Fru-fru

China doesn't have a macho culture. Obviously.

Early bloomer

I don't remember seeing blooms here in February before. These showed up several days before our big thundersnow. I love spring. Bring it on.

The light at the end of the tunnel

The 15th and final day of the Chinese Lunar New Year festival is today. It is known as the Lantern Festival. I went to a park in the late afternoon to take photos of the lanterns. A "temple fair" atmosphere takes place at the park, which is something like a county fair. There was cotton candy, dart throwing at balloons, toys for sale and food.

The photos above and below are, believe it or not, lanterns. At dusk, the lights will be turned on and these will glow. These are huge, like parade floats. In the photo below, even the white building with roof tiles is part of the lantern.

Below are small battery-operated plastic lanterns. Kids carrying them around on sticks to light their way.

The crowds after dark will be so thick that you can't move. That's why I went during daylight hours. It's easier to take photos during the daytime too.

Lots of cheap junk is for sale at the fair.

 Lots of lanterns, big and small, decorate the park.

 More lanterns.

Besides the cotton candy, I didn't see much food like what you'd see at a county fair in America. They had lots of sweets, nuts and grilled meat sticks. This guy is grilling squid on sticks. 

Fireworks are going off. Hopefully it will end at a decent hour. The local kids go back to school tomorrow.

Cooking Lesson

My once-a-week house helper, above, taught me to make baozi (bow-zuh) yesterday. Baozi is steamed bread with meat and vegetable filling. She told me it would be easy. But when I found out it wasn't easy, I stopped paying attention. Not much chance of me ever making these from scratch. Mimi was kind of paying attention though.

When I realized that the dough is made with yeast and is basically the same dough recipe you'd make for, say, cinnamon rolls, I wanted to bring this cooking lesson to an abrupt halt and make breakfast instead. Because if you're going to go to that much trouble to make something, it ought to be something mouth-watering.

I can buy baozi on the street for about 30 cents each, so that's what I'll be doing next time I want to eat one.

Afternoon at the coffee shop

Gifts from Mike and his "girlfriend" -- the flowers were from them a while back, the homemade goodies in recycled jars and the wooden goose basket were from today.

I spent the afternoon at a coffee shop talking with a 25-year old young man I first met a few years ago. (He says he is 27 years old, but based on his actual date of birth, he is really 25). Let's call him Mike. Because it wouldn't be cool for me to give you his real name.

Warning: This story doesn't have a plot or anything, I just thought some of you might want a glimpse into everyday life.

Mike, a reserved type, is nice looking, is a mechanical engineer and has a good-paying job. 

Back in December he introduced his girlfriend to me and I quickly discovered they were living together, planning to get married at the end of 2013. He expounded on that today. 

Turns out they are already legally married, and plan to hold their wedding ceremony with invited guests at the end of 2013. (In this country, the act of marriage registration makes the marriage legal, not the ceremony itself as it is in America. Lots of Chinese married couples choose a later wedding date after they are registered.) 

I don't know why Mike introduced his wife to me as his girlfriend in December though. Why not just say "this is my wife?"

Mike's wife only had one week off for Chinese New Year, so she's back at work this week. Mike himself has three weeks off. He is bored sitting at home out by the quiet lake, so he wanted to visit someone. So he called me up. He wanted to practice his English as much as anything. We met at Starbucks. Fortunately, there are lots of Starbucks in this city; unfortunately, we initially went to different ones, postponing our meeting for half an hour or so. 

He brought me some homemade snacks his mom had made. She made sugar-coated peanuts and sesame toffee squares. He and his wife also picked up a souvenir for me while visiting a tourist mountain on their trip home for the New Year. (They drove home for the holidays, because they have a car.) I am so touched -- I feel unworthy that they thought of me during their trip. 

Mike didn't come from money. His parents are poor farmers, growing their own food. His mom has 10 chickens, a cat, an ox and used to have a pig. We looked on Google maps to see where their plot of land is several days' drive to the west of here.

