San Fransisco

It's been awhile now, but we went to San Fran back in August. We decided to stop over for a night on our way back to the states for a visit. Daniel had some PTO saved up and took a day off and we did some sight seeing.

 We elected not to ride the trolley - because it was over an hour wait to get a ticket. Ridiculous.

 Chinatown. Surprisingly enough, it was very Chinese. It was a little weird for us.

 The shops were just like the ones here, selling the same stuff.

 Pearls and other jewelry.So much of the same thing - down to the exact pattern of some of it. Crazy.

 Beautiful churches.

 The Thai neighborhood.

 Fur lunch we went to Joe's crab shack. It was great. Crab here in China is small and difficult to get out of it's shell. It's not very good. Here we got a bucket of crab. King legs, queen legs, and snow crab. I love King Crab legs. It was wonderful. Next time I'd just get a whole bucket of the king. Our view was good. We looked over fisherman's wharf while eating. It was nice. Because it was late enough in the afternoon, it was quiet and not crowded. I had a good afternoon.

 Alcatraz. We didn't have time to get out there, but we will do it when we go back someday.

 The sea lions.

 We have a friend who is a HUGE Hello Kitty fan. We saw this and thought of her.

 We went to Ghirardelli square and had ice cream and hot chocolate. And bought a bag of 80 assrt pieces of chocolate. I decided my favorites are the milk chocolate with caramel and the new chocolate caramel with sea salt.

 The "F" Street cars. We rode these a couple of times.

Daniel was fascinated with the CLEAN, functional public toilet.

It was a nice little break for us. That night we slept for over 13 hours because we were so tired. We went back in the city for a bit the next day before we flew to SLC.

It's crazy to think I only have one more long flight and then we are home. Well mostly. Daniel will have to keep coming back. In fact he has to be in China again from January 12 to March 2. I am not excited about it. I am going to meet him during the week of Valentines, also the Chinese New Year, and we are going to spend our time in the Philippines, in Cebu hanging out on the lovely beaches. I'm excited about that part. Not about the fact that I will have 3 weeks to either side of it without a husband. But we'll make it. After that his trips will be much shorter.

Gosh it's been amazing year and half.

Virginia Part 2

This was probably my favorite part. After we left Poplar Forest, we went to the National D-day memorial in Bedford, VA.

The reason it was chosen to be the home of the memorial is because Bedford boys enlisted as soon as they graduated from high school. In the many deaths that happened on D-day, 19 boys of the 30 something from Bedford died, three died within days. They suffered the largest per capita death in the United States. The telegrams that came about d-day came in July. One mother received 2 telegrams. For a community of only 3,200 people, 22 deaths was a huge hit. They were chosen as the city to host the D-day Memorial because of this connection.

It was an amazing memorial. I think it was one of the best put together memorials I've ever visited. It tells the story of D-day from it's inception, until it's hard won victory.

You start at the "English Garden" section. This is a pavilion with a statue of Eisenhower, the General in charge of the whole thing.

I'm going to share some facts that I remember being told. In order to make a map large enough for the war room, they had to turn to outside sources. They had a game company in England make the map in large unidentifiable parts. Then when it was finished they had two gentlemen from the company put it together. After they put it together they were taken into custody and kindly provided for and not allowed to leave until after the invasion.Their families were notified that they were being taken care of, but that the men couldn't return home for a while. They couldn't risk any of the information getting out.

On the ceiling above Eisenhower there is a map like the one they had made.

There were 5 beaches, Sword, Gold, Juno, Omaha, and Utah. All the branches of the Armed Forces were used, including the Coast Guard. They Coast Guard were the ones responsible for driving the boats back and forth across the channel to pick up and drop off the soldiers. They are also the ones who filmed parts of those days. It is thanks to them we have the films that have. The Air Force, the Navy, Military and the Coast Guard. I'll stop giving the history now, because I'm sure I'm getting stuff wrong.

Anyway, this is the shield that represented the Allied forces.

 So then the garden is shaped and fashioned after this shield.

They were planting the summer flowers in the colors of the shied. The colors on the shield represented a color from every flag of the Allied Forces. 

This is the sword.

The night before they landed, Eisenhower sent this letter to all the soldiers. The lady who was our guide played an original recording for us.

