A very strange thing happened last week. After school one day, I was relaxing on the couch, not really doing anything, and all of a sudden our alarm above the stove starts going off and the fan in the hood of the stove starts up. I had no idea why. I went downstairs to find our building monitor, Larry, but he wasn't there. Tina, who is on duty when Larry is gone, was there. Tina only speaks about 5 different English words (kind of like my Chinese). I explained to her that the alarm in my room was going off and I didn't know why. She came upstairs with me and unplugged everything. If we plugged it back in, the alarm would start again. She had me fill out a maintenance report. On Friday, one of the FAO (Foreign Affairs Office) people said that it was our smoke alarm, and they were able to fix our hood, but not the alarm yet. Maintenance is coming on Monday (today) to fix it. Well...the good news is that we finally figured out what that alarm was for. I still like to think it is a carbon monoxide monitor though.

We also filled out a maintenance report on our air conditioner. It has started to leak. The leak isn't constant, but it still causes a bit of a problem! Maintenance is coming today to fix it as well.

There was a Halloween party in the new apartments for foreign teachers. We live in the old apartments. I had never been to the new apartments, but Aric had. He told me that they were pretty nice, but I had no idea that they were as nice as they actually are! The building is new, so it doesn't have all of the yucky muck stuck in all of the cracks in the bathroom, the rooms are bigger, the windows come with blinds, etc. I want to know what we did wrong to get stuck in the old dorms. We probably just pulled the short straw.

A few weeks ago Aric and I ate at Subway. Mmmm! I had the Sweet Onion Chicken Teriyaki. It tasted just like in the States, except a little more Chinese-y. Aric had the Club. He said it was just like in the States. The very best part was my cookie for dessert. There was one chocolate chip cookie left in the case. I pointed to it, and the worker, trying to be nice, brought out a fresh tray. However, they were all burnt, so I insisted that I wanted the "old" cookie that had been sitting out in the cookie display. Mmmm....it was so tasty! Exactly what you expect when you eat a Subway cookie and the perfect soft-gooiness; I was in cookie heaven.

This weekend, we took a trip to Carrefor to restock our cabinets. Our imported foods were running out. We are planning on having a Mexican night this week. A little pricey, but when we eat on Baise, we pay about $0.50 for our meals, so we figure we can splurge :-) We have taco seasoning for our ground beef (or we hope it is ground beef...), tortillas, and chips and salsa. Yes! We also picked up some German Doritos...they're yummy too. The real Doritos imported from the U.S. are too expensive. We also picked up our imported cheese (I like cheese a lot), more cereal, brownies, more Bisquick, and a few other necessities.

Carrefor is one of my favorite trips to make. The product selection is head and shoulders about Trust-Mart (speaking of Head and Shoulders...they have that shampoo too). I also enjoy seeing a lot of other foreign people. Some acting just as excited about the product selection as I am.

While Aric was at his soccer game this weekend, I took a trip to the wet market (this is where you buy all of your fruit and veggies). Mmm...I picked up a few apples, and they were really tasty; we're going to get more this week. I also picked up some oranges. I'm not really sure what kind they are. I call them Mandarin oranges, but they might not be. They're little, orange, and green. I'm not usually a big orange fan, but these are good. I purchased this large "honey pomelo," which, after a bit of Googling, I found out is like a really big grapefruit. Seriously...it is about the size of a Honeydew melon. I'm interested in cutting into it, but also a little afraid. I did ask the man at the wet market to pick out the best one for me. That is...I asked him in very broken Chinese, so I think that's what he did. Hopefully not the worst one! For veggies, I picked up some fresh green beans and a few carrots (really big carrots). We'll expand our selection later.

Today we're having some groceries delivered from "My Local Store." This store has a lot of organic and imported products, and they deliver to your house. Wonderful! They will be bringing us some cucumbers and potatoes, along with our new fruit/veggie wash from Japan. I'm thrilled about the fruit/veggie wash!

On Sunday, Aric and I went to the Fabric Market to pick up our new pants. His turned out well. I didn't pay enough attention to how soft the linen was in his original pants, so the linen in his new pants isn't quite as soft. They are still good though, we'll just have to try again. He saw the lime green linen, so I think he might be forming some ideas...

