My feet thank me

Today was a much needed and deserved R&R day. I slept in until a leisurely 8:30am. Elizabeth and I got ready and caught the bus to downtown. On the bus, we met two girls from Georgia who were also here tutoring at a different university. We chatted the whole way about this and that...how much people honk their horns here, how we both weren't given as many hours as we were promised for tutoring, the best place to get such-and-such...it was really fun. We got off at the same stop and we helped give them some directions. They are leaving tomorrow. So we went to the bank and exchanged some more money, then headed over to Yu Gardens again for a foot massage. We found the lady who approached us the first day and went up to the 3rd floor to her store. We got an hour long foot massage and then a 30 minute back massage for less than $10 each! I love China! Afterwards, I felt as if I could walk 20 miles. We decided this might be a weekly thing... We shopped for a bit longer, then caught the bus back home just in time to do a quick email check and go out to eat with our professors and a professor from Central Michigan. I am still absolutely stuffed! We had green beans, eggplant with potatoes, curry chicken, duck soup, pork, and a chicken/bamboo/onion sandwich.

Now to back-track a bit. Saturday, Elizabeth, Carlson, and I went downtown and walked along Nanjing Road during the day. It was fun, but it's much prettier at night. We window shopped for a bit, then Elizabeth and I each bought a single pearl necklace for $5. Did I mention I love China?!? We had lunch at this place that served excellant pork chops over rice and Japanese dumplings. Then, we went to the Shanghai Museum. There were all sorts of exhibits, Chinese calligraphy, jade, currency, bronze and stone work, minority costumes, paintings, you name it. There was also a traveling exhibit. It, ironically, was 'Art in America.' There was some Andy Warhol works along with other contemporary artists. We headed home after that and relaxed in our rooms for a while, then went out to eat. We had this green bean in oyster oil dish that was very good, sauteed lettuce, a spicy beef soup, spicy chicken, and a ham, mushroom, and shredded beef dish. I thought I wasn't going to like much Chinese food. Boy, was I wrong!

Yesterday afternoon, we rode the bus to a place called Forest Park that's a couple miles away. I've never seen a park with so much stuff to do! One corner had an amusement park with a rollercoaster, train rides, a mechanical bull, and other carnival-type rides, another corner had horseback riding, you could rent either rowboats or electic boats and take them down the lake and little streams, there was kite flying, people were fishing for crayfish...and much more! We saw about 10 sets of brides and grooms getting their pictures taken, you could overlook the Huangpu River, and you could also do a cable slide. I convince Elizabeth to do it with me. Imagine parasailing, but on a big cable instead of behind a boat. The guy strapped us in a big sling underneath a kite. He also motioned to this cord and said something about 'stop.' We weren't sure if we had to pull it to stop or if that was the emergency stop cord or what. So, he slung us backwards over this lake and all the Chinese people on the boats below us were laughing and taking pictures. When we neared the other tower, Elizabeth and I looked at each other and debated about whether we were supposed to pull the cord. We didn't pull it, but it stopped anyway and started moving forward. Then it stopped again, so we screamed and everyone below us laughed again. Now, when we watched the people before us, they had all come barreling in at high speed and slammed into this bungee thing which stopped them. So now on the way back towards the tower, we again debated about whether or not we should pull this cord. We decided on no and held our breath as we neared the tower. But, the guy who was running it knew that we didn't understand exactly what was going on, so he brought us in much more slowly than the others, much to Elizabeth's relief and my disappointment. I will definately be doing that again! We walked around the park for at least 3 or 4 hours and probably only saw 2/3 of it. Later that afternoon/evening, we walked around the farmers market that's a couple blocks from campus. We borrowed Monty Python from Patton (our teacher) and fell asleep about 3 skits into it. This tourist thing is hard work!