(no subject)
I'm posting these by going back through my emails and taking out the personal bits. Enjoy!
10/30/05
I just got back from the beach in the small chinese city of Dalian--only a few million people here. We haggled our way to a reasonably priced umbrella and sat down. Today was pretty hot, and the beach was crowded, but we were pretty much the only westerners there. Jack and I quickly learned that the beach slopes into the water really fast. We tried to touch the bottom, but even with goggles you could barely see a foot in front of you. The water got very cold and dark as you went below the surface. It actually scared me to go to the bottom. We then tried bodysurfing, and the waves were perfect for it. After a half hour of trying and only a couple mouhfulls of polluted salt water I had prefected my technique: wait until the water coming in hits the wave and dive rignt in front of it. Put your hands out in front of you (the superman stance) and let them cut the water draining back in from the last wave. The chinese seemed very curious; we were the only ones bodysurfing, and several tried themselvs or started to watch. I think we may have reached immortality on the vacation videotapes of a few chinese beachgoers. The only problems were that the beach was covered with some very pretty but very sharp stones (The beach was called golden pebble beach. My stomach feels very scraped), and every time you messed up your timing you seemed to get a mouthful of very strange water. For some reason, at one point the water smelled strongly of salami. Jack scared me by brushing up against me--I screamed ''aaaaaah, a salami!" but it was still lots of fun. Our taxi driver was very nice about stopping so Dad could take pictures of interesting things we passed. My birthday was low key. We ate outside at the hotel's restaurant--I had curry, Mom and Dad had Thai noodles, and Jack had fajitas. There were 15 stepping stones through a secluded pool/garden in the hotel, so I walked on them and thought of 15 things I liked about myself and 15 things I wanted to do in the next year. Being 15 is pretty cool, because 16 year olds can use the health club at our apartment in shanghai 24 hours a day. Somehow (accidentally on purpose) My birthdate got put down as a year earlier, so they think I'm 16. Good thing because my only excercise has been in the pool because it's so hot outside.
10/30/05
I just got back from the beach in the small chinese city of Dalian--only a few million people here. We haggled our way to a reasonably priced umbrella and sat down. Today was pretty hot, and the beach was crowded, but we were pretty much the only westerners there. Jack and I quickly learned that the beach slopes into the water really fast. We tried to touch the bottom, but even with goggles you could barely see a foot in front of you. The water got very cold and dark as you went below the surface. It actually scared me to go to the bottom. We then tried bodysurfing, and the waves were perfect for it. After a half hour of trying and only a couple mouhfulls of polluted salt water I had prefected my technique: wait until the water coming in hits the wave and dive rignt in front of it. Put your hands out in front of you (the superman stance) and let them cut the water draining back in from the last wave. The chinese seemed very curious; we were the only ones bodysurfing, and several tried themselvs or started to watch. I think we may have reached immortality on the vacation videotapes of a few chinese beachgoers. The only problems were that the beach was covered with some very pretty but very sharp stones (The beach was called golden pebble beach. My stomach feels very scraped), and every time you messed up your timing you seemed to get a mouthful of very strange water. For some reason, at one point the water smelled strongly of salami. Jack scared me by brushing up against me--I screamed ''aaaaaah, a salami!" but it was still lots of fun. Our taxi driver was very nice about stopping so Dad could take pictures of interesting things we passed. My birthday was low key. We ate outside at the hotel's restaurant--I had curry, Mom and Dad had Thai noodles, and Jack had fajitas. There were 15 stepping stones through a secluded pool/garden in the hotel, so I walked on them and thought of 15 things I liked about myself and 15 things I wanted to do in the next year. Being 15 is pretty cool, because 16 year olds can use the health club at our apartment in shanghai 24 hours a day. Somehow (accidentally on purpose) My birthdate got put down as a year earlier, so they think I'm 16. Good thing because my only excercise has been in the pool because it's so hot outside.