We finished our evaluation yesterday and hope to get the results sometime next week. It's hard to believe how long we've been here and been studying language full-time. (It was 7 months on the 18th of October.) Often, I look around and wonder what we've been doing this whole time besides just studying language. I was going through pictures recently and found we've been really blessed by some amazing friends here and a lot of our time goes into our relationship with them. Over the past few months we've had some neat culture experiences and some sad ones. Here's one of the fun ones from National Day at the beginning of October.
Our friends took us to a local amusement park which featured carousels, ferris wheels, roller coasters, and boat rides.
S's closest local friend in this city. Isn't she adorable?
We also braved the enormous ferris wheel!
Cutie pies - waiting in line for our turn.
Once we got on the ferris wheel, my friend pulled an apple, a pear, a knife, and a plastic container out of her bag. Our local friends seem to always have fresh fruit handy for snacking anytime there's an opportunity. No wonder many of them are so healthy!
South side view from the ferris wheel.
North side view from the ferris wheel.
B loved the boat ride.
Other boats on the lake. It was a fairly cold and rainy day.
More snacks!
Handsome boat driver.
I love these purple flowers! They are everywhere here!
After the park we went out for one of my favorite local dishes called 过桥米线 which means "cross over the bridge rice noodles."
过桥米线 really deserves an entire post of its own but the gist is that they bring you a big bowl of boiling broth (which I forgot to take a picture of, sorry) and then you add in the thinly sliced raw meat, veggies, and noodles of your choosing.
These are some of the things we did NOT choose.
Maybe next time. Maybe not. I think we could handle it if we felt like a friendship was at stake. However this friend makes no such demands. She and her husband are constantly talking about how we are guests in their country and it is their job to host us well.
We know that this friendship is the result of His answers to your requests on our behalf. Thanks for thinking of us!