Thanksgiving Weekend in Hong Kong

Our Thanksgiving weekend was fantastic.


Christmas decorations everywhere! It felt like home for a weekend (well, sort of). The kids really loved the Science Museum and Disneyland (of course). Damon finally got a real vacation! It was hard coming back to Dalian, but visiting the USA is less than three weeks away!

Hong Kong Disneyland

Surprisingly, Hong Kong Disneyland was the least crowded of any Disneyland we have been to. Tokyo and California were both crowded and we waited in long lines. Here, our longest wait was 20 minutes! The park is smaller, and there are very few fast passes (and they were not needed for us). We guess that the park in California might have been similar to Hong Kong Disney in the 70's. Much more relaxed than now days.

The park looks exactly the same, a lot of English speakers, and very clean. We loved seeing "It's a Small World" decorated for Christmas. They had Christmas songs mixed in with the usual song, which was also a nice treat. I think this is the only visit I didn't have the Small World song in my head for hours after the ride.

Seoul, South Korea

October was crammed packed with fun events and fantastic memories. We went to Seoul for Chinese National Holiday-October break. Our friends the Smith's joined us on our adventure. We always have fun with them, Doug and Brandi are both science teachers at Dalian American International School where Nicole and Trejan are LOVING school. The Smith boys are among Trejan's best friends, they play roller hockey almost daily and if they aren't outside they are at our house playing. We go to church together and have a lot in common, they are from Seattle, and are UW fans.

We have spent many hours at the airport in Seoul, Korea (sometimes we have a six hour layover coming from San Francisco) but this was our first trip to really visit the city. Seoul is VERY different than our small little city (small for China only 6 million) Dalian. While living in China we get use to strange things, like hearing people spit and seeing people pee on the side of the road or on sidewalks. Leaving China we were reminded of how so many of these these things have become "normal" to us. The Koreans are very respectful, polite and friendly. Seoul is very clean and has organized traffic like other big cities we have visited outside of China. There was not honking and spitting we needed to ignore. It was very refreshing.

Our three days in Seoul were great, except that Damon got sick. He had an infection and we weren't sure if he needed to be treated immediately. After talking to the International SOS doctor the decision was made to wait until we got back to Dalian. Damon was sightseeing in pain, and with a fever but this didn't stop us from keeping busy. We visited the Changdeok Palace and took the subway all over the city so we could walk around different areas and eat delicious food.

On Sunday we thought we were going to a "water park" called Lotte World, but it was not a water park, it was a Disney type amusement park. The kids were in heaven since this was a complete surprise to all of us. I didn't read enough information before we left about Lotte World, but we had a great time.

The subway system is great in Seoul, but at times it was crowded. With eight people trying to get on at the same time it was a challenge. We made sure that the kids were always sandwiched between the adults. Thank God we made sure to follow this rule, because once Damon got the door shut in his face, and he had to wait for the next subway. We told him through the window to get off at the second stop. Luckily the subways are only about 5 minutes apart so we were not separated for too long. Overall we had a great trip, except for poor Damon (being sick, and getting left behind).

Fourth Grade Harvest

The Dalian American International School arranged a field trip to harvest corn, sweet potatoes and dates at a local farm. The entire fourth grade (two classes of 16 each) joined in and had a great time. Many of us are excited to go back to the farm in the spring to help with planting. It was the first time I used a machete, it was fun to hack corn stocks, but it is exhausting! Growing up we had a small garden, and we helped my dad harvest corn, but this was an entirely different experience.
The kids learned how much time and effort it takes to grow vegetables. It is easy to forget what it takes to get the vegetables to the market where we buy them so easily. I learned first hand how the machines farmers now use save hours of back breaking labor and the inventions have changed farming forever. It is interesting that China is so far behind in many things.