One Crazy Weekend

Last week I found myself doing a bit of a tour of Southern China.  It all started Wednesday...

Wed. -  Fly from Shanghai to Guangzhou (used to be called Canton, as in Cantonese).  Flight canceled, then new flight delayed due to weather.  Company changes email service while I'm in the airport.  My new laptop keeps giving me the blue screen of death every time I hook up to the free airport Wifi.  This means I can't download the code to reactive my blackberry.  (Deep breath)  Arrive in Guangzhou after midnight with no internet or email service, the driver we set up waited in the airport for 2 hours, saw our original flight was canceled, and left.  I had previously found the hotel taxi card (in a nearby town) on the internet on my BB, but this page was rendered unavailable.  Sat in taxi line for over 30 minutes, giving me and my travel partner time to find the hotel reservations that had previously been emailed.  Got in the taxi, driver was clueless.  Lots of calls and stops for directions, arrived at hotel after 2:30am.

Thurs. - Meetings in the morning in Foshan.  Drive to Shenzhen for a Medical tradeshow, where I saw this:

???

Deeply confused and moderately disturbed, we head to the Hong Kong border.  By the way, it continues to rain all day.  In HK, comforted by the below sight:

 And this:

The menu read:  Tartaletta  - milk chocolate and caramelized banana tart, roasted banana gelato.  In other words: the stuff dreams are made of.

Fri. - AM meetings in HK.  Right before lunch a storm rolls in and the bottom drops out.  We had another meeting at lunch then I headed for the airport with plenty of time before my 5pm flight.  Get all checked in and past border control by 4pm only to sit until 9:30 due to delays.  Flight was eventually cancelled, which led to the below mob scene:

Good thing the police were on the scene...

It was total madness.  No one knew what was going on and people were crowding the desk screaming at the clueless 20-somethings behind it.  I was talking with another American who said he was actually in the air for 9-11, grounded in Albuquerque, and it was nothing like what he saw that night with regards to the chaos and the way people were acting.  Anyway, had to reenter HK.  Made it to the hotel at 1am.

Sat. - was told I had a 9:30am flight.  Got to the airport at 7:30.  Sat until 11:30.  Arrived home at 4pm.  Headed out shortly thereafter with Riley in tow to meet up with some new Indian friends to do the shopping for the men's dinner.

Sun. - Head to church, which was great by the way as usual.  Afternoon is more shopping and cooking.  Below are a few shots of the men's dinner.  Yet again, another awesome experience where we got to make more new friends and support them in prayer!

The chef from the Shangri-La took the day off to cook for us.  Man, this guy had some skills!  He said, while eyeing my $10 santoku from Walmart, that my kitchen was set up better than the restaurant.  Oh, and for scale, that's a 19L pot full of chicken legs!

Oh, one more thing:  Rowan loves these events.  Below is a conversation we had about them:

Me:  You know this weekend is another men's dinner.

Ro:  Are the Indonesians (last month) coming to our house to cook?

Me:  Not this time.

Ro:  Are the Mexicans (month before last)?

Me:  Nope, this time it's people from India.

Ro:  Yay!

He enjoys showing off to new people more than just about anything!

Suzhou Zoo

This was actually one of my worst experiences in Asia, period.  Apparently I am some sort of tree hugger (probably because I was born in CA).  I was pretty upset by the conditions as well as the way people were acting at the zoo last weekend.  Rebecca said I was visibly unhappy, which is interesting.  Reid finally asked me what about the zoo I didn't like and I said "Why do you think I wasn't happy?"  He replied "Maybe how the animals were kept and treated?"  Nine years old ladies and gentlemen.

Yeah, so things didn't start out well trying to swim upstream to see the snakes.

Birds in rusted out cages.  At this point, I was thinking things weren't so bad, just needing a little maintenance.

Then I saw the majestic lion in it's concrete jungle.

Followed be a black jaguar covered in sores (no, that's not smudged glass over it's flank).

Next, came the squirting of drinks into the grizzly bear's mouth.  This was probably the beginning of the end for me.  The sores you can blame on the zoo, this is just people acting badly.

So is this, a monkey chewing on a candy wrapper.

Another monkey playing with a plastic bag.  So cute.

This was the elephant "area".  I don't even know what to call it.

Apparently the zoo knows how bad it is because you can rent your own boots to kick someone with.

It wasn't all bad, this was a beautiful view of a scenic waterway.  Yes, those are flamingos in a pen with a five foot strip of water to dip their toes in.  Who could ask for anything more?

OK, so it wasn't all bad.  The wisteria smelled amazing and transported me back to the WB winery...

Not wanting to end on a total downer: there was at least one healthy animal there that day.

Spring is in the air

We had a great stretch of 60 to 70 degree and sunny weather for a few weeks.  Our days off were filled with outdoor activities and cook outs.  After a long dreary winter, morale was running high in the McLain family.

Out on a bike ride, we paused to catch our breath and check out this great vista.

Oh yeah, family of four on a scooter.

Dairy queen was shut down, so we had to punt and go to KFC for ice cream.

Flowers, check.  Peace sign, check.  Laowei child, check.

Digging into some Korean BBQ.

Apparently Reid has discovered girls, and vice-versa.

At the same time, Riley was off by himself quietly swinging.  Huh?

Thailand!

I was back in Thailand almost a month ago (that's how behind I am!).  Below are a few pics.

The beach view from the hotel in Pattaya.  Unfortunately, I was just dropping off coworkers.  I had to run and catch a midnight flight back that day.  :(

A guy walking around the hotel with parrots.

Lunch stop on the side of the road.  Actually, the foot was excellent and no one got sick.

Mmmm.  Thai iced tea.

Lemon grass and kiwi?  excellent.

I call this one "the perch".  It's a squat potty.  After mulling around potential reasons for the set up, we figured it was just cheaper than the typical recessed version.

What happens when you have a physical ailment and can no longer squat properly.  Similar to western toilets...

This was a view from a construction site.  Theere were kids and animals walking around as well.  This is quite typical in Asia where the construciton workers set up temporary domiciles for the project.

Finally, ending on a high note.  This honey comb was on the breakfast buffet.  Jealous?

Men's Dinner - Indonesia

What, what an awesome time!  The intensity of our Indonesian friends for their country and people was truly inspiring.  The fellowship, food and prayer time was phenomenal!

A kitchen full, for sure.

Giving the talk - learned some great facts about Indonesia - did you know it was the #4 largest country (population) in the world - behind the U.S.?

After the boys broke in my new wok, I took it for a test drive to make french fries and beer battered chicken...

Easter #2 in Suzhou

A few weeks ago (been awhile since I blogged!) we celebrated our second Easter here.  This year was incredible as we joined with the Chinese church in a joint service.  For the AM service, there were about 500 people and then the late service had closer to 1,500.  Amazing!

Worshipping through music, singing in whatever language you know.  On the screen to the right are the words in both English and Chinese!

Palm Sunday, week before.  Obligatory kids program.  The really did do a great job!

Symbolic eggs were handed out.  Not sure what that is though, maybe a jackalope?

Grillin' and chillin' - Easter dinner with our Suzhou family.

Decided chicken was the safest meat option.

All the kids gathered together for the talk before the Easter egg hunt.

Ding-a-ling that's one cute kid (try to focus on the girl in the foreground, not Rowan).

The spoils of war.

In case you were wondering how to explain Easter to your children, please reference the above excerpt from the "What's on in Suzhou" monthly magazine.