Sunday break

Today was my first official day off. After Natlie fell asleep last night, I rode over to Emma's apartment. Emma is Brae Howard's friend and Brae is my brothers' friend. Eden and Katrina, two other girls Brae knows, came over as well.

I spent the night at Emma's. It was cold. No one but the upper class turns on heaters unless they are absolutely frozen.

This morning I attempted making American pancakes for the girls and failed miserably. I tried to excuse myself by saying the kitchen utensils weren't good for making American food. They saw past that though. I'm not a "skilled" cook. At the end of my experiment, a few nubs of charred pancake batter and a smoky kitchen were all that I had produced. We were still hungry.

So we skipped outside this sunny morning and onto the metro headed to People's Square (like Times Square in NYC). In the food court, I looked around. Everyone I saw was dressed well, eating well, and consuming so much. What did we want to eat? We wondered to ourselves. We went around the whole circle that made up the food shops. Japanese rice pastries, ice cream, kabobs, dumplings, noodles, donuts, shakes, mango smoothies. There was every good junk food in that food court, I'm convinced.

We found a good restaurant which was crowded, unsurprisingly. Instead of coming back when a table would be free, we accosted the present customers, peering over those still slurping down their noodles. We impatiently nudged each one out of his seat until each of us had replaced another. That's the way to get things done here. Nudging, pushing, taking initiative, not beating around the bush.

Afterwards we rode to Century Park and bought a pineapple for a dollar. The vendor cut it into quarters for us and slid a wooden stick through each creating a wonderful treat.

The park was full. These past two days have been the first sunny and warm weekend after many weeks of rain and clouds. We sat on the green grass among Shanghainese couples, teenagers loudly hassling each other and their colorful kites, and mothers and fathers toting one little child around - each cuter than the one before.

It's been a nice break.