ants.in.my.pants.

i have been here too long.

i am wanting to be back in my beloved china.

i long for the sights, smells and the beautiful smiling faces. 

my beautiful feet are itching to move on down the road.

texas.

my body is in texas, but my heart is in china.

i long to be back in my beloved china. 

i went to walmart today to buy school supplies and was shocked by the coldness of the people there. i miss all the smiling faces and the endless noise.

i miss chinese opera music well into the night.

i miss my hard bed and the stinky tofu being sold on the street.

i miss the pearl lady and her crazy english.

i miss my home.

hong kong.

im in hong kong again.

this city is preeeeetty.

ill be home soon.

four twenty.

good morning.

its four twenty in the morning and my journey home begins now.

i will see texas in thirty eight hours or so.

much love.

some r&r.

today was a lovely day of fun. we spent the day at one of the prettiest places on earth, went to the beach and ate more jousa than anyone ever has. :-)

picture number one is of me and peter with our chinese hats! we are ready to do kung fu, eat jousa and work in the rice patties. these hats are so so so fun! i am so glad we found them for sale.

picture number two is me on the dock at the beach today, it was such a beautiful beach with totally clear water.

picture number three is me at the beach again. just to answer the question i know you have mom, i am wearing clothes because we were told this morning it was only going to be about 60 degrees today so we all wore jeans and brought hoodies. so we all had to roll up our pant legs and play in the water like that.

picture number four is on the bus ride today. it was such a funny bus, it would stop randomly along the road to pick up people who wanted rides and drop them off at any place down the road. one bus we took today was probably the craziest thing i have ever ridden in. all the cousins and aunt sue remember the crazy bus from camp abaco, well this one make that one look niiiiiiice. this bus was one rmb cheaper to ride so we thought sure why not save 15 cents and ride this bus. well first off, the driver is smoking while he drives down the road, and because of that a couple of guys join him. then, the little lady that takes your money when you walk on the bus will not sit down, no matter how many empty seats are around her, she instead holds onto a piece of either rope or part of an old seat belt she has tied onto the door to keep it shut as the bus bounces down the road. for some reason this bus had a little night light sized bulb just hanging from the ceiling, it was just randomly hanging there. on top of everything, the fumes came in from the 2 small windows that would open and put most of us in a poison induced coma/nap. but, the good news is we arrived safe and sound and had a great day!

picture number five is of a little boy on the street today, his mother sells chickens and ducks while he stands next to her. i thought he was totally adorable.

picture number six are of peter and my beautiful feet. we spent over 8 hours next to each other on a bus, what else would be be doing with our time other than taking pictures of our feet? haha!

anyway, i have been thinking about tomorrow being my last full day here and instead of saying im going back "home" i am going back to the states to get things ready to come home. i have always been told that home is where the heart is, and my heart is in a small village amongst the high rise buildings of this city. i have wanted to live and die in china since i was a small child and now i know where in china i am going to be. 

i will see yall soon.

much love.

so little time left.

i have been getting requests for more pictures....so i hope you enjoyed these.

picture number one was our welcome table at this restaurant we went to. they are live crabs, tied up with leaves and set around a huge pile of ginger root with christmas lights on it. leave it to the chinese to be creative huh?

picture number two and three are what we call "bib" (bone in every bite) chicken. it is a whole chicken, insides and everything fully cooked, covered in sauce, then its chopped up and served. the honored guest gets the plate in front of them with the head facing him. i think the head ended up on everyones plate during the course of dinner. it actually is my favorite meat dish here. the chicken is so moist and just so so good, it is a lot of work picking out the bones though.

picture number four is of some kids in a paddle boat. peter and i rented a paddle boat and went sailing around the big pond in the beautiful park. these kids were so funny, they were yelling "hello!!!" at me from across the pond and wanted me to get closer to them so they could say hi. notice that none of them have life vests on and there is no adult supervising. so very different from my childhood days of paddle boat fun!

picture number five is me in the paddle boat, it was so nice, the sun was setting behind the buildings and casting a glow over the pond.

picture number six is a rose made from molding clay. there was a homeless guy who was making these flowers and peter bought me one. it was soft and would not harden, so i gave it to a girl because i will not be able to take it back to the states with me, because it is soft and it would get messed up. the red clay even smelled like a rose, it was such a beautiful gift. i wish i could have kept it.

i have been having a very hard time coming to terms that i am leaving in two days. i do not want to leave. peter and i even formed a plan that ends with me getting "lost" in hong kong and then he comes and finds me. haha!

it is funny, at night time the city comes to life, it is 11pm right now and for some reason there is chinese opera playing in the street. we can hear it from our room and it is funny. opera music in general is not something i want to listen to on a regular basis, but chinese opera is about 75 million times more annoying. yet, for some reason, i love listening to it, it lulls me to sleep at night. 

tomorrow we are going on a journey, we have to wake up at 5am to catch a bus by 645 and go on an adventure. its going to be so cool! i am really excited! i will tell you all about it on monday night.

this trip could not have gone any better, it has been very evident that each and every one of us came here for a reason. there was never any "dead weight" or fruitless efforts. not only has strength been multiplied, but sickness has not gotten any of us. i only barfed once and one other girl did too, but that has been it. in comparison to other times in china this is unheard of. last night i could not sleep, i would wake up and feel like i needed to spend time with my Father and i would, then i would cry and fall back to sleep, i did that over and over all throughout the night. never in my life have i known exactly what i want to do, where i want to be and where my feet were to go, until now. i cannot wait to learn chinese and then learn the dialect from this area. i know that these people are going to soon become not only my friends, my neighbors, and classmates, but also my family. greater things are yet to come, the harvest is ready, but the workers are few. these tired feet have founding their resting place.

feeling the movement.

there is a movement going through this city and it is powerful, greater things are yet to come. today we went to the oldest part of town and took pictures. we went through some very poor villages and played with a bunch of kids. i love the children here, i would love nothing more than to move into their village, live with these kids and play with them everyday. one little girl went and got her barbie doll when she saw us, she wanted to show her to us. it was precious. the little baby in the picture kept following me, smiling at me and wanted me to hold him, it was adorable. 

the first picture was from dinner tonight. we went to a place on the street and had hot pot! it was so yummy! most of the smaller places put toilet paper on the table for napkins and the nicer places charge you 1-3 yuan for a package of napkins. so, i thought the toilet paper amongst the many sauces was a nice picture. 

after dinner we went out with a new friend of ours to get coffee and we got to share the story with her. the coffee from this area is strong, yet really really good. 

today i had my first feeling of sickness, and get this, after eating at pizza hut. go figure huh? i have been eating dinner off the streets every night and brushing my teeth with tap water and the "western" food makes me sick. haha i guess i can just say its a sign that i should stay here and only eat chinese food. :-)

man, i do not want to leave here. i have come to love the noise, the traffic, the smells, the random "hellos" with a very strong accent when i walk by. i just love this place. china has a very distinct smell and i know i will miss the smell once i get back home. 

well, i need to go to bed now because our wake up call will probably earlier than we expect tomorrow.

check your feet and make sure they are being beautiful!