On Monday night after school, I went and purchased my new bike, who I've named Sube...in honour of my much missed Subaru. She's a cruiser, with a sweet bell, removable basket, and most importantly, beer can holder. Yup, that's right, an upright, proper, beer can holder. Sube is ready to rock Luxu this spring/summer. My friend's Bridget and Meagan also got cruisers, that may or may not be the exact same...in every way. We wanted to start a bike gang...and matching bikes seemed like the baddest A way to start. #wearegunnagetbeatup
I also need to describe the experience of purchasing a bike from the 2 gentlemen at the Giant store who spoke English as well as we speak Mandarin. There was a lot of mute moments, hand signaling that we wanted to buy the bike in store and order 2 more of the exact same bike. We also wanted them to throw in some freebies, lock, light, gloves, the usual. We pointed at the bike. Pointed at each of us, and put up 2 fingers. They kept putting up 3 fingers. This went on for 5 minutes. No talking. Just finger putting upping. Now, just sit and think about what that might have looked like. Do it. Are you laughing? Good, you imagined it properly. Didn't laugh? Stop reading my blog. Right meow. Thank goodness we got in touch with a co-worker who was able to sort us all out.
Tuesday night after school, I went with a bunch of Junior High co-workers to Suzhou (Sujo), a large city about 1.5hours away. We went to visit another JH co-worker who was in the hospital all week. Such a bummer to be in a hospital, so far from home. It was nice to lend some moral support and go for a visit. Although, it made for a long school night. I made a decision to not write about the how bad and terrifying being on the roads are here, because there is no sense made in how people "drive" over here, buuuuut my mom reads this, so I will mention nothing about it. Don't worry mom, I always wear my seat belt, and have lots of car naps.
Funny story about this visit: Chinese folks wander in and out of foreigner's rooms, especially the blonde ones! When we were visiting, this elderly gentlemen (we are still not sure if he was a patient, visitor or hospital employee) came in the room, stared for a while, and then sat down and started speaking Mandarin to us. He then proceeded to read Mel's chart. It was all very nice and friendly, but still strange for me to get used to. He wasn't the only one either during our hour-ish visit.
I finished off the week helping out with an after school club at the high school; volleyball. It was great - lots of recreation happening in the gymnasium after school on Thursday - basketball, floor hockey and volleyball. Starting next Tuesday, I'm also helping out with an Ultimate Frisbee recreation league. Super fun - the students love it.
One of my students drew this in about 30 seconds, when I took them outside for a walk, #talented
