Shopping Frenzy

Marie and I met up with two of the TAs, Arwen and Shei Shei this morning at the "zoo" market somewhere far from where we live. It is this gigantic shopping area where every seller has their own tiny stall packed in with as many things as possible! Think Portland's Saturday Market with no breathing room. Only Marie ended victoriously with a few scarves from our first stop of the day.

Next, we went underground to another packed shopping center. I can't even estimate how big it was and there were hundreds and hundreds of stalls with people selling everything from jeans to knock off hand bags and tons of jewelry and shoes. We spent the rest of the morning there until we got hungry. We went across the street to a delicious kongi restaurant. Kongi is a type of porridge here, which is rice and smashed vegetables all mixed together. It reminded me of baby food, but it was still very good.

After some bathroom craziness where I dropped my phone in the toilet (Hey, I guess my skill of dropping electronic things into toilets extends across continents and not just at Namanu Outdoor School) we went back to the underground shopping. I bought my sister a pink scarf with giraffes printed on it and a much needed watch for myself.

The phone, luckily, continued to work after some drying out and massive applications of santatizer!

We then took a bus to HaoHie, a touristy destination frequented by lots of tourists. It's a person-made lake that has shops and restaurants all around it. I knew we were in a good spot when "Shorty Fire Burning on the Dance Floor" welcomed us to the site. We windowed shopped around the lake and then ended up in a beautiful Hutong neighborhood where Shei Shei excitedly introduced me to my first serving of traditional Chinese yogurt and cheese from a little Hutong shop. It looks a lot different then any kind of dairy product from the states but it was very yummy.

Eventually, Shei Shei and Arwen went home and Marie took me to a Carefour store a subway station from our neighborhood where we nerded out and bought a bunch of school supplies since EF barely gives its teacher pencils!