Ah, Adam, so good to hear from you. I see you’re still campaigning to be my No. 1 son. Thanks for the tutorial.
Yesterday we were invited to the Dragon Boat races in a nearby river. The various colleges of the University competed against each other. We cheerleaders had the same orange golf shirts as our rowing team, the College of Finance. I wanted to change teams and cheer for the guys with the cool shirts with Chinese writing and the intimidating headbands. We came in 14 out of 24.
While standing at the railing, taking pictures, they set off a very long string of firecrackers, right in back of me. Pieces were landing in my hair. I couldn’t get out of the way–they had me cornered. Pretty exciting. Riley would have loved it.
Then we visited an old “water” town, with canals instead of roads. We were treated to a lunch with 24 dishes. I tasted everything but the jellyfish, including: toad, eel, dried fish with heads and skin still on (I didn’t eat the head), and snails. Everyone else washed it all down with Chinese beer.
There’s a famous bridge in this village called Freedom bridge. Vendors had bags of goldfish they would sell tourists so they could “free” them into the water. Another first for me was a shooting gallery consisting of balloons attached to an outside wall and some type of BB guns for people to try their luck. I didn’t see anyone win, so I don’t know what the prizes were.
On the bus ride home I saw a huge tree moving down the freeway in front of us. It was so big you couldn’t see the truck carrying it.
Several foreign teachers arrived this weekend. They’ve all been finishing up finals at home. It should be more fun now. My next-door neighbor is from Paris, and reminds me of Buzz Marden. There are two professors from Weber State. I’m going to ask the IT guy to look at my computer.
John, I tried to call you just now (8 p.m. Sunday). Skype kept saying it was connecting, but never did.
I’m off to class now.