So after the Allied Forces planned, the next step is to attack. So the second part of the memorial is the beaches at Normandy.

There are two sides to this section. On one side is listed the American soldiers who died and on the other is listed the soldiers of the other countries who participated.

It's a huge plaza. It's divided into 5 sections, one for every beach.

As you approach the water, this is what you see.

The section that represents the actual beach, is concrete that has sand in it from Normandy. They brought a little piece of France to Bedford.

The things on the ground were put in place by the German's to tear holes in the bottoms of the ships. This was one reason the Allies needed to land at low tide.

There are mechanisms in the water that react like gunfire. It was a good effect.

The statues at the beach landing section.

An actual airplane used on D-day.

Then we wove our way around to the top. There is a statue in front of the arch of a soldier dragging another soldier.

 If you look closely, you can see a wedding ring on the standing soldier's left hand.

That is an actual wedding ring from a D-day soldier.

On D-day there was a soldier who was caring for a comrade who said thought he was dying. The wounded soldier took off his wedding ring and asked that if he didn't make it, that his wife be sent his ring. After the fighting was over the helping soldier had this ring is his pocket, but no name and no way to find out who the man was who gave him the ring. He held onto it for years. When he got wind of the statues that had been commissioned for the memorial, he contacted the artist and told him his story. The artist had an idea and asked the man to send him the ring. He placed it on the left had of this statue in memoriam to all the men who left died and left wives behind. An amazing little story.

The arch has the black and white stripes that all the Allies painted onto their aircrafts, so they would know the planes from the different countries who were part of the Allied forces.

 The statue of the downward gun with the helmet and dog tags.

 The top of the statue of the men climbing the wall.

It was a pretty impressive memorial. Definitely worth a visit if you are anywhere in the neighborhood.

My Chinese, locked out, Mexican food, Thanksgiving.

Yes, each of those happened to me. Today alone.

To start, I woke up early and taught seminary. I am grateful for this opportunity for many reasons. I have never been very good at the Old Testament. I'm at least passable with the other books. The Old Testament is like me doing calculus. And if you know me, I haven't had math since I was about 16 years old. Not my thing. So now I am learning the Old Testament much better and I love that. I also get to start my days, every other week, with an hour of spirituality, despite the dead pan attitude of my skype attendees. Seriously, teenagers in the morning is bad, but over the internet where you can't stare them down? Worse.

But the best thing is the preparing of the lessons in which I learn and feel the spirit and grow according to my own knowledge. I believe I need this specific boost at this time, partly because of the challenges of living in China, but also dealing with the challenges that life is giving us in general right now. Things are hard and the gospel is good.

After this, I go back to bed for about 2-3 hours. I am not a morning person. I need that morning nap. It gets me going for the rest of the day. And apparently I need it when I roll over and find it is three hours later. Today I exercised, thank you Pinterest, and then called my mom for a good chat. Then I finished getting ready, had some leftovers for lunch and headed out the door. Without my key. As the door slammed shut I remembered that I saw my key outside my purse. Lovely. Now this isn't Utah, where the doors are unlocked until you lock them. I have no door knob. Just a pull lever. The latch will always catch. Which means it always locks. Always.

Fun, huh? Since it was 1 o'clock and I had stuff to do for a while I didn't worry about it much. I called Daniel and  told him I was a dork and to make sure he comes home on time. then I went with a woman that goes to church with us and we walked like around our nearby shopping centers for nearly 3 hours. I was successful in what I was looking for and came home with about 30 kuai in my pocket. (That's like 5$). This can't do much.

While shopping we found these little treasures.

In any of you understand what these are supposed to mean, please let me know. We are making a little bit of a collection of bad translations or just bad English in general. It's awesome.

When I got back I went to see if the building managers could let me in. Nope. Not unless I wanted to partially destroy the door and get new locks. Not happening. So I called Yimi, my translator, and had her call my maid to find out how she got in when the door was jammed. Turns out Ayi was in the neighborhood and she ran her key over to me on the condition that I pay for her taxi fair. Let me clarify here, that this is not a greedy move. For someone who only makes 130$ from me, a taxi fair is a luxury that is not indulged. So I said gladly, and 15 minutes later she came running into the building, handed me her key, told me to pay her tomorrow, and ran back out. Thank heavens. I was in.

