Cakes, Monuments, and Brides: 4th of July Round-Up

For our 4th of July party, two of the PC volunteers had a special cake made. They wrote down the message they wanted put on the cake and asked a Chinese bakery to make it for us. I'm not going to post the picture here because some of my readers might be offended by profanity, but if you want to see it, click here. The best part is, when they went back to pick it up, the bakery had placed it in the front store window! Obviously there were no English speakers working at that bakery. (And yes, those are cherry tomatoes on the cake; tomatoes are eaten as fruit here.)

Speaking of America, I took this picture of the Washington Monument in D.C. the evening before I left for China. I felt I needed to make a connection to my hometown and home culture before I flew away for two years, so while the rest of my group went out to dinner/drinking, I went to the monuments to take pictures. The guy who spent the weekend in D.C. with me also likes photography, so I'm glad he didn't mind going with me, it's a nice memory I have of spending time together that weekend. (If you want to see more of my D.C. pics, you can click here.) I've been to the monuments countless times, and I love them every time. I had prints made for my Chinese apartment walls. They are comforting when I feel homesick.

And here's a picture I took in Vegas the year before that I just think is funny: a bride at a bus stop on Las Vegas Blvd at 2:00 AM. Ahhhh, Vegas.

I'll be back to talking about China tomorrow.