March 18, 2018 - Cherry blossoms

This was one of those weeks when we worked more than we played.  Hard to believe, isn't it?  We do try to focus our class preparation in ways that allows us time to explore as much as possible.  But it's early in the semester and we are still busy with getting all the lessons planned - and we gave our first quizzes this week, so the grading begins.

We did receive some unexpected news on Wednesday.  Back in the summer, while in Utah, we were extras for a TV show called "Studio C" which is a weekly family-friendly comedy show.  They aired our segment.  Kathy is one of the mourners and  John is the organist - you almost get a glimpse of him a couple of times, but only if you watch closely.  Anyway, we had fun doing it, even though they edited a lot out (including John's crusty stare at the people disturbing the funeral), and it was a fun surprise to find out it had aired.  It's the first skit of the episode, which has several comedy skits. You can see it at: Studio C Season 8 episode 13

In the "not so fun"  department, another BYU China teacher in Shanghai got appendicitis.  He first went to a traditional Chinese hospital. Decided it wasn't for him and navigated several subway lines with his wife (ouch!) to go to an "international hospital." We didn't see the first one, but when we visited him after surgery we could see that the international hospital was very nice.  While most of the doctors and staff are Chinese, they speak English well.  He had a good experience - if having appendicitis can ever be a good experience.

The biggest surprise of the week was the cherry blossoms.  One street on campus is lined with cherry trees, and apparently is famous enough to attract large crowds of visitors.  We knew we have a beautiful campus, but we were surprised to round the corner of the street and find it restricted to all traffic, including bicycles, because of all the pedestrians.  Mobs of people, most with cameras, out to see the blossoms! 

We found women (and girls) dressed up especially to have pictures
taken among the blossoms.

And there were other flowers in bloom on campus that were also attracting attention!

People pulled small children out
of strollers so they could explore
the blossoms. And get their
pictures taken.

What especially touched us about all this was the appreciation of all these people for the beauties of nature.

Other excitement revolved around cinnamon rolls - an unusual treat in China. Our friends, Jared and Heather Turner, own CinnaSwirl, a cinnamon roll store in Shanghai.  We went to the grand opening of their 2nd store on Friday.  They are located in the basement of a mall at one of the busiest subway stops in Shanghai.  And was it ever busy on Friday!  

Okay, we're used to busy subways, but when we looked down this escalator
and saw this sea of people, we had to take a picture. We haven't seen crowds
this bad since we visited the Terra Cotta Warriors during a national holiday.
The people on the right are riding the escalator down. The people in the middle
are taking stairs down. We are all hoping blissfully that we will be able to
navigate the crowd in the bottom to get to the subway. 

We successfully navigated the subway crowds and made it to the new store.  So open, bright, clean, and colorful with a wonderful smell.  And the rolls are delicious, too! They're based on a family recipe and can be ordered without frosting, or with light, medium, or tremendous amounts of frosting.

Samples! Choices include caramel frosting, walnuts, raisins, etc.

We ended the week with a near tragedy that had a wonderful ending.  John left his phone in a taxi on the way to church.  At the end of the meeting, he had someone who spoke Chinese call the phone, expecting whomever answered would not likely speak English - no answer.  "Find my phone" didn't work because he had changed the SIM card to a China SIM which wasn't registered with Google, etc. So he tried calling again, using Kathy's phone.  Someone answered!  He quickly handed her phone to someone who spoke Chinese.  A man had found it in the taxi, had taken it to his hotel with him, and was waiting for someone to call.  So we went to the hotel and retrieved the phone.  Wonderful! Amazing! A lost phone in a city of nearly 25,000,000 and a happy reuniting!  And a new friend...

Our friend Tammie did not have such a happy ending to the story of her lost phone, and that really was a tragedy. These phones are crucial to our success in navigating subways, finding our way around town, calling taxis, looking up information, contacting our classes (all of our classes are signed up on WeChat, the Chinese social media system that not only lets professors send out documents, etc., to their classes and answer their questions, but also allows us to pay for things by scanning QR codes with our phones). 

On the way home from the hotel, we crossed a river over the Garden Bridge pedestrian bridge right at sunset.  It was a pleasant and beautiful way to end the day and the week!