Clothes, tickets and buffet.

Classes continue and Spring festival is the 23rd, with our break starting on the 18th. Debora is picking up our return train tickets this morning for our trip to the Harbin international snow and ice festival. You can only get tickets 10 days in advance and you can only get three at a time with passport or ID. We will leave on the 18th and stay three nights, returning a couple of days before Chinese New Year. We will spend the rest of my two weeks off prepacking and getting ready for our big move to Quzhou. We now have finished the last thing we needed to do here to go, which was getting physicals. I would not have been suprised if we didn't have to be present to get the physicals. They basically just pencil whipped it. According to the papers, I grew three inches and lost 65 pounds. The way they check your eyes is very interesting. If you wear glasses, they will hold your glasses out to look through them to determine your eyesight, which is always passing. All this for $45 each for Debora and I. Now, all we need do is get train tickets to leave. The school we are going to already has a two bedroom apartment with a king size bed in each waiting for us. I think Debora is excited about being able to get out of the house and work. I know I will not miss working for Ivy. Having never taught before, it has been an experience beyond belief, but for many reasons, it is time to move on. For any that are seeking employment as foreign teachers in China, I would NOT recommend Ivy or even Jiamusi in general. Do your homework; there are better schools and cities.

Somewhere under all this is DJ. We all have to wear three layers on bottom and four on top with at least two on the head and cover the face plus gloves. Today, it will be -2F, and that is the warmest this week. The place we are moving to has a high today of 50F. It will be nice to be able to go outside without spending 30 minutes to get ready, making sure you have as little skin exposed to the burning cold.

We finally found a shop here that sells second hand clothes. They only had their winter clothes out of course, but we did find a flannel shirt and pants for DJ, as well as some bigger clothes for us. Deb got two new suits and I got some more warm things to wear when we go to Harbin.

DJ taking sissy for a walk around the apartment.

DJ and Archie in Spot's house.

Every Chinese restaurant I have ever been to in America was buffet. We have not seen a buffet in China since moving here until recently when a new restaurant opened not far from our apartment. It cost about $7 each which is about an average cost to go out and eat.

The first time we went, we were treated like VIP's and taken by hand and shown everything like we had never seen a buffet before.

They had both Northern and Southern Chinese dishes including some stations where they prepared food to order while you wait. They also had some western foods like pizza and french fries. You could also get small trays of shaved meat to cook at your table. Plus, there was a large variety of other things including desserts.

Most of the food was wonderful, while other things we will leave to the taste of the locals.