Lost about what to write today.  Funny how it works.  I can be on a bus and think of a mazillion things, but as soon as I walk in the door – whoop – there it goes. 

Mr. Hot Stuff and I ventured out on the #13 bus on Saturday to Trust Mart (think Chinese Walmart, they are owned by Walmart also).  Big store, similar prices to here in Clifford, but with a much bigger selection.  We bought the most delicious bread there! Best we’ve had since coming here.  I think it is also sold at our wet market by the hospital also.  I will have to look for it.

Our Maxtor Data Storage Device for our computer is nearly dead.  Don’t buy this brand – now we discover that they break really easily – grr.  All of our music files are stored on that thing.  We brought almost no CDs with us, just digital files on that storage device, so we need to figure out how to get that off of there.  I think it has most of our photo files as well.  grr.

This last Sunday, everyone came back to our branch for the school year.  There are several private school teachers in our branch as well as the ones BYU sends over to the Guangzhou International Language College.  Almost all the seats were full during Sacrament Meeting.  Very cool.  I’m really impressed with the way our branch president, Pres. S., works with this branch.  He is really sensitive and respectful of the various levels of church experience and all the different cultures represented in our branch.  Next week some of our family will have new callings, but you’ll just have to wait to find out. 🙂

There is nothing quite like the smell of the crowded buses at 5:00 p.m. after a hot day.  I’m told the temperatures get quite pleasant by the end of the month.  I sure hope so.

The other day we received our shelves and some cupboards. Yea!  We unpacked almost all the rest of the boxes, flattened the boxes and put them out by the recycle bin on the road.  The grounds workers (gardeners and sweepers, etc.) swarmed to them like ants to a picnic.  I’m guessing the cardboard can be turned in somewhere for money.  It was quite the sight.

In Clifford Estates, the street/grounds crew wear blue, but in the city they wear purple and orange.  I can almost hear some mothers telling their children, “Now if you don’t want to wear purple and orange the rest of your life, you’d better work hard in school.”  The colors alone are powerful motivation. Yikes.

Miss S. has locked horns with her science teacher.  He gives an assignment and she asks a lot of specific questions to clarify what the expectations are. If she thinks something is unreasonable, she doesn’t hesitate to question it.  He gets very frustrated and starts raising his voice to the class.  I’m not sure how to help her with this situation, the questions she asks are the same questions I would be asking if I were there.  She has little to no respect for a teacher who is inconsistent and will proclaim to the class, “I lie, too bad.  So sue me.”  It understandably shuts down the learning process for her.  It is further exacerbated by her feeling that he is not spending any time actually teaching the class.  Happily, she really loves her economics and English teacher (same person for both classes) and her P.E. class is doing dance for the semester.  Miss S. also stays after school to practice with the volleyball team.  She doesn’t think she’ll make the team, but she enjoys the game and physical activity so she will continue to attend practices anyway.

Mr. J. seems to be managing all right at school.  He’s pretty easy-going and tends to keep a low profile.  He does his homework and is friendly.  Some of the other boys are a little amazed that he doesn’t have any video games or watch T.V. but they have gotten over the shock of it and are mostly friendly to him. (One of the boys on the bus is a huge potty mouth, but Mr. J. is good at ignoring – or seeming to ignore – so the fun-shock-value has kind of worn off for the obnoxious behavior and it has eased up, I think.  I hope so, Miss S. has been tempted to give the kid a black eye. Not helpful.)

We went to a BBQ at a friend’s house down the street on Sunday.  The daughter is in the same grade as Mr. J. and they attend the same school, where her mother is a teacher.  It was a nice evening.

Time to hang some more laundry out.