We have never seen so many fireworks in our life. They started off and on last week and then came to a climax on Saturday night at midnight. But they have not stopped. Celebration of the new Lunar Year takes time. Something must have been significant about last night because there was another big build up of fireworks going all night long. I am not kidding, it really sounds like you are in the middle of a war. It reminds me of when Brad Pitt travel across Beirut in Spy Games. There I go basing my reality on movies again.

After we were off the mountain, we stopped for lunch at a different hotel. I swore I was speaking good Mandarin but the people there did not understand a word I said. I asked for tea and the lady said, “yes” and then never brought anything. I asked for something else and the same thing happened. Andy reminded me that when we lived in Mexico and we didn’t understand what someone said to us, we often just said, “si” so I figured that was what the wait staff was doing as well. We thought we asked the waitress for the same dish that the table next to us was eating, but instead we got this little ramekin-type dish filled with what looked like fat.

First of all (and the Hoobing’s will love this story), this Chinese woman walked into the room and walked up to the window. I was sitting directly behind the window, so she was about three feet in front of me. The room was very quiet until she started asking (in Chinese) something to the lady at the counter AND farting really loud, for like 30 seconds. I was so shocked at first that I thought it must be her purse rubbing the counter or something. But then, it became clear, both by the sound and the smell that emerged that she was indeed, farting. I was shocked. About five minutes later, after the gas passer had left, this whole dance team of young Chinese girls along with three agents from the consulate came into the room.

While the second day was interrupted with a negative experience, the second to the last day was as well. My mom woke us up with the words, “we’ve been robbed.” Come to find out four Mexican guys had walked into our house and stole two cameras and about $600 (USD) cash. We were stupid to leave the doors unlocked but it is easy to be relaxed about such things when the weather is hot, the beer is cold and the view outside is out of this world. The scariest part of the robbery was that they actually went into my parents room to steal their camera and charger while they were sleeping. We were very lucky that nobody woke up while it was happening. Apparently, it is quite common in that area to get robbed before your last day because they do not think you will do anything about it. Andy did go and file a police report simply for insurance purposes but, of course, it is possible that the police could be in on the whole thing. You never know in Mexico. Luckily the robbers decided not to take Andy’s and my mom’s passports, which had been left out! I guess they only wanted things that were very easy to get rid of.

I found it amazing the fast pace my life instantly whipped back to once arriving in Boise. I had made a concentrated effort not to plan too many engagements before I left China, but it still turned out to be crazy busy. It didn’t help that at work I had so many people to catch up with that it took longer days to get any “real work” done nor did it help that I started two of the three classes I have left towards my MBA while I was there. So now, my goal between now and moving back to Boise is to figure out how to truly slow things down and not have so many things going on all of the time. Talking to my friends and family, they will be no help in figuring this out because everyone else is just as busy, if not busier. What paces we all keep! After a couple of weeks in Boise, I actually started to look forward to going back to China just to have some time.