The WuHan Temple

Today we visited the WenShu Temple with my friend Xiaowei. The temple was originally built in 1697 and renovated in 1824. It is an active monastery and the monks typically study for 2 years. Chinese Buddhist monks are not allowed to marry. We watched as Buddhists gave offerings and burned incense. The monks were eating their lunch shortly after we arrived, so we watched them chant and pray before eating. Chinese Buddhist monks are vegetarians. They also have a pond where they place fish and turtles that were left to die in the markets. The temple was just beautiful and I want to go back when everything is green and it is warmer. It would be the perfect place to walk and meditate. Xiaowei tried to take us to a well-known vegetarian restaurant just off the monastery grounds, but it was just too busy. Instead we went to a small restaurant where we ate Sichuan noodles, Chinese dumplings, and Chinese pudding made of black beans and nuts. We then went to the largest market in southern China. Everything imaginable was for sale! Lauren bought all of her gifts to take home to her friends. Leigh was just besides herself when we found a whole section with shop after shop crammed with shoes. Surprisingly, she did not buy any, but she wants to come back. While we were busy with the temple and shopping, Anna was at Eaton International School. She loves that school! Today in the after school program, she learned some French. I've attached a few photos from today. The one of Leigh and Lauren in Egyptian garb is from lunch at Dico's yesterday.

We are in Chengdu!

We arrived one week ago at 1:45 in the afternoon and were more jet lagged than I have ever been in my life. We had no time to rest, though. I was out the door right away to buy groceries for our empty refrigerator, to change some dollars into yuan, and set up the apartment for the four of us. Fortunately we were assigned a wonderful college student named Sherry who is currently on break from her university in New Zealand. Sherry patiently led us through the shopping, money exchange, and endless questions. My friend Xiaowei called us right away too to see if we wanted to attend the Lantern Festival, but we were exhausted and Anna was sick. We fell into bed early and everyone was up again at 2 am. It took us a full 5 days to stop feeling like we were moving every time we stood still.
Chengdu is a city of clouds and smog that is bustling with 10 million people 24 hours a day. Our apartment is right by the Sichuan Chengdu University. We know our neighborhood now and have our favorite shops and our favorite treats. We have all lost weight and find ourselves constantly hungry. Our favorite restaurants include the Bookworm, an expat coffee and book shop where the owner sometimes brings his two kittens, and Peter's Tex-Mex, another expat restaurant that actually has decent Tex-Mex. We have eaten with the locals too when we went to the Lantern Park with Xiaowei and four of his students and slurped the hottest noodles I've ever had! Last night we went to the international student orientation at SCU followed by a traditional Chinese banquet. The students adjusted far more quickly than we did-none of them reported continuing jet lag like we had. Anna started school at the Eaton International School and came home just delighted.

Looks like we are in for rain!

Weather for Chengdu, Sichuan, China - Add to iGoogle

50°F Current: Rain Wind: N at 2 mph Humidity: 87% Fri 64°F | 51°F Sat 60°F | 55°F Sun 60°F | 53°F Mon 62°F | 50°F

Lantern Festival

We arrive on February 9th and my friend has asked us to join him in celebrating the Lantern Festival complete with fireworks.

Photos of Chengdu

Leigh, Lauren and Anna

Here are pictures of my daughters Leigh, age 12, Lauren, age 12, and Anna, age 11. Leigh was adopted from Hunan in 1997, Lauren from Anhui in 2000, and Anna from Ningxia in 2003.

Some photos of our apartment in Chengdu