Tag Archives: fish

Happy Birthday Andy

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Today March 24th, Andy Zorn would be 32… Happy Birthday, son.

A few images that are great memories of him. Love you kiddo.

He was the life of the party, red headed, green eyed and always into something. A fabulous fisherman, he could out fish the lot. He was a wonderful son and a great friend. Missing you on your day.

You are gone, never forgotten.
Life goes on, so live it well, it could end at any time.
Go for the gusto, travel, meet new people, listen and help others.
Be KIND.

Wish you were here I’d take you out to the Great Barrier Reef and let you snorkel and eat a lobster.

Pondering the past, the gift is the present

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October 1, 2010

I wonder does he ever think about me, worry about my welfare, wish he was here with me, why did he do what he did to cause all this?  I don’t know.  He is so far from me now, in another world and I ponder over these things on occasion.  Do I hear from him?  Some.  It’s just a facade;  he never opens the door, walks in, sits down and talks one to one.  Did he ever really talk to me?  I don’t remember.  It is all a haze now like my morning view of the city.  I see the buildings but I don’t know what they are, like him.  Who was this man beyond the exterior?  I have learned the “one thing” is living your life in the moment.  I am stuck in the past, thinking like this.  It’s over, move on I tell myself, live life today, the present.  Someone said the present is a gift.  Looking out my window I see my gift a vast life to explore.  I see a five story pagoda on a little hill it keeps calling me to come visit.  A tear trickles down my eye.  Today I miss what I didn’t have with you.  It was a beautiful dream which floated away in a cloud.

A hot cup of honeysuckle tea, music drifting from my downstairs stereo with songs about the story of her life sounds like mine.  Alice gave me this CD by Deana Carter.  I enjoy the Sheryl Crow like melody.  It gives me a lift, makes me smile.  Alice and Sawyer will be coming by in an hour.  They are going to help me translate the Chinese characters on my TV remotes.  They are the best adopted Chinese children a mom could ask for.  They take care of me, like Sam, Casey, Randy and Andy do.  They fix things I can’t.  Sawyer gave me a T-shirt yesterday with a guy fishing in a boat with sharks swimming around.  “Big fish?” and “Exploring Unknown Worlds” are printed on it.  Sawyer likes fish, like my boys so this is something he got just for me and in blue, my favorite color.  Love, you find it everywhere, just look.   The gifts of the present and living life in the moment are my treasure.

Faculty dinner and the back door

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The high school had a lovely dinner for all the new teachers, IB and the public school teachers the other night at a very nice restaurant.  One fun tradition was lifting your wine glass and cheering, each table would walk around and cheer you, then your table would stand up, walk to each table, toast and cling each glass.  We had six large tables of twelve each so it took some time.  The food was served with appetizers first, some vegetarian dishes, red wine and some kind of boxed booze, everyone said stay clear of that stuff.  It was 45% must be an “Ever Clear!”  Dinner was many dishes of meat, whole fish, a bowl of guts in a sauce, BBQ beef, pork and chicken.  All my meat eating western friends, did enjoy these dishes.  John and I waited patiently for the vegetarian food and it finally did arrive, but to our surprise was in chicken broth.  We just gave in and dipped out the mushrooms and set them on our plate and ate them.  We had a bowl of steamed weeds, that is the best description I can give.  John liked them, I could hardly get them down.  Reminded me of the seaweed soup I had the other day.  Every time I took a sip, smelled like fish and  just couldn’t eat it.  Melons came and we all enjoyed that.  Someone set off a major fireworks display on the front door of the restaurant, causing me to jump and check it out.  WOW this was spectacular and right on the sidewalk.  My sons would have loved this and gone outside to see the action.

My school has a back door entrance, mainly an exit to purchase food from the local street vendors, but you can see all kinds of activates, from men playing checkers, to ladies washing children and vegetables, to many types of food for sale.  I’ve had Thai food, steamed dough dumplings with different fillings pronounced bowser, milk chai tea and fresh fruit.

Coming back in from an excursion on the back street to the high school grounds, one finds serenity and peacefulness.  Yes, this high school has lovely gardens and a stream with fish.  It has many multistory dorms, for those students who come from a long distance to school.  Many buildings are open air including our teaching facilities.   It is a wonderful campus.

