Ok, So It Has Been A While

Well at least this time I have an excuse. First blogger deosn't always work here and second, my computer was down for about 2 weeks. So here goes.

The weekend after Xian I went hiking. It was fairly obvious that I had not been for a hike in a while as it was more challenging then it should have been. We hiked up to see some old parts of The Great Wall, which were pretty cool. I still have not been to the restored areas, so I cannot compare. We had a beautiful day, for the most part anyways. There were a few short periods of snow -- there is often some wierd weather in mountains.

After that the month just flew by. There were some dinners out and some discovery of the local foreigner bars. Then on the 31st we had a Halloween party at school, that was fun-- the kids were too cute. The other teacher in my class and I were in charge of the painting room. This was a good thing since our kids are so young many of the rooms were too difficult for them, but they were able to hang out with us.
Elena
Tyler and I
Ayisha and Laura
Annika and I
Isabella

Justin and Annika (they are good friends)
Annika, she loves to laugh
Ruhi and her brother
Richard (Nemo) and Tyler (Superman)
Richard

Last weekend (Nov 3) I went to the park that is across the street from my apt to see a performance by an Aussie group. The premis that they announced at the begining was that due to the drought in Australia they could not keep their swimming pools full. Thus they had to find a way to replace the 'popular' sport of syncronised swimming. They replaced it with syncronised swinging -- here are some pics -- it was quite funny.
The plan for now is to head out hiking again tomorrow -- I really need to get out of the city and breath some clean air.