Friends

As we walk around this city, go shopping, or eat at a restaurant we often meet ‘foreigners’. Frequently a conversation begins about life in China. Everyone we talk to seems to really enjoy this city. We’ve met people from around the world.
This week we’ve made friends with a man from Texas who is working with a company that makes parts that will be used on the redesigned Boeing 747. He’ll be here for four months. Another couple we met is from France. They’ve lived in both Shanghai and Chengdu. They like it here better because it is much more relaxed. She is publishing an English language magazine about what’s going on in Chengdu, (one of several), and he works in real estate. One of our favorite new acquaintances is a dynamic 70 year old from Australia.
Although she speaks very little Chinese, she’s lived off and on for the past 6 years in China. Working as an English teacher she has made more friends and acquaintances than almost anybody we know. She is currently looking for a part-time job so that she’ll be able to stay for a longer period of time. Would that when we’re in our seventies that we’d have the energy and desire to look for employment so that we could live in a different culture . Tomorrow morning she’s taking us to her favorite place to get a massage.
Next day. We’ve had the massage and it was great. It took us about 40 minutes to walk to our friend’s apartment and, of course, 40 minutes back. However, during the walk back we stopped at a restaurant to spend a couple of hours with a friend from the states. After cleaning our apartment and doing the laundry we took off on another exploration to find a new way downtown. Another long walk brought us to the restaurant we’re working with. We sat down at an outdoor table for our usual ice cream and coffee and were joined by the chef, Peter. After a half-hour of great conversation our time was stopped by rain. Since we had to walk to catch a bus we decided to leave. Before we left we exchanged email addresses and phone numbers, a very common practice here.
The most difficult challenge of living in this city is dealing with traffic. Like many cities the growth has exceeded the city’s traffic infrastructure. We’ve heard that somewhere between 300 and 800 new cars are added to the traffic every day. In a city that has seen it’s population increase from 2 million to 11 million in just ten years traffic is only one of the many problems being dealt with by the people. From what we understand the growth will continue for some time to come.
We’re looking forward to traveling to Beijing next week. We’ve been warned that during the three day holiday there will be thousands of people traveling at the same time because it’s a 3 day national holiday. We’re hoping to see the Great Wall, the Forbidden City and the Summer Palace. Also, we’re hoping to connect with some friends that are living there. We’ll post the results of our trip when we’re able.
A pleasant surprise happened this week at the local fruit market. As we were wondering about the three different prices on the pineapple a young lady interrupted us, and, in excellent English explained what the differences in the pineapple were. We decided to buy one and were bringing it to the cashier when a man working in the store indicated we were to give it to him. He took a cleaver and a special knife, faster than we could imagine he had the pineapple peeled and ready for consumption. Check out the picture.