I am loving the Summer Friends Bible Study. The added benefit of the study is that I am making new friends too. The interesting thing about living here is that I meet women from everywhere. The women in our Bible study are from various parts of the US, Singapore, Taiwan, Hong Kong, South Korea, South Africa, and UK. I am learning so much about places I have never been, but the bottom line is… we are all connected through our faith and the universal issues of women in general.
After Bible study on Wednesday morning, some of the ladies were going out to lunch and invited me along. The group consisted of Lisa, a doctor from Shanghai that has been in Minnesota for the last 20 years, and recently has returned to Shanghai to practice medicine here. We also had Tracy from Hong Kong, Jenny from Colorado, Jacqueline from Taiwan, and Kye (pronounced Kay), from South Korea. And me, the lone Texan… which they always want me to talk as they seem to think I have an cute accent. ME???
Jacqueline has a car and driver which opened the opportunities for lunch tremendously. We ended up at Din Tai Fung Chinese restaurant in the Super Brands Mall. I was a little nervous about what we would be ordering, but most of the women did not care for strange ingredients or organ meats either, so all would be ok. We ordered a ton a food and I loved everything we ordered.
The yummiest of all were the chicken dumplings. There is a sauce that you need to make to eat on the dumpling. Jacqueline demonstrated how to concoct this sauce… slivers of ginger, Chinese vinegar, soy sauce and a red chili sauce mixed together. The dumpling has the meat center and a juicy broth. So this really hot dumpling is put in the little bowl and you puncture it to let out the steam. Then top with the concoction and pop it in your mouth. Oh my… it was delicious! What a wonderful burst of flavor!! We ended up ordering more of those little babies.
It was great being able to order a variety of food so that I could try a lot of dishes without having to commit a whole meal to one item. We had several Shanghai signature dishes which were wonderful too. We had spicy noodles, fried rice, pork buns, 2 kinds of dumplings, 2 kinds of vegetables and a couple of other things. We sat there and ate and talked and just enjoyed the company.
I was sad to see it come to an end, but the servers were getting impatient. I cannot imagine why, we had only been there for 3 ½ hours! So we paid our bill, which by the way was 110 RMB each… only $17.00 USD. This was so much food, better than a feast and cost so little!
Back out in the mall, Jacqueline and Jenny went shopping and the rest of us headed to the subway. Kye, as it turns out, lives in the apartments right across from ours. So she and I headed one direction and Lisa headed the opposite. Tracy lived close to the Mall and went home. What a fun day!
Thursday, July 7, 2011
But Jenny and I were only going across the street to the Dragon Fly for 60 minutes of heaven with a foot massage. Jenny had had a foot massage somewhere else and she had not enjoyed it at all. So it became my mission to introduce her to the Dragon Fly experience!
Sixty minutes later we emerged from the darkness and sounds of dribbling water in to the daylight of reality completely relaxed. Even though her first experience had been terrible… she was reformed after this tranquil spa experience. Success!!
Jenny lives on the opposite side of Pudong so she was interested in exploring Jin Qiao. She came along on my visit to the Carrefour, which turned out to be her first time in one. She was taken back at the size and the offerings in the wet market area of the store. The same area my own kids were amazed by. But she survived the visit.
We shared a cab as far as our apartment, and then she was on to her own. It was almost 5:00pm so giving up the cab would be a huge mistake. Another wonderful day with new friends…
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