Popcorn

The good news is that we have found an apartment. It's quite lovely and fits us perfectly. Our family and friends who come and visit will enjoy a nice private place to stay--(we encourage all to come and visit!) It's close to Taylor's work, downtown, shopping, and entertainment.

With that out of the way, we were able to take a couple of days to enjoy China. We visited a tourist town close by called YuYuan. We took lots of pictures of ancient Chinese architecture, and visited a nearby park. This being a tourist site because of the awesome buildings and temples, there were many small souvenir shops with people trying to get you to buy their little souvenirs. You can find those same souvenirs anywhere in Shanghai: Terra-cotta warrior replicas, small chess sets, chinese chops (a little stamp with your name on it), sets of chinese chopsticks, decorated tea cups, jewelry, etc.)

We took a day tour of the water village Zhouzhuang. Our tour guide was able to show us this small secret of a town an hour and a half from Shanghai. As we toured this small fishing town that is nearly 1000 years old, we were able to learn about ancient Chinese housing, customs, and culture. This small town has waterways instead of roadways, and is lined with houses, beautiful arched bridges, canals, and narrow streets. It used to be a fishing village until the 1400's when it became a trade route, and today, people still live there in those same 1000 year old houses!
We were able to board a small fishing boat and travel through the town. We were also able to have lunch in one of the small restaurants overlooking the waterway. Our lunch consisted of: a green vegetable, scrambled eggs with small little white fishes (I avoided the fish), pigs feet (one bite was enough), and oysters (bearable), over rice. Yum.

Close to Shanghai we toured the silk factory and they were able to take us through the process of how we get silk today, and Tay and I were able to help some worker ladies pull a small amount of silk into the size of a queen bed (I felt like Libby touring through places like this in her new town).

We also toured a small Confucious temple that is two minutes walk from where we will be living.

And today we attended church at one of the three branches they have here in Shanghai. This will be our ward, so it was nice to be able to meet the people (all foreigners of course due to government regulations stating we can't have church with the local people) and I was comforted to know what I already know: that the church is constant wherever you go in the world. Their big focus in Relief Society was 72 hr. kits and emergency preparedness along with the same lesson they are having in the U.S. It's comforting to know that the Church is the same worldwide. We were warmly welcomed and even found some instant friends who will be living 5 minutes walk away from us.

A funny story:

The other night we bought a bag of sweet microwave popcorn which I had been craving. Our hotel doesn't have a microwave so we took it to a small convenience store that had one and thankfully Taylor speaks Chinese and was able to communicate. And this is the conversation they had: (He had to replay this for me after the conversation since I don't speak Chinese of course).

Taylor: handing him the popcorn. Could you pop this in your microwave?
Old man: What is this? accompanied by a very strange look
Taylor: It's popcorn.
Old man: What do you want me to do with this?
Taylor: Put it in the microwave for 3 min.
Old man: Why?
Taylor: Uh...to pop it.

So the old man and old woman puts it in the microwave with looks of intrigue, worry, and curiosity.
After the timer rings, he pulls it out and it hasn't popped even halfway and he says, "Ha. Here you go." I'm telling Taylor to tell him to quickly put it back in the microwave and hurry and pop it, it can't stay out too long or it won't work! And the old man won't let us because he doesn't understand, and to make the story short: I didn't get my popcorn:((

Thankfully we'll have a microwave in our apartment!