Hong Kong is for Lovers

Lee and I took a fabulous trip to Hong Kong for our 10th anniversary. I have to admit to feeling guilty and selfish for taking a trip without the kids. They were really sad when we left. They stayed with Ying for the school days and church friends over the weekend. A great big shout out of thanks goes to Tracey and David Larson, for keeping Ally happy and entertained. Thanks a billion to Michelle and Davies Walker for treating Eve to a great birthday party - Happy B-Day to Lauren! Thanks to the Finotto - in Cooper talk that's 'Anotto' family. Cooper loves Vanna like his own mamma!

We stayed on Hong Kong Island in the Lan Kwai Fong Hotel. It was pretty nice - and pretty pricey, but you only have one 10th, so we decided to do it right. We had read about the small rooms, and boy were they right! When the bellman brought up our bags with barely fit all three of us in the room! But, it was a FANCY teeny tiny room. 

Here's a night shot from our room on the 23rd floor.

We really enjoyed sleeping in late and taking it easy. One of my favorite parts of the trip was the little bakery down the street. They had amazing braided sugarloafs, which I shamelessly ate one of each morning. 

Our first day we headed down to a very urban shopping area (I can't remember what it's called) to buy camera items for Lee. We are both rapidly turning into camera snobs! Lee bought a wide angle lens that he has been drooling over for a long time. Yeah!  We also hit the 'Ladies' Market', which was one or two streets over. I found some great scrapbooking ABC punches, which made the whole day worthwhile for me. Here's a camera shot of the area around the market.

We took the Star Ferry across the harbor to get from our hotel to the mainland. It was pretty fun. Living in Texas and Florida before that, we didn't really get the chance to take many ferries. I really enjoy the ferries in Asia. Of course, Lee is drawn to any vessel that floats! 

We also took a trip to Macau, which is also an island off mainland China. I am sure I will mess up the history, but Macau was originally settled by the Portuguese. It is an interesting place to visit because they speak both Portuguese and Cantonese there. We took a ferry from Hong Kong Island to Macau, which took a little over an hour. Once in Macau we had to go through customs before entering the island. We got suckered in by a tour guide, who took us around the island and showed us all the main sites. It was pretty funny because as he was bargaining with us for the price, a little old guy came up and tried to sell us a rickshaw tour. Macau is very hilly, and we just had to laugh at the idea of this ancient old guy peddling us all around the island on his bike! He was so mad when we opted for the car ride... he actually ranted and raved for quite awhile, yelling at out tour guide, until we finally left him there, still yelling! 

This is a 500 year old Buddhist temple that we visited. We almost died from incense inhalation!

We took a hydrofoil ferry back to Hong Kong Island. Lee was excited to add it to his list of vessel types he has been on. 

Other noteworthy events on our trip were: going to a movie theatre and watching American movies in English!!!!, getting to speak English most everywhere we went, enjoying clean subways with polite passengers, eating western food every night - like Mexican and pizza!, finding Diet Coke at every restaurant!!! 

Hong Kong was very different than Shanghai. One thing we noticed right away was that rather than seeing a million scooters and bikes, everyone had little hand carts that they moved things around on. We are used to seeing scooters piled high with items like a/c units, and even small refridgerators. In Hong Kong, because it is so steep, everyone uses little hand carts. We also were happy with the fact that in Hong Kong, people don't push and shove like in Shanghai. It was nice being somewhere where people are polite and friendly! There are a lot more westerners in Hong Kong and speaking English again to storekeepers and locals was really nice. 

I really liked the elevated moving sidewalk on Hong Kong Island. When you exit from the Central Subway station, you can walk a little bit and climb a few flights of stairs and take a moving sidewalk all the way through the downtown area. Since Hong Kong Island is a mountain, it's really steep. It was fun to be on the sidewalk looking down at all the pedestrians and watching life around you. I really enjoyed taking it each night. It was faster to walk to our hotel, but I always opted for the sidewalk because it was so interesting to look into the shops on the second and third floors of different buildings as you cruised on by.

We had such a great trip, but when all is said and done, by the end of our 5 days, we were both ready to come home to our little ones. They were so excited when we called from the Pudong airport to tell them we were almost home. We even missed Shanghai. We took the Maglev train (which gets up to 300 km/hour) home. As we were waiting in the taxi line, some woman pushed right between Lee and I to try and get the next taxi! Lee and I were standing shoulder to shoulder with our luggage and she physically forced us apart to cut in line! Of course, we didn't take it lying down! We both immediately let her know what we thought... needless to say she ended up right back where she started. But, we definately knew we were back in Shanghai... we didn't make it 20 minutes off the plane before someone was pushing, shoving and trying to cut in line. Home, sweet home!

