No Leaf Blower Needed

No leaf blowers needed here...where so many people are actually willing to do manual labor.



This guy is picking up very small bits of trash and leaves on our field...the WHOLE field.



China is so much different than the US in so many ways.
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Stick Tree Pics

Since the brain camera doesn't work, I was lucky enough to see more "stick trees" today while I was out with my real camera.




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Brain Camera

I wish I had a brain camera...then I could just download what I saw today on the drive home from the store. I didn't have my real camera with me. But even if I did, the scenes passed by too quickly for me to capture them on camera. So, I'll give you a written description, but I know it won't come close to the real thing...

- Bus, bus, truck crash. Luckily we were there after the people were taken away.
- Man standing with large plant on a flat wagon being pulled by another man through one of the busiest intersections in town, right among the cars and buses.
- Old lady and bundled up baby in the back of a 3 wheel motorcycle. Motorcycle is turning left through oncoming traffic. No helmets.
- Bus on the sidewalk.
- A truck full of stick trees. Trees that are about 1 foot in diameter and 15 feet tall. All branches are cut off. Stubby little roots only. About 50 of these in a truck being dropped off to be planted. Once planted they look like big sticks in the ground. We'll see if they grow.
- Torn down ruins of a village (brick rubble and trash) to make way for new high rise apartments.
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China Post

How does our mail get delivered in China? Well, for the past 10 months I knew that the guards from the main office bring it to our building and put it in our mailbox downstairs (about 1 letter per month!).

But how does it get to our housing complex?? Now I know. By motorcycle, in saddlebags. Even on Sunday.







Notice the Barbie hand warmers on his handlebars :)
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Easter in China

While Easter goes relatively unnoticed by the Chinese, we are enjoying a three day weekend due to the Chinese holiday of Qing Ming Jie (or Tomb Sweeping Day). The Chinese visit their family graves and clean them of weeds and dirt. They also set out money and food for the spirits.

However, the Easter Bunny does come in China for those who believe! This morning the kids found chocolate in their baskets and candy filled eggs hid in new and exciting places in the house! After 12 years of finding eggs at our old house, this was a new adventure!



We also enjoyed watching the giant Easter egg hunt at the school for our community (about 60 kids participated) and we ate a yummy Easter brunch at our community cafe.





Kiana and Kevin helped hide 800 (!) eggs for the hunt!!


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Hong Kong

I think of our Hong Kong trip as "Planes, Trains, Buses, and Boats"! It was certainly an experience of public transportation at its best.

On the first day alone: Car to the airport, bus from the airport terminal out to the plane, plane, bus from airport to downtown, 2 metro trains to get to Disneyland.

Add to that: Ferries to get across the bay between islands, taxis, a funicular train (a cable train up a steep hill pulled by a cable), the longest string of escalators in the world, and more metro trains.

Hong Kong is a beautiful big city. We stayed in Kowloon (upper red), the main downtown area is on Hong Kong Island (lower red. Disneyland (dark yellow spot) is on Lantau Island (blue). And we flew into Shenzhen (top light yellow), which is in mainland China. Flying into Shenzhen was much cheaper because we were coming from mainland China so it was a domestic flight. Most people fly into Hong Kong International Airport which is on Lantau Island (the dark yellow strip).



Because it's hard to find rooms for 4 people in Asia, we ended up booking a suite (king bed plus a sofa bed). This worked out great for us for two reasons. First, we had more room to spread out and also because our room had floor to ceiling windows that overlooked the downtown area (all this for about the same amount that 2 rooms would cost in other hotels). We stayed at the YMCA...seriously...(got the song stuck in your head now?). When Mike suggested the YMCA, I thought he was joking. But it turns out that the YMCA runs regular hotels. Here is our view.



Hong Kong presents a 13 minute light show every night at 8 pm, so we had front row seats in the comfort of our room. Forty-four buildings participate!

We also enjoyed the Hong Kong science museum. The kids really miss OMSI, so they were super excited to go there. And guess what we found...an OMSI exhibit on loan to the museum!



We had great fun going up the longest outdoor covered escalator system in the world. The escalators take people from the sea level downtown area up to "mid-level" Hong Kong (midway up the mountain). The mid-level is a place where people live and there looked to be lots of good restaurants (we had Subway - it smelled too much like "home" to pass up). In the morning until 10:00am, the escalators run down the hill, then they reverse and run up the hill until midnight. They cover a distance of one-half mile and elevation of about 450 feet. It takes about 20 minutes to get up the hill.

At the top, we had our picnic lunch in a city park. The kids miss playgrounds too :)

Then we walked to the funicular to ride to the gap between the two peaks in the mountains behind the city. Awesome view.



We took ferries, enjoyed some good food, did a little shopping, and walked about the city.

Hong Kong is an interesting mix of China and western influences. On some streets you feel like you are in China (small indoor malls with individual small stores and other small stores opening out to the street) and in some areas you feel like you are in a modern city (elevated walkways and the fanciest, nicest malls I've ever been in). As an American living in China, it was a little strange to feel like I was traveling back and forth between China and the Western world in a instant.

We definitely could have spent more time in Hong Kong. So much traveling to do and too little time off work and school!

Here are more pictures.

Hong Kong City

And, I will admit publicly that Mike was right. Traveling light is better. Only two small suitcases meant that packing up was much quicker and public transportation was much easier. We limited the souvenirs we brought home, so unpacking was easier too!
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Hong Kong Disneyland

We had a great time at Hong Kong Disneyland. It was interesting because it feels a lot like Anaheim - the entrance is almost identical and the layout is basically the same. However, it has fewer rides and is much less crowded (at least when we were there). It's like a baby or beginner's Disneyland - great for first timers or little kids because you can actually do it all in one day. We missed some of our favorite rides that aren't there, but still had a fun two days! The best part was that we were able to walk on most rides with just a short wait (we hate waiting). The kids managed to go on Space Mountain 15 times!!

Here are some pictures (double click to see the whole album). The days we were there Hong Kong had the worst pollution levels ever because of residual sand from the sandstorm in northern China that blew south.

Hong Kong Disneyland

Four Disney resorts accomplished, only Paris to go!
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