Laoshan

On our last day in Qingdao, we adventured out to Laoshan (Mt. Lao) which is about 45 minutes outside of the city. We got up at about 5:30 and checked out of our hotel and found our way to the public bus stop by 6:30am in time for what was supposed to be the first bus. However, we waited for nearly an hour just to find a bus that would go all the way to the mountain. Then we stood. We stood for over an hour on a public bus that was packed full of sleepy asians and grumpy westerners. When we got to the mountain we found out that we were on the wrong side but had no choice but to go up it anyways. Luckily, the view was breathtaking and despite my complete and utter lack of wind and overall patheticness in the fitness category, we climbed up for about 2hrs plus before we had to turn around and head for the long bus home. Here are some pics of the view...

Qingdao

Happy Easter weekend, everyone.

I've been dyeing easter eggs at school and still have one final batch to do in my art class on Monday. It's still rather humorous to me how the simplest things become incredibly difficult in Asia and dyeing eggs has been just this. Just getting the school to get WHITE eggs was a bit of an issue, let alone finding enough containers/bowls, drying mechanisms, etc, for 15 kids. My apartment looks like a recycling depot since I am saving anything and everything I can for use in art projects like empty water bottles and cardboard boxes.

In an attempt to get away from it all get out of my spring blues that I've been in, I went to Qingdao last weekend with a few friends from work. Qingdao is a port city across the water from Korea which meant that we just *had* to get Korean barbecue for dinner one night. We walked along the water and looked at the beach, checked out the german architecture including a church on what is called a "European style street," and went to food and barbecue streets for various meals. Oh, and we went to the Tsingtao brewery!
Overall the weekend was peaceful and lovely until a horrible train ride home with no dinner, an hour-long wait for a taxi in the underground parking lot of the train station in Beijing, the walk up 14 flights of stairs, and my discovery that my internet had been disconnected at 12:30 am when I got home...
Oh, but I drank beer out of a shopping bag on "pijiu jie" (beer street) across from the Tsingtao brewery. Ah, the sacrifices we make...

March, Michael, Mao, and Me...

Greetings all,

much apologies for my disappearance this past month. A lot went on that has kept me quite busy and it's been a struggle to keep my head above water. My extra-curricular art class is moving along nicely. It stresses me out coming up with ideas for it and finding the time to prep for the activities but overall I really enjoy it. I've also started tutoring a little and have been using the money to get myself a proper set of M.A.C. make-up since some of my make-up dates back to about the 9th grade. I was sad to find that two of the eyeshadow colours that a friend recommended to me are not made in China so I'll be asking for some to be brought to China from Japan! On that note, if you happen to come upon *Smut* eyeshadow I'd gladly accept it if you mailed it my way! :P
My middle brother made it all the way to China for a whirlwind visit that he seemed to enjoy. We had only about 6 days together in Beijing and lots to see so we scooted around the city on the ONE day that I had off and went for various delicious dinners during the week when I finished work. Here are some pics of our adventures...sadly I have a cold and am too tired to properly blog about this (and I also forget some of what we did!). Skype me for details!