Wang Peng, Bike Takers and the Crayon School

  Chengdu, China
Wednesday, September 3, 2008

So yesterday was my first day at the crayon english school (thats what it's called I think... all i can remember is that is has Crayon and English in its name... school seems like it would be obvious too). I had 6 little girls. I guess the one little boy I have couldn't make it. I was really nervous but it didn't go too bad. I had more trouble trying to park my new bike (we will save that story for later).

The lessons were about "his" and "hers" and "How much is it?" I brought my american money with me so they could see and actually use the real thing. They picked the buying and selling thing up really fast. It must just come natural to little girls. haha.

My TA in training was JunJun, well at least that is her name now. Her english name is Julie also! And she is 21. Coincidence? lol

So the bike. My friend and fellow USAC student, Sang, is just amazing at getting deals (he was the one who got us the discount on the translator). He asked if I still wanted a bike and that there was a bunch of them going to the place after class (by the way, calligraphy class was really fun! we did the basic 1 2 3 in class). So I got a nice 50 USD bike with a bell and a lock. Bt while we were there these officials in green shirts came and just started taking away bike from the people who already had bought them. They were illegally parked I guess. But these green shirts just come, ask no questions and take it away in their truck. Stores who have things on the sidewalk get a huge fine and two brand new bikes got taken away from the store next door. Apparently Mike was telling me that these people will just walk up to people walking their dogs and demand to see registration and if you don't have it they take it away, too. It costs a hell of a lot of money to get it back as well.

It's just funny that motorbikes and cars can drive all over the sidewalk but OMG ONE SCREW FROM A STORE HUGE FINE!! lol

Anyway so I got my first experience riding a bike through the streets of Chengdu. That was... interesting. I thought I had it all with the taxis and the busses. But biking is just wow. But it's awesome how fast you get places though.

Finally I got an email from Aunt Jean asking about cats, so i decided to talk about the animals. There are "wild" dogs all over the streets. I see like at least 4 a day. I don't know if they belong to anyone or not but they sure are everywhere. I can't say the same about cats though. I have seen maybe two on the streets. But then there is Wang Peng.

Meow

Wang Peng (W ah ng Pung) is my roommate Tristan's cat (and now I guess ours too). He was bought from a pet store (which made me feel better that he wasn't just found on the street) to take care of a bug issue in our apartment this summer (cleaning would have taken care of that issue too but I digress). I took some pictures of him for you. He is still a little kitty. I didn't like him much at first but now I only dislike him 10% of the time. He is really a cutie and currently is such an attention whore. As soon as you walk in the door "meow." He does that constantly now. The funny thing is he is getting tons of attention from us though.

He was just walking around when I took these pictures but then he started digging through the garbage so he got put in time out (Tristan's room). I wish I could have found the ping pong ball. It's adorable to watch him play with that thing. He is a really smart cat though. I once threw a pen on the ground to see if he would leave me alone long enough to do some work and he just looked at it then at me with a "Really? This is supposed to entertain me?" sort of look.

O.K. Now it is time for me to go and do some studying before Tai Chi because we have another birthday tonight so we are going to Pizza Hut (which I could care less about actually).

Zai Jian.