Love Me, Love My Dog

Can't help myself....

I have a windowsill in my bedroom where Mimi can get an extra dose of Vitamin D provided by the sun.

I bought Mimi a stuffed panda in Chengdu. She alternately loves it, uses it for a pillow, and kills it by thrashing it with her teeth.

She loves macaroni and cheese (this batch has ground beef mixed in it). On a paper plate, she can carry it with her from room to room, and even take it to bed with her. Unfortunately for me, her bed is my bed, so yes, I regret to inform you that sometimes I sleep on a bed with macaroni and cheese. Maybe this is not cool, but I promise you my life is never dull. Maybe I need to give her a heavier plate.

Some American friends dropped by to visit Mimi and me one day, so Mimi got a bath and had to wear clothes that day.

Mimi rules, still. Don't tell the Dog Whisperer.

Chengdu

I went to Chengdu, China recently. I was surprised! It's a great city.

This was taken at the Sichuan Opera. It was quite entertaining! Pretty chilly in that room too. It was cold the whole time I was in Chengdu, although it is not generally known for being a cold place.

This is "Ancient Street." It was built in 2005. (Huh?) Anyway, it was so quaint, and the fact that there was a Starbucks on this street didn't bother me at all.

This is no mannequin...that's a real guy all dressed up to look scary, like in the Chinese movies.

Lots of artists and artisans set up shop on Ancient Street.

Sichuan snacks. I don't know if the food smells bad, or the girls are just trying to keep the food clean by not coughing on it. Apparently the girls can't breathe with those masks on, which is why none of their noses are actually covered.

Still in Chengdu...there are quite a few lovely restaurants like this one called Grandma's Kitchen. There's a Tex-Mex restaurant down the road that looks similar.

This seven year-old girl must have thought I looked lonely dining by myself in Chengdu, because she sat across from me the entire time I was eating dinner at Grandma's Kitchen. Her parents were upstairs, and this girl had finished her meal, and so she just hung out and we talked in Chinese for more than half an hour. This girl, like everyone I asked in Chengdu, told me exactly where she was when the devastating earthquake hit outside Chengdu in May. She was in her second grade English class in a first floor classroom. None of the kids knew what was happening until their teacher told them it was an earthquake. The kids all scurried out of the room to safety outdoors. Chengdu city didn't really suffer damage or injuries to my knowledge. The outer poor villages and towns were the ones where all the devastation poured down.

Chengdu is a really fun, modern city. Overlook the smog, and I think it is one of the most fun cities I have been in. Everyone dresses fashionably. Tibetans in native dress (red and orange robes) roam the city--too bad I didn't get any photos of that. There's electricity in the air, and yet it is laid back. If you ever get a chance to go, I give it two thumbs up.

Shanghai

Here are some photos I took in Shanghai not long ago. The skyscraper photo doesn't do justice to the skyline. There are thousands of more like it in the city of 22 million people. Notice all the Christmas decorations in this Communist country. Definitely no nativity scenes in sight, yet it is still a bit amazing to see anything at all like this!

What Do You Do?

Let me introduce you to my lovely friend from Bedrock whom I will call Ms. Shoe. Photogenic, I'm not sure, but her inner beauty shines forth like a bright light.

Ms. Shoe was a gardener/maintenance worker/trash collector at my apartment complex in Bedrock. I felt sorry because Ms. Shoe's husband left her to raise two daughters on her own. Ms. Shoe only makes the equivalent of $70 a month. One day I asked her if her husband was able to help support the daughters financially. That's when I found out that Ms. Shoe's husband didn't leave the family, he left this earth four years ago in a tragic fall from the high-rise hospital a block from where I lived; he was a construction worker. My heart sank at this news.

Ms. Shoe has a daughter in college. This daughter's tuition is paid for by bank loans plus about 20% of Ms. Shoe's monthly income. It will take her daughter a lifetime to repay those student loans. Ms. Shoe has to send this daughter even more money for food and dorm costs.

