Birthday Bash All Around Town

My birthday festivities started off with a western breakfast of French toast - my favorite!

Next, we headed to a park to meet up with some others. We chose this park because it was on a Shanghai list of best blossom trees to see right now. Basically, there was a small row of half blossomed trees with scads of people taking pictures. We joined the crowd and chose to laugh at how entirely misleading the articles we read were!

As always, there was dancing. This time I had a very happy and energetic dancing partner!

After dancing we spotted the panda. The man inside was all too happy to stop for a photo. He put his panda head on and made the China sign. It seems I should be shorter than the panda. That was weird. 

Throughout the park were people playing music and singing. This man was playing the most beautiful music from what we think must be a traditional Chinese instrument.

It's incredible how we can be in the biggest city in the world yet find places where it seems relatively quiet. It's rare, especially due to the loud nature of the language spoken here. I'm making a note of this park as one of my favorites for good pollution days! 

We saw countless men playing board and card games someday I will actually remember the names of these games. They must've been playing for high stakes with the crowds they were attracting!

After dancing in one area of the park, of course we had to join in on the stretching in another part of the park!

These men seemed to be challenging one another to who could hold a note the longest. We affectionately called them the Dueling Flutists. If I'd been alone, I may have sat on the bench, pretended to read, and enjoyed the entertainment! 

After the park we made the two hour trek Have I mentioned it's a BIG city!? to another part of the city where we checked out Holland Town.

Few have heard of Holland Town. Blogs and articles written about it were less than appealing, calling it a ghost town. However, being a Dutch gal I had to check it out!

Thankfully, my friends were also curious and up for the adventure!

The dying palm tree, neon Chinese store front, and Dutch architecture was just too much! Where in the world were we!?

It was filled with authentic Dutch architecture. They'd brought in Dutch architects who replicated much of the famous Netherlands feel. Sadly, that's where it ended. It was like a a beautiful city that could have been on the outside of a vast metropolis. 

It got me craving poffertjies and Dutch mess. 

Just in case we were fooled into thinking we were actually in the Netherlands, there's the Chinese sign with the ever typical poor English translation that is ALWAYS good for a laugh!

We took pictures, enjoyed the scenery, pretended we were in Europe, then went on a hunt for food. We came up empty and ended up eating at McDonald's outside the laser tag place! Folks, I've had McDonald's more times since living in China than I have had in the last decade! 

After the nauseating McDonald's food we met up with more fun peeps!

Apparently, in China, you must watch a how-to movie prior to playing laser tag. I told everyone it had to be because there's no guns in China so people don't know how to hold them. Pretty sure all my friends here think I have a truck filled with guns back home. I got a lot of interesting looks when I said, "I stink at laser tag. I'm better with real guns." 

Did I mention we were also celebrating Tchafikah's birthday? Her's was the 16th. We're even the same age. Basically, our friendship was totally meant to be.

"Glow in the Dark Archery", rather, archery with neon lights around us. Semantics, right? We had fun shooting. Is that what you call it?

THEN, we went back to the urine smelling laser tag room. That's where the real fun was! I've never had so much fun playing laser tag and never wanted to shower so badly afterward! 

For our final game we were asked if we'd compete against another group. It was a blast!! The important thing to note? 

We won. 

The most important thing to note?

I was on the winning team all three times. Thank you. 

It was certainly a unique birthday exploring all around the city with new and dear friends! The Lord was so good to bring a group of people from church, work, and trips I've been on to spend the day celebrating with me! 

What a treasure to feel loved while so far away from home.