Varsity Basketball

As some of you already know, Adam has been coaching the high school boys basketball team this year. He helped out last year and really enjoyed the whole season. One of the ways that they often practice is through scrimmaging the teachers on staff who like to play basketball. The day before the team left for their tournament in Wuhan, they invited the whole school to come watch their scrimmage--they had some half-time activities and music playing, and concessions. Someone kept score, and someone kept stats. It was almost like an official high school game, which we see nothing of usually--complete with an honorary "coach" and a mascot (a girl on student council dressed up in a tiger costume). Even though it was very late notice, quite a few people associated with our school showed up. It was fun to see elementary and middle school students watching the game, as well as high schoolers taking a break from their mountains of homework. Parents, families, and teachers, with a few other random folks showed up for the event. It was a lot of fun--and I hope it happens again in the future!

Right now, the basketball team is in Wuhan. I had a call from Adam who informed me that they lost 3 of their four games today. I guess they suffered several injuries and were not really able to play their best until the very end. That's how it goes at these tournaments, though. There's so much pressure to play well. In one sense it's a great opportunity for all the schools in our company to get together and compete against each other. But it is unfortunate that the students don't receive more opportunities to play in official matches. There's another day of competition ahead for them. I hope that they have lots of fun!

In other news, I miss Adam! I like having the house to myself, but life isn't as fun when Adam is gone.

Ok, it was really hard to take pictures in this gym--but I did manage to get a few cool shots. Sadly, they are of the students playing so I can't share them here.

Some of our loyal teachers who gave the high school boys some hard competition.

Taking a rest...warming the bench.

There goes Adam! He's so fast and can jump so high! That's one of the first things I noticed about him, back in the day. Haha. Well, I think age might be catching up with him a little. He feels the strain a bit more these days.

My fun baby friend! She loves to yell--and this was the perfect place to use her lungs!

More teacher friends! I love these girls!

This gym, in case you were wondering, does not belong to our school. It is located in our apartment complex in the "Club for the Elite". It has a swimming pool and fitness area as well. Sometimes the school rents the gym for practices, since it is far too cold to practice outside during the winter in Shenyang.

Here is the "coach" with another cute baby.

Afterwards, the team wanted to go our for kao rou, also known as Korean Barbeque. Basically, you order plates of meat, and vegetables too, but mostly meat--and grill it over hot coals on your table. The best part is the peanut sauce they give you---lots of garlic and onions and ginger. Yum. Sometimes we order "ban fan" which is the Chinese version of Korea's "pancheon". It's rice with lots of veggies and an egg on top. I like it because of the spicy Korean barbeque sauce, "gochijan" that they put on it. I have no idea how to spell these words!

Here are two more teacher/coaches at kao rou. I got to tag along because of Adam. I was out of element.

Something new Adam ordered based on the picture menu, which didn't turn out the best. Bacon wrapped around little mushrooms of some variety.

Oh, here's more proof of Adam's growing culinary creativity. I came home on Monday after a long day of teaching and rehearsing to find a delicious meal prepared. What was it? We're not sure--he made it up. It included rice, tomatoes, silantro, pizza sauce, chicken, cheese and red onions. Probably a lot of other ingredients too--Adam has had to become a cook for the purpose of survival. This baby has had me nauseous or exhausted, usually both...or unable to walk because of back pain...too often in the last few months. Thanks to Adam, we have not starved.

Does it look good to you? It was very tasty!

~julie