Ms. Shoe has a daughter in sixth grade. Ms. Shoe and this daughter live in a one-room rental that costs another 20% of their monthly income. There is no bathroom, no place to take a shower, and no kitchen. It is just four walls with one dim light bulb hanging from the ceiling. They were sharing a single bed, either scrunched up together or sleeping in shifts. I gave her my extra bed (a comfy cot, really). Tears poured from her eyes at this cheap gift of mine; finally they would each have their own bed. Their room has no heating in winter, and no air-conditioner for summer. Even if they had a fan or heater, they could not afford to pay the electric bill. Ms. Shoe has an old cell phone, but cannot afford to add money to it to make it work (in this country people pre-pay for phone service). Her daughter in college in another town has no way to contact mom in case of emergency. The 6th grade daughter eats one bread roll for lunch every day. They never eat meat.

I told another Chinese friend about Ms. Shoe, and that Chinese friend said "she will never make it."

Ms. Shoe's parents are elderly and unemployed. Her in-laws broke contact with them when Ms. Shoe's husband died; the in-laws have no use for granddaughters--they are, in the opinion of the fraternal grandparents, useless girls. Ms. Shoe's financial contributions to her family are the only resource. Imagine her stress, trying to survive.

Ms. Shoe is your sister in Christ. Your sister is the face of poverty.

Ms. Shoe doesn't have a mean bone in her body. She never asks for a single thing. She wasn't trying to criticize me, but just spoke the truth--tears streamed down her face as she told me that my dog had a better life than her daughters.

What do you do about poverty? I'm not sure, but I know you don't just sit back and do nothing.

Matthew 25:40 (NIV) tells us the words of Jesus: "The King will reply, 'I tell you the truth, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers of mine, you did for me.'

Church

I visited this local church today. It is one of the most beautiful church buildings I have ever seen in my life, anywhere. The chandeliers are just mesmerizing. So many things are different about this church than the ones in Bedrock. This one is extremely clean, has pews instead of theater seats, is spotlessly clean, has young people who attend, has middle-class attendees (instead of only poor farmers) who dress very well, and the preacher speaks the national language instead of a dialect. You have to arrive 30 minutes early to get a seat downstairs. If you sit upstairs you can't see anything going on, but there are closed-circuit TV's that show what's going on. This church is one of those registered with the government. Anyway, I just thought you'd like to see what it looks like.

Autumn in Bamboo Forest

Autumn in Bamboo Forest is really pretty. In Bedrock we had dry autumns, and the leaves just died and fell off the trees. Here in Bamboo Forest it has been a very wet autumn, and so the changing colors have been really pretty to view. I didn't get many good photos, but I'll put up some photos of BF since I arrived.

I'm getting more visitors in Bamboo Forest than I ever did before. I already had one friend spend two nights here, and a married couple is coming to visit next week. A friend passed through town in October and I caught up with him for coffee. Bamboo Forest is a tourist town, and near a big city, so it is not nearly as isolated as Bedrock was. (I'm not slamming Bedrock...I love that place too...I'm just enjoying different things in life now.)

It is Thanksgiving Eve. I just made a pie. Happy Thanksgiving!

Much Ado about a 'Do

I got my hair cut today. At Costa Coffee I saw a barrista with a fashionable, perfectly cut style, and used her reference for a place to get my own hair cut. I researched my preferred hairstyle on the internet, and printed out a large clear picture for the hairstylist to copy. I did it. It’s done. There’s no going back in time.

I have not had this hairstyle since I was 19 years old. I’m not sure if I should cry or go start a rock band. I asked the guy what picture he was looking at to cut my hair. I pointed out that in the picture I brought, the elegant, sleek style’s shortest point was way below the chin line, practically at the bottom of the neck. Then I pointed to the mirror and showed him that the shortest point on my new haircut (bangs not counted) was at the level of my crow’s feet. It took it a minute to sink in, but finally the guy said “oh.” I could have shown him a picture of Mimi and I would probably have gotten the same haircut that I got today. I could have shown him a picture of a chocolate bar and gotten the same haircut. He just decided what kind of haircut he wanted to give, and went for it, with no regard to the picture I brought, my age, my dignity, or anything I said. After a moment, he defended himself and said he was making it look more fluffy. Fluffy? At what point did the word “fluffy” enter this conversation? I looked around to see if I had accidentally gone into a dog parlour by mistake. I smiled and pretended to be happy. No use crying over butchered tresses. He started to cut the bangs. The only thing that could possibly make this haircut worse were bangs that were halfway up my forehead. That would result in me having to wear a wig, and since all wigs in China are black, I couldn’t take any chances. I told him to leave the bangs long, which means I pretty much look a bit like a sheepdog.

