Heading on Vacation...

We're almost ready to head out the door on vacation to Anshun in Guizhou Province. (See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anshun)  It is the National Day holiday Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday and then they switch the Thursday and Friday workday to Saturday and Sunday so everyone can have a full week vacation.  It sure is a clever idea.  We are taking two vacation days on top of it so we will have 9 days away.

Our pretty Chinese baby

Since we last posted an update Mark has been to the States and back.  He was selected for an "Emerging Leaders" program through his company.  It is a select group of young employees who will be prepped for management positions.  It is a two year program and he is supposed to have three to six in class trainings.  While the training was in Charlotte, NC, his boss was gracious enough to also send him to the Stoughton, MA office so he could visit family and friends.  The weekend he was home also happened to overlap with the Friends of Wompatuck's Landmine Mountain Bike Classic, so it was nice he got to attend that too.  We were the race directors for it last year so that race is close to our hearts.  In Charlotte, NC he got to spend a bunch of time with our good friends Paul and Sarah Priest, so going to Charlotte isn't down time anyway.


The other night the "Owner" (i.e. the guy who is buying the nuclear power plant) held a Spouse Appreciation Dinner for all of the expat employees with spouses.  It was a fun time of games and conversation.  And it was very Chinese.  Hard to explain... but just very culturally different than any party you would go to in the States!  The "owner" is apparently a bit stressed that some expats are not happy and will (or have) left, so they are trying to make us happy with funny things like this.  Mark, LiLi, and I are very happy here though, so this is all bonus!  We love living in rural China and experiencing a culture so different from what we are used to.


We wanted to throw this update up quickly before our vacation so as not to 1) feel guilty, and 2) have too much to update later.  We might even post while vacationing.  We'll see...