Meet Wuhan

Fried bananas with chocolate sauce!

Well folks, the time has come. I am in Wuhan. Chelsie picked me up from the airport and escorted me to the new apartment, which is actually pretty cute. I think it won't be bad at all to live here for a month and a half, except for the alone part and the squat toilet part. Those might be rough. After we got dumplings for lunch we went to snack street and the Yangtze River. This was quite the experience. I am accumulating several little presents to send home because they are so dang cheap and awesome. Along the street that is, in fact, snack street there were numerous goodies to be had......

Chuan (sounds like chwar)...meat on a stick = spicy

I took this picture mostly because I think Cody will appreciate tiger tattoo man :)

After perusing snack street for a little bit, we walked down to the river. Although the water pretty much looked like watery mud, it was a pretty view of the city across the river. People were swimming in the water and people were bathing their dogs in it too. Babies and old people alike were enjoying their time in this filthy water. An old man pointed at my watch and said a whole lot of Chinese that I didn't understand. He was very persistent in pointing at it, so I assumed he wanted to know what time it was. I told (actually signed) to him that it was 6. After that he kept looking at it rather intently so I'm not sure if he was asking what time it was, or if he could buy it......

All those people were either swimming or wading in the water

Happy baby splashing!

I particularly appreciate the confidence with which this rotund, speedo-clad gentleman stands, don't you?

Another thing that Chelsie informed me of that I simply love is that if a dog here has white fur, you can pretty much count on it being dyed some color. I found this hard to believe until I saw it with my very own eyes:

Also, toy poodles are the dog of choice here in China. I can not respect that, but I can appreciate pink paws and ears. Keepin' it classy, China. 

Today was a good day. I think Chelsie and I both really enjoyed having somebody to talk to, since we've both been living alone for a while now - Chelsie much longer than me. It's nice just to know that there's another living breathing human being in the other room, even if we aren't talking and we're both just updating our blogs. It's a nice feeling.