#turning32

A few people have been asking me how i spent my birthday and Chinaversary (my birthday was also the date i’d been in China a month) so here it is!

Those of you who know me know how ‘crazy’ I can get (just a bit) about birthdays and by crazy it’s more a case that to me, birthdays are special. They’re special because they’re an individual celebration and I think that should be celebrated (even if the person whose birthday it is doesn’t!) So some people may rightly assume I was nervous about spending my birthday away in a new country but I really wasn’t. I’d achieved the one thing that had taken months and months of preparation, worry and stress (and support from you guys - you all definitely walked that road with me!) and that was CHINA. So because I was finally here I didn’t feel worried or stressed about how I would spend the day or what I would do.

But let’s not place the value of a birthday on the things you do or how you spend your time. We all know that your birthday is about the people you choose to spend it with and on that front I did have reason to be (a little) apprehensive. I’d moved to the other side of the world and everyone who I wanted to celebrate my birthday with was millions of miles away. So while this post is about my birthday, it is also about the two people who MADE my birthday :)

Lizzie and Candy (i’ll speak to you both later about disclaimers and alias’ if necessary haha) have totally changed my China experience for the better. I genuinely believe I wouldn’t feel as settled or happy without them and it all started on the EF annual trip, one week after i arrived.

Lizzie and I had been told we were sharing a room for the hotel stay and even though she worked at the same school as me we hadn’t really spoken before. So when I walked into the hotel room and saw the glass bathroom (all see through!!!) I was a little like oh okayyy (in reality more like OH MYYY GOODDDDDDD). But let’s not be dramatic, I must relay the facts as they were and tell you about the modesty curtain which was a (very useless) sheer piece of material in front of the glass wall separating the bathroom and bedroom but (and even with my eyes) you could totally see through it.

So when Lizzie walked in a little later (she’d been on a different coach) our first conversation was obviously the bathroom arrangement, but thankfully we were able to laugh about it, although nervously, and then swear an oath not to look when one of us was in the bathroom?! What was more amusing and that we hadn’t realised was that the wall (the one with no curtain) was next to the room door, so as you can imagine I was a little startled when there was a knock at the door just as I was getting out of the shower! I froze. If Lizzie answered the door she would see me (NAKED) and so would the person at the door! Thankfully Lizzie had realised this at the same time as me and hung back slightly as I flung my towel around myself to answer the door. Funnily enough the same thing happened when Lizzie was getting out of the shower … what can I say we were a popular room haha. 

After the trauma of shower gate (which we didn’t stop laughing about and haven’t really stopped laughing about since) we started talking and she quickly won me over with her supply of snacks (dried mango and pistachios #winning) and put me at ease with her minor but hilarious clumsiness (we will not tell the hotel about the spilt coffee your secret is safe with us). We had a few other people from school join us later for a million games of Heads Up (it’s a phone app game - definitely recommend especially if you’re playing with people whose first language isn’t English) and I haven’t been able to get rid of her since. (hahaha totally the other way around!!!)

As for Candy, our friendship was set over our mutual dislike for exercise, which i believe are how some of the most solid friendships are formed. On day two of the trip we went to DaMing mountain and were given the option to WALK up the mountain (yes you read it right) or go up in the cable car. You know which line I was in! So I was stood in the queue with Lizzie and Candy (Candy I had been introduced to briefly at lunch the day before) but at the last minute Lizzie was lured by the (I have no idea what) of climbing the mountain instead and defected to the other side! So me and Candy got talking and in no time had found our common interests of photography and craft beer, which as you all know are pretty high on my list of likes! So I’m walking around this mountain thinking wow this girl is really cool and then we get to a bridge … ‘no wayyyyyys am I crossing that bridge!’ she said. Why? She proceeds to tell me she HATES spiders and the sign on the bridge says do not cross if you have arachnophobia …

Thankfully i checked the sign and it actually said do not cross the bridge if you have agoraphobia which it turned out Candy did not have and so we proceeded across the bridge (me stifling laughter the whole way - I will not let her forget this!! haha)

We also later realised that people with agoraphobia would be unlikely to be halfway up a mountain and attempting to cross a bridge anyway but I have already mentioned about the crazy signage here so we will put it down to that haha.

Since then we have been (she has taken me) to Pinjiang Road, the Lotus Wetland Park and so many restaurants and bars I cannot remember them all, so when she she suggested a pool party for my birthday I was very much in :)

So I spent my birthday swimming, sitting by the pool, drinking Tsing Tao (pronounced Ching Dao - yes there is an embarrassing story about this) and eating pizza in great company. If things didn’t quite go smoothly we just laughed …

Peggy - Lizzie’s cat needs her own blog entry she was like a thing possessed that day making the freakiest sounds when we walked in but i think she’s getting used to me now . She put her nose on my arm the other night before running back off to the bedroom

The swimming bands - so we’re getting into the pool and the ‘lifeguard’ comes over and says (in Chinese) that we need swimming bands to swim. Cut to us standing in our bathing suits at the complex reception with sad faces trying to convince the receptionist to give us three swimming bands even though we only have one room key. We succeeded ;)

Tom Thunder and the swimming caps - to swim here you have to wear a swimming cap professional swimmer style. Lizzie had to buy a new one from the ‘lifeguard’ (we will refer to him as the ‘LG’ from now on) which was bright blue and she resembled one of the characters we use during classes at school called Tom Thunder … hahahaha

Tipple tails or forward rolls - this challenge meant the purchasing of more equipment from the ‘LG’ (i swear he was making a killing that day) and attempting tipple tails and sitting on the bottom of the pool etc. This made me love my birthday even more because as you all know when I go swimming there is very little actual swimming involved! 

The ‘LG’ - a pretty boy who spent more time on his phone then he did checking the pool for drowning kids. Although I do wonder what he was saying to his friend about the three foreigners who were the only people in his pool on a Tuesday afternoon having tipple tail and sitting on the bottom of the pool competitions!!

It was a little strange not having cards and gifts to open on my birthday but all in all it was a fantastic day and definitely one i’ll remember. This year has probably had the biggest extension with cards and gifts still arriving weeks after my birthday so thank you to everyone who took the time to send something they’ve all been very well received :) :)

As for these ladies? Thank you for celebrating with me and making turning 32 not bad at all :)