新年快乐!

Xīn Nián Kuài Lè! Happy New Year!

We went in town with a friend on New Years Eve, but the lanterns at Yuyuan Gardens were closed. We did see some of the decorations around Yu Bazaar, and had some delicious beef noodles and lamb skewers.

We didn't do much on New Years Day. Just did a long walk in our neighborhood and lunch at Family Mart. This morning we had a special New Year's breakfast at home, and took down the Christmas Tree (which was half Chinese New Year decorations).

Wishing everyone a happy Year of the Pig!

CNY

It has begun.

I had planned to take the Kiddo out to our local pedestrian food street for dinner only to find almost all the restaurants closed for New Year. The actual date of Lunar New Years Day is next Tuesday, February 5, but a lot of businesses, especially small businesses will be closed for up to two weeks around that date.

Chinese schools are mostly on break right now. My school has a week and a half off starting after this Friday. Like most international schools, we do a shorter New Years break because we also do a break around Christmas.

New Year decorations are up all over town. Here are some I photographed at Laowaijie (literally "Foreigner Street"; a pedestrian street of mostly Western restaurants).





















We have no travel plans for the break. I'm hoping we get to do some more sightseeing in Shanghai including this year's lanterns at Yuyuan Gardens, and maybe some new parts of the city we haven't had the chance to explore yet.

Weekly Recap For February 4-10 2018

This was a busy week at the day-job, so I slacked off a lot of my daily goals. I did have a nice day out last weekend checking out the World Expo Museum and the West Bund with the Kiddo and his friend. Today was my school's Chinese New Year party, with a ton of delicious food. We then headed to Yuyuan Bazaar to see the Chinese New Year lanterns, We'll be doing a lot more sightseeing in Shanghai over the next two weeks, so expect to see lots of pictures on Flickr and on Instagram.

I also did a few reviews this week.

Book Reviews on Goodreads

Magic Tree House #23: Twister on Tuesday by Mary Pope Osborne. (3*).

Comic Reviews On Comic A Day

Cecil #1 by Jonathan Todd. (7.5/10).

Supporting

I am supporting Traci Marcovitz with help with student debt.

Looking Ahead

Chinese New Year is coming up this week. We get a week and a half off from work/school. We'll be hosting visitor here in Shanghai for most of that time. We have plans for a lot of local sightseeing. We were at Yuyuan Bazaar today, and I'll be taking the Kiddo to the historical district of Qibao (and the massive Vanke Mall for lunch) tomorrow. We might head back to Yuyuan to see the lanterns at night some evening this week. Our guests arrive next Sunday, and we'll be hitting many of the major Shanghai sights with them: the Bund, the Pearl Tower, the Natural History Museum, People's Square and Tianzifan are all on the list.

We've got the Kiddo's birthday in March, and then April vacation. We're planning to travel somewhere within China in April, but not sure where yet. And we'll be back in the US for parts of June and July.