home sweet home... in china.

french fry box at dico's reads:
"every min 100 acres of rainforest
disappears from our world.  if each
person saved 1 sheet of paper
(size 16? my guess is 10x16),
we could save 284.4 tons of forest."

I finally made it to my parents place in middle of nowhere China! A small town that many legit Chinese people from China have never heard of… yet despite that, there are over 8 million people who reside in this “small” city. If anyone’s been to China, you’ll know that there are plenty of McD’s and KFCs and some Pizza Huts. There is not even a McDs or Pizza Hut in this small town – only a couple of KFCs and a local KFC like place called Dicos – so that tells you something about the size and development of this town.


Despite that, it feels like home even though it is not Philly nor even the country I was born and raised. There’s something about being with family that creates that comfortable home-like atmosphere. Or perhaps it’s simply that I have a bedroom here to myself and I feel the freedom to throw my stuff anywhere I want, or at least wherever in the bedroom. My parents are pretty used to my messiness, and I’m quite used to (putting aside) their comments about me cleaning up. My excuse is that it’s hard to live out of a backpack for so long… excuses I aside, I admit I can be quite messy at times. And it's been so nice to just sleep in and veg...

parents pad in china

river and walkway next to their apt

As I write this morning, I’m sitting in their apartment on my parents yang tai, sun room/indoor balcony like structure that the localers use to hang their wet laundry. My parents also use it for that purpose, but also just to sit, relax, soak in some vitamin D, read, work, or whatever. Legit Chinese people don’t like the sun so I assume we are probably the only family here that uses this for that purpose. Nonetheless, I am enjoying this wonderful morning sitting out here, having a little qt, listening to my itunes, sipping some Nescafe coffee. My mom’s just joined me on the yang tai.. the two of us, with our coffee and laptops open. My mom playing mahjong tile matching game with others on the www, me just doing my usual.

My dad’s at work during the day, so my mom and I have been hanging, running errands, and stuff. We wandered over to the mall yesterday – pretty decent mall actually. I convinced my parents to get a router for their one internet line – things here work a bit differently such that you need to register the computer that will use the internet line, so it’s a pain, nearly impossible to switch computers – so having the router installed has been really great as many of you all know how much I like to stay connected. I feel like I finally have some time to catch up on some emails and do some things that I’ve really been needing to do, like prepare for a trip to India this summer to work with Emmanuel Ministries again. Emails and work that have been delayed… starting the catch-up.

Last night I saw an interesting article by one of my fav nyt reporters. Won’t post it here and now. Good article tho..and a good reminder of the need to remain careful with communications to/from this country.

Outside my parents apartment is a little exercise playground with all sorts of fun exercise machines that don’t do much of anything. Well, I guess it’s better than nothing, but my mom and I had a blast playing with those on our way out yesterday. Here are some pics.

the human hamster wheel

side swing

eliptical swing

upright rowing maching