2nd week in China.
On Monday Julie took me, all the kids, and the ayi (the helper) to the "supermarket" called Auchan. We got there by taking the Suzhou bus, a first for me. It costs 1 Rmb to ride , which is about 30 cents. So we walked in and it basically looks like walmart only in Chinese and on steroids. It's super crowded , to the extreme. Julie said she hates going there and she usually sends her ayi to do the shopping. Everything is in Chinese so it's hard to get what you want. I wanted to buy shampoo and conditioner but I didn't know what was what so I just sniffed the bottles and guessed what they were. Hopefully I got the right stuff. So then we went to the sea food area, just to see it. They had live turtles in a little net jus wiggling around. Julie said they cook them alive :( . They had all these different kinds of fish swimming around in a tank and some were dead just floating there. They had frogs and eels and rays. It smelt and looked really gross. Then we went to the checkouts, theres over 100 checkouts which is a really good thing. We left and the ayi was pushing the cart. Because the ayi was pushing the cart we got stopped. This old Chinese man who works at Auchan was yelling at her because he thought she was going to steal the cart but really we just needed to take it to the taxi. I called over Julie and she yelled at him in Chinese which was kind of scary. Julie took the cart while I handled the kids and we slowly got over to the taxi with the guy watching us. It's sad how they won't let a Chinese person take the cart to the taxi but they will let a white person do it.
I started to get a little more independent this week. Julie let me borrow her bike and I rode around by myself. I crossed the bridge and went to a little park. There was like no one there, and it was really beautiful and clean with lots of trees and statues and little bridges. It was very nice. I almost ate crap on the bike though because it was kind of tall and I had to stop fast or get ran over by crazy Chinese drivers. But I made it back safe and with no injuries :).
I went to seminary for the first time. The first day I got picked up by the teacher and her driver. The international school is really nice and big. The whole seminary is in one class with a total of 7 kids. They are really nice kids. I didn't get a ride back home after seminary though because all the kids stayed there for school. So I had to take a bus. For the first time by myself. It was pouring rain and I almost slipped. The bus was crowded as usual but I made it home safe. The second day of seminary I had to get there on my own. It was pouring again. I waited a long time for the bus , I got on the right one and made it to seminary. Yaaayyy.
We had to go to the Chinese hospital one day because the kids needed a checkup for school and me and Porter needed to have a wart removed. Ew wart is a nasty name. The wart was making it really hard for me to walk because it was on my foot. Porters was on his hand. We had our driver with us through this whole process because he speaks very good Chinese. We could have gone to the foreigners hospital but it's more expensive. The Chinese hospital was not clean, there was alot of people with babies who didn't wear diapers. It was confusing but Tom the driver helped out big time. There are stations for Porter to go to like a teeth cleaning station or blood taking station. The blood one was the hardest to get through because the nurses were really bad at hiding the needles. Porter would see it and get really scared and start kicking, hitting, biting, and screaming. I held the baby and took care of Kallie when she got really scared. The baby fell asleep on me and Kallie just sat next to me. People were staring and surrounding Porter and Julie. We eventually gave up and went to the dermatologist. She barely spoke English but we understood "lazer " . We called up Cannon and his assistant to come to the hospital before we did anything because we weren't sure if we trusted the Chinese lazer. Cannons assistant spoke very good chinese and English and she told us it was safe. Porter went first and screamed and kicked again but they got the wart. Then it was my turn. The doctor had no problem showing me the needle. But it worked and all went great after that. Except that Porter never got his blood drawn.
