Veggie meals and supermarket fishing

Vegetarian eats are very rare in China, since even vegetable dishes are cooked in animal grease and everything's cooked in the same place (I gave up after the first week of not being able to eat anything and decided for sake of sanity to eat meat). But there are a couple (expensive) restaurants I've been to that are delicious, and we recently found a new cute place with great food and better prices.  Take a look.

And not vegetarian, but entertaining.  Just a man fishing for dinner at the supermarket.

Looks like someone found a girlfriend

I found a mantis on my building two weeks ago

I found this today.

Dafen Oil Painting Village (大芬油画村）

About 1.5 hours from me is a "village" that is famous for it's oil paintings, everything from replicas of famous works to commissioned work and originals.  We made a trip out there to see if it was as cool as it sounded, and indeed it was.

As you can see, the buildings were painted in bright colors that are unique to the city, making the artsy area easy to find and memorable.  There were aisles upon aisles of little shops and studios.  

I had brought two landscape pictures to have commissioned, because when else in my life am I going to be able to commission an oil painting?  We had a recommendation of a painter from a friend, but in the sprawl and confusion of the village we couldn't find him.  So we walked around for a while and found an artist I liked.

Some of the most confusing communication ensued, because they of course do not speak any English and my oil painting vocabulary is weak.  But some headache later, I left with a receipt.

A week later I was able to return and pick up the artwork, and all the hassle was worth it.  The pieces are gorgeous and I'm thrilled, because one of the paintings is a 25th anniversary gift for my parents.  The other, naturally, is for me :)  

I felt confident enough to order a portrait piece of my nephew as well, and I'll get to pick it up in about a week.  Fingers crossed!

I'm trying not to go too nuts with getting things commissioned, like paintings and clothes from the tailor.  But it's such a fun opportunity and when I'm dirt poor again in the states I will never be able to.  Even on the small small salary I make here, we're put squarely in the middle class of China.  And it's so cheap comparatively!  My painting totaled about $40.  If only I could learn to paint too!  Unfortunately I found the village too late, and with only 3 weekends left there's no time.

For your viewing pleasure, my new painting:

Picture I took in RMNP

12x20in (or something like that) painting

Dim Sum

Some delicious food pictures of our dim sum.  We ate at what Lonely Planet called the best dim sum restaurant in Zhuhai.  It was great indeed!  Yum yum.

Macau for May Day

We got a three day holiday (which in China actually means we had to work on Saturday and then got Sunday-Tuesday off) and so we again packed our bags and this time headed to Zhuhai and then across the border to Macau.  It's the middle of monsoon season now and the rains were pouring, but luckily the weather improved and only sprinkled a few times for us.  Zhuhai turned out to not be too interesting, but we stayed there because it's much cheaper than Macau!   Monday morning we crossed the border (after a two hour line) and headed to the Vegas of the East.  We started at the Venetian, where Thomas explained a lot of the games to us.  It was my first casino!  And what a choice. It has the biggest casino floor in the world, and is head to toe gilded. 

We did some tours of Cathedrals and architecture, which was interesting because Macau used to be a Portuguese colony so it is a big difference from mainland.  After a delicious feast at Alfonso III, we went to some more casinos, including the Grand Lisboa, the Wynn, and the MGM Grand.  After getting a refresher course from Thomas, I played black jack and won a hundred dollars!  As my first time gambling, it was a great time and I can now say I've never lost :P

  

Rain out my window

Fisher girl statue at Zhuhai

the Venetian

St. Paul's Cathedral ruins

View over the city

In the MGM, an actual live butterfly globe

Lookin at a winner!

Camping in Hong Kong

We decided to invest in a tent a couple weeks ago and took advantage of our three days off to use it.  I went camping with Christiane and Thomas on Lantau Island in Hong Kong.  It took us a looooong time to get there because it turns out everyone was trying to go to HK, but after two buses, a metro, lunch, a ferry, and another bus (four or five hours later) we got there.  The campsite was a lot nicer than we expected; it had campgrounds with tables and laundry lines, not to mention a clean bathroom with showers.  We stayed for two nights and were able to tour the island and see the big Buddha, go to a stilt house fishing town, and hike.  Well, Christiane and Thomas got to hike.  Because...
Only draw back -- I got some kind of food poisoning from breakfast and had to delay the trip an hour to rally, and on top of that had a bad head cold!  Come on, China.  So I stayed in the tent while they went hiking (sad face) but otherwise tried my best to keep up.
We didn't have a lot of things we needed, like fire wood, pads to sleep on (we were literally separated from the rocky ground by only the tent) or flashlights (we found out once we got there that T had forgotten his headlamp).  But we made it work.  By far not the most comfortable nights of our lives, but it wasn't too bad.  We might even go back to another site next weekend if I can recuperate enough (I got another kind of stomach flu this week, COME ON, CHINA!).
It was a little foggy / hazy but the pictures still turned out.
::I know the pictures are orientated strangely, it's a problem with the website.  I'm not able to rotate them, sorry!::

Sports Day

Last week was a holiday called Tomb Sweeping Day (not clear if anyone actually still sweeps tombs or if it's just a day off) and so in typical China fashion we were commanded to work  the weekend so we could have Monday and Tuesday off too (holiday was Wednesday).  That's right, a seven day week and then three days off then a two day week.  Instead of just giving us Monday off and making it a three day weekend.  I don't know.  It's how they do it here.  I was a little luckier than the other teachers because my school decided to hold a sports day.  It was iffy because it looked like too much rain, but the students rallied and literally swept the track of rain water so they could run.
Events included marching, jazzercise, races, long jump, high jump, and throwing something (couldn't tell what). My duties were to remain on campus and walk around.  I decided to be responsible and not ditch out for five days off and took some pictures, but remained relatively useless.  The students had fun and the weekend ended with a soccer match between the school team and some parents.  I was told the score was 4-0 but never told which side won...  Haha.