I sometimes like to stand by the stream and look at the fish or listen to the waterfall.  It is so calming and makes me realize how relaxing this is for my overtaxed, multitasking American brain.  Yesterday in the corridors of the first floor, students were learning Karate.  The master teacher was so fluid in his high kicks showing them how far and hard he wants them to kick.  Partnered up, one student would kick and the other held a padded hand paddle to kick too.  They would kick and laugh trying to get their feet up in the higher pose.  Each day is so delightful.

I saw a UFO!

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I saw a UFO night before last!  Walking back to the hotel about 9pm looked up and this set of green lights in a semi-circular pattern were flashing on and off.  It was hovering around and then would change the light pattern into a triangle.  I saw the hotel guard and signaled for him to see it.  He agreed “UFO”– universal word, as he spoke no English.  Other people walked up and some showed me on their English/Chinese hand held computer translator they thought it was a kite or a helicopter.  NO way Jose, this is a UFO.  It was higher than the skyscrapers and just floated around, maybe twenty minutes.  I went to my room and tried to photograph it but can’t seem to get the shutter to stay open long enough.  Need to read up on time exposures  in my Nikon book!  Alas no proof, darn!

Woke up to a Chinese cooking TV show this morning.  Ok sauté some garlic, add some chili powder and water, looks like soup we are making, um.  Now the main ingredient oh my gosh it is a fish head!  They sprinkle it with a dark vinegar (No  soy sauce is used here at all!  Surprise, that must be a Japanese custom) and fry it.  Then plop that head in the soup and add some fresh eggplant, tomatoes, green beans with a corn starch thickener.  Ok I am going to pass on cooking or eating this!

Infomercials are here too. I saw one for buying uncirculated Chinese yuan, probably proofs.  Another was a rubber set of breasts with a hole in them to increase your bust size, yet still have nipplies and the last was a Blender-Boiler to make hot soy milk!  My favorite TV show is the Spanish Bull fights translated into Chinese!  I’ve never really seen a bull fight — so this has been a new education, watching the matador get pierced in the leg by a bull’s horn.  He tries to save face and not look like he is dying from severe agony and continues to hobble and coax the bull to ram his cloak.  I think the Chinese like “blood and guts” on TV.  I saw a news show with a child that was backed over by a car and the driver just didn’t see him.  He then proceeded to drive forward, hit him again, open the door jump out then the car rolls back over the kid.  What a mess, I never could figure out if the child survived.  In America we just wouldn’t see all the gory details.

Walking toward the back entrance of the University I meandered by a sweet little pond, with huge red-orange goldfish.  I heard the sweetest melody, someone is singing a Chinese opera song.  I saw a very old gray haired lady just strolling around the pond singing I guess to the fish.  I was transposed and couldn’t move.   She looked up, saw me, smiled and kept on singing.  What a charming moment in time!  Walking on, I come to a tunnel with a ten inch thick cement door.  Ok now what is this?  I walk in and see the  light at the end of the tunnel.  (Spiritually I am looking  to see the light at the end of my tunnel!)  As I walk though, I realize it might have been a bomb shelter, damp, dank, with exposed wires running the length of it for lights and a trench on the sides collecting water and what ever else is wet and smelly.

Leave the tunnel, and hop on a taxi.  Today it is sunny and I notice my cab driver has on a short sleeve T shirt with pull on sleeves he has added that tie at the wrist and upper arm, plus white gloves.  Well this is an interesting fashion statement!  Later I learn that the Chinese want to stay light complexed  and I am wearing a tank top to get what little bit of direct sun I can find to tan. We have the windows down even in the heat, and we drive past men pulling carts with piles of Styrofoam packing pieces, one with used cardboard boxes flattened and tied down, and another with old lumber pieces bouncing around.  All of this looks like trash to me, but may be someones treasures, I don’t know.  I see a biker with twenty or so helium brightly colored balloons, maybe he is going to the hospital down the road.  Another man is walking balancing two large bowlfuls of fruit on ropes with a stick across his neck.  Then out of the blue we stop at a red light and I hear this god-awful coughing up and hocking of a loogie right next to my window.  Seems this is quite accepted and I hear and see this many times a day.  The thing is, don’t step on it when walking!  Another reason to leave your shoes at the door of your home.

