dragon Gate

The only picture I have of the three of us!

Shao Kao is Chinese night bbq and is pretty awesome!

Halloween- China Style

Our pumpkins are really just oddly shaped squash, so carving one proved a bit tricky. I couldn't fit my hand through it so I had to flip it over. 

 

Voila!

KIA kids trick or treating at our house on the 26th. 

Our carved pumpkin from below.

Small group Halloween party on the 30th- we are Google Maps!

Group shot... 

A more normal group shot.

Fun Fair 2013

Every fall KIA hosts an event called Fun Fair- a carnival like event open to the community. Each high school homeroom runs food and fun booths where the general public can spend their Fun Fair tickets to either play games or eat great food. It is a great opportunity for the school to open its gates to everyone and provide a great service to our both our Chinese and expat neighbors and friends. 

This year Eric's homeroom class (the 10th graders) came up with an awesome booth called Trick or Treat where people, mostly kids, could come and cut a string hanging in the booth and receive whatever prize was on the other end. The trick was to pick the correct string because they were all tangled together so they never knew what they were going to end up with. They also hosted a skee ball booth, a balloon dart booth, and a booth where people were served juice and had to guess the flavors. Sounds weird, but it was actually very successful. 

My homeroom class (the 11th graders) always have a "Soak a Teacher" booth. A poor teacher sits on a stool with a huge water balloon sitting in a basket over their heads, while contestants throw a ball at a target. Hit the target, soak the teacher. I had to sit in that booth last year. Thankfully, this year we had other volunteers! We also hosted cookie decorating, bracelet making, and mini-golf. Our food booths were curry rice bowls, cotton candy and popcorn. Yum. 

Preparing the curry!

11th Graders Cotton Candy booth

10th Graders Trick or Treat booth

Getting ready for a full day of fun!

11th Graders Cookie Decorating booth