You know you're in Asia when....

...you get stared at.  A lot.

So this isn't something that is new to us.  I mean, it shouldn't be by now.  Living in any Asian country gets you over the 'issue' of being stared at by the first week.

And just in case you were wondering, yes sometimes it is still a novelty.

Take today for example.

We were on Gulangyu getting some X-mas gifts for the niece and nephews.  We had to wait for them to be finished, so we decided to get an ice-cream and sit on a bench to people watch.

After a few minutes, a man hence known as City Worker (aka: job is a cleaner) comes up to us and stops right in front of us.  Thinking he wanted our ice-cream cups, we motioned to put them into his bag.  He stopped us and pointed to the trash bin not 5 feet away.  That was okay; that's what a trash bin is for. But we were left confused as to what he wanted. So we looked at him some more, said hello in Chinese, smiled, then went back to our conversation at the lack of his response.

City Worker decided that our attempts of interaction were not what he wanted, so he sat down on the bench directly in front of us.  And stared.   And stared some more.  He sat and looked for about 5 minutes.  Then he got up and walked away.  No good byes.  No thanks for letting me watch you talk and lick your ice-cream cups.  No you are beautiful.  No taking our cups when we were done licking them.  City Worker just left.

Both Ed and I were disappointed, not only because now we really had to throw away our own trash, but we didn't get any thing out of the 'exchange'.  Just endless curiosity, then slow realization that he just wanted to look at our beauty (and yes, that is still the reason why I think EVERYONE stares at me.  Angelina Jolie and I have it sooo hard; you have no idea).  But you know what.  It was okay.  We got a giggle out of it.  I'm obviously telling you about it now, so it didn't bother me or make me mad.  Its stuff like that that makes us realize that we are that much different here, despite the large number of foreigners.  Yeah, sure sometimes it is awkward.  Most of the time is funny. 

So the moral of this story:  Take a picture.  Which they do.  Secretly.  Which I hate.  So now I'm charging 5 RMB for every secret picture.  I think that's okay because I have this rule: if you ask to take my picture, it's free.  If you sneak it, it's going to cost you.  But that's another post.

And the winner is....

Dad!

Even though he guessed pleasant goat/happy goat...he's close enough.  Plus I can tell that this contest wasn't really for everyone!

I was Mei Yang Yang.  Pleasant goat (Shi Yang Yang) is the brother of Mei Yang Yang.

I was a big hit with the kindergarten class!

Costume Guesses

I would like to start off by saying a huge thank you to my parents and my aunt Dana for guessing.

Unfortuantely they are not correct, but my mom is the closest so far with "lamb".

My dad might win for orginality.  He said, "You are a goat at the tiger santuary waiting to get fed to the tigers".

See Dad, you should come to China so you and Ed can go to the tiger farm and feed real goats to the lions. I think you'll like it.

I'll give you guys some hints:
China
Not Hello Kitty, but close to her.
Cartoon

The contest is still open!! Keep guessing!

Howdy There!

Yes.  I know its been a while.

Yes. We are still alive.

Yes. It is the same excuse as always as to why I haven't written.

But I'm writing now!! 

A lot has been going on here, but nothing fun and exciting.  It has all been work related stuff--so I won't bore you with the details.

Hopefully, we will be able to get out and do some more exploring in Xiamen in the next weekend or so. 
Here is a list of things we want to do:

1. Have clothes made. (and yes I will share that process with you, hopefully).
2. Eat lunch or breakfast with monks (a friend wants to take us, so why not!).
3. Ride a chair lift (just when you thought Xiamen couldn't offer you any more excitement, it does.  We found a chair lift and we are going to ride it!  No there is no skiing involved).
4. Hang out at our new favorite place, 18 bar.

For those of you who actually want to know what we've been up to, I've added some pictures to the right of the page.  It will take you to our online photo storage.  You can click on the slideshow option to get a quicker view.  I tried to upload a slideshow directly to the site, but as you may have guessed, I couldn't get it to work and gave up.  So you are stuck with going to the site.

I have some more photos to add/edit (including Halloween).  No promises on when I'll get those to you.  But I will leave you with a Halloween photo:

And for a fun contest to see if anyone actually reads this thing:  The first person who can correctly guess who I am, I'll send you a 'fun' but good package!  No prize for guessing Ed's costume.  His costume is too easy.

And on a final note, I'd like to leave a message for my brother.  I've updated, so call.