Saturday, January 28, 2012

2 1/2 weeks in Kunming.

There are purses every where, but on this trip I feel in love with the ones that look Chinese. I bought the three I am holding. They were made by this young man. He has done many for famous people. There pictures are on his wall inside of his shop. This outdoor market was something.
We are back from 2 1/2 weeks in Kunming, what a wonderful experience. It is a great city to visit, and our hostel was amazing. The above picture were a couple from Holland. We fixed them pancakes for breakfast before they left. We had some nice talks with them and enjoyed their company in the hostel very much.
This is the mall that was right below our apartment. We could get on the elevator and go down to the first floor and have a lovely evening looking at all the expensive shops that we would never buy anything in.
This is the new furniture they brought into our room. We loved looking out the window every night. The lights in the city were beautiful.
This is one morning when we got up, found it was a lovely warm day and heated out to see the sights of Kunming.
You can see a little mark where out apartment is at. In this picture we are on the 6th floor at a very lovely park area.
We went to this really big lake and when we first got there we rented this little car. We used it for just 30 minuets because we discovered that we could move faster walking.
Always in search of western food. Okay, I am always in search of Western food. We found this very nice restaurant by the University. They had many good place because of the foreign students that go to school there.
I spent 4 hours with Li, she taught me how to make these really cool strings grafts. I think it would just be easier buying them, but now I know how to make them and bought the material to do it.
This is a group of young ladies that were dressed up for some reason. They were on a walk through the out door market. This market was right across from our hostel, and it was great.
This is one of many statues in the main shopping area. Whole streets are closed off from cars and you can walk freely back and forth across the street.
One of the greatest things to do while in China, is to go and see the shows. This one was 2 hours long and it was amazing.
It had been raining a little before we went into the show. It was only two blocks away from our apt. and it was truly amazing performance.
This was Green Lake. It was the holidays and everyone was there enjoying the dancing and the beauty of the place.
A view of the lake.

These are how the chicken are taken to the open market. In this case the open market was along 3 blocks of the road. Everyone selling chickens. They were really big.

Thursday, January 12, 2012

More Days in Kunming

This was Sunday of day 4. We got up in the morning and got dressed for Church and then we listen to two General Conference talks. I would have been nice to have sacrament, but that will have to wait for two more weeks. At 10 AM we went to see the Stone Forest. Something Jay has always wanted to see in China. It was really beautiful and of course we had to buy a hat.














We were able to go with two really great students from Italy who were staying in our hostel. The are students at a University in Shanghai. When we get home we plan on getting together with them and fix them some Western food. We are able to answer any question they asked us and that was so great.

More Days in Kunming

Tuesday, January 10, 2012

Vacation In Kunming

This is us at our hostel in Kunming. Today we were told it was a apartment building, but whatever it is we sure do like it.

Our second day here we went to the Yunnan International Culture Center, it is lot like the Polynesian Culture Center in Hawaii. It shows the 26 different minorities here in China. Most of them live in the South of China.
There are so many different types of hats. Each one represents the different groups at the Center.











Monday, December 26, 2011

4th Christmas in China

MERRY CHRISTMAS --

AND HAPPY NEW YEAR.
This is Gloria, one of Dana's students and she just loves Santa Claus.
These are my crazy English classs students. I think I was tired at this point. What do you think?
Cookie Making in our apartment...for the Christmas Party later.
You can see that we have had a fun time at the Christmas Party which we threw for our
English students here in Wuxi, China. They helped Dana make 850 cookies and place them in little gift bags for the student who came. Also, they brought small gifts to exchange and they did that too. The photos with Santa were very popular as you can imagine where this is the first time most all of them have ever seen Santa Claus in person. Now they all believe in Santa and he is not just on TV or in the movies they see...
This was yesterdays tour in Wuxi of a place called Turtle Head Park. It was a fun time for Dana and I as we took a ferry to the island and saw many buddas and budda things and enjoyed the day as you can see from our photos, even though it was cold. This one looks a little upset with us taking his photo.
Sleeping Budda. Colorful female one, and big too.
They are everwhere.
A Ferry boat.

This is the LDS church meeting house in Suzhou, and where we travel to each Sunday for one hour by taxi. Last Sunday about half were gone for the holidays. We fly out on January 4th for almost three weeks winter, (Spring Festival) vacation in Southern China in a city called: Kunming. We hope it is warmer there.
The Branch Christmas breakfast was so fun and we helped flip the pancakes etc...and we ate a lot too. Our branch is so talented when it come to food makin...
FLIPPIN PANCAKES...
We went shopping for pearls and also found this stone necklace quite cheap. It cost about $10.00. When I asked what the stones were because they were really pretty, she looked in her ielectronic nterpreter -- Turquoise. I bought two necklaces with stirling silver, magnetic clasps. She is double tying all of the stones on four strands of cord. Below...
Brother Doug McGregor, is also living off and on in Wuxi. He is in our branch and we went shopping with him for pearls and gifts. He has a driver who drives him wherever he wants to go. b. This woman here, he met on the plane over, who was from Suzhou, and she offered to help him go shopping and she was very helpful that day. The man is the just a parking attendant.
We bought these pearls and have an order for more... They are beautiful. They cost about $35 - 40. american dollars for each set. They are cultured, real pearls and are here in abundance.
My birthday party in my English Class on Dec 15th was a bash and the cake was delicious, and everyone got a piece.
Kirk and Midge Evans visited us from BYU China Teachers program and took us out to dinner at TFI Fridays...in Suzhou. We wish we had one of these in Wuxi. Maybe some day.
MERRY CHRISTMAS.