ding dong the mouse is DEAD.

Lemme tell you a story. It's a fine story and every detail is 100% true. So when we first moved in to our apartment in Tongcheng, Maddy and I noticed mouse droppings....and we were like GRRREAT. Let's hope they are old! We cleaned up and hoped for the best. But then, the next day there were more droppings!! Woooof. So we knew there was a mouse somewhere...hiding. Little piece of vermin.

But we had no idea where it could be. UNTIL. The repairmen came to fix our AC and when they popped open the vent, the mouse came flying out and scurried under a shelf thingy. And they men laughed and kept working and we were like "uh....are you gonna help us catch that?" After they finished working on the AC, they started banging on the shelf to get the mouse to come out. Which it did! And it scurried on over to our bathroom and disappeared through a pipe! So we were like hoping it was gone for good.

BUT THEN. Another repairman came to fix our washer (if you haven't noticed already, nothing was working when we first moved in haha!) and as he was fiddling around in the pipes, BAM! The mouse flew out. It literally was flying, there's no other way to describe it. So Maddy grabbed a bucket and I grabbed a broom and chased it but then it went into my room, behind my dresser into this dark and creepy alcove. Grrreat. I grabbed my boots and my head lamp and I ventured into the unknown and tried to find the mouse. I prodded around for a bit and found it hiding in a box. But it got away and climbed up my curtain and out a hole in my wall! It was so gross and terrifying and filled with lots of screaming and laughing. It was quite the sight.

So we thought the mouse was gone because we saw it run away. THOUGHT. We went to Huangshan for the weekend, right? And when we came back...there was this horrid smell. We had no idea what it was for a day or so until one night, I looked through the hole in my wall and lo and behold THERE WAS THE MOUSE! I saw it's little nose and whiskers. It was dead and we think it got stuck in there! Not sure how it got stuck...maybe it was too fat from mooching off our stuff? Who knows! But it was gross and I started laughing and making all sorts of high-pitched noises. We tried to push it out with a little stick...didn't work. We tried pushing it out with a water-bottle...didn't work (but it DID help keep the smell out because we left it there) We told our liaison, Annie, and today she had the repairman come and get the mouse out. He went outside on our balcony, took some pliers and yanked it out by the tail and let it fall five stories to the ground where it remains.

THE END.

Magnificent Mountains

After moving to Tongcheng and a tiring week of teaching, Maddy and I decided it was time to get outta there and see Huangshan. This is THE number one place I wanted to visit in China and how lucky that it's in my province! It was a little frustrating with the buses and communicating because...welp...my Chinese is practically nonexistent. But we finally we made it to our hostel and it was THE best thing that ever happened. We stayed in this place that was right on Lao Jie (which means Old Street) in this city, Huangshan. It was very cozy and very China. We went shopping and went to KFC (AMERICAN FOOOOOOD!!!!!! Kind of.) and found a bakery that was delicious and we went there every day...sometimes twice a day. Fat Americans. We're living up to our stereotype. ;) 

Lao Jie outside our hostel.

But then we felt fine about all the KFC and treats because we climbed 5 miles of stairs! Hardest work-out of my life. Imagine yourself on the stair stepper at the gym for 3 hours. YEAH. But it was gorgeous on the way up and we made some friends along the way! And the top was worth everything.Huangshan is like the Yosemite or Zions of China. Standing on top of that mountain was one of the most amazing things I've ever seen in my life. There really is no way for me to share what I felt or what I saw. So here's some pitchas!

It was AWESOME. To say the least. This Earth is pretty magnificent.

And this week we are back to teaching! One day I'll tell ya all about that because it deserves a post allllll on its own. :)