National Day

Nearing hump day here and actually this week is a holiday here.  It's National Day and is equivalent to our July 4th.  I think, this year, because of the holiday landing on a Saturday, most people get the whole week off.  In China, holidays are counted a bit differently.  I don't know if I can explain it well enough but basically if the holiday lands on a weekend, you get the weekend off.  Now in the US, that's just a given and the day off gets moved to a week day but not here.  You get the weekend off here and then you actually make it up on another weekend - so yeah, it's not really getting any time off.  Again, I butchered the explanation but overall, it's weird.  For example, the kids got this entire week off . . . I haven't told them yet that there will be a Saturday that they'll have to go to school for a half day to make up the holiday.

The entire week off has been nice.  They timed it well by giving progress reports on Friday - just before the week break.  So now all these teachers don't have to respond to my emails that say, "What?!!  How can xxx-child have a D??!"  The education system here is definitely a bit harder than the US.  I think the kids had a transition with 4th grade in general but also a double whammy by having 4th grade in China.  Grading is harder and demands are more . . . I feel for them.

Some pics from our week thus far . . . First pic below is from the Bund, an area of town near the Huang Pu River and is very touristy.  I didn't get to shop there but we swung by after our Anniversary dinner (Happy Anniversary dh!) at . . . ok, going to sound corny but we ate at the JW Marriott.  Supposedly they have the best steaks but stupidly I had salmon and he had a burger.  Dinner was great and date night sans kids was SO nice thanks to in-laws who were (still are) in town and who helped babysit.  Anyway, the jeannie-bottle building to the left is Pearl Tower.  Nights in Shanghai are just gorgeous - everything is lit and quite often the colors of the buildings change too.

Okay, I took this pic from the bus we were on.  You probably can't see it but below is a man on a motorbike-type thing with a carrier of some sort on the back.  We are constantly joking about the safety of vehicles around here and this just adds fuel to the fire.  Inside that box was a boy - maybe 6 years old?  He kept peeking outside the box and looking around.  Probably no different than a bunch of men riding in the back of pick up trucks in Texas . . . still just seemed odd and funny here.

Lastly we saw fireworks last night.  They had a huge fireworks show in honor of National Day.  The bottom of the picture (black shadows) is the line of people just watching them.  We found a spot where we didn't have to be next to people thankfully but regardless, the locals here, do not understand the meaning of "personal space".  It drives me bananas.