We love to rag on Shanghai, but anyone who knows us knows how much we love living here. We are having the adventure of a lifetime. We are so happy to be here, doing interesting things and going to great places. The world is just full of wonderful people and we can't wait to meet them all!

Can You Believe We Made it 10 Years?!!!???

Thursday Feb 5 was our 10 year anniversary. I am humbled and amazed at how quickly 10 years can fly by. The day started out like any other day. 6 am and the alarm clock was ringing. My 7:15 I was snuggled back in my bed for my little 'nap' as I call it. Lee laughs at me, but taking my little nap helps me stay up past 8 pm so Lee and I can hang out after the kids go to bed... I digress, sorry. Anyway, Lee called early in the day to wish me a happy anniversary. He is so much better about dates and birthdays and special occasions than I am. He called a little later to ask if Ally and I could take the scooter or taxi to the subway station for gymnastics. I have to admit to grilling him a little about where he was going. He claimed to be going to the technology shopping area with his boss. I kept saying - "How will you get back before Ing has to go home?"   "Ing gets off at 7 and I don't think you have enough time." Finally I let it go. Lo and behold I came home to these flowers! Amazing! I was floored!

So the next evening Lee took me to a wonderful restaurant for dinner. Dinner was so swanky! Lee was so handsome when he came downstairs that even Ing commented on his good looks! He took me to  "Cucina"  in the Hyatt Regency Hotel on the 56th floor of the Jin Mao building, which is the second tallest building in China.  We had to take a combination of elevators to get there. My ears were popping the whole way up! A handsomely dressed matridee greeted us at the elevator, took our coats and helped us to our table, which was right by the window. We just couldn't stop looking out the window. 

You know you are high up when you are looking down on the Pearl Tower!

We enjoyed a 4 course meal, which I have never done before in my

 life. We had an amazing appetizer plate with foods that I couldn't even describe. This was followed by the pasta - of course I had gnocchi which is my favorite pasta. Lee ordered lasagna, which wasn't quite as good as he hoped. This was followed by lamb chops for Lee. I knew I would be too full so I just helped him with the potatoes. We then each chose our own desert (we usually share). He had... you guessed it, tiramisu! I had amazing chocolate mouse cake with hazelnut ice cream on the side. Totally great meal! We walked off our full tummies on our short walk to the subway. What a lovely evening! I wish I had taken my camera for some pictures, but the camera bag didn't go with my outfit! :) 

This weekend Lee is taking me to Hong Kong for a getaway trip without the kids. I am very excited. To date, I have not done any travelling outside of mainland China since we've been here. We had some friends to dinner last night who lived in Hong Kong before Shanghai and they spent the evening giving us details on the subway system, and where to go and what to do and see. I am so excited. So stay posted for our Hong Kong trip!

Chinese Market Day with Cooper

Turtle Soup sounds great on a cold day! 

I think these are eels. Tasty!

                           This is some sort of vegetable, but who knows what it is!
                                Pig's hind quarter anyone? Cooper thought this was totally gross!

   Dried, cured fowl... Fun times!
  
I am behind in posting this outing. We went to this really fun market on Jan. 14th with my friend Tami. We had such a great time! There is a canal/river that runs behind our neighborhood. We really like to bike there and I love to jog along the river. It also takes us down to our good friend's house. I have ridden past this little market a dozen times and finally got the nerve to go in. I was intimidated because there isn't a single foreigner to be seen there and I was so afraid that I wouldn't be able to communicate. Finally, I got up the guts and discovered that it is now my favorite place to grocery shop! I don't trust the meat there, and you will agree as you browse my pictures, but we now buy our vegetables, eggs, some breads and fresh noodles (mientao) there. I probably go twice a week for our fresh stuff. I also discovered that they sell cupcakes that taste almost identical to our cupcakes there. I can get a huge bag of like 30 for about $1. So exciting! 

Cooper liked the fish stalls the very best. We saw eels, turtles, crayfish, all kinds of fish, and lots of fish heads. Almost all the fish are live and you just pick what you want. I don't trust the live fish there either because I think they catch them in the nasty canal/river, which has who knows what floating in it. Cooper was examining with wonder the fish heads that are pictured here. The little lady reached out and poked the biggest one's eye, and much to our amazement (Tami and I both screamed!) the fishhead totally took a huge gasp for air (ok, water). His gills opened up, his mouth opened wide and I am sure if he had the rest of his body he would have flopped around. Just as soon as we got over our shock, he went back to being a dead fish head. It was crazy! Cooper said "Do it again!" So, the lady did. Totally crazy!