A Good Visit

While Hooters for Christmas dinner was quite exciting, it wasn't the only highlight of H.D. and Jill Reed's visit to Shanghai. Despite Bu Chou's hospital stay occupying a good portion of their visit, we were able to give them a good flavor of our day to day life in China and were also able to do a little sightseeing.

At the end of the visit (which concluded today on Jan 1), they had developed some significant learning's about our life in China:

• Mr. Chen (our driver) and Mae (our housekeeper) rank right up there with Morgan Freeman in "Driving Miss Daisy" and Fraulein Maria.
• No fireworks laws means that every Tom, Dick, and Hong can have a glorious show in his or her backyard or apartment roof. This makes New Year's Eve is REALLY cool - even without the presence of Dick Clark and Ryan Seacrest.
• Traffic laws are merely suggestions (unless there is a police car within plain view).
• 15 people really can fit in a 4' by 4' elevator.
• Brett Favre jerseys can be purchased a LONG way from Green Bay, WI from someone who is convinced that football is played by kicking a black and white round ball.
• $10 boxes of cereal do not come with bars of gold as the prize inside. Despite the extraordinary price, they come with alien decoder rings just like in America.
• One bicycle can hold not only a person, but also a water dispenser, a full size refrigerator, and a washing machine.