New Chinese Friends

                This last little while has been pretty crazy. My kids in class are pretty crazy. I love them to death but the weekend provides a nice little break. This weekend brought with it a new adventure. A group of my friends here in China and myself took the bus into town on Saturday to explore a little bit. We found a mall that looks like it’s pretty new and explored a bit. Eventually we found a huge arcade type area and kept going up the stairs until we found something amazing. On the top floor of this store was a roller rink. It was incredible and it looked like so much fun. After some hesitation some of my friends and I decided to go roller skating. It’s been a long time since I’ve been on roller skates so I was a bit shaky at first. However, I quickly made friends with a few Chinese girls who helped me to stay upright and have a good time. They were so nice and helpful and I made some great Chinese friends. The only problem was that there was a bit of a language barrier as I don’t speak Chinese and they spoke very little English. However, we worked through it and I spent a good amount of time skating and just getting to know one another. When we decided we needed to go they we’re a little bit sad and I got some amazing hugs from my new Chinese friends. Hopefully, I’ll be able to see them again.

                Once we were done skating we went across the street to the Tesco and grabbed a quick snack before we ventured out again. We got onto another bus and made our way to one of the parks here in Changzhou. It was a very large park and very beautiful. It is very close to one of the pagoda temples so the backdrop was absolutely stunning. There was a beautiful little lake and there were boats you could rent and ride around the area. However, when we got there it was just a little too late to rent a boat so we made the strong resolve to come back so that we could see the area by boat. However, since we weren’t going to go on a boat ride that way we found an area that was just about the water with a pavilion and some benches along with a gorgeous view. We spent awhile sitting and marveling in the beauty just pondering, then we left to look at a few shops, where I found a beautiful hand painted tea set which I bought. Soon after we called it a day and headed back toward our school. Once we got off the bus we grabbed a bite for dinner then headed home for the night. As the days go on the adventure continues.