Weekend Adventures

So last weekend we rode the bus over to Walking Street. It's a large, cheap shopping area in more downtown Zhongshan. Sorry, no photos.

We mostly went to take a look around and see what was there. It was also our first real experience with other people's reactions to us. While walking around, a man with a chocolate stall gave us all a free piece of chocolate. And people sneak pictures of us all the time. It's always funny to catch them and then pose for them so they know you saw :)

When we were done looking at the shopping we stopped for some ice cream at a stall Christina remembered. She talked to the owner while we ate our ice cream. The next thing we knew, there were 10 people taking pictures of us eating our ice cream. My favorite was the mom taking a picture of her husband and son, but I could tell I was in the picture too. When they realized I noticed, the husband and son just came over to pose with me for the photo instead :)

The bus was kind of confusing because you pay when you get on going one way, but you pay when you get off going the other way... Luckily we figured it out without too much of a scene and a nice English-speaking man helped.

This weekend we decided to climb up to a pagoda we could see on the hill from the bus. When we started looking for how to get up, we discovered it was actually in a large park. Where we first went in was a big rose garden.

It took us a little while, and some thinking we were going the wrong way, but we finally made it to the pagoda! And we could even climb up to the top :)

View from the top!

Once we were done there, we went down a different way and discovered a big grassy area with a bunch of families hanging out. From there, the park just kept going. There were amusement rides, two big ponds, a zoo you could pay to go in... And by the time we found an exit, we were no where near where we went in.

Zodiac animal fountain!
With the addition of a phoenix to the right.
And you can see the pagoda in the back.

While wandering around we saw the same group of guys twice. When they saw us a third time they finally got up the courage to ask to take a picture with us :) I just wish we'd gotten a copy on one of our cameras too.

After we got out of the park we took a bus to Nanlang. Nanlang is where Christina taught last year and where Korrin will be going in February. On the bus we saw a dad and little girl we recognized from the park. The little girl had been too scared to talk to us :)

In Nanlang Christina showed us around a bit and then we ate street barbecue for dinner. There's just a bunch of stalls set up on the road with different meat and vegetables on sticks. You choose what you want and then they cook it up for you. It was yummy! (Once again no pictures because the camera was full and I didn't think to use my phone until later...)

Here are a few more pictures of the park:

Koi fish!
Sorry, don't know how to flip the image...