Alright, friends! We made it to the last day in China, which means my last blog post about it. It was very bittersweet and although I was excited to go home and see my parents and my kitty, I was also very sad to be leaving. Our family members had been so good to us, and I would definitely miss them. We would not be seeing them for a long time again...I guess that's the price of living on two different continents.
Today was our rest day, and would be spent almost entirely at home. We had to pack and get ready to leave early in the morning the next day. I used my time to blog, clean up my living spaces, and arrange everything in my backpack and suitcase. Today was also the only day that I took a nap after lunch, like most Chinese people do for siesta. It was a lovely nap, but the temperature was getting higher and higher throughout these past few days. I was sweating profusely because my grandma felt like it was unnecessary to turn on the apartment's A/C.
In the afternoon, my grandma's youngest sister came over to visit us. She brought us peaches and grapes, and talked with her sister and my aunt for a long time about recent events/news. I helped my aunt prepare these Chinese herbs so that they could be cooked, and then we went out to dinner at a restaurant nearby.
Dinner was, once again, delicious. We ordered so many dishes that I'd never tried before, and it was a memorable last night out with my family members here. My aunt took me and Jason out for a walk after dinner; we got some pastries for breakfast tomorrow morning at a bakery (boy, do I wish we had the vast selection of sweet and savory snacks that they offer there...donuts don't stand a chance when there are such amazing rolls, breads, etc.) and we also grabbed some more snacks to bring home from a chain in China called Lyfen (in Chinese, the name is"let's get a few" or "a few snacks").
It offers rows and rows of little snacks and bites of all different kinds. There's sweet snacks, like jellies, brownies, or cakes, salty snacks like seasoned peas, little black eggs, shrink-wrapped meats, and much more. The main thing that we like to get there are these peeled, sweetened walnuts that are flavored with honey. They're amazing, but you can only really get them in China. My aunt insisted that we get more besides the walnuts, though, and tossed eggs, jellies, and meats in our basket as well. Hmm...I'll let my parents take care of those ones.
Once back at home, we went to bed early. I stayed up for a while and talked with Claire for a while. She's been able to speak with Jason and me entirely in English this time we've gone back, which is super impressive! There's still so much we hadn't talked about and wanted to chat about... unfortunately, we'd just have to rely on WeChat until we see each other again.
Our last dinner in China
Delicious balls filled with black sesame
The bowl of red stuff is sweet congee soup, with little glutinous balls...trust me, it's terrific.
I want macarons topping my cakes from now on.
The rows at Lyfen...snacks beyond your imagination.
Time to go home! We headed to the airport around 5:30 in the morning, after waking up groggily to hug Claire and say goodbye. Once we got to security, we said goodbye to my aunt and uncle, who have seriously had a lot of work dealing with us while we were in China. Thanks for everything! I promise, I'll bring you guys out for a lot of fun when you visit me in LA.
It was a marathon of three flights until we could be back in our beloved Boston.
First: Shanghai --> Beijing (~ 2 hours)
Second: Beijing --> New York (~13 hours)
Third: New York --> Boston (~1 hour)
After suffering through more airplane food, uncomfortable naps, and crying babies, we were finally, FINALLY in our parents' car and speeding towards our sorely missed house. The flights weren't all that bad though...thankfully, none were delayed, Jason and I got a three-seat row to ourselves for the 13 hour stretch, and we had gotten into Boston safe and sound with all of our luggage. Phew. On the way home, I watched the Lego Movie, Saving Mr. Banks, 47 Ronin, and Ride Along. Best way to make 13 hours go by much faster than you'd think: TV, TV, TV.
Well, that just about wraps things up, folks! Hope you've enjoyed reading these. I'm back to the US, which means that these next few days, you will find me thoroughly jet lagged and sleepy, as well as adjusting back to American life and surprisingly missing certain parts of China. In other words: I won't be leaving the house too often...I'm going through a weird phase right now.
Until my next blog post, friends! As always, thanks for stopping by!
Quenching my thirst in New York...almost home!
Boston is as beautiful as we left it.
No comments:
Post a Comment