The two pairs of pants that I had made for me are awesome! I brought in a pair of my own pants that I really like for them to copy. I think that this is the best way to go, have them copy things. My pants fit perfectly; I'm thrilled! I've never been able to find pants that I'm really happy with, and now I can have lots and lots! I'm planning on getting a few more pairs in different colors (right now I have gray and dark jean and my original pair was brown, I think that I'll pick up a khaki pair, and maybe a lighter jean, along with some purple and rose colored...the possibilities are endless!).

After our very successful trip to the Fabric Market, we came back and had Kraft Mac and Cheese and apples. YUM! Could my day have gotten any better?

We have a three day weekend coming up (Nov. 14-16), and we're planning on hiking Yellow Mountain:
( http://www.china-travel-tour-guide.com/attractions/yellow-mountain.shtml ). Hopefully the weather is good :-)

Halloween at School: In China, Halloween isn't widely celebrated. The younger generation is starting to celebrate it a lot more. At school (especially in the primary school), the kids dressed up and wore their costumes all day. During break time between classes, they cluttered the office saying, "Trick or Treat." All day they were collecting candy. I was given candy by a few kids, and I even had some 6th graders dress up. Two of my 6th grade boys came dressed as girls.

We walked by a Pizza Hut on our way to "Munchies" on Halloween, and saw that all of the wait staff was dress up. A lot of the western restaurants get into the Halloween spirit. Munchies is a restaurant that serves western food that we heard about in a lot of the Expat magazines, so we decided to give it a try. It was pretty good. The chili cheese fries rocked :-) The burgers we only decent; we'd rather go to Applebee's for a burger since it is closer.

We both decided not to get the H1N1 vaccine. Not many foreign teachers are, and only a small handful of Chinese teachers are. We'll see how those who chose to get it fair. I decided that since I've never gotten a flu shot before, now was not the time to try it out.

Speaking of medicine: Shanghai is not the friendliest place to people with asthma, but I've been fairing pretty well. I've been worried about running out of my inhaler and not being able to get another one. However, I heard from a fellow asthmatic that you can get inhaler refills at any pharmacy. So, I decided to try it out. I didn't need one, but I like to be prepared! I showed the pharmacy employees my inhaler, they read the label (Proventil) and said that they didn't have it. Now, I knew that they had inhalers, so I didn't leave. I stayed at the pharmacy, looking at my inhaler, with a confused look, my eyes hopefully saying, "Look, I know you have this. I don't need Proventil necessarily; I'll take the generic form, Albuterol." I must be very good with eye-language, because one of the nicer pharmacy employees decided to go out on a limb, and show me the inhalers they had. I picked the one that I wanted, Ventolin. It is the same thing as Proventil...they're all really Albuterol.

Cooking: One discovery I've made about myself is that I'm not a good chef. I was pretty pleased with my cooking skills in the States. I would have categorized myself as a little bit above average. With the right ingredients, I could follow a recipe well, change it up a bit, and create new things. However, in Asia, I am a lousy cook. I've come to the realization that it is very difficult to cook when you have no idea what the ingredients are, how to measure them, or if you don’t have the right tools. I miss being able to run to the grocery store, know exactly what I want, buy it, and then throw it together for dinner. I also miss having the correct measuring cups with familiar labels. I really don't like cooking with the metric system. I also don't enjoy cooking on our small gas stove. I'm getting better though. The internet is my cooking friend.

A lot of my stories revolve around food. I think that adjusting to the food is the hardest thing. Adjusting in two ways…eating it and having it digest properly. I’ve found some probiotics called Yakult. These little drinks help keep the digestive system working properly…even in China. I have a new appreciation for digestion and all that goes with it.

Happy November!

Melanie (& Aric)
11/2/09 9:31 AM

Photos of our success at the Fabric Market:
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2008979&id=177700216&l=e651142009

written by  AricMelanie on November 2 from Shanghai, China
from the travel blog: China!
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Yellow Mountain looks awesome!! You aren't planning to do Tiandu Peak are you??

written by  Ross on November 1

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Yesterday I looked at the forget-me-nots that are on my balcony. There is one tiny blue flower on it. :) We've already had a hard freeze here in Ohio, so that's really impressive.

Looking forward to seeing you and Aric!

written by  Cristina on November 2

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Cristina: Forget-me-nots must be pretty strong flowers to withstand that cold weather! I'm glad that they're lasting. I can't wait until you come! We're so excited!!!

Dad: I'm not sure about Tiandu Peak. It seems pretty scary to me. We'll see how adventurous we feel :-)

written by  AricMelanie on November 4

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