Shangri La Hotel....

So it was Brianna's birthday today... and little Cardstons... Happy Birthday to them! The four of us in our apartment woke up real early and blew up some balloons and walked them over to the other apartment with a big Birthday sign and hung it up and threw balloons everywhere for her birthday. That was fun. And we had cake later.

This evening, Abby and I originally had plans to go on a home visit but Aiden's mother invited the seven of us teachers to join her, Tina, and Aiden for dinner. So... because they are so influential at the school we couldn't really refuse even if we wanted to. I don't know why we'd want to. They took us to a five star hotel... it's a famous line all over Asia called The Shangri La Hotel. Maybe you've heard of it :) It was beautiful! and the best part. AH! We got to the restaurant, and it was a Western food buffet. Western food as in, AMERICAN... like Mashed potatoes, sea foods, beef, steaks, fruit, COLD salad, garlic bread, pasta, ICE CREAM! Ummmmm. Yes. Besides, Pizza Hut once and a McDonalds ice cream cone here and there, we haven't eaten Western food since we left for China in January.

Before we started, we decided that it was fair to say that we would probably be uncomforably full by the end of that meal because really, how often do we get that kind of food? ... and it would be an understatement to say, that we were infact all VERY uncomfortably full by the end of our meal. And when it was the end to us, Aiden's mom kept telling us to get more because we still had a half hour to get more food before they closed the buffet, so not wanting to be rude, we did. I've never felt so sick in my entire life. I had a food baby. I felt like there was another human being inside of me. And when I woke up the next morning, I woke up still feeling sick with a food baby. Bluh. Gross. But it was delicious, it really was. Funny though. I don't know why we all reacted that way. We will eat Western food again, and it will be soon enough. But I guess when you're in a foreign country and all you eat is rice, meat and vegetables every day... some good carbs and dairy can do great things for your heart and mind :)

It was so sweet of them to take us out though. It was not cheap taking all 7 of us out to a nice restaurant like that, and they were so generous to do that. It was fun interacting with Aiden outside of class too. He is definitley one of two of the best speakers the ILP program has at Bond and it blows my mind how smart he is at only age 5. He's a cutie.