Something you don't see everyday

While on Reid's class trip, I met a couple of the dad's that happened to be in a band.  So, last Friday Rebecca and I went to check them out.  We ended up having a great time!  They played songs like "Sweet Home Alabama" and "American Pie" as well as a few other nostalgic hits from America and abroad.  All of them were excellent musicians.  So there we were listening to American classic hits while in China, played by a band that was made up of 2 Australians, a European and only one American...

Hanging out, pagoda in the background, drinking it all in - very nice time.

Ahh!!!  Creepy guy in the bushes!  This is quite common, staring at the foreigners and their crazy music.

Space Derby

Saturday was the annual space derby for the Suzhou Boys Scouts of America.  Similar to the pinewood derby, you get a kit and carve your rocket out.  Install a propeller driven by rubber bands, wind it up, put it on forty feet of fishing line, and race away!  It was a lot less competitive than the pinewood derby, mainly because there is so much slop in the winding and the rubber bands themselves.  There were 26 kids overall.  Reid surprisingly came in 2nd and Riley finished somewhere in the middle, much to his disappointment.  Below are a few pictures:

The rocket line up.  Reid and Riley are 5 and 6 from the bottom on the left row.

Reid's ship - a pirate / Halloween rocket.

Riley's - Red, White and Blue American ship (those are flames on the tip).

Very clever pencil.

Nice shark - won the best design award from the scouts.

A Coke bottle.  I looked at it and said "cool, a bottle rocket", which was not the design intent apparently.

The Priceline Negotiator She Isn’t

While my parents had a great time here site visiting, one thing became shockingly clear.  My mother’s sole aim while in a store with me was to undo whatever mediocre negotiating abilities that I have gained in the last 9 months!  Here was a conversation that actually took place:

Me:  “We want this one [a bracelet that she wanted]; how much?”

Store clerk:  “60 RMB.”

Me:  “Too much, I think 20 RMB.”

Clerk:  “I can’t sell it for that.”

Mom:  “How about 40?  45?!?!”

I had to rush her out before her fear of losing the sale overwhelmed her and she offered more than his original price.  I went back later that morning with a Chinese friend who was with us and she got the bracelet for 25 RMB, which was better than I could have gotten honestly.  Anyway, I gave it to my mother with a snide “here is a free lesson in negotiating" comment and then promptly realized that in the end she got it for free!!!  Who’s laughing now?

Apparently the trend continued throughout their time here as Rebecca took them around various shopping districts.  Finally, my father put her in timeout for bad negotiating:

Fooled you!

Hah!  Thought you had seen the last haircut blog, eh?  Below is Daddy Mac partaking.

Riley looks huge here!

Also, the following conversation took place right after (paraphrasing a bit, but not much):

Me:  "Not a bad cut, right?"

Daddy Mac:  "I think it's great!  I wonder what guard he used, they always cut it too long for me in the U.S."

Me:  "A comb."

Daddy Mac:  "No, I mean guard for the clippers.  I usually get a 4 on the sides."

Me:  "I know, I mean the guard he used was a comb."

Pretty impressive, actually...

Maybe next time!

My parents and Rebecca have been wandering around this week doing shopping and sight seeing.  I'm quite jealous of their trip to the top of the World Financial Center in Shanghai.  It is the 4th tallest building in the world and at the time it was built, it was #2.

Unfortunately, this is the best shot I have of the skyline.  They drove straight to the building.  Hopefully it shows up as the blue outlined building that looks like a bottle opener behind the Aurora.  The lit up skyscraper on the left is the Pearl Tower, which appears bigger here due to the perspective I was shooting from across the river.

Shot from the bottom.

Looking down.  See the cars???

View of the Pearl Tower from the top.  Somewhere to the left across the river is the building where I took the night picture from.

Tongli

Tongli is a quaint water town very close to Suzhou.  It ended up being a great place to walk around, see some traditional housing, take a gondola ride, shop a little and see fishing with cormorants.  I loved it!

One of the first views around the outer moat.

This was a typical sight throughout the day.  Person washing something in the water, restaurants along the waters edge and boats in the far background.

This looks like trouble is about to occur, doesn't it?

The birds have a string wrapped around their neck so that they can't swallow big fish.  Once in the boat, the handler pops the fish out as seen above.  The bird standing on the front of the boat also has a fish in it's throat.

Pulling a bird out of the water.  The one at his feet is waiting to have a fish removed.

Bad to the bone.  More like dorky to the bone.  The only thing saving me is that I am apparently doing an unconscious "Blue Steel" from Zoolander...

Obligatory photo op.

Maybe the best gift wasn't a wooden sword for Ro and nun chucks for Riley.  Actually, we're 4 days into ownership of the weapons and no one has struck out with them inappropriately.  I think it's either my good parenting (as I recall the quote was "if you hit anyone with those, I can assure you that you will never see them again") or Taekwando has given Riley a healthy respect for martial arts.  Yeah, I would bet on the outside influence over my parenting too.

