Labor's Day Weekend at Zhu Jia Jiao (朱家角)

freshwater eel and the crayfish

cotton candy man and the bicycle man

Group pic w. Rhea who's hugging her bag

Rhea's old grandma is the only believer in her family. She displayed her Christian calendars in a row, dating back 5 yrs ago. So sweet!

line drying baby pants with holes. in China toddlers wear these pants instead of diapers. when they need to go potty, the mother/grandma conveniently sqats the baby in the right position, and it's all theirs. i dont know why, but my only guess is they do it so it's better for the baby's bottom since it has air ventilation.?! this is one custom that took me by surprise. anyways, this is a priceless picture of the actual bottomless baby pants! woo hoo!

Rhea's parents raise fish, shells & other edible water creatures here. We had a lot of freshwater fish for lunch!

Rhea's "Old House"

Rhea's pets - three hamsters in a tub. (the third one is not in the picture). Their names are 老黄Lao Huang (Yellow), 老白Lao Bai (White) and 老灰 Lao Hui (Gray). Very creative!

Rhea's "new house" - we're so exhausted.

yay! I mastered the perfect Asian "V" pose! We love this red couch!!!

Zhu Jia Jiao (朱家角)

also commonly known as the Suzhou Creek to foreigners

is famous for its "Water Village" because a whole village was built around the canals where people used boats to transport goods and people. Imagine the gondollas in Venice, Italy. Yeah, this is the Venice of China.

Our lovely friend, Rhea, invited a bunch of us to her hometown, which happened to be Zhu Jia Jiao (朱家角). We had lunch at her "old house", (because she recently moved to a "new house" and her "new house" has no kitchen stuff so they can't cook there yet) and "old house" in Chinese is synonymous with "hometown" (老家). If you know Chinese you'll get the pun :p

After lunch we headed out to the Creek Zhu Jia Jiao (朱家角), and we got on the boat, had cotton candy, walked around the village. It was FUN! :D

Then we came back to Rhea's "new house" and chilled - we were so exhausted. We explored her "new house" which, by the way, is BEAUTIFUL and modern - it has a 2 storey loft, a sun room, 5 rooms and super sweet red sofa bed! We almost didnt want to leave...

Thanks Rhea for your kind hospitality! :D