A lazy Day at Home

I stopped going to my ESL school since I couldn't enjoy it as much as before. When I don't have work to do, I just chill out at home. Today I did lots of reading (Jon Wong's China), and nearly finished it.

BAST

"I don't trust you."

"Leave me alone."

"Don't move, or I will come and get you."

Our Cat

We had a cat before we left for Canada and we loved her. She was a gorgeous little thing in the whole world. We absolutely loved her.
It was near my birthday and Simon didn't know what to get me. We went out for a walk and Bast (we named her later) whizzed past us. Simon swiftly followed her and affectionately held her in his hands. I always liked small animals so I quickly got close to her and patted her gentally. The owner saw us at that moment and moved toward us quickly, "Do you want her. Take her." We were so surprised and took a moment to understand what she was trying to do. We didn't hesitate long before we took her back with us. She liked to play when she was a little baby, however, she was quite aloof after she grew up. That made us frustrated sometimes.
But we still love her. For it's almost impossible to bring back a cat with us when we left, plus Simon's father is allergic to cat, we had to give up on her to another foreign teacher in the school.
All our best wishes to her.

My Grandad's Smile

This is the my grandad's happiest picture I have ever seen in my life. I was so glad our wedding gave him such a beautiful smile.

My First Winter in Canada

A totally new country and new experience but I love it. Now I believe that I can be brave if I want to since I've landed on a new landed surrounded by different people.
I have to see I was totally amazed by Canadian winter. I saw snow! And it's pure white! All white! All clean! The first time we had heavy snow, I urged Simon to take me out to the huge field by Simon's parents'. And of course, we took our camera with us.
The red hat was my Christmas gift from my mother-in-law. As you can see, it's very red. (She heard that I love red, so she bought everything in red for me and for us!) The tree behind me is huge.

If you look at it carefully, you will find a little surprise: there are Simon and me. We had several old similar shots in our photo collection as well. I just adore them.

Our St Mary's Trip

As we had planned, we spent this Saturday in St Mary's! It's such a beautiful place. Too bad we couldn't stay long because of my work schedule.

Today, I had two nasty customers.
I worked in the fitting-room a lot in Sears. One customer asked me to get her a different pants size. I went to the usual place which was where it should be for it of course, however, I didn't find any size 20. The next thing I did was to check the plus size section just in case to the regular sizes were mixed up. But no luck. So I had to go back and told her very politely "sorry, I'm afraid we don't have the size you're looking for." She wore an angry look immediately, "You didn't have intention to look for it at all! That's why!" Lots of my other customers stopped whatever they were doing and started gawking at us. Confused and very disappointed, I was instantly short of words. I apologized: "I'm really sorry but I couldn't find any." She pulled the 18 size from my hands, snapped the door closed and stormed out, "I will find it!" I was left alone.
She was back with size 20 in a minute and pointed it to me, "Look!!! I found one." She didn't even bother my explaination and left with a scorning and triumphant look. I knew the pants must have been moved to somewhere else, which the customer knew and I didn't.
I was wondering why people sometimes get angry so easily at other people and don't give slight respect to other people's service? I really tried to help her and to give her good service. But it looked like I didn't want to sell her at all; It was like I didn't bother looking for her in the first place; it was like I was the only reason the clothes got moved off place! Show a little respect to other people's work, please! Maybe a little bit more understanding too.

Our Honeymoon

Our honeymoon happened two months after our actual wedding ceremony. We spent one week seeing all kinds of interesting sites in Beijing. Summer palace was my favourite among all the places we had been to. It was totally worth the trip. We chose a sepcially hot day to go (didn't mean to!) and planned a half day there! We thought we could have gone to all the other interesting places near there-like Qing Hua Universaty or Yi He Yuan, but it was such an beautiful place and so huge too. We ended up staying there for a full day and didn't even see all the sites in the single garden! At the end of the day, I have to say that the emperors really knew how to enjoy themselves. Since they didn't have to time or energy to travel all over China, they had the idea of putting together a minuature garden of various interesting and famous spots originated from every corner of China to entertain themselves whenever they wanted. How brilliant that was! Of all the beautiful places in the whole world to go, my dream is to stand in Tibet one day, so of course we went to the Tibet temple while we were there. And also we went to Suzhou Street-the paradise of the earthy world, which was very close to the end of the other gate. Since we had been roaming around for the whole day, we were on the point of breaking down when we thought about having to walk a short distance to the busway station back to our hotel. Simon suggested to stop by a tea house before we got off. Thinking about the natural idea of over-charging in tourist spots, I objected his idea firmly at the beginning. He comprimised by offering to go upstairs and having a look at the tea house first. Guess what!? The moment we got into the tea house, I was absolutely struck by their unearthily peaceful world. I agreed and we chose a cool spot sheltered by trees and cicadas. The tea was served in a set of gordeous yellow tea set, and together they gave us a small plate of pickles and watermelon seeds! This was just terrific. I couldn't have been happier when I saw unexpected pickles and seeds! I made sure I finished it all off.
Speaking of hotels, we lived in Guo Han Hotel - our favourite among all the others in Beijing. The picture here was taken just inside of it. We shopped in Silk Market that day and got all dressed up after we were back to the hotel. Simon wanted to try "Liang Ma River" - a fairly new restaurant around San Li Tun area back then. The photo was taken on our way to or back from the the restaurant. I can't recall which.
The skirt I was wearing there is one of my favourite ones too. I brought it to Canada and wore it quite often. Lots of people wondered where I had got it. When I told them "China", they opened their eyes wide and smiled, "no kidding, very pretty".

Another day has passed.

Three days to go, and we've been here for 4 months!
My parents missed me already because I could tell from our last phone conversation. So I've been trying my best to send them as many photos as possible. Hopefully that would help them a bit.
Two weeks later we're moving out of Simon's parents' house. Both of us are very excited about our new house and our new life. We're so looking forward to it!
Simon has a great family. I love them the moment I met them. The longer we get along, the greater people I think they are. But we still think it's better for us to move out to start our own independent life-just like what we did before.

Tomorrow we're going to one of the small towns to see the coming spring. Simon's father is really anxious to show me what Canadian spring looks like. I'm so ready for it! Winter is nice here but it's a little on the long side.