For my niece

Nihao,

This post is mostly for my niece.  We have noticed since we came here that shoes are a very important part of women's wardrobes.  Some are very interesting.  Some are what I like to call fashion suicide.  Some of the stores are pretty amazing in the sheer volume of styles available.  So the other day while roaming a store I decided to document some of them....in particular turquoise.....one of the colors my niece seems to like....a few pink ones thrown in for good measure!!  I know she likes pink:)  We didn't even document red, orange, green or of course good old brown and any other colors you can think of.

pink boots anyone??

This store is a clothing and shoe store. The shoes seem to go on as far as you can see.  There are almost as many shoes for men as women.  This is a small fraction of the racks in the store, multiply this area by maybe ten or fifteen....we didn't count.

That is it for the shoe show, hope you enjoyed it!!

Zaijian,

Ramona

Dishes, Cats and Quilts!

First off today I must apologize....It is not Ya Show Market in yesterdays post.....Mike and I cannot remember the name so when I find out I will correct it.  It isn't like they have a giant sign out front or anything!!

 For anyone in the family....you know what these are, just like home:)  For the uninitiated these are a family tradition for breadsticks at breakfast.

We were given a set of dishes by Mike's team at work.  It was a welcome to China, house warming gift.  A tradition here as well as in the US.  Blue is supposed to be an important color here and fish are also important, representing plenty, that you may always have plenty to eat.  I am not sure I have the exact meanings as there were 9 people gathered around as we opened the gift and they were all talking at once and very excited.  I don't think they knew just how much I like dishes so, for me anyway, it was the perfect gift.

Another pair from the bad day good day pictures out the second floor balcony.  This is not rain or fog, this is smog.

Just so you don't think it is all bad, below, the next day!

 And below that, sunset, out the same window.

Sparkles likes to get in things.  Her first day here she got into the sink in the tiny bathroom where the litter box is.  We don't actually use this as a bathroom because we have four other full baths in the house.

This looks like a black and white shot.....it's not, just look at her eyes!!

Here she is sitting in the basin I got for soaking laundry!

 This is one of the bihou we keep finding in the house.  I think we are up to six....the cats got to one of them before we did:(
They appear to be a type of gecko, I have tried looking them up but not  finding much information.  These guys are all babies.  they are so cute!!!

Random shot of the living room to show my quilt my Whoo friends made for me before we left.  It keeps them close as I see and use it everyday.  (Ayi folds them up neatly everyday..I prefer the draped look, oh well.) Also, the 2,000 piece puzzle we put together since we got here.  We brought a bunch of puzzles so we wouldn't get bored.....I don't have time to be bored!!  But, we had time to do the puzzle.  Our furniture is here in China but not here in our house:(




Just a regular house in a far away place full of leaky parts!!  Still working on getting Olivia's room done.  I hope they finish before our shipment makes it through customs.
Olivia got back last night from her trip to Harbin.  She seems to have had a good time.  We will post her pictures soon.

Love, fondly, sincerely,
Zaijian,
Ramona

Same Market, still looking

This market was not as big as Mike and I thought it would be the way everyone talked about it.  It did cram a lot of booths into its space, however.  We bought a few things, I mainly went along taking pictures with Mikes phone.  I need to get in the habit of carrying our smaller camera so I can get better shots.  It was fun to come upon this market unexpectedly.  I was supposed to take a trip here with a group from the school but couldn't go.  Got here on our own instead.

 Nuts!  Got a bunch of Walnuts, so good.  Nuts here are expensive no matter where you buy them.

 

 Somebody in their shell.  I definitely don't know what these are and will not be eating them.  I am allergic to bivalves.  Have not tried snails but don;t think I want to risk it..It is not worth the possibility of getting sick.

 This is fresh meat....yep...just sitting out on the boards.  I read somewhere that there are things in the wood that inhibit bacterial growth.  I guess it works, it did not smell like spoiled meat at any of these stalls. It all looked good:)

Pigs feet...need I say more?  They looked maybe like they were boiled, certainly well washed.  They eat chicken feet too.  We promise not to serve these if you come to visit...unless of course you wish to have them.  Maybe I could get Ayi to stay and cook dinner that night!!

 I don't know how new the turkeys are as the sign looks pretty old!  The turkeys did not look much bigger than the largest chicken you can get at the store in America.  Maybe they had better ones in the back....

 Just another sign, interpretation left up to the reader.

This stall was a bit gross.  I guess Ox Tail soup?  Again pigs feet and just on the right side are some chickens....feet and all.  I didn't look to see if the heads were still attached,  they usually are.

 Not a vegetarians delight in the meat area of stalls.  Sheeps head anyone??  And pigs feet on the same tray.

Nuts...mostly peanuts, cooked in different ways.

 These are ready made/fast food in China.  All the grocery stores have them.  Some are sweet some savory.  Some have meat or egg or veggies.  I tried two kinds yesterday.  One was sweet with sesame seeds on top and the other wasn't really worth eating, an acquired taste I would imagine, it wasn't awful just bland.  Next time something different.  A Culinary adventure.

 One of the fruit stalls....they do not seem to mix fruits and veggies.  I got some clementines.  So sweet.  I mentioned this to our teacher and she did not know what I meant so I showed her.  Orange They are all oranges, they do not differentiate between a naval or a tangerine......all orange!  Learning everyday!