Now this was a better gift - a hand woven grasshopper on a string.  Can't hurt anyone and a steal at less than 50 cents (no foolin'!).

Humble Administrator's Garden

If you're ever in Suzhou, it's a must to see this site.  It's billed as one of the top gardens in China, listed in the same breathe as some of the royal gardens in Beijing.  Anyway, as the grandparents are garden aficionados we had to make this a priority for their trip.  After sitting in traffic for an hour, we finally made it to the exterior of the building. 

While we were waiting in traffic, I witnessed a horrific sight.

A woman ran in front of our car while we were sitting still and a scooter hit her at full speed.  I immediately grabbed the kids and told them to look away because it sounded brutal.  As I watched, it appeared as though the woman who was actually hit was semi-OK, meaning she was squatting holding her face in her hands and obviously crying in pain.  The woman on the scooter was sprawled on the ground, convulsing with a blank look in her eyes.  The thing that pissed me off was that everyone just stood around looking at them.  Someone call the police!!!  My Chinese is so limited that I can't even tell the driver that (although I figured it out now).

Thankfully, we were close to the garden which meant traffic was really bad and the police were there to make sure that people kept moving and didn't park on the sidewalk.  They were next to her within a minute or two.  Also, as we were just out of the car, an ambulance passed us.  They were on the scene in less than 5 minutes.  So, she got just about the quickest response by trained people as you could get anywhere.

Not to make this about me, but one thing to relay is the utter sense of helplessness in this scenario.  I'm no doctor, of course, but it also wouldn't help to try to lead by jumping out and directing people in a language they don't understand.  So all of my contempt at others just staring is compounded by my own reality in the sense that that is all I ended up doing too.  That and praying for them both, which is probably rare in China, so maybe that's the best thing we could have done.

Anyway, clouded by the events above, we entered the garden and took a few shots.  It was very crowded and we probably had 30 people take our pictures, make comments, etc.  It's getting old.  I wish my black friend in one of the previous blogs had been with us because we could have walked 100 feet from him and no one would have seen us!  *Sigh*  I miss you Tony!

Below are a few pictures:

My favorite view in the garden.  The pagoda way down at the far end is actually outside of it, but the garden was designed so that it would appear this way.

A typical scene when we're out in force.  This is a rare one now with Reid even in it as he realizes that we won't make him, he typically declines not to pose.  Note the lack of a smile though.

Now this is a photo op he can smile for.  He is pretending to poop down an abandoned well.  Classy.

Tiger Hill

Yesterday we took the grandparents to Tiger Hill.  It is awe inspiring in many ways, mainly related to the age of the various sections (some date as far back as 2,500 years or so).  Anyway, it took us 1.5 hours to get there (normally 30 to 45 minutes) due to traffic.  The crowds inside weren't bad though due to the size of the park.  We walked around a bit, had our pictures taken by about 30 people, rode a boat, etc.

We were able to find a few spots without any people!

Climbing the last few steps (i.e. swimming upstream), that's Gramma Mac in the pink top and Reid next to her in orange.

Roro and Daddy Mac on the boat ride.

This one was too cute not to have in here.

San Shan Dao - Day 3

A bonsai tree at the local garden, supposedly shaped like an elephant.

After 3 days of hiking, picking oranges, campfires, more hiking, catching fish in nets off the dock, and partying with friends, the crew was pretty well beat on the ferry ride home.

San Shan Dao Sights

As we toured around the island, we were able to visit some great historical and religious sites.  Below are some of the high lights.

Top door frame to an old house owned by the same people that ran our "hotel".  It was damaged by the red army during the cultural revolution.

Reid's birthday was the closest, so he got to ride on the carriage, powered by yours truly and one of the teachers.

Reid had one of his buddies take this shot of him and Buddha.

Another Buddhist shrine.

Ladies cleaning lunch at the local dock.  The splash out in the middle of the water is a fish eating the chicken guts.

The line for ice cream at the top of one of the mountains...



San Shan Dao - Day 1

Last week I headed off with Reid and the year 4 kids to San Shan Dao (Three Mountain Island), which is in the middle of Tai Hu, a large lake just to the West of Suzhou:

Reid boarding the "speed boat", which wasn't all that fast, but since it was so old and he steered it haphazardly, it was fast enough for me...

Apparently word got out that a herd of laowei children were arriving.

My crew - the McLain's Platypi (which I'm hoping was the plural form of platypus).  All of the other groups had cool names - Dragons, Panthers, etc.  We tried McLain's Marauders, Hydra, but had little success getting everyone excited about a name.  Finally, I landed on platypus as an homage to Phineas and Ferb...