Kaifeng

The Foreign Affairs Office at MapleBear organized a trip for all foreign teachers to go to the neighboring city of Kaifeng.  It was an ancient capital city during several dynasties, so it is a very old place with a lot of cool history.  The main purpose of our trip was to see the chrysanthemum festival that happens every year in the fall.  We went to Dragon Pavilion Park, an indoor market for lunch, and Millennium City Park.

The Dragon Pavilion Park was so beautiful with so many flowers.  I can't even imagine how much work it must take to create and then maintain everything.  It was a bit of a drizzly and gross day but that didn't stop the swarms of people from coming to see the flower festival.

Certain places don't get a lot of foreigners and Kaifeng is one of those places.  We were constantly being stopped to take pictures with people, which is funny at first but at a certain point you just want to look at the flowers.  We tried to take a foreigner group shot at one point and a crowd formed around us.  People were shoving children and friends into the shot with us.  I eventually started a countdown and we made a run for it.

The foreign teachers on the trip.

A special shot for my old man.

I was mobbed after this photo with people wanting to pose with me.

One of the floating gardens.

Flower dancers.

The Emperor's Dragon Throne.

After the Dragon Pavilion Park we went to a huge indoor market with hundreds of food and merchandise stalls.  There was some really weird food, even for Chinese standards here.  

It may have been rainy outside but there were blue skies inside the market.

Some sort of bean and rice mixture in a bamboo cup.

I'm pretty sure most of these would be illegal in the States.

Seahorses, beetles, and other things I would never want to eat.

Giant centipedes and tarantulas...

You choose a skewer and they dip it in hot oil.

I don't even know.

The Millennium City Park was a little more touristy with model buildings, reenactments, and shows, plus more flowers.  It was a lot of fun though.  We saw a Chinese acrobatic circus thing, a traditional wedding reenactment, a fire breather, and a reenactment of some attack that happened on the Kaifeng city walls way back when.

The girls.

A flower dragon!

Posing with some giant vegetables because why not?

The poor guy looked like he drank kerosene for a living.

The bad guys preparing to attack the walls.

There were little stalls throughout the park where you could dress up and of course we had to do it.  The women working the stall were loving it but also stressed out because they wanted it to be perfect.  The stress was also multiplied by the crowds of people that surrounded us to take pictures of the foreigners dressing up.

The crew all dressed up.

Some of the paparazzi. 

Vegas show girl headdress?

Stray thoughts:

• I had to share this picture of my little Gucci man.  He actually lives in my same apartment complex as me and his grandma looooves it.  She gets so excited whenever she sees me.

• I hope I didn't freak anyone out about the air quality here.  Some days can be like this day when it was similar to air back in the States!  This past week it was all in the good air range.  So while some days you feel like you can cut through the haze, other days it's completely fine.  I live in a strange place.

Canadian Thanksgiving

Canadian Thanksgiving was October 12th and since I work at a Canadian school I celebrated Thanksgiving a little early this year.  Although it will be noted that a restaurant run by an American will be hosting a Thanksgiving meal on the actual Thanksgiving so I'll eat my turkey next month too.

Leading up to the big day I read Thanksgiving books, did some crafts, and tried to get the point across that the day is for celebrating all the things we are thankful for in our lives.  One of our crafts were these little turkey hats.  There was a lot of gobbling going on as we worked on them.

As my grandparents would say, this little turkey is being a turkey.

The three foreign teachers at my school put together a menu for the children to try out authentic Thanksgiving food.  Unfortunately we are in China and some things can be hard to come by, so the turkey was actually chicken.  Also, they only made food for the kids but I had to make sure it tasted right so I sampled a couple of the items.

Corn, butterless mashed potatoes, and Thanksgiving chickens.

The meal minus the "turkey."

One of my classes enjoying their meal.

Here are some random photos of my kiddos.

Tying a vine around my neck and I decided to take a picture before stopping him?

A selfie with Spider Man!

Just chilling in a wheelbarrow.

The girls trying on my sunglasses.

 Stray thoughts:

• Most sweets aren't as sweet here as I am used to back in the States.  I got a brownie the other day and it was like lightly flavored with cocoa powder.  It was very disappointing.  I have some Ghirardelli chocolates that I brought with me that I have been slowly rationing.  Although I did treat myself the other day and bought a mini cake for myself and it didn't disappoint.

Fancy little box for a fancy little cake.

This cost less than 3 US dollars.

• I knew the air quality would be bad but I guess I didn't fully understand it before I came here.  A haze hangs over the city most days and while it makes for some pretty beautiful sunsets and moons, it's pretty scary to think about.  Not every day is terrible but it's starting to get worse, which happens as it gets colder because they burn coal.  It should be noted that I have joined a gym and only run outside when it's safe.  I also have a face mask now that I wear when walking to school and getting rides on scooters.

In comparison, the air quality in Chicago was 30 today.

I'm buying an air purifier when I get my next paycheck.

•  I found out that I could buy a nice dog like popular breeds such as a husky or a pug for 300 yuan or $48 and mutts are even cheaper.  I wanted a dog before I came here and now that need is heightened by living alone, lack of contact with dogs (especially Jordy), and that I could buy one for so cheap.  But don't worry, I won't actually buy a dog here... probably.
• The other morning this little dude followed me for about 20 minutes of my 25 minute walk.  He would run after cars and bark at them, sniff around and explore but would always come back to me.  I got pretty nervous crossing busy streets but he is a stray and has it figured out.  I named him Benji after that movie from my childhood.  I now keep a little packaged meat in my backpack in case I see him again.  I was grinning like an idiot the whole walk to school.  

Benji, my hero.

•  My parents are rockstars and sent me a Halloween package and now my fridge is all decked out.  The rice krispy treats lasted 5 days when I really just wanted to shove them all in my mouth at once when I first opened the box.  I also shared a couple because I'm a saint.

• A friendly reminder that if you want to talk to me then WeChat is the best way.  You download the app and my username is jackielaesch.  Shout out to my mom and Danielle for getting it!  They can attest to how nice it is and the cool stickers and voice messages.  Also, if you want to video chat like FaceTime or Skype then your mornings or weekends are the best for me.
• Hey Uncle Tim and Aunt Tracy, you should bring the boys to visit me!  I'll take them to the restaurant that is a 5 minute walk from my apartment.  I think they'll like it.

Bumblebee the Transformer is hanging out in Zhengzhou apparently.

• Rocking out to some ladies tonight while I blog.  Shout out to Billie Marten, the new Adele, Sia, and Lapsley.
• This blog was powered by Tyson chicken nuggets and Progresso garden vegetable soup.  The foreign food store is heaven on earth.  I spent way too much last weekend.  My friend kindly let me use her scooter to bring all my goodies home.

It may not look the most appetizing but oh my gosh...

All set?  You bet!