Dave and Andrea take on China

I am sitting at Pudong Airport waiting for my flight to leave for Berlin and being the cautious traveler that I am, I have nearly 2 hours to go POST-security. That just means plenty of time to catch up on what's been going on the last few weeks. I'll break it up into several posts since there's been a lot.

Ok. So my parents arrived April 16th and we hit the ground running. First priority? The fabric market of course. No not the choice of my mother, in fact she probably thought spending 2 hours in a 3 story cement building packed with wall to wall fabric stalls borderlined on torture (George Bush take note, new method!). No my friends, this outing was the sole pleasure of my Father's (mine too but that goes w/o saying). My Dad was a machine, churning out orders for a sport coat (many pockets , no flaps, good buttons), 5 shirts and 2 pairs of khaki pants. He even managed to get in an order for my mom and me in meantime for a Chinese style jacket. Being a seasoned market-goer and bargainer I managed to get them to their breaking point and even got compliments in my bargaining skills. I wasn't buying the "Your Dad big, more fabric" line. That would be 1 of 3 visits to the market after revisions but in the end I have to say my Dad was looking pretty smart in his new digs. My mom also looked very snappy in her new jacket and I even sensed a little regret that she hadn't been a more willing participant on the first day. Next time!

I also participated in my first running event. The Jinqiao 8K run. While it was by no means an event warranting months of training or feelings of great accomplishment once finished, it certainly was an experience. Most runs of this length in the US have minimal fanfare and are quick arrive-run-go home events. Well the brochure listed "Opening Ceremonies" at 8:30am and the run to start at 10. Opening ceremonies?? How big was this going to be? We got to the starting area around 9 and already there were about 300-400
people lined up in orderly fashion in front of a huge stage doing group stretches and all wearing the exact same shirt and hat and waving flags. Hm...the competition? Not exactly. There were two events that day, an 8k and a 2k. Yes 2 kilometers which is about 1 mile. And it wasn't a walk. For the most part people ran this. They called for that run to start at 9:30 and the entire mass of people left for the start line and were back in about 10 minutes. There were then maybe 200 of us left for the 8k including my 3 friends below. Everything else was pretty much standard besides dealing with the pushers and shovers and people trying to get to the very very front or the people running with the big flags and no regard for those who may be behind them getting whipped as the pass them by. Nonetheless it was a good run around Pudong which is across the river and more of the suburban area of Shanghai. I finished 18th out of 200 females and 270th overall at a time of 38:12. Nowhere near my marathon days but still a fun event to be part of.