Life is good

THERE'S AN EPIDEMIC! We didn't teach for three days straight. The first day was because so many of us were sick and the other two were because the kids were too sick. So we had a lot of time on our hands, Dad. The first day, I had a little bit of a sore throat, but I definitely wasn't one of the sicker ones. Lauren and I took that opportunity to deep clean our room. We washed our concrete floor three times. It was pretty dusty and dirty. I attempted to wipe the walls down, but the sheet rock would just come off on the sponge, so I kinda gave up on that. The next day, I was running out of Airborne so I didn't want to use it so much, which may have been a mistake because I was a little worse. I didn't do much that day. We kinda all stayed in an just chilled. We did walk down to the round-about for some yummy yummy dumplings. I really want to see if the people at the dumpling place will teach me how to make them in exchange for teaching them English. How cool would that be?! But then again, maybe I don't want to find out what's in them. We'll see.

Yesterday was a very filled day. We were so sick of just sitting around, so we went on an expedition. There's a temple on the mountain we're at the foot of. We think it's Taoist, but we're not entirely sure. Whatever it was it was gorgeous! But before our trek up the mountain side, a few of us needed to go to the bank to exchange money. It was at the third bank that they finally accepted our cash and my passport. The second we didn't really try. It had a line, and the third one didn't. The lady helping me was so nice and patient. It's funny how much you really can communicate with someone even though they don't speak the same language. I had to keep asking her for smaller bills because we had to divvy it amongst o

urselves. I felt so bad and slightly embarrassed, but she was nice about it. Good ole Bank of China.

From there, we headed toward the foot of the mountain where the entrance to the temple grounds was. We took a cable car up and wandered around the first temple. There were cute Chinese women everywhere. One in particular showed us around and took us to all the different rooms. I wish I could have understood what she was explaining to us. After exploring the first temple, only three of us stayed to explore the rest of the mountain. It only cost us 25 yuan (a little more than 3 bucks, roughly). There were temples scattered all over the mountain!! It was a fun day. There was one part that was like a cave- went straight into the mountain. It was eerie but awesome. Then we ran into some people who loved us. They took like 50 pictures of us. Some with us actually posing with them, and some just of us walking. They were so cute. Leaning on us and holding our hands. Oh, don't worry, Dad, we still have all our money. I just think they were excited to see three American girls. So cute!

Lauren, Tina and I had been at it for about five and a half hours when we decided to head down the mountain to find something to eat. Lauren had to pee so bad. I had peed up on the mountain at the temple in a nice little trough. That was a first. But Lauren did not heed my warning when I said she should go. She ended up going in a wall of bushes off the side of the road while Tina and I kept watch. It was hilarious! We were laughing the whole time. As soon as she came out, Tina pointed at her hands and said, "You better sanitize those babies." She's hilarious. Love her.

Our stomachs were on the verge of collapsing when we made it to Martin Luther King's. It's this place called MLK. I actually think it's MKL, but we call it what we want. It's a chicken sandwich place. Talk about yummy! No dark meat, just good quality chicken. On our walk home, Tina and I got some milk tea. It's this really milky, creamy drink with tapioca balls in the bottom. Filled us the rest of the way up. Lauren got the Chinese version of shaved ice. And then we saw our faces all over the city! Our school put of posters with a picture of our group on it all over the place! It was so weird. So Lauren stole one and now it's in the supply room.

It was a good thing we left when we did, because twenty minutes after our arrival we were on our way back out to the city center. Sixty years of communism!! Wahoo! It was a rehearsal that we went to see. Lots of people singing loudly in Chinese and waving different flags. It was interesting, but not our choice of entertainment. There was a little boy totally enthralled by two nearly deflated balloons. We started playing with him. He loved it, and so did we.

A long day finally came to an end and I was able to take a shower. Never felt so good! Nice and warm, too. But little did I know that this was not the end of my evening. We ended up having four other girls in our apartment until 2 a.m. just talking. It was fun! Good day.

That was my day, Dad. How was yours? I love you.