Halloween, Jinmao Tower and Girls Weekend

Here are our lovely halloween cats, posing with pumpkins.  Take special note of the photo of the witches hat.  Look carefully and you will see little white legs under it!  They are so funny!  We went to a little Halloween party where we live for a couple of beers with friends.  They had a raffle at the end, where we won mouth wash and 'luxurious' cotton buds.  Everyone was a winner, but it was still funny.  Shame we didn't win first prize of a rice cooker.  Second prize was a Kindle.  That just shows people's priorities in China. 

Halloween day was the rescheduled sports day for Junior School.  I worked the whole day - year 3/4 in the morning and year 5/6 in the afternoon.  8-4.30 with a 30 minute rushed lunch in the middle.  I was standing up all day doing the discus, and it was hard work!  I was exhausted after.  Luckily the sun came out and some people even got sun burnt.  We had all expected it to be freezing, because it's quite cold in the mornings now, so I had my thermals on, then it turned into 25 degree heat!  The weather is crazy at the moment. We went from air con to heating and back again this week in school.

On Friday night, 6 of us went up the Jinmao Tower, one of the skyscrapers and the 12th tallest building in the world.  We had a great evening, and there was even a magician who came around to entertain us.  I really want to hire him for something. He was incredible!  Our friend was desperate for him not to come over 'I hate magicians' and so on.  He was clapping and laughing by the end of the first trick!

Last night, Matt had a night to himself with the kitties, and I went back into the skyscraper district to stay in the fabulous IFC Residence with 7 other girls from work.  The rooms were amazing.  We had 2, 2 bed suites, which were like apartments. The above photo was our stunning view of the bund from our window.  We had a fab weekend, making use of the gorgeous swimming pool.  We went out for a huge lunch, so just ordered some sharing plates from room service for dinner and ate it in our dressing gowns!  We did get dressed up later and go for a drink in a posh restaurant called Morton's.

This morning, we had brunch that we had brought with us - fruit, yogurt, croissants, etc, and I got home at about 2pm, just as Matt was setting off to play football.  It was such a fun weekend!

Zotter's Chocolate Indulgence Experience

I've had a bit of a flat week.  Half term was quite a while ago now, and the Christmas holidays are still a long way off, so i'm in a bit of a slump, and so are my classes.  Most of my energy this week has been focused around the D'Oscars, our schools ridiculous film making project.  My EAL class finally finished their filming on Friday.  Post production will be done mostly with their class teacher, so my role is pretty much over, thank goodness!  It's been very stressful for me, though the children have really enjoyed themselves, and learnt so much.  Luckily, everyone seems to be changing topic starting from Monday, which is great, as it should motivate the kids and get them interested again.  We have sports day on Tuesday, which should be fun, and tomorrow is the Dance Off final.  There are 3 EAL kids in the final.  It's fantastic to see them flourish in creative situations, where language makes no difference.

Matt has had a good week, busy as usual.  His girls football club won their away match on Thursday, which was great.  On Friday, he went to the pub after school for a catch up with a couple of friends.

Yesterday, we went, with a couple of friends to Zotter's Chocolate Indulgence Experience.  It's not a chocolate factory.  The factory is in Austria, where the Zotter family are from.  The daughter, came to Shanghai and opened up a 'tasting experience', which was so much fun!  We decided to cycle there since it's not very far.  Matt and I borrowed bikes, and we had a lovely 20 minute cycle to the river, crossed over on the ferry, with a great view of the industrial, busy water way, then a 2 minute cycle to the 'museum'.  We were the only people on the English tour, where you can try 130 different types of chocolate, including a 50 % cocoa chocolate bar that was voted 'best chocolate bar in the world'.

Our guide was great, and spoke perfect English.  We started off by trying 100% cocoa (wow! I am not a dark chocolate person really, so it was far too bitter for me).  You get given a spoon that you use throughout the museum and basically pour liquid chocolate onto your spoon via taps.  There were so many different types to try, it was a bit overwhelming.  Different percentages of cocoa, sheep's milk chocolate, caramel chocolate, white chocolate, chili and strawberry chocolate, banana and orange chocolate, whiskey chocolate, chocolate covered gooseberries, strawberries, raspberries, raisins, sour cherries, nuts.