To Market we Will Go!

Mike and I went to church on Sunday and wandered around looking for a restaurant afterwards.  We stumbled on this large market called Ya  Show (rhymes with how).  Stall after stall of all sorts of food stuffs, mostly fresh veggies, fruit, seafood and fresh fish and meat.  This is just a few of the pictures.  If I knew how to do a slide show I would.  I will post another blog with more.

Ya Show Market Beijing...seafood

 A close up of the seafood.  That is a pile of squid  the pink just to the left of the post.

This is fresh food, you can choose your fish or turtle or what ever you wish to eat.  They do not recommend you eat river fish due to the pollution.  So, if you don't know your fish.....don't buy it.  

This woman is selling all different types of dried beans.  I think to get out of her booth she has to crawl under the rack on the left of her stall.

 Those are big baskets of eggs, you buy them by the pound.

Mushrooms, so many types and I haven't a clue!!!

Corn....Isn't it pretty?

Tofu, I don't know if any of it is the famous 'stinky tofu' No English spoken here!  They seem to have more than the soft, medium, firm you can get in the states.

 Itty, bitty cucumbers with the flowers still on them.  I have not run across these in any places we have eaten so I do not know what to do with them.

Duck, Quail, Chicken.

Dried mushrooms as opposed to the fresh above.

A little bit of everything from the same shop as above.

Random photos from Beijing

Beijing through our eyes.  And Mike's I Phone.

A sign Mike saw (This is actually not in Beijing, it is in a National Park near Chengdu)   Just another piece lost in translation.

This is Olivia in Capital Museum.  She is standing up perfectly straight.  The floor is slightly sloped in this weird hall space , the wall is angled outward, we are inside a giant sculpture.  Hard to accurately describe...just a neat shot!!  Fun house effect.

Just a big fat juicy caterpillar we saw on the sidewalk!

A toad on the edge of the road!  Late at night.

A frog on my birthday, in the gardens of The Orchard, where we had dinner.

A spider in the same garden.   Caught in the flash so it is hard to say exactly what color he was.

Some random furniture in a market we were in just looking around, a bit much.  Can't say as I would want any in my house and this massive place was full of stuff like these.  This is a minute sampling.

I tried moving the pictures around and writing beside them but that skill eludes me:(

Love, sincerely, fondly,
Zaijian,
Ramona

Lost in translation....forever

Shopping again..imagine that!  I was taking my time looking, trying to find some new things to add to our culinary experience at the grocery store.  We are not trying this, I don't have a clue what is inside but I had to take the picture to show Mike and O.  Is it going to make us drunk and frisky?????

Sorry it is blurry.  This is a package of some spice mixture.  I guess you won't be tired if you use this on your chicken??

Just to let the record show, I posted the pictures with minimal input from the IT staff.

Love, sincerely, fondly,

Zaijian,

Ramona

China #7

Nihao,

Today we went shopping, seems like we do that a great deal.  What can I say, we live here so we have to get stuff.  

Speaking of stuff,  'A slow boat to China' has arrived!!  Now hopefully only 2 to 3 weeks before we get our things.  Customs officials now get to touch everything we own....eeewwww!!

Back to shopping.  Olivia needed a few things so we had the driver come and get us at three.  We ended up getting Olivia a new bicycle among other things.  Mind you we only have a car so Mike chose  to ride the bike back to the house, otherwise there was a delivery fee for what is a 10 minute car ride.  Olivia and I went in the car.  Mike got home 15 minutes before we did!  Granted he went a different way, actually the way we had come to this particular shopping area, the driver decided to go another way.  I don't think he will ever make that decision again.  We got around a corner, the last point at which we saw Mike, and sat and sat and sat a while longer.  It happens like that, you cannot guarantee you will be anywhere on time unless you walk or ride your bike.  You can weave in and around cars but they get stuck when something breaks down.  Any way, we got home and Mike got in the car, Olivia got out and we went back shopping at the same place.  We had never been there before and had only gone in one store, sporting goods.  We couldn't go into anything else because of the bike.  

Mike and I wandered around and found a grocery store and picked up a few things.  Pretty close to home and a nice big store.  then we headed home again.  We were going along nicely, just the way we came when all was stopped.....who knows why, you rarely know why.  So in an effort to get somewhere...so they think.....they turn a single lane into three.  There is almost always a bicycle/scooter/oddball vehicle lane along roads and when things get backed up cars and trucks start going in that lane and making even another lane.  The cars are so close together you could stick your arm in the one beside you.  Nerve wracking for those used to a bit more order on the roadways.  The car our driver had today was not Mike's and it had an alarm that sounded whenever another vehicle was too close.  I guess Wang Cheng didn't know how to silence the warning sound so it was beeping like crazy.  The reason he wasn't driving Mike's car today was it was in the body shop being repaired....someone had run into the back corner.  Brand new, only have had it about 4 weeks.   Such is life I guess.  The more we go around the easier it is to understand why GE does not want us to drive in China.  They think nothing of passing on the right or when there is a huge truck coming at you in the opposite lane....they can just move over into the bike lane...heaven help the bike rider and scooter that are going along in that same bike lane at the moment!

Just a bit crazy, come and visit, we'll take you for a spin!

Love, fondly, sincerely,

Zaijian,

Ramona