Day 31 -- Suzhou and Yixing, China

We all got up early today. Dad went to work and the rest of us had a trip planned to Yixing (Pottery Town—the “ceramics capital of China”). We packed a lunch and left the apartment about 8:45am to meet the rest of the group that also signed up with EAS (the Expatriate Association of Suzhou) at 9:00am. The bus was cramped and it took us two hours to drive to Yixing. I slept much of the way there as there really wasn’t much to see on the way. The only vaguely interesting thing I saw was a line at the employment center in Suzhou that was 4-5 people wide going all the way around the block (which is more like 4 US city blocks put together). Apparently there is some understanding of a line in China. Anyway, we were told that many people quit their jobs for the New Year and then search for more prosperous work after the holiday. We arrived in Yixing at 11:00am and spent 2 hours there. There were some really nice ceramics and I guess a lot of expats go there to buy their dishes. I did see some really nice pots and vases that I wouldn’t mind having, but they were large enough for me to fit in and I really had no way of getting them home (much less affording them after not working for a month!). We walked around for a while waiting for something to jump out at us. Mom found a tea tray that she liked and Daniel mentioned that he saw a tea set he liked and was interested in. I told him there was one by the door that I liked too. It turned out to be the same one, so we decided to get it (a teapot and 6 cups) and also a tea canister and creamer to match. They used black clay with a white glaze and used a wax technique to write characters on each piece and keep the glaze off of that, so the black clay shows through the white. We went back to the bus about 20 minutes before we were scheduled to leave so we could eat our packed lunch. Shortly after 1:00pm, we headed back to Suzhou. We had to stop at Yumway again to buy something that we forgot, then we waked to Starbucks to sit and chat more with some of Mom’s Dutch friends. While we were there, they spotted Astrid, a German friend, walking by. She headed a few doors down to her dentist appointment only to find that they were running behind, so she came back to join us at Starbucks. Her husband is working here in China and she has been going to the University to study Chinese. From what Mom says, she picks up languages very well and already knows a lot of Chinese. She found out recently that her husband will be working on a job in Changsha for a couple years, so she just returned from a short trip there. That gave us something to talk about. When she found out that we had just returned from HK, she asked for recommendations on hotels there. I happened to have my notebook on me with the recommendations I got from my friend, so I gave them to her. Anyway, she is a very nice, down to earth person and Mom is kind of bummed that she is just getting to know her and both are leaving soon. But that is the life of expats I suppose. Took a cab back home and Dad got home shortly after. Daniel and I worked on packing our stuff. I’ve been trying to convince him to stay longer or be okay with me staying longer, but no go. Sara (Mom’s friend from Australia) came over and we all headed to Zen for dinner. They elected me to order. All the food we ordered was delicious and I found it difficult not to overeat. The only booboo was that the spicy and sour (hot and sour) soup had shrimp in it, so I couldn’t eat it. One of the waiters said something to me after a few exchanges that we had. I thought I understood, but double-checked on the translator later. I was right. He told me that my Chinese accent was good. He could be just yanking my chain or being nice, but it made me feel good nonetheless. It was raining really hard when we finished eating, so we sat and chatted a while until it let up a bit. When it did, we took taxis back to the apartment. I packed some more and tried to get caught up on my blog, but I really wasn’t feeling it. Instead I wasted a ton of time online and managed to get in touch with some people I haven’t talked to in more than 8 years via MySpace.