Foot Binding

I had heard about this before but I never thought I would ever get to meet someone who had their feet bound. Today we were invited to our aiyi's house for lunch. Her husbands mother lives there with them. She is 88 and has the tiniest feet I've ever seen. She commented first on the size of our feet and held up her own. Nick talked with her and she told him about having her feet bound.

Her parents did it when she was 6 years old, so her feet are the size of a 6 year old girls. They bound up her feet and then crushed the bones. She told us for about 5 years she was unable to walk outside her house. She only moved when absolutely necessary. She lived before TVs and her family couldn't afford books so she sat all day long. She was so young and went through something so painful. I can't even imagine what it must have been like for her and yet she was the cutest little lady with such a positive attitude. She was very happy and told us she still goes down 3 flights of stairs to go out walking for exercise everyday.

I'm glad we got the chance to meet her and get to know her story. Its very humbling to meet someone who has gone through so much and then to think about all the silly things I complain about daily. It was a good lesson.

Here is a picture of her foot next to Nick's.

Fireworks!

They are very good at fireworks here in China. Last night we crammed about 35 people into our little apartment for a delicious dinner of finger foods (we don't have that many forks! and plastic silverware here is a joke), and then we headed out to watch the show. It was 30 minutes long and spectacular! It was by far the best firework show I've ever seen. The good news is I don't have to wait another year to see it again, they do another show at the end of Chinese New Year on the 15th.

Guonian Hao

HAPPY CHINESE NEW YEAR!

I have really been enjoying this holiday! Not only is the city beautiful with all the lights and decorations they put up, but stores are empty. Normally I have to mentally prepare myself to walk into the IKEA here. For some reason parents like to take their children there to take pictures of them in all the little rooms. It gets hectic. We went on Wednesday though and it was practically abandoned. We went to the grocery store that night and it was the same. Usually its a battle to push your cart through the crowds of people picking over meat or vegetables, but during Chinese New Year everyone is home with their families.

The fireworks have been pretty crazy for the past few days. I don't think we could count 15 seconds in between them for all of Wednesday night. They were going off all around us. Being up on the 29th floor gave us a pretty good view to enjoy the show. Some of them would explode below us, but the big ones would blow up right in front of our window. A little scary, but really awesome! They take their fireworks seriously here.

We went for a walk last night to Xinghai Square, right by our house. Its a huge park where they had put up lots of lights and where people had gathered to set off their fireworks. Tonight is the big firework show put on by the city at Xinghai Square, and we are having a little party with some friends at our house then walking over to watch them. Apparently its a big deal. On the news two days ago we saw a story on all the work that has gone into preparing for this show. They have spent tons of money on it and have been setting up for days.

One of the trees in the park up close. In addition to putting up lights on thousands of trees, they also attached fake leaves!

Year of the Rabbit

The whole square is about 4km around. Thats a lot of trees and lights!

And so it begins...

All day long I have been hearing the boom of fireworks. As I sit on the couch writing this blog there is another show going on right outside my window. It is fun being up on the 29th floor of our building. Most of the fireworks that people are setting off are right at eye level for us. Its pretty to watch them all now, but I've heard that the fireworks will not stop for the next week. We'll see if I still like them as much when I am trying to sleep. I'm mentally preparing myself now for the next few days when the fireworks will only be more and more constant for Chinese New Year.

A cute picture of CoCo just because:

More Chinese Art

We headed back to the Chinese folk art exhibition before it closed and got a few more things. Our house is finally starting to look lived in. Before we had so many white walls it was kind of overwhelming to start decorating it. I really like the things we found though. The first is a watercolor and the second is something called straw weaving.

We have found so many cool pictures like these lately. My only worry is that by the time we leave China I will be tired of everything Chinese looking and I'll want to decorate with something else entirely...then what will I do with all these paintings and artsy things we're collecting?

Meet CoCo

We decided before we went home for Christmas that we wanted to get a dog. The week after we got back to Dalian we headed to the dog market. We looked at all the different puppies and picked CoCo not only because he was cheap, but also because he looked the healthiest. He is a brownish/black mix, and apparently Chinese people want their dogs to be all one color so he was only 500 RMB.

He is 3 months old and super fun to play with. He is a small dog, which is good for our small apartment. We weren't sure what kind of dog he was, but after extensive googling, we think he is a Havanese. He is a super smart dog and learning quickly, he was a little sick the first 2 days we brought him home. Probably because they aren't fed very good food at the market, but he is doing great now. He is super social and loves people. He will follow us around the house all day long.

I decided I wanted to name our puppy CoCo before we ever went shopping. I figured if it was a girl she would be named after Coco Chanel. However, since CoCo is a boy he is named after Conan. I've gotten a lot of crap from people for giving him a girl name, but I also found the name on this list of boy dog names. (Look at number 60) Besides, CoCo is easy for Chinese people to say.

First day at home. He was terrified of the taxi, and a little hesitant when he first came in, but now he runs around and explores everywhere.

Watching TV with Nick

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CoCo's first bath at home

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Playing tug of war. Mostly I just drag him around the floor while he holds on tight and growls at me, but he loves it

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Trying so hard to get up onto the couch to see what we are doing. He has to stretch his whole body out and his head can barely peak over the couch cushion.

CoCo has been so fun to have around while Nick is traveling for work. He is good company. He loves to follow me around the house, or will sit and sleep on my feet while I watch TV. Last weekend while I was sick (the flu or food poisoning, its hard to know which here) he even laid by my side and cuddled me all day.

Our new decoration

Our apartment has been pretty plain since we moved in 4 months ago. We love the furniture, but the walls are white and bare. This week at the mall by our house they are having an exhibition of Chinese folk art. In one corner of the mall, a bunch of local artists brought all their stuff and set up tables. We have walked by it a few times, there are so many cool things. Some of the things we can't afford right now, like the carved gourds or the paintings on the inside of bottles, but I still love to go watch them work. We did find something awesome though, that I couldn't pass up.

There was this little old Chinese lady who did paper cutting. She had some really cool stuff. It was all really intricate and I can't imagine how she even begins to do it. She had this dragon cut-out already framed and everything. Only 150RMB. I loved it immediately, and not just because its green. She told me something like this only takes her an hour to finish! It would take me a week.

We found some other cool pictures by a lady that does something called straw weaving. It was a little expensive, but they are there all week and I might be tempted to go back and get it. It was beautiful! Nick also found a market that is supposed to have people selling all kinds of cool things made here in Dalian. We are going to go check it out this weekend.