Thursday morning we went on a trip to a "small city" called Laixi. Laixi is probably five times as big as Memphis, but they still say it's small. We rode on a comfy bus for about two hours, and then we went inside out hotel to put our stuff down. The hotel was pretty nice, but had no hot water D: and an ugly floor, so we didn't walk around barefoot at all.
We ate at this really pretty hotel right next to ours. It was nicer and the food was awesome. The first good Chinese food I've had the chance to eat since coming here.
Then we went to see a Nestle factory, but we didn't go inside, we just listened to a guy who worked there tell us about it, and how they process milk and cream. Fun. But he wouldn't give us free ice cream.. :(
Then we went to a small school where some 11-13 yr old girls performed very long dances and skits for us, it was really impressive. But we couldn't understand what they said. Then we made the Chinese knots in the picture. Then we went outside to play jump rope and Red Rover.
Later we went to a city square, where a classmate named Jacki and I rented small play-cars for ten minutes and rode around the square honking at people and telling other classmates in play-cars to "Stop! Pull-over!" I wish we could rent those cars in America....After that, we noticed a huge crowd of people and realized they were gathered around two boys from our class and listening to them speak in Chinese and laughing. People were very friendly, but they followed just a little too much. It was kind of creepy.....
Then we went to a KTV place, a karaoke room. There were about 13 of us, we all sang together for about four hours. We sang Michael Jackson, Nsync, and other silly songs.
The next day we went again to another school in a poorer area. We walked through a small neighborhood of houses that seemed to not have toilets. We visited an elementary student's home. It had two rooms, one with a bike and a huge bag of corn that they eat and also sell, and some other things, and then one with a small kitchen right next to a large bed, called a "kang", which means its extrememly hard and heated with pipes underneath somehow.
Then we went back to Qingdao. I think Laixi people were friendlier and more curious. They usually smiled at us, whereas people in Qingdao stare and don't smile.
Last night, one of the tutors, Lulu, took us to see Kungfu Panda at the really nice theater at a mall called Mykal. That movie was awesome! Then she went with us to eat at a Korean restaurant. We had the worst service ever, the waitress didn't seem to know what she was doing, and she burned some of the meat. I think she was really busy though. And the meat was still gooooood. They bring a grill to your table and cook it there and cut it up with scissors. Then you take a leaf of lettuce, put the meat and whatever you want with it, and roll up the lettuce and eat it all. And you have to eat it in one bite, otherwise its rude. That's why Koreans eat with so much food in their mouths, haha! Our service took so long that we were almost late getting back to our dorm.
Today I think I'm just gonna chill, I hurt my knee somehow on the trip, so I can't go shopping today.