I rushed home and googled “mullet.” I am not sure what a mullet is, but I know if you have one you are scum of the fashion world and people will tease you mercilessly…and you have to wear tight jeans, smoke, and name your child Miley, none of which are appropriate for a 40-something single woman in my line of work. Well, I don’t really know anyone in town, so I don’t fear my friends making fun of me. I fear no one will want to make friends with me in the first place though. If I have a mullet, I’m going to have to hang out at video arcades until my locks grow out.

I checked out the online photos. Whew, not a mullet! Looks like I’m sporting a shag instead. Did you know there are 4.1 million hits for the word “mullet” on google, and that entire websites are devoted to this style? Shag only has 227,000 hits. If you are into mullets, you can even join the mulletia. One website says, “Wearing a mullet makes you look like a complete and total fool, and instantly makes you much poorer and less intelligent.” Wow, am I ever glad I got a shag instead!

I walk over to the mirror and gasp. I am not exaggerating when I say that I thought someone let Andy Gibb (God rest his soul) into my house, because he was staring back at me from the other side of the mirror. That’s what every modern woman really wants, to look like she belongs on a 1970's BeeGee’s album cover. This probably explains why I have been singing “Staying Alive” all afternoon and dancing in the hallway; Mimi finds the whole song and dance routine rather fascinating, especially since I am sick, have completely lost my voice, and Mimi no longer recognizes me. “Ay, ay, ay, ay, staying alive, staying alive.”

I go back to the computer and google “Andy Gibb shag.” There are 61,000 websites that feature information about Andy’s shag haircut. I don’t want to look like a BeeGee anymore. I heat up the electric rollers.

My hair looks better all curly. Maybe if the hairdresser had known I had hot rollers, he would not have felt the need to use scissors to make my hair fluffy. I’m not too upset. Hair grows at a rate of about half an inch a month, so by this time next year my hair ought to be looking smokin’!

Images of Bamboo Forest

Leaving Bedrock

Times change, and ya know, even the Flintstones had to move on. On September 20th, I moved away from Bedrock to move to my new home in Bamboo Forest. I was sad along the entire 8-hour bus ride, but the sadness was lifted the moment I arrived in the modern, garden-like, historical metropolis city of Bamboo Forest.

Bamboo Forest has a population about the same size as Hong Kong's, more if you count the immigrant population that cannot according to law call BF their permanent address. But BF has more space than Hong Kong, so it's buildings need not be so close together nor so tall.

The first and best change: an elevator. Mimi didn't like it at all the first day, but when she learned the useful purpose of the elevator and the fact that it allowed her more trips out to the grass during the day, she quickly began to love the elevator. While we are going down, she body slams different sides of the elevator in a sort of victory celebration. Mimi doesn't get on the elevator when other people are on it though. There is no rule against it, but we want to maintain friendships. Mimi tickled a little girl with her teeth our last day in Bedrock, and the frightened parents took their daughter in for a series of rabies shots because they didn't trust my little booklets claiming my dog had a rabies' vaccine. (Mimi's teeth did not even break the skin.) Our departure from Bedrock was, it seems, well-timed.

The second and best change (two bests? yes!): lettuce. After twelve years of no salads, I have become a salad freak. The little grocery store here at my apartment complex sells it, and I can't get enough of it. But I probably will eventually get enough of it and start to hate salads. I think that's going to take a long time though.

The photo is from my apartment complex grounds. It is peaceful to walk in this apartment complex. The neighbors in Bedrock were sweet, but they were also busybodies, always in my business, criticizing me for using my air-conditioner in 100 degree weather, and stuff like that. Here, everyone uses their air-conditioners and no one hassles me when I go walking. I no longer need nerves of steel to leave my home. It's hard to believe I am in the same country still!

Bad Fisherman

Wow, it's been nearly three months since I lasted posted something on this blog. It's all because my dog, who was fishing for compliments, didn't get any! Well, finally she got one (thanks Madre), and then another, so her tail's a-wagging with pride once again. We now will resume our correspondence with the outside world.