Loose Ends

Leaving for the national week long Chinese New Year Holiday tomorrow, I realize that this will be my last post for a week. I am pleased to report that I believe to have found the perfect hostel for my vacation by recomendation of a friend. The sadder news is that the wheather in China won't be great and large parts of the country still have massive travel problems due to China's inability to cope with a spat of bad wheather (they're calling it the worst national disaster in history - I call it a dusting of snow). I expcet a good trip.

I'm posting the photos from my 'Laser Strike' excursion I went on last month. Its taken a while to get the photo's, but now that I have them, they're worth the wait.

Chinese New Years is like our Christmas festival in most conceivable ways. The entire country is off work, people travel home to be with their family, there is ritualized food, people celibrate with lights (or in China, firecrackers). The office is closing in 1/2 an hour, most people are already gone. I have 5 day off work sandwiched around a weekend - but its not quite that simple. In China, for every holiday you have off work, there is a weekend you must 'make up' the time off. Most of the country did not have last Saturday or Sunday off, as they were working to offset the vacation they were taking for the New Year. It seems silly to me (why not just give people off??), but its the way its done in China. There are lanterns everywhere, and the malls have fake cherry trees in pink foliage out, so the city does look more festive. I'll let you know how celibrating it in Guilin goes.

Last thought - Yes I watched the Patriots game from a bar at 7am, then had to teach 5 classes that afternoon, that was awful.