It's been so long...

Hello everyone!

I know..it has been so long since we have last updated you...I am so sorry.

Work:
Since our last blog all we have been basically doing is working. Work is getting less and less stressful because we are finally getting the hang of everything. The students are great and seem to be enjoying and benefiting from our classes which is amazing! We have started an English corner/club that we meet with every week. During these club meetings we are giving students extra practice with their English skills. Yesterday we taught the students about Halloween in America. The students had a great time..we showed them what costumes and Jack-O-Lanterns were and they even made their own masks. Then we had them wear their masks, knock on the classroom doors and yell "Trick-or-Treat" to get candy. They had a lot of fun. Today my students came into class yelling "Trick-or-treat" and "Happy Halloween"..it was great!

Birthday:



















Last Monday was my 22nd birthday! We had a lot of fun. On Sunday night the four of us and Harry went to an Italian restaurant called The Olive Garden, which was nothing like the one at home, but still a treat. Then we went to a Bavarian beer house for dessert. There we had an amazing slice of warm apple pie and an even more amazing volcano chocolate cake with warm fudge that oozed out of the middle of it! They were so delicious!



































On my real birthday everyone had to work which is the bummer of having a birthday on a Monday, but after work I had a surprise visit from all the assistants in our department. I was so surprised! They came in and sang me happy birthday in Mandarin and English! Then we had cake and opened presents..our friends from the office are so generous!





























Later for dinner we were invited by our wonderful neighbor, Jao Ping, to eat dinner with her and her husband at her restaurant which is almost directly underneath our apartment. We had a great hot pot meal, which is sort of like boiling soup right at the table. The pot sits on a hot plate and you cook whatever meats and veggies that you want. Then as a birthday tradition they brought us eggs and noodles and prepared a huge sweet and sour fish for us! The noodles and eggs I think meant longevity and the fish for wealth. Everything was amazing..near the end of dinner we got a visit from Jao Ping's daughter Keai (which means cute in Mandarin). She is the cutest thing ever. Her mother has relatively good English skills and is desperately trying to begin teaching Keai English as well. Jao Ping likes to show us how much English her daughter knows, but a lot of times Keai is too shy to perform for us. She is such a smart little girl and will probably be very successful in her life, especially with such a hard working and wonderful mother.
Needless to say I had a wonderful birthday in China!











































DanDong:
Just last weekend we ventured out of Dalian with our new friend Hunter, who is also a foreign teacher from New Zealand, to a city called DanDong. DanDong is where the Great Wall begins. The section of the Great Wall that we saw is unfortunately no longer connected to the longer section near Beijing and has been refurbished quite a lot, however it was still exciting to be able to see it finally!














Another exciting view we saw just across the river from DanDong was North Korea! We actually walked across what is known as "The Broken Bridge" which was destroyed by the US during the Korean war. The bridge used to connect China to North Korea, but now only goes half way across the river and then breaks off. There is a newer bridge right next to it, which sort of has an eerie feel to it because the whole time we were there we never saw anyone cross it.














While we were walking back from the Great Wall we took a different trail which lead us to where the river eventually turned into a stream, which made N. Korea only a stone's throw away..literally!
While we were in DanDong we even got to witness the beginning of a Chinese Wedding which has the bride and groom drive up in a parade of cars covered with balloons and flowers, while they are greeted with tons of fireworks, confetti and pigeons being let loose! The bride we saw looked scared by all the commotion.














We had a great time in DanDong...we figured what other time in our life are we going to be able to have the view from our hotel window be that of North Korea!! Crazy! :)

Well I think this fills you in on our lives since our passed blog! We miss you all so much and hope you are all doing well! We love you all!!

Love,
Ashley and Josh