This is an Ex-Parrot!

Elephant riding has been the most popular tourist activity in Thailand for decades.  Only in the past five years has an outcry gone up against the mistreatment of elephants, as the huge creatures are not built to carry metal cages and heavy loads on their backs. In order to force an elephant into complacency, starvation and torture are often used in domestication, and often the elephants are…

Chiang Mai: City of Night Markets

I’m not sure what I was expecting from Chiang Mai, but unlike Bangkok, Chiang Mai didn’t meet my expectations. Overall, it was still a city, just smaller than Bangkok and closer to the mountains. One thing that was not in short supply in Chiang Mai was Night Markets. Every night there is a night bazaar, but on Saturdays and Sundays the weekend night markets take over. Along a huge stretch of road…

I arrived in Bangkok alone and shaken by the events that has taken place in Shanghai.  I was picked up at the airport by Chip McDonald, my old boss’s nephew, who has so graciously agreed to house my plethora of large bags until I return to the US in a few weeks,so knowing I had someone waiting for me helped phenomenally.  I was told by a friend that Bangkok was similar to Manila, which I visited…

Tamsyn and I had planned everything about our trip to Thailand. We knew which days we would be where and where we were going to stay and everything was booked and it was all supposed to be easy and stress free and nothing would go wrong.  We boarded our flight from Qingdao, giddy with excitement that all our bags were allowed on the plane, ready for the trip of a lifetime. Then, in 15 minutes,…

This final week in China has been full of goodbye after goodbye after goodbye, not just to people, but to places and ways of life as well. It’s a long, stressful process that makes me realize just how many people have impacted me and vice versa. 1. Ashia and AJ One of the first goodbyes happened over a month ago when my good friends Ashia and AJ left for the States for the summer. Since they…

Back to the Start

As many of you are aware, I am wrapping up my time in China in less than a week. As I walk through the places I have haunted for the past two years, I am bombarded with memories of the things I love (and sometimes hate) the most about my life in China.  For example… I love the feel of the streets around my apartment complex on a warm summer evening, the vibrancy of the people wandering through…

Last weekend, some friends and I accomplished something that had been on our bucket list for a while: we camped on the beach. Shilaoren is the nicest beach in Qingdao, and often thronged with people during the day. We had seen people with tents in the evening and wondered if we could do that too. We found a guy who rented a “6-8” person tent to us for cheap, and he came and set it up for us and…

On this day in 1989 nothing happened

Saturday marked the 27th anniversary of the Tiananmen Square massacre, and it was business as usual in China. For those of you who are historically challenged, the Tiananmen massacre, or the June 4th incident, refers to the Chinese governmental crackdown and use of martial law against hundreds of thousands of protesters who had been camped out in the great People’s square for weeks. The…

English Naming Gaffs: why your student is named Fork

In China, it’s common for people to adopt an English name to use in English speaking situations or with foreigners. As the English teacher at my preschool, it has fallen to me to give new students an English name, and so I have had the privilege to name close to 200 students in the past year and a half. I often name kids after friends and family members, so I can send a picture to their namesake.…

Erhu and Taichi: Culture among the culture-less

Over the May 1st holiday we had the pleasure of witnessing the Shandong Erhu club playing in a park. The Erhu is one of China’s most ancient and traditional instruments, and is also incredibly difficult to play. These guys knew what they were doing, though, and it was a lot of fun to watch. One of the members also performed the ancient Chinese art of taichi as one of the men played the Erhu. It…

This past weekend was the May 1st holiday, or Chinese Labor day, when the entirety of China has time off and uses that time to travelo. Qingdao, as a seaside destination, is flooded with tourists from the central cities and villages, many of whom have never seen a foreigner. The tourist areas were teaming with people people everywhere, and we were asked to be in pictures far more than usual.…