Tianmu Lake

For the last day of our holiday we went to Tianmu Lake. We had an amazing time! We got there around 8:30 in the morning and didn't leave until 5:30. Most of the day we spent walking, so we covered a lot of ground. Here is a brief recap of all the things we saw and did.

One of the first places we stopped was at the Hall of Fame. This pagoda is a building that contains the names and a brief biography of 736 Number One Scholars who came first in nationwide examinations dating back to over 1000 years ago. It is meant to inspire individuals and promote the culture of the number one scholar.

We practiced a bit of archery.

This is Jenny, Jen and Destiny on the shore of Tianmu lake.

Jen and Destiny relaxed for a while in hammocks amongst the bamboo.

There is a minority group who put on performances at Tianmu lake. We watched the show and then took some pictures with them afterwards.

We brought a lot of food with us for a picnic. We shared some of our fruit with the Macaques on monkey island.

We zip-lined off of the top of monkey island to a small island in the middle of Tianmu lake.

This is Jen beside the world's largest teapot with a looped handle. Those are tea plants in the background.

A panaromic of Tianmu lake from the highest point we reached that day.

Mid-Autumn Day

Mid Autumn Festival in China is a time to celebrate the harvest, just like Thanksgiving back home. Mid-autumn day is always celebrated when the moon is full and people eat moon cakes. We went to a performance at People's Square celebrating mid-autumn day. Unfortunately we spent most of our time trying to make our way through the thousands of people that were there. Finally we made our way to the stage where the security guards let us on because we are foreigners. By that time the show was already over. So here are the few pictures we were able to take of that evening.

Jen and Destiny with the policemen.

Backstage with the crowd behind. Left to right: Sophie (one of the Chinese English teachers), Jen, Sophie's cousin and Destiny.

They let us on to the bus for a moment with the performers.

A Day With The Chinese English Teachers

Hello,

Well we are a little behind with our blogging because we have been having so much fun here. The pictures below took place during our National Day vacation when we were visiting some of the Chinese English teachers. On this day we went over to Linda's house. Her daughter was so cute with pink puffy things in her hair. You will know what I mean when you see the pictures below :). We played on the playground, which was really different than in Toronto. They look like training gyms for kids, which was amazing. The kids here are having a whole bunch of fun and getting a work out without even knowing it!

(Left to right) Linda, Destiny, June, Josh, moi, and three of the cutest girls. The one in all white is in one of my grade 3 classes. The smallest one is June's daughter and the one with pink puffs in her hair is Linda's daughter.

Destiny and I playing on this crazy type of see saw. We were launching each other into the air, which was fun for us but I can't imagine seeing a child do that.

Me and a little girl from one of my grade 3 classes.

I was so scared of being up there (I am scared of heights) but you can't tell at all by my face. After the picture it took me the longest to get back down.

I know what you are thinking and I agree that they are the cutest! Josh was on the other side weighing them both down and they were just loving it. They didn't want to stop!

School trip to the theatre

Hey Everybody! There is so much to catch up on. Right now we have a week long holiday (Chinese National Day). At the end of last week all the students went to the theatre. Jen and I went with the kids in grades 2-4, which must be at least 500 students. We all walked from the school to the theatre, which was about a 20 minute walk. Here are a few photos we took along the way.

Some of my grade 4's.

Some of Jen's grade 3's.

Students filling the theatre. The play was pretty good. It was a musical about a girl whose father left her mother for another woman. The girl got involved with the wrong crowd, got into drugs and ended up going to jail in the end. A pretty serious play for such a young crowd! But it was done with lots of humour.

These are some of the kids on the way back to the school after the play.

When we got back to the school some of the kids were doing their afternoon exercises. It is so cute to watch. We also have it on video.