Half way through there was a hot chocolate station, where you got hot milk and a solid bar of chocolate, which you popped into the milk, melted, then whisked.  We tried almond praline, and green tea (surprisingly delicious), with a shot of amaretto in it.  We were all going a bit loopy from the sugar by this point.  It was like we were drunk!

We made our own chocolate bars too, choosing 2 flavours to make the bar with (mine is 50% cocoa and cashew), then we could add whatever toppings we like.

At the end there was a conveyor belt with all of the unusual flavored bars of chocolate; fish marshmallow, whiskey, birthday cake, tequila salt and lemon, plum brandy, caipirinhia, and about 30 others!  Amazing.  We got to the shop at the end, and I could barely look at a chocolate bar, let alone buy any.  We had to go to Subway for huge sandwiches afterwards because we needed savory food!

The cycle back was very pleasant.  It was fabulously warm and sunny.  We had to sleep off what I like to call the 'chocolate hangover' for a couple of hours, then we went downstairs to a Halloween party of some friends.  It was good fun.  Matt came upstairs at 10 to watch West Ham Vs Palace, with his Palace supporting friend.

Today couldn't be more different.  It is a red day for pollution, so we don't really want to leave the flat.  You can barely see anything out of the windows. Nasty!

Disneyland Shanghai!

Disneyland!  The best place EVER!  Shanghai Disney is great, and really has the Disney feel too, which I was worried it wouldn't.  We decided to get there for opening, and stayed until closing, so  we were there for about 13 hours!!!  That's a long day!  It was very busy, so we decided to buy fast passes, which were very expensive, but saved us 3 hours queuing on just one ride.  We probably saved about 8 hours of queues, which is crazy if you think about it.  

The first ride we went on was Tron, a futuristic rollercoaster in the dark, where you sit on a motorbike and get propelled forwards VERY fast.  It was fantastic! 

We saw a bit of the Baymax from Big Hero 6 show, and watched the Captain Jack Pirate stunt show, which was fun.  Matt met his hero, Darth Vader, and Kylo Ren from the new Star Wars film.  I was happy with meeting R2-D2.

And having our photo taken in the Millenium Falcon, of course...

We found this fantastic Yoda rucksack in the shop.

The Pirates of the Caribbean ride is incredible, such an immersive experience.  And Soarin' Over The Horizen is fab. It was Dad's favourite ride at Epcot in Florida.  We went on the very cute Peter Pan ride, and bounced around with Tigger on the Whinnie the Pooh ride.  There was a great wet ride too.  It's always a bit of a bonding experience being on a water ride in a big rubber ring with strangers.  You always end up chatting and screaming with them!

Lunch was a very nice Halloween themed cheese burger.  There were lots of halloween decorations around the park, which was fun.

The parade was wonderful, as they always are at Disney.  This was the Storybook Express.

Toffee apples!  I always think they look better than they taste, so we didn't get one.  Instead, we went out of the park to Disney Town to the Cheesecake Factory, my favourite place on Earth, where we shared deep fried macaroni and cheese balls, and a huge slice of cheesecake - White chocolate, macadamia nut and caramel. Yum!

There was a great Halloween parade of Disney villains in the evening, followed by a light show of pictures projected onto the princess castle.  Pure Disney magic.

We finished the very long day with a couple of mojitos back in the cheesecake factory.  We were like children today, full of wonder and having a fantastic time.  What a great day.  Disney really is the best way to de-stress!  We didn't think about work at all!

Sunday was a quiet day.  I ached all over from walking about 10 miles at Disney.  Matt played football for the England Veterans team, and I went to a fabulous new shop I have discovered, with my friend from work. We, of course, went via Dairy Queen for a strawberry cheesecake flavoured Blizzard ice-cream.