American Thanksgiving at the school

Here's that potluck dinner I was talking about in my last post. Troughs of food! Bih Hua the owner got the turkeys.

Below is Anne and Katherine. Anne is one of my closest friends here in Taiwan. We're in a kindergarten class if anyone's wondering.

Olivier came with me to the dinner. I have that "take the goddamn picture already" look in my eyes.

So we ate a lot and then I went home and passed out, like a regular thanksgiving.

Gettin' ready for lots of eatin'

Tomorrow is American Thanksgiving and a friend of mine has invited me for supper. Then on Friday the kindergarten teachers have organized a whole day of Thanksgiving crafts with the kids. Then on Saturday, it's the Cornel Thanksgiving potluck at school and most of the staff goes. We all eat in the kindergarten classrooms at Nan Men. Everybody brings a dish and it's a mad eating frenzy with adults on tiny plastic chairs.

One of the Chinese Teachers asked me the other day what the difference is between American Thanksgiving and Canadian Thanksgiving. I told her that in the U.S, Thanksgiving is a major holiday with lots of turkey and a long weekend and it's a really big deal and all the sitcoms create a Thanksgiving special. In Canada, we have Thanksgiving in October and we eat turkey and everyone is happy we have a long weekend. I don't remember ever getting that excited about the pilgrims in school and I don't know why we celebrate it on different days. I don't think she was impressed with my knowledgeable answer.

Anyway, I'll try to remember to bring my camera for this one. And if anyone wants to fill me in on the background of Canadian Thanksgiving, that would be good too.

Da'an Beach

On Nov. 4th Olivier and I got on his scooter and drove and drove and drove 'til we found a beach (Da'an, it's out by the harbour). We were concerned about pollution, but so far we haven't started mutating or sprouted nasty rashes. It was very shallow, but scenic and there were no other people around except for the occasional crab fisherperson. And I didn't get sunburned! Yay!



The trip wasn't planned, hence no bathing suit and my pants look pretty stupid rolled up.
Me and lots of sand.

That's Olivier in his cool sunglasses. He's so cute, I must take more pictures of him.

Time flies when....you're really tired and there isn't much going on....

Oops, I've been pretty pokey when it comes to updating this blog lately. I had a small, impromptu party on Saturday with some friends that was lots of fun and I completely forgot to take pictures. And earlier that day, there was a sports day at school with lots of kids running around in potato sack races and with their faces painted....and I completely forgot to take pictures. However, Olivier and I went to the beach a couple of weeks ago and although I forgot to bring my camera, he didn't, so I will post some pictures of that later on. Good to be with people who are on the ball. This way you'll know it's really me writing these posts and not just some crazed blog hacker who has stolen my identity.

We only have one photocopier at work and it's broken and all the teachers are going crazy. Crazy! Arrrggghh! What to do?

Bridget