Limbo, Limbo, Limbo!

Sunday

Well today was pretty boring... We had an English corner at Number 7 Middle School and I got to teach with Cecilia which was quite fun! It went really well and the middles school students understood everything, always a good thing! On the plus side we saw some traditional dances on the way to school! 

We left Number 7 to find the road closed as today was the day that the 'Tour de Qinghai' bike race comes through Xining! This was obviously quite an important event for the people in Xining because they lined the streets in their thousands! We saw the bikes go past in a colourful blur before heading out for lunch. 

We decided to try somewhere new because the American couple who run our favourite ice cream shop said this place serve the best pizza in Xining. We went in and sat down and ordered our pizzas. Mike and Cecilia's came in about 15 minutes but a good 2 hours later Will and I were still waiting... They eventually turned up and they weren't even that good, what a waste!

Cecilia and I decided to head back to school to chill while Mike played basketball.

Monday

Monday morning had a leisurely start as we had no plans until the afternoon. Fish had offered us another Chinese lesson. After lunch we headed into town, Will had other plans so wasn't going to come, Fish said that this was 'great news'. There is no love lost between those two...

The Chinese lesson consisted of the same stuff that we had learnt with Fish on Friday but it was good to go over it because Mike and Cecilia missed it. I made some flash cards for emotions though everyone made fun of my drawings, they were pretty bad though...

After the lesson we were asked to watch videos of our students evaluating the project and choose the best ones. It made me miss my students so much! Chris, a seven year old from Gu Chengtai even boom sh boomed!! So cute!!

Tuesday

Fish and Vivian had told us we had to stay in school all day today which went down like a lead balloon! It isn't the most interesting of places to be stuck.

At about 3pm Fish and Vivian turned up with Mr Qi and a film crew from Qinghai Television. They wanted us to give our impressions of Qinghai, the teaching and how we've changed. We said it in English and Fish translated it to her best ability. It took forever as we had to keep changing location to show off all the facilities at school. Each time we had to lug a rather heather amp...

Wednesday

Mike went into Xining early to play basketball while Cecilia and I didn't head in until 11. Once we got in we grabbed lunch at the food court, it took a ridiculously long time to get a table...

After lunch we met up with Mike and headed to People's Park; once there, we decided to hire out a pedal boat for an hour. It was really nice, naturally Mike and I were the only ones doing the work... Lazy Sweed!

We were there relaxing in our boat in the middle of the lake when all of a sudden we see a couple of monks in a boat heading straight for us! They intended to ram us! Monks!! This seemed to open the flood gates and soon we were surrounded by Chinese people taking pictures of us, filming us and knocking into our boat! Oh to be white in China...

Once our hour was over we docked our boat and got out and headed towards the fairground for some rides! On the way Mike tried his basketball skills in one of the side show challenges, he won Cecilia a fluffy star! Sadly the log flume was out of order! Bu Hao! So naturally we headed for the bumper cars! Bumper cars are just universally fun. I got Cecilia back too!

After the bumper cars, Mike went and played basketball again and Cecilia and I went and chilled in the shade. I had a nap! We then decided to go and get a hot drink so we headed towards Greenhouse where we drank Lady Grey tea and ate carrot cake. Now one thing that I have taken away from China is a love of different types of tea! My friend Hembo would be proud of me! Green tea rocks! 

After we finished our hot drinks we headed back towards the office because we were taking out our bosses for Korean barbecue (again). This time it was Mrs Wang, the head mistress of the school we live in, Mr Qi, Mrs Guo and Vivian. We were worried they wouldn't like it but it seemed to go down well. Except Chinese women do not like to eat much meat so as a result of Will's ordering we had LOTS of meat...  I think they appreciated the gesture though and that's what matters!

After food and saying goodbye to our bosses we decided to head to the night market with Vivian. It was really great! Lots of tat really but I bought a couple of souvenirs including a whole lot of chopsticks!

After wandering around for a couple of hours we got in a taxi home. Now taxi drivers are usually difficult but this guy charged us what the meter said (for the first time ever in Xining I might add...). Yet this journey was the worst journey I have ever had... Namely because of Weena (Will and Deena) were bickering the whole time! It is seriously the most annoying thing I've had to deal with here in China...  It went something like this
'Deenie you can't sleep in my room tonight'
'Why not?'
'Cuz its my room'
'But I sleep in there too, my room scares me'
'not my problem Deeny'
'Will you are suck a ****'
'You make my room smell'
'**** off do I, Its your bum that makes it smell'
'No it isn't its just your smell'

And then it kind of looped with more swearing... Needless to say Mike, Cecilia and I were ready to shoot ourselves.

Thursday

Nice relaxed day! Mike, Cecilia and I went into town after a lunch of dumplings in school. We headed to a cafe and got a hot drink. We played Chinese Checkers (I WON TWICE!) and then played cards for a while. We even played consequences which was funny as always. We then got a pizza for dinner and took half of it home for an evening snack. Very good pizza and so cheap!!