Last night, we had one of those moments. I was cooking dinner and glanced out our back window. We live on the sixth floor of our building.
We saw something being set up in the complex across the street from us.
All the neighbors came to watch as they put in water and candles.
Some people pulled out a table and started playing cards.
Then when the sun went down....
The lights came up! Magic!
It got too dark for me to take more pictures of the bride and groom, but there was clapping and cheering and hugging and even a little kissing! The last things is fairly unusual in Chinese culture. It really was fun to watch from a distance.
Then this morning- reality. I woke up around 4AM because I was cold. Really cold. I got up and looked out the window at pitch black-no street lights. Paul told me that he had read a note on the door that the electricity and water would be off for a while. We assumed it was until morning but it was from about 3AM last night until 11 PM tonight.
Our government controlled heat was turned off April 1st (that is another post for another day!) but we have these air conditioning units that can double as kind of space heaters. They really take the chill off and having them off was not good!
Since we can't drink our tap water, we have a water machine. I'm sure there's a better word than water machine but I can't think what it is! We had luke warm instant coffee made with its water. Paul tried to chop some coffee beans with a large butcher knife but alas-no real coffee today.
We bought several big bottles of water to flush our toilets and wrapped up in blankets and sweaters. We went out for dinner and then to a little coffee shop to do homework. There we found almost all of Elisabeth's high school teachers, who also live in our complex! It's a small world after all!
Magic and reality- I guess that is just life!
1 comment:
I love the magical part... and I pray that the reality part goes smoothly. Our heat in Russia is controlled by the government as well. Dress warm!
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