Vehicles of China




There are so many strange things about China, but we have now become accustomed to many of them. The cars however, are not in this category. I think it is because they honk so loudly at us all the time as we are peacefully walking down the sidewalk minding our own business. There are so many cars and trucks and buses here that would have long since been decommissioned in North America. They are rusty, falling apart, and they smoke when they are turned on. Unfortunately, we usually see the best ones when we DO NOT have the camera with us (clearly we need iphones), but here are a few that we have managed to capture on film.

These little beauties are EVERYWHERE, they haul families, seaweed, garbage....you name it.




This is the pedal version of the previous one. They seem to last forever! 



"The Blue ones DON'T stop" These are the taxis. Yes the are ALL blue and YES they are the most dangerous vehicles on the road.

This is a typical bike in Jinshitan, the village where we live.

This is Timio and Paul on Tim's Scoot-scoot. I dont think there is anything else to say here.

This is a SIX seater POLICE golf cart. WTC!

This is a "traditional" bamboo raft made out of PVC pipe. Yay environment!

The China version of the Dodge MPV van. The seat you can see in the slider door, folds down, so you can cram more people in.

This is a Man. A Mini-van. It has 3 wheels and a joy stick. Yes the men standing in front have bowed their heads to its awesome-ness.

F.C. Dalian Shide

Last weekend we went with a group of teachers to Jinzhou to watch some “football.” Dalian’s professional soccer team – F.C. Dalian Shide (pronounced shh-dah)- was once the best in Asia, and won 8 consecutive Asian cup championships. Now they have been picked clean of their most highly talented players by European teams, but they still provide an incredibly entertaining spectacle most nights.

To get to Jinzhou we had to take the light rail line from Kaifaqu. Jinzhou is basically another suburb of Dalian, but is much more “Chinese” than Kaifaqu. It has less of the high end malls and development, and more grimy highrise apartments, neighbourhoods and little mom and pop noodle-shops.

When we arrived at the stadium, the first thing we saw were two haggard looking goats tied up next to a bbq stand. The stand was selling “young-rou” which means either goat or lamb... in this case it was pretty obviously goat. Alongside the goats there were masses of people filing into the stadium, huge earthenware cooking vessels where people were cooking yams and seafood, old ladies selling seat cushions and noisemakers and a sizeable police presence.

When we got into the stadium the game had already started. We had hoped to order some beer, but were disappointed to find that they were not selling any inside the stadium. All there was to drink was pepsi that you could buy in paper cups that were thoughtfully labelled “cups”. By the end of the game it became apparent why.

The game was very entertaining. Two weak red cards were called (which had the crowd up in arms), a penalty shot was missed (Paul started the whole crowd booing the opposing player who was shooting on the Dalian goal- he is taking full credit for causing the player to choke), two goals were scored and the crows on the far side has to be subdued by the riot police. Perhaps our favourite part was when a small man/large boy somehow slipped under the protective netting that separated fans from the field, and started chasing the 6 foot tall ref around the field. The tiny person was flailing his arms comically, and pretending to kick the ref as he chased him around the field, he then avoided capture by players and police for a solid minute before being taken down hard near the goal line.

At the end of the game, fans were incensed by the poor reffing and the diving of the Tianjin team and started throwing their seat cushions over the netting. It was pretty easy to see at that point why no bottles or beer were allowed in the stadium.

We had a great time watching and ended up going into Kaifaqu for some beer, sushi and pizza after the game. It was definitely a wonderful night and something we will be repeating next year.

RieuBienvenu Whirl Wind BC Tour 2011 Schedule

Hello Peeps,

OK so here is the RieuBienvenu Whirl Wind BC Tour 2011 Schedule:

Aug 9^th Land in Vancouver

Aug 10^th Head to Comox              

Aug 12^th Head to Victoria (party chez linda that night)

Aug 12- 18^th in Victoria (reserve your preferred dates early!)

Aug 19^th Head to Vancouver (ps Dre we need a ride)

Aug 19^th – 24^th in Vancouver

SING and SWIM 4 is on Aug 20^th.....ALL KNOWN ASSOCIATES are WELCOME to come!

Aug.25 Fly Back to China

Ok so here is other information you might want, no we are NOT planning to sleep. YES we do have to do errands like the dentist and doctor, NO we aren’t coming back any ealier from Thailand.

If you have plans like a wine tour or camping let us know ASAP so we can figure it out!

Much Love,

Dale & Tracy @ Sing and Swim 2, looks like fun eh?

Tracy and the Daughters @ Sing and Swim 3! Yay Jars!

Spencers band, main stage at Sing and Swim 3

The Chinese RieuBienvenu’s

(P.S. When you leave an anyonymous comment TYPE your name)

We are all Canucks?

Well Paul certainly isn’t. But, in the name of seeing the Boston Bruins lose and the cup return to Canada, he is jumping on the bandwagon.

So many of the Canadian teachers are Canuck fans and with the lack of t.v., we have all been streaming the games on our computers. This weekend, Kristen had the great idea of borrowing a projector from the school and inviting a bunch of people over to watch the game. Breakfast was involved, so we got a full turnout (not to mention French toast, eggs bennie, bacon, cheese plates, fruit salad, sweet buns, chicken nuggets and fried potatoes).

