Fuxing Park and Photo Walk

Last weekend my friend Lindsay and I went on a photo walk. She has just finished taking a photography course and knew of some cool places to go. She is like me in the fact that she likes to just walk around in old town Shanghai and explore the little alley ways where the locals live. It is so interesting to see how they live. Whenever I am out walking I try to get a glimpse into their houses to try and get somewhat of an understanding to the way they live. I had never been successful in getting a local to let me in their house until now! I was taking a picture of a little boy playing in the doorway of his house, and I suppose the grandparents were so thrilled that I thought their grandson was picture worthy that they invited us right in and encouraged us to continue taking pictures. It was very neat. Anyway below are some of the pictures that I took while on this walk.

These two pictures were taken at a temple. These are prayer cards. People write their prayers or words of hope on these cards and then hang them from the trees and this stand. Although most of them were written in Chinese, there were a few written in English.

Obviously this is a picture of a satellite dish, but what is funny is the plastic bottle that is acting as a component to this high tech system. I guarantee they get better tv than we do:)

Here is the picture of the little boy playing in his doorway. He was so cute, but quickly became shy when I started taking his picture.



Two weekends ago we went to Fuxing Park. The parks in Shanghai are great for people watching and also seeing the locals in action. I loved this park. I would say a majority of the people at this park were in their late 50's or older. The great thing is that everywhere you looked people were dancing or singing and having a great time.

Writing with water. We stopped and watched this for a while. Les was talking with someone who told him that they write different philosophical sayings and then sit and ponder the meanings.

Les taking Brycen fishing for the first time. This was a little pond filled with tons of goldfish. Les put the bait on the rod and then Brycen caught the fish and then they made me un-hook the fish...what, why do I get that job?

The "older generation" dancing. They really were having a great time.

Playing Catch Up

I am trying to play catch up with some of the things we have been doing lately.
Les was in Beijing for 2 days and was lucky enough to go to the Great Wall for a few hours. We hate that we didn't get to experience it for the first time together, but such is life. He said it is really cool. He was amazed at how steep it was in some spots but said the views were amazing.

They had this performer at Activity Day at Brycen's school. He was pretty cool. He danced and his mask somehow kept changing colors. He would wave his fan in front of his face and voila....a new color.

Activity day at B's school. Here is Brycen and his friend Kai playing in the water. These two thought it was really funny to throw the soaking wet sponges at me.

Brycen and Les went for a boys days out to the Shanghai X-Games. It was really hot this day, so they didn't last too long, but they had a great time watching all the cool stunts that can be done on a skateboard and rollerblades.