One activity.....balance 10 nails on top of 1 nail.....this group got it (after a few hints) One of the kids in the picture had to go to the hospital after he broke his thumb screwing around with the volleyball....
This is the best of all my pictures of Hong Kong at night. A bad camera combined with a smoggy night equals bad pictures. i did get some good postcards though.
Here is my volleyball team.... we are pretty happy after winning our last game and taking 3rd place! GREAT GIRLS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
kids were busy doing team-building activities all day long. This group was pretty proud b/c they won one of the competitions.
above: HKIS is getting new turf on their field. This view is from the road pulling into their school. You can see the school to the right of the football field. The picture on the right is taken looking out one of the balconies of the school. How would you like looking at that view on you way to class? i wonder if many students skip?
above: HKIS is getting new turf on their field. This view is from the road pulling into their school. You can see the school to the right of the football field. The picture on the right is taken looking out one of the balconies of the school. How would you like looking at that view on you way to class? i wonder if many students skip?
picture of a few of my volleyball girls with "Flat Stanley" in Times Square...notice how much taller i am than them. The girl on the right in the photo is one of my middle hitters!
things are finally slowing down after i was away thurs morning until sun night....my 8th grade class went on an overnight mentoring trip to a nearby ski "resort" and then i had to have a driver pick me up friday morning to bring me to catch the plane to Hong Kong with my volleyball team.
The mentoring trip was great. they tried to get me to return to school that afternoon b/c they though i would miss my plane the next day....but i said "no i think i need to stay with the kids." Well about 1 hour after i COULD have left----and just after we set up our tents....it started to POUR! most kids put their tents up pretty sloppily so many o fthem ended up getting rain intheir tents. I was in a 3 bedroom tent with two other females and we weren't even done putting up our tent when it started to rain. We survived though. it actually rained at a good time-if it was going to rain. we ate supper after the rain stopped and then ended up having a rain free night. had a big bon fire---which the workers kept THROWING kerosine on....over and ove.r then the kids roasted marshmallows and they said they tasted like kerosine. YUK! That night it was FREEZING .....i would guess in the 40's----i had lots of layers on! but it was an experience.....like riley says to me all the time "It is all part of the China Experience!" The next morning i got up had breakfast and then a driver came to pick me up. I was bummed b/c friday was a BEAUTIFUL smog-free day and one of the activities was climbing to the wall ........another time. The kids said it was great!
Fri was a long travel day-----4 teams checking into a chinese airport isn't the easiest thing....but the kids were great. 3 hour flight to hong kong was needed for me -----i slept the whole way! that night we played Shanghai American School and won easily. That night the girls all stayed with host families and some of the coaches and I went out and checked out a few local bars. I had a beer and was ready for bed, but i stayed out for a while to peopl ewatch. we had a bit to eat on the street an dthen a couple of us headed back to our hotel---i had my own room which was nice! slept like a rock!
Sat was interesting-we played Hong Kong International School (HKIS)and then a local Chinese school and got killed. They all serve overhand hard.....and 6 of my 9 girls serve underhand so needless to say we didn't do very good at serve receiving..... so we lost both those games. we got done early so i got to walk around a little before the tourney started taht afternoon. hard to explain where HKIS is. It is on Hong Kong Island--but it is on the opposite side and on the top of the mountain where all the buildings are. it was an unbelievable school---built on the side of the mountain. i took some pictures of the views. nowhere to walk around there as there is basically one road that winds like in the Black Hills and there is no shoulder. Anyway-that afternoon we had to play HKIS again and lost big.....so we were done. My team and i headed to Times Square to eat and do some shopping. Interesting being with 9 15-16 year olds. One of my girls is a HongKong native so she took us around. Then we went to "The Peak" where all the famous Hong Kong pictures are taken. WE went to see the light show but it was a little smoggy so the view wasn't as good as we would have liked. Then i drove with 2 of my girls to their homestays b/c they didn't want to get in a cab alone. Over an hour winding around the mountain.....i was so carsick by the time we dropped the last girl off...i actually cleared out one of my shopping bags b/c i felt so sick! so when i got back to the hotel i crashed!
Sunday-up and at em----we won our game today! great way to end! then we had a luncheon and awards ceremony before heading ot the airport. We ended up being in the airport for 3 1/2 hours before our plane left so i got to do a little shopping for the boys. Krispy Kreme donuts were a big hit for all the kids---and me too! i brought some home to share...and got the boys both some toys. The school gave me a per diem and i had some $$ left-so basically the school bought my kids toys! Got home that night and the boys were all in bed....tried to wake them up but nobody wanted to stay up.
Monday i got to see the boys for a bit before i was off to school-and had another volleyball game after school (terrible timing) so finally at 6 i got to spend some time with the boys! One more week and volleyball is done! i love the game and the girls-just tired of being away!
so riley and boys stayed busy-----don't thinnk they even realized i was gone? Amazing how much they change in 4-5 days! Kellan is getting a little attitude and throws some fits.....Kieran is still sweet as ever.
well-this novel is about to end...sorry i got a little long-winded. i will add some pictures---the ones from Hoong Kong didn't turn out great-our camera is pretty crappy! i think riley is going to get a new one this weekend!
we hope all is well with everyone back home! we miss you all and love hearing from you!
love
laurie and family
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