Mike's worldview is so different from mine. For example, he was excited to tell me he had a dream and Einstein was in it. Yep, he dreams about Albert Einstein, the scientist. I can't even imagine having a dream about anything to do with science. Or about anyone with a bad hairdo for that matter.

Mike wishes he could go to England to meet wheelchair-bound scientist Stephen Hawking, and he was carrying a biography of Apple co-founder Steve Jobs with him today. It seems much of the world is in the business of building heroes that have nothing to do with Jesus, though He's the only one who will remain standing when all else fades away. I am so unimpressed with just about everyone else the world tries to sell me on as a hero. But I didn't want to ruin it for Mike, so I just winced smiled as he talked about them.

Deep down in my heart I had a mental picture of how I hoped our meeting would go today. After discussing deep questions that his soul had pondered since my Christmas party, Mike would drop to his knees right there in the middle of the coffee shop, repent (with tears streaming down his face) and become my spiritual brother today. Alas, not today. It didn't even come up. Oh well, there's always tomorrow.

After taking an e-bike, subway, bicycle and taxi for my outing today, I finally returned home. 

I'm kind of chuckling over the fact that a popular 25-year old guy called up someone my age to spend the afternoon with, but it's actually not that unusual. It's one of the things I love about this place. Anything can happen.

Bless this food

I'm thankful for those who have been helping my parents by bringing meals to them. My dad learned to make meat loaf and all, but he sure appreciates an evening when he doesn't have to cook and clean. He's quite capable of a lot of things -- he mows the yard and has regularly washed dishes for years. But when you put him in the kitchen as a cook, he is out of his element.  Neighbors, Sunday School classmates and J's family have all helped. And since I wish I could help but can't, I want to say thanks to those of you who do help. Bless you!

Crazy dog man

I was walking through a village on the morning of Chinese New Year when I ran across this man carrying a dog that looks somewhat similar to Mimi. So, of course, I had to stop and have a chat with the guy. I mean, obviously he has good taste in dogs, if not dog fashion. 

The guy told me his dog was born on August 3, 2003, and was two years older than Mimi. Can you believe that? He didn't even get the dog until it was three months old, and the guy knew the dog's exact birthdate! And he's a man. I knew there were crazy dog ladies in this world, but I was talking with a bona fide crazy dog MAN.

I pretend to know my dog's birthdate, but really, it is just a good estimate, give or take a week.

I got rid of some of Mimi's old clothes in the past month. I should have thought to give them to another Pekingese dog owner. This dog would've looked cute in Mimi's hand-me-downs. I mean, this dog doesn't look BAD, but seriously? Everyone knows that bold horizontal stripes visually add pounds to your figure!

Thundersnow

When I went to bed last night, I knew snow was in the forecast, and expected to wake up to a white world.

What I didn't expect was to be awakened at 4 a.m. with a loud roar of THUNDER. It kind of freaked me out a little, but poor Mimi was more terrified than I have ever seen her. She jumped off the bed, tucked her tail in, hid under a chair (it would presumably save her from being crushed if the sky fell on her), and wouldn't come out for hours. Not even the fireworks of Chinese New Year scared Mimi like this did.

I wondered how our snow storm could have changed into a thunderstorm. I peeked out the window and was surprised to see it was actually snowing after hearing that sound. I've never known of thunder and snow occurring in the same weather event. 

So then, I went back to bed, and I wondered if a meteor had possibly flown through the air like one did in Russia a few days ago. Yeah, that must be it. It surely could not have been thunder, right?

But I got on the Internet this morning, and sure enough, there is a rare phenomenon known as "thundersnow." 

Thundersnow is known for producing thick snow fast. True to form, this is the most snow we've ever gotten in such a short period of time, in all MY days in the Middle Kingdom at least. If you want to see a video of thundersnow -- not MY video, just some random video -- you can see it here: http://boingboing.net/2013/02/08/thundersnow.html

I thought when I moved south I was moving to balmy weather. We've had snow about 4-5 times already this winter. What's up with that?