City Lights

 

Krista's Birthday Plan...
Plan A: a night out in Hong Kong. 
Depending on: our pocket books.

Plan B (made the week of the birthday): A surprise party on the rooftop of our place. 
Depending on: if Plan A couldn't work due to us being poor and pay-day not coming soon enough. 

Needless to say, we had to go with Plan B!! We were all both poor and pay-day didn't come soon enough. 

  Upon the realization that Plan A was not going to work-out at the beginning of the week I threw out the idea of cleaning up the roof and throwing a surprise party. Of course Patrick took my idea, ran a marathon with it and with his magic planning skills went to work on creating the best birthday celebration I may or may not have ever attended. THe rooftop turned out more beautiful than I had ever imagined! I had thought 'do a sweep, get rid of the broken chairs and rusting bbq.' He took the space and took it from drab to fab in an afternoon with a little help. I have never turned on so many fake tea lights in my life. All of his work was well-worth it when Krista walked onto the rooftop and saw us all standing there wishing her a Happy Birthday with the white tables, bar, music, and city lights behind us. It was hilarious and perfect. We ate, drank and chatted for what seemed like a good long time. The weather was perfect and it was such fun being dressed up and chatting on the roof with the beautiful lights all around us. When it came time we shifted the party to Coco Park where we danced and sang our way into the wee hours of the morning. 

It was a spectacular evening here in Shenzhen!!

Chinese Thanksgiving

Katriena, Myself, Kelly, Emma, Gina

Thanksgiving Means…Family and friends, delicious food and wine, out-door activities, the changing colours of the leaves, scarves and boots, among many other things. It means happiness and togetherness. For all of these reasons I found it a bit tough missing out on the festivities of Homecoming Week-end. This year Thanksgiving dinner was held at my Aunt Sue and Uncle Jack’s house. Although I missed the delicious meal and hilarious and always interesting conversation that the Hooper’s have, my day was made when the entire Hooper Family (well, those present) called me at school yelling “Happy Thanksgiving Kateeeee, We Love and Miss Youuu!!” I love my family and couldn’t help but laugh and tear-up at their beautiful screams. I think they must think that because I’m across the globe they had to yell over skype so that I can hear them. J Because we all missed Thanksgiving here in China we had our own ISNS Family Thanksgiving the next week-end. It was Amazing!! We did a Thanksgiving potluck, we all had to sign-up for something and I couldn’t believe all of the food that arrived on the day of. I signed up for desert…Panamie (the bakery down the street) made a delicious cake for me to bring. I thought this would be easier than trying to cook/bake something in my rusting microwave or on my hot plate.  There turned out to be so much food that we got to have leftovers (my favourite). Of course we ate too much and couldn’t eat desert. So, we saved our pies and had them with tea on the roof the next night. While sitting on our rooftop and enjoying each other’s company I realized, for maybe the 5^th time that day that I am very thankful for all that I have. I am a very lucky girl!

Bug Pasta

Oh, PS: thank goodness we had such a delicious Thanksgiving meal that night, I hadn’t eaten at all that day. This was because when trying to make pasta for lunch uncooked noodles and live bugs came out of the bag that I had just opened….not ok.