Christmassy Happenings 圣诞节快到了

(singing practice at school)

(pet shop in the underground market)

(lady selling turtles...or some kind of amphibian)

（Frances stringing ornaments [baubles in British English] onto some tinsel)

(the little 10yuan tree that I bought for her house, what would Christmas be without a tree?)

This weekend it was all about the Christmas-ness. On Saturday Frances (pictured above on the sofa) and I went into a "posher" part of Chongqing to find Christmas decorations. Thankfully she knew about a particular wholesale market that sold Christmas decorations. We made an afternoon of perusing the stalls that were loaded with Santa suits, ornaments, tinsel, snowmen, snowflakes, fake snow, and plastic trees. How strange that China doesn't celebrate Christmas but they have all these fantastical deocrations for we foreign folk to utilize! Restaurants buy the decorations I think, because those are the only places I see decorations.

Everything was amazlingly cheap. Bargain bargain bargain! Haggle haggle haggle! The shopkeepers would always name an enormously exaggerated price. Then our job was to name a rediculously low price. They refuse. We up the price a bit. Then hold out until they finally agree.

With that we bought: tinsel, a little tree, several ornaments (ball form), and colored Christmas lights (fairy lights as they call them in the U.K.).

Sunday Frances and I braved the crowds (on any given Sunday there's a crowd) to do what little Christmas shopping we could. I love Christmas shopping. It reminded me of Christmas shopping for my family and friends when I am home. However, this time I just flew by the seat of my pants (usually I make a Christmas list) because China has such unordinary things I just decided to buy those. Some of the pictures above are some of the sights I saw while shopping around.

Later in the evening I returned to school to practice singing with my class. Today we have a "harmony singing" (literally translated) competition. I am to sing a few solo lines! Wish me luck! (I will definitely update you guys on that). My class found it hilarious that I was taking pictures of our class president leading us. She is the one waving her hands trying to keep time to the music. I will be singing part of our school's anthem!