Celebrating the 4th of July in a foreign country isn't exactly like spending a day at the lake. We did however have a cook-out, kind of, and someone graciously set off a very long string of firecrackers in front of our building (in our honor I'm sure!) The day was really great and somewhat typical, but some really great things happened today as well.
For starters our old friends Eric and Kara arrived in Nanchang this morning along with several college students to spend a couple of days revisiting the city. Eric lived in Nanchang and worked for ELIC back when Matt and I were here and he was also in our wedding; his wife Kara also worked for ELIC in another city and so we were friends with her as well. It was sooo great to see them again.
Later in the morning I met up with my friend Dora and we went to meet the new landlord. That's right, the new landlord! Because we have a new apartment. Matt met up with us and after we haggled for new mattresses, read and tweeked the contract we signed it and paid the deposit! We are so excited to move into our new place on August 1st!
Once Gracie got up from her nap we decided we should go shopping for the party we held tonight. Once we arrived at the foreign market we discovered that for the first time ever there was no ground beef - not good when you are planning to grill burgers! Fortunately there were imported frozen patties from Australia at about 3 times the price so we loaded them into our buggy along with all the fixins for scruptious burgers. We also had potato salad, baked beans. and an assortment of chips. Oh, and cookies!
On the way home from the store we had a very chatty driver which we really enjoy, but the ride home was full of all kinds of excitement. About half way home we came up on an accident - a car and a motorcycle had collided and the motorcycle didn't fare too well. It's driver was sitting on the ground about 5 feet about from the mangled bike. The car suffered a hole to the window where I suspect the motorcycle or it's driver hit. This is a common occurance, but always disturbing. Thankfully the man didn't seem critically injured - amazingly! Driving on we thought we'd be home soon, but our driver decided to pull over to run an arrand. We were trying to tell him we couldn't wait because we had meat and no time. He didn't listen - he just insured us it would only take half a minute. A minute later he came back to the car and we were on our way again. So funny!
Back home I started putting groceries away and then Matt got a call from our friend Yao who works at the train station. Our friends were having trouble getting train tickets because they were all sold out, but Yao had called on all his resources and came up with the tickets and Matt had to go immediately and buy them (well Eric had to buy them) which left me with Grace and a lot of food to prepare. Already 4:30 I knew we wouldn't make our 6:00 mealtime... but we were thankful the tickets had been provided!
The best part of our cooking experience was Matt trying to cook on the grill when he got home. A charcoal grill, which he has never used, cannot be lit and ready. He learned that the hard way, so after an hour of trying to get it started and burning right he finally gave up and came in to cook the burgers in a skillet 3 at a time. So everyone ate in shifts. It was yummy and thankfully everyone seemed to enjoy just hanging out. (The grill was burning hot by the time we were finished eating!)
When half the people were ready to leave a Chinese friend asked if we were going to sing the National Anthem. So we did, very terribly! It was awesome.
Happy 4th everybody! God Bless America.
