Happy New Year.....from our students!

The "Senior 1" students of No. 8 High School, Chongqing, China, put on an absolutely wonderful Holiday Show!  They are so very talented!!!  

We had front-row seats!

Enjoy the following photos and videos:

Sweet girls!

Click here to watch one of the many dance routines!

Many of the students take dance and ballet classes.....

Click here to see how athletic and flexible some students are!!

This student, Gemma, wishes to work internationally someday.

Click here to see Gemma's class dance!

Click here to see more of the traditional dance.

Another fun dance routine:  Cheerleaders!

Click here to see the cheerleaders!

There were some talented singers.

Click here to enjoy some singing.

There were some elaborate costumes.

Click here to see another dance routine.

One class did a musical skit about Cinderella, including a guy dressed as a step-sister.  Fun!

These kids stepped "out of the photo" for their dance routine.

Click here to see a dance routine set to American music....very popular here.

Merry Christmas 2010 !!!

Merry Christmas

to all of you, friends and family!!!!  This posting will be in lieu of sending out any kind of Christmas letter or card this year.  Perhaps you have been reading our blog, and are therefore well aware of our 2010 news and happenings!  Life is good!

This is a giant bill-board from a building across the street.  Christmas songs can be heard throughout the shopping complex.  We sing along!

Our biggest news of 2010 is the birth of beautiful Baby Veronica, who is able to communicate regularly with us (in China) via computer skyping. 

This is our teeny-tiny, little, 12-inch-tall, pre-decorated, artificial Christmas tree.....

I take it to all the classes and share it while teaching the students the lyrics to favorite Christmas songs.  Chris is using the season to show the movie:  Polar Express, which has plenty of English conversation, entertainment value, and a great story-line.

Two of our students giggled uncontrollably out in the hallway, as they were (secretly) delivering this surprise Christmas card to our door. 

Most of the students here are absolutely AWESOME !

Christmas oranges, from Qing.....best oranges I've ever tasted!

The Chinese are definitely embracing the idea of Christmas......though probably because of the commercialization of the holiday.  (We will not have even one day of vacation from school, for Christmas.)

**** Do notice the spelling on this banner.  It is VERY common in China to see English words used in greetings, on signs, in menus, on posters, and on clothing, and yet spelled incorrectly......... then duplicated a ba-zillion times, as with this escalator-lined holiday greeting.  Seems to us that, often, the Chinese are far too proud to ask a native English-speaker to proof-read their work for possible mistakes prior to publication.  Fun to photograph!

We are having a great time over here in China, though missing so many of you incredibly!   We wish you all a very

Merry Christmas

and a Happy, Happy, Happy New Year 2011.

Much love to all of you 

from O Ping and O Fei (Paula and Chris Overholtzer)

Chongqing City Life (part 6) Restaurants

You have seen some images of restaurant menu options in China.  Now we'd like to let you know where we REALLY eat in Shapingba District, most of the time......

(Actually, Chris is far more adventurous, and will try nearly everything.  Paula, however, has a "block" against trying certain types of "foods"......... 

A Taste of Singapore

This is actually our favorite restaurant, located on the fifth floor of a shopping mall just across our busy street.  It is owned and operated by a young couple from Singapore, who therefore speak both English and Chinese fluently.  Vicki and Paul have become our friends here.  On Tuesday nights, they provide "Trivia Night", operated in English, and attended by English teachers from England, Ireland, Poland, India, America, and other places (I'm sure.)  My favorite thing on the menu is the (very British) fish-and-chips.  Chris always selects from the wide variety of spicy Asian foods. 

Fish-and Chips.......I usually bring half of it home, for the next day's lunch.

These little gals are always our servers.  Though tipping is uncommon and unexpected here, we plan to tip them each very well at some point......  Special gals, who speak not one word of English!

We rarely patronize Starbuck's.  The prices are American-high.

The signs do, however, remind us of your lives "back in the States."

The Chinese version of Starbuck's

This is our second favorite restaurant, but NOT for the pizza.  This is actually a wonderful BUFFET, with fresh lettuce and tomatoes and "Thousand Island" dressing!!  They have a soft-ice-cream machine, too, with ICE CREAM that tastes exactly like Betty Overholtzer's home-made ice cream of Chris's childhood!  (Just cannot go here very often, due to obesity issues.......)

 We hit McDonald's, especially for breakfast, once-in-awhile.  They play American songs, and do offer coffee refills.  (Other beverage re-fills are non-existent here.) 

Dairy Queen offers only Ice Cream.......... (and banana splits!)

Pizza Hut serves salads and cheesy mashed potatoes.  The problem here is that the portion sizes are teeny-tiny little dabs of food (like one piece of lettuce or a half-filled bowl of soup).  Always a disappointment.

I enjoy wearing my wool poncho from Mexico, on the really cold days.

KFC is very popular in China.  The students here think that Chris looks like "Colonel Sanders"!

Of course, all menus are modified to reflect Chinese preferences.

All these American restaurants do give us options, and keep us from having to eat local favorites, like Rabbit Head Stew.  (Chris couldn't even try this one......)

Chongqing City Life (part 5)

The women here in China are often very, very stylishly dressed.  Here are a couple of photos:

Both of these young women are wearing real furs.

Hiking around this "city of mountains" is a common weekend activity.  One Sunday, we went hiking with Li Senlin and his wife....along with Qing and Melody.   

Li Senlin had also spent one year teaching in the Battle Ground  School District in Washington state, back in 1995.  He is now a well-respected, senior teacher at our school here in Chongqing.

Senlin is a very special person to Barbara and John Rogers of Amboy, WA.

Senlin and his wife treated us to a wonderful meal, and then to a visit to our third Chongqing Hot Spring Resort.

Speaking of "Amboy", we saw this sign on a building one day! 

 We've seen plenty of Chinese kids enjoying YoYo's.   

So, we bought our grandsons, Maverick, Devlin, and Jaxson, yoyo's for Christmas 2010.  (Hope they make it to the States in time!)

Click here to see a neighborhood kid do great yoyo tricks.

A view of the traffic on the street in front of our apartment.......This photo was taken from the cross-over walkway.  Here in China, many times there are walkways over or under the streets, for safety.  

No, everything in China is not beautiful.  But this is functional, anyway.  From our building, we can see the roof-top of the building next door, where these women are sorting garbage, apparently looking for recyclables.  We're glad to know that recycling happens here, anyway!!

Chongqing City Life (part 4) Tea-time with the Buddhist Monk

We spent two Saturdays having Tea with a Buddhist Monk and his entourage..........  Very Interesting.

He was definitely a soft-spoken, peaceful sort of guy.

The Chinese take their tea-drinking very seriously.  We spent both afternoons just conversing and drinking specialty Green Teas.

Tea Ceremony

Cool tea-time characters, over which the hot water is ceremoniously poured

Tea shop.......We visited one (brand-new) building with HUNDREDS of such tea shops!

Tea, for sale in all sorts of packages

Women sorting the TEA

This is the building, built just to house tea shops!

This tea shop featured a tea grown only in the high mountains of TIBET.

On each of our outings with the Buddhist Monk, we spent much time talking with this man, a lawyer and fluent speaker of English.

Some university students joined our group, too.

The students especially wanted to practice their English with us.

We went out to dinner with them.......

.......and visited a city park.

Kids were having great fun in the city park.