I also went to the Chinese mall this week. Julie was taking Kallie and her friend Xan to go get their nails painted and to go get a new outfit for school. So while they were doing that I went to go look around. It's a pretty good mall. I like there stuff. The only store they have that america also has is H&M which makes me a very happy girl. I think the prices are a smidgen cheaper than America but whether than that it's pretty much the same. I walked around from store to store then when I got hungry I had a cinnamon pretzel and a lemonade, the pretzel was really good but the lemonade was eh. Then I went to the wal mart that was downstairs. I bought a bunch of random treats just to see what I might like. I also bought a bag of chips and a little red chinese rabbit stuffed animal because it's the year of the rabbit and I want good luck :). All the treats and the rabbit put together was about 4 bucks. So after wal mart I went to to the bus stop and got on the right number but went to the wrong direction. I ended up on the wrong side of Suzhou, real china. It was even more crowded than the city. I thought it would smell bad but it actually smelt pretty good. There must have been a rester aunt near by. I got off at a random stop and crossed the street without getting hit by crazy cars that don't really stop. I went the right way this time. When I was sitting down there was a little girl staring at me the whole time and a married lady sitting next to me who looked like she was starving. She had a pretty dress on but she looked very unhealthy. Sometimes I wish that I could ask about there lives. They must have a story. So I finally made it back to Horizon Resort , where I live, and I felt sooooo relieved. I walked back to the gate and these two guys on a scooter stopped in front of me and stared. I kept walking like no one was there. I got in the gate and the guys kept staring. Eventually I turned around with a "what the heck is your deal" kind of attitude. Then they wanted me to walk over to them but I'm like "oh no you come here". We met in the middle, talking through the gate. I only talked to one guy. I said "what do you want". And said to go around the gate. I said no. Lol I kept saying why, why, why, why. He knew just a little bit of English. Just enough to get my name and number haha. I only gave him my number because I needed someone to talk too and I thought it would be cool to get a Chinese friend because I heard it was hard to make Chinese friends. So he started texting me, like jus asking what my name was again and where I was from. Then he asked if I wanted to go to the Jinjihu show. Which was a show very close to where I live that has lights, lasers, and music. I said I would, but then canceled twice because I had other stuff to do. I don't think Cannon trusts him because we met outside a very nice American community. I understand and I don't think I'm gunna go to that show with him.
On Saturday I went to the water park with the other youth in my church. I took a taxi for the first time, to one of the girls house. It was kind of weird because he only spoke Chinese so I gave him a card with the address on it in Chinese. The house was kind of a distance but it only costs about 3 dollars. So the youth and some adults met and we got everyone into 2 vans and drove about 45 minutes. The water park was really nice and only costs 100rmb which is 15 dollars. They had a dressing room but I heard alot of stories about naked women walking around like nothing so I didn't go in. I had my swim suit on under my clothes. All the Chinese men wore speedo short shorts and stood against polls like they were models or something. It was very nasty. The girls were all modest though which was nice. They didn't have a whole lot of rides but the water park wasn't crowded and those few rides were really fun. They had butt pads we had to wear so that our butts wouldn't scrape the ground through our inner tubes. Then me and like 5 other of the youth payed 30 yuan (same as Rmb) to go to the baths. That money payed for an hour of a milk bath, a wine bath, a tea bath, a tea bath with rose petals, a bath where fish ate the dead skin of your feet, and an ore bath. We could switch baths whenever we wanted too. The fish bath felt so funny because there were hundreds of tiny fish sucking on our feet. We kept laughing and trying to stay as still as possible. The wine bath smelt like kool aid. Most of the time we were in the tea bath because that was the warmest. At the end we jumped in the ore bath that made us orange. Then we showered and left the park. After the park one of the girls invited me over and we played Mario cart with her brother. Then their driver drove me home and that's it.
On Sunday we had to meet at another building because our church apartment got flooded and damaged by the rain. I guess the air conditioning broke and let the water in. So we met at someone's neighborhood clubhouse. It was really nice I liked it better because we got to sit on couches. After church we went home and took Ci Ci with us, Cannon's assistant who is also LDS and from Hong Kong. That night we went to someone's huge , super nice house for dinner. They have a 13 year old girl and a 14 year old boy who are both really cool to hang out with. We were basically on YouTube the whole time lol. Julie said I finally made some friends yaayyy! And that's the end of my week.
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