A lesson in math for Texas 5th graders!

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Nan Shu Foo Zong is the name of the school I teach at.  This is the IB area.  The hallways are open air and we are up 100 stairs!  No elevator.

My colleagues at their desks working, or napping.  Lunch is one and half hours, so a “siesta” is accepted at lunch time.  My Tex-Mex language seems to pop up when I am trying to speak in Chinese.  the other day I asked for water and said “Agua Por favor!”  and someone commented was that a dialect of English, yeah if you are in Texas!  No it is Spanish and I am speaking it here and no one understands Spanish, nor my choppy Chinese.

My desk is right behind Peter, my Aussie colleague.  Looking out the window from our office you can see a wonderful highrise, that is my apartment complex.  I will be moving soon, this makes me very excited.  It will be a short walk to and from  school, no more taxi’s and city buses to school.  It will cut down on expense, the bus is 2 RMB and taxi is 14RMB.  How much is that in dollars?   A lesson on money:

The yuan (sign: 元; code: CNY) is, in the Chinese language, the base unit of a number of modern Chinese currencies. The distinction between yuan and renminbi (RMB) is analogous to that between the pound and sterling; the pound (yuan) is the unit of account while sterling (renminbi) is the actual currency.

A yuán (元) is also known colloquially as a kuài (块 – “piece”). One yuán is divided into 10 jiǎo (角) or colloquially máo (毛 – “feather”). One jiǎois divided into 10 fēn (分).

This is what I had in my purse.  If 6.7 yuan = 1 US dollars.  Can some one tell me how much yuan I have?  The large coins are 1 yuan each, the gold is .5 yuan and the tiny coin is .10 yuan.  IF you can add it up correctly I will send you a Chinese post card!  Why am I giving you a math lesson, because my friend Linda in Friendswood told me she has given my blog site to her friend who teaches 5th grade.  These students are reading my blog and learning about the culture for their English class.  I thought to keep them interested I would do some teaching from across the world to them!

Yesterday I taught the Chinese IB faculty about my life through a power point presentation.  I gave a show about my family, Thanksgiving and how we pray and eat, Christmas, a craw fish boil in Austin, going on vacation to Taos and the Native American Pueblo, Tahoe, Galveston, Wimberly, San Fransisco, and Durango.  I had pictures of pets, snow, my backyard and art studio.  Many of this was very foreign to my new colleagues.  The comments that I received in my email from the TOK teacher are this:

Susan,

Thanks a lot for the presentation, nice. What I found most amazing is :

1.  the muddy houses    very very simlar to the ones where people in Shan Xi province used to live. The only difference is ours are cave-like houses. But mud.

2. the claw fish   that’s almost the answer why you like Nanjing without knowing it. People in Nanjing are crazy about claw fish and it’s almost a scence in summer.
One table with a big bowl of claw fish, some people sitting around the table…

3. Budda

I can’t believe it.

One thing I am learning is we are all the same, but different.  The next thing I am learning is a good teacher is always a student.  This student (art teacher) is learning more than her little Rolodex brain can hold.  I feel like it is spinning and information cards are flying out.  Anyone still have a Rolodex?  Does this tell how old I am or just that I have an antique vocabulary.

Speaking of antiques, I made mention to Jonathan (British colleague that has lived here six years) I can’t find very many old architectural buildings or antiques shops.  He told me the Chinese government had the people destroy all the old artifacts years ago and much of the old architecture is destroyed for newer buildings.  I’ve seen more Asian jade art in the Crow Museum in Dallas than I have found here.  I will keep looking, it has to be here.  Religion is non existent.  I have seen the Buddhist temple, no Buddhist tho and one Catholic church.  In Texas there is a Baptist church on every corner like McDonald’s!  My new Chinese friends don’t practice religion, that I can tell.  School will meet this and next Sunday for regular classes. (Remember we have a funky holiday next week and we work weekends for the weekdays off)  I will have to Google my church in Dallas to read what is going on, and listen to the podcast to get my religion fix or go to the Buddhist temple and light incense and say a prayer.  That is a nice way to pray.  I will let the wind carry my prayers in the smoke from my incense to God.  Like I said all the same, but different.