Then Daniel and I talked about dinner and what to do. He text me on his way home and said "Let's do Coyote." sounds good to me. So I turned on Pushing Daisies, which by the way should never have been cancelled, and started to organize things for my trip home. 45 minutes later, Daniel text me and said he was at Coyote and was I coming. Well, yes. I had no idea that I was supposed to meet him there.

There are two times at which it is a nightmare to catch a taxi. During shift change, from 4:20-5:00 and after the work day, 6:00-6:30. It was not 6:15 and I had to wait nearly 15 minutes for a taxi. But I got to the restaurant (using 9 of my 30 kuai) just fine. I had a delightful dinner of soup that burned my throat a little, a quesadilla with black beans, and some guacamole (new recent favorite acquired taste). To top it off we indulged in this rare treat:

Look carefully and home made pumpkin cheese cake with white chocolate chips made in China and eaten at a Mexican restaurant. Jealous? You should be. It was amazing. We bough 2 pieces. One we shared there, and the other we will share tomorrow night for out at home date. It was so good.

Then we had the fun of giving our taxi driver directions home because he didn't know where it was. This, by the way, is only the 2nd time this has happened.

All in all, it was a pleasant day, though, despite the challenges. It made me grateful for things like cell phones with translation apps and cheap taxi rides.

I am looking forward to being home on Tuesday and seeing as many of you as possible. I can't wait to taste things like my grandma's cranberry jello. Oh,. So. Good. To sleep on a soft bed, to smell fresh air, to indulge in quiet. I know, "quiet you say," well yes. Even though I am often home alone, I can hear cars, wind, boat horns, the songs blared over the loud speaker for the kindergartners to exercise and have recess with, and the grinding. The jack hammers have quit for the time being, thank heavens, and all it is now is pounding with like a sledge hammer.

Well, have I been entertaining this post? I hope so. I hope all of you Americans that read my blog are grateful for the traditional Thanksgiving that will be yours this year. Enjoy some pie for me, okay?

What does American Independence mean for you?

Sorry for the lack of posts. Our internet has been having "ahem" problems. 

Here is some of what it means for me.

I'm going to use chunks of the Declaration and the Bill of Rights to post this.

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn, that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security.

We have rights. But we also have priviledges. Some people to do not know the difference.

right:a moral, ethical, or legal principle considered as an underlying cause of truth, justice, morality, or ethics.

privilege: an advantage or source of pleasure granted to a person 

The way I see it is a right fundamentally can't be taken away. Privileges can. I remember some kids saying (maybe even myself) that they have a right to drive and get a driver's license. Wrong. You have been granted that privilege that is conditional upon your behavior. 

Our rights are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. Choice. We have a choice in every situation, even if all that is left is our choice of attitude. We as Americans have been granted further rights and privileges. But we are told that with great power comes great responsibility. Are we responsible Americans? Many aren't.

Let me tell you some of the privileges you have as American's that I have seen that the Chinese people don't have. I will post these on a schedule so you all aren't inundated with words.

1st Amendment:

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.

In China religious groups have special permission to meet, but we are not allowed to converse, invite or participate with Chinese Nationals. If we mess up, they might even take away our ability to meet. 

The Chinese internet is severely monitored. The Chinese people can't get to blogger or many other websites and host sites that facilitate the discussions of opinions. Any website that talks about the Tibet "issue" is likewise blocked. They are so afraid of political unrest. (Justly so, since there are 1.5 BILLION Chinese people.) By the way, the Chinese are NOT trying to take over the world. If they were, they would have done it by now. 

I'm not sure about the redress of grievances in China now. I do know that while Mao was alive, to file a complaint to the government, or even mention a problem you had with the government, was considered unpatriotic and treasonous. Can you imagine being imprisoned for treason because you complained against our health care system? 

I will regularly post about our rights as Americans and the privileges that we have been granted. 

Property. Americans can own a chunk of land. That land belongs to you. The government owns EVERYTHING in China. Buildings are allowed to be built. The government leases that land for 99 years. So that mortgage that you have? That's a privilege. 

Freedom of speech: do you really know what this means? It means the government can't do anything to you because you published, spoke, etc, you opinion.