Mad Max scoring his goal on our wall curtesy of a projector and cbc.ca

It was awesome to have so many people together to watch a game and although it wasn’t the best performance by the Canucks, they still managed the win. Which means only one more win until the Bruins go home to lick their wounds.

It has been a year already?

We were caught a little off guard when we realized that our first anniversary was fast approaching. It seems like such a short time ago that we were planning for our wedding and running back and forth between Poco and Victoria.

To celebrate, we decided to spend the weekend in Dalian (the biggest city nearby –around 6.5 million people) which is about an hour and a half away by train. On Friday the 3^rd we headed into town on the light rail train immediately after work.

We splurged a little this weekend, and booked ourselves into the nicest hotel that this part of Northern China has to offer. Suffice it to say that we felt underdressed much of the time we were there. The view wasn’t great, but the room we stayed in was one of the best we have ever been in- perhaps the best! The bathroom wall slid into a recess to make the gigantic soaker tub sit in the center of the room. The rain shower was wonderful, the huge television was fun to watch real English shows on, the bed was soft and the pillows were plushy. Oh and the breakfast buffet and spa style swimming pool were fabulous! All this for under $120 Canadian.

 We spent Saturday walking around Labour park, enjoying the music from the full brass band, the waltzing older Chinese couples, the cages of cranes (yes the endangered species- on display in metal houses), the rose gardens and children’s amusement park. Later we went for massages at a Thai massage spa. So decadent! That night we headed to the top of a hill to the nicest restaurant in Dalian. The restaurant was Italian, the food delicious, the drinks cold, the service attentive (they pulled out our chairs and folded napkins in our laps- not typical Chinese waiters here), the view fairly good and the decor relaxing.

A different type of crane from the ones we see all over China.

Does Disney know about this???

Fishing for goldfish!

In all, the weekend was great. We had a chance to think back on the first year of our marriage, chat about how much fun our wedding was, and how great it was to have all of our family and friends give us so much love and support for our marriage.

Wild and Wacky Weekend of Sports!

A couple of weekends ago, the teachers were all told we had to participate in the 17^th annual Maple Leaf Staff Sports Meet on a Saturday. Mandatory attendance. Sigh....

In any case, Kristen got kitted out in her lovely red oversized cotton t-shirt which was the uniform of the Senior High Teachers and was down at the field by 8:20am on Saturday. Paul, sporting the fancy shiny (but incredibly tight for XXL) adidas track pants, fluorescent yellow and blue polo shirt and white adidas hat  that the Junior High somehow had the budget for was down there by 8:00 to practice marching with his team. All the teacher marched in at the opening ceremonies- Kindergarten teachers, Foriegn National School teachers, Elementary School teachers, Middle School teachers and High school teachers. Some groups- like Paul’s mostly Chinese (except for him) contingent of Junior High Teachers- marched and sang marching tunes (in Chinese... Paul just tried not to get out of step). Others, like the High School Teachers (mostly Canadian) just walked in yawning and waving. We marched past the gallery of the track bleachers where dignataries like Sherman Jen (the owner of Maple Leaf Schools) and the superintendent and principals were sitting. After some speeches we started competing- each school staff against the others.

Dodgeball, running, high and long jump, relay races, Frisbee toss, tug of war, etc. All of these events and more were ferociously contested in the scorching heat- it was maybe 25 degrees celcius with little shade around. Even though he hadn’t signed up to compete, Paul was enlisted for the Junior High School and went on to fail miserably at long jump. However he redeemed himself by single-handedly winning the team Frisbee toss. His teammates scored zero points in the toss (out of a possible 45) but Paul scored perfect scores by accurately all five of his Frisbees into the center circle of a target 50 feet away. Which meant he won a mug and a towel, and his teammates (who also got mugs and towels) were pretty happy with him.

This is the viewing platform where the head honchoes sit. That is the owner in the middle.

Goofy outfit.... probably. Undeniable skill with a disc... definitely.

All in all, it turned out to be a pretty fun day, but not nearly as fun as the next day, when the Ultimate Frisbee tournament took place. The Ultimate club was split into two teams, and two teams from Dalian University came to play as well. Naturally some teachers were recruited to form two other teams, so a real tournament was possible. Paul coerced Kristen into playing, and they formed a crucial part of the less stacked teacher team (one team had all the P.E. teachers and had obviously played together before. It was easy to tell by the nicknames and plays they were yelling while playing J). Kristen twisted her knee pretty good when she launched herself to make a catch, but braced it up and kept playing ‘cause she’s a machine.

In the end, the team won zero games and no mugs or towels. Kristen hurt her knee. Paul came away with just a wicked field burn on his knee and an even better sunburn. Two days later he was about six shades darker, which prompted some of his students to ask him “Mr. B, why are you so black?”

Yes. Mr. B, why are you so black?

New Comment Forum

Hello All,


 We just wanted to let you all know that we finally figured out how to change the comment issue on the blog! So NOW we are expecting LOTS of feedback from the (apparently) many of you who are reading!

Just select the "Anonymous" and you should be in buisness!

Plus THANKS all for the Love and Support on our FIRST WEDDING ANNIVERSARY!


It means a lot to us~