A Delightful Decade

Yesterday Sam and I celebrated our tenth wedding anniversary.  A decade of marriage!  A few years ago when thinking about being married for ten years we talked about the possibility of returning to Italy (where we honeymooned) to celebrate.  Of course we had no idea that we would be halfway round the world in China by that time.  However, Shanghai  is not a bad city to celebrate in, it has many places to go making it hard to decide where to celebrate.

At the beginning of the year I decided that our tenth anniversary celebrations should be a bit like the Queen's jubilee celebrations - ongoing throughout the year!  We started the celebrations in April by spending a night a the Peace Hotel.  We plan to have another night in a hotel when our next set of visitors come and have a spa day, afternoon tea, a Shanghai brunch and lunch at a couple of nice restaurants on our list!

I started yesterday's celebrations with William and Oliver by going to Blue Frog for lunch, at their suggestion!  In the evening we decided to go for champagne at the Long Bar at the Waldolf Astoria followed by a meal at M on the Bund. 

The building which now houses the Waldorf Astoria was originally home to The Shanghai Club, a private British gentlemen's Club which first opened it's doors to the rich and famous of Shanghai in 1910.  However, just being a member of the club was not good enough for some, what was really coverted were the seats at the east end of the Long Bar, nearest to the windows on to the Bund. 

Noel Coward drank here and once said that if you rested your cheek on the bar and looked down it you might see the curvature of the earth! 

Where you sat along the 39 metre long bar gave an indication of your social standing in Shanghai.    Naturally, Sam and I headed straight for the east end of the bar and ordered ourselves a couple of glasses of champagne, courtesy of my lovely parents!

Unfortunatley we were not able to sit at the original bar as that was ripped out in 1990 to make way for Shanghai's first KFC!!!!  However, it has been very well restored and stepping in there did feel like we were stepping back in to Shanghai's refined past, without the entry restrictions.


After sipping on our champagne we stolled up the Bund a little and around the corner to M On The Bund.  This is a restaurant that we have wanted to go to for a while and has played host to a bevy  of royals and famous people including Prince Andrew making it perfect for us!  Indeed there was even a reference to the jubillee on the menu!

It has been a part of the Shanghai restaurant scene for over thirteen years which, in a place where restaurants can come and go fairly rapidly, means it must be pretty good.



 While perusing the menu we drank prosseco - a nod to our Italian honeymoon!


The menu is a mixture of European, Middle Eastern and North African dishes.  Sam chose Ottoman lamb dumplings and chicken tangine and I chose scallops followed by Catalan prawn stew all washed down with a very nice Australian wine!

I had requested a table by the window so we could see the view ( the restaurant is on the 7th floor overlooking the river) as I thought it was to hot to sit outside.  However, when we got there, there was a nice balmy breeze and we were given the most romantic table on the terrace with the best view.  It pays to mention wedding anniversaries!

We thoroughly enjoyed our official celebration and are looking forward to continuing to celebrate in style at various locations for the rest of the year.

The view from our table - didn't even have to stand up to take the photo

Sun, Sea and Sanya

Anticipating that our holiday in the UK in August will be rather hectic we decided we needed a few days away at the end of term to relax and recharge, especially for me after teaching my first lessons in five years!

I did lots of research and we considered the Phillapines, Thailand and Vietnam but for the length of time we wanted to go for, the tropical island of Hainan seemed to fit what we wanted.  Lots of people avoid it like the plague as it is still China, however as we have not left China for fourteen months and are still sane, that was not going to phase us!

We got a good deal including our flights to stay at the Intercontinental Resort, Sanya.  We opted to stay in the Club rooms, as most of the food and drink appeared to be included!  Both Sam and I were pretty excited as it was the first time staying in this type of 5* resort.  We had to wait over 30 years for the experience whereas William and Oliver waited just under 5!

Our flights left Shanghai early on Friday morning so we were at the airport in plenty of time so that we could get coffees and tuck in to our bacon sandwiches, the key to getting a good start to a holiday!

William and Oliver were quite excited when they realised that we were getting a bus accross the runways to get to our plane and that we would actually have to walk up the stairs of the plane - just like royalty!  Everyone was posing on the steps and having their photos taken by the plane reminding us that for a lot of people on the plane it was their first time flying.  One of the things that we often have to remind ourselves of in Shanghai is that although the city is modern, the country is still developing and activities like tourism are very new still.

The flight was early and we got a taxi with no problems and were at our hotel by lunchtime.  Anna had contacted them to tell them that we are celebrating our 10th wedding anniversary this year and we had a very nice reception.  On arrival I was presented with a bouquet of roses and asked at what time we would like our cake!

As the resort is large, guests are ferried around in golf buggies.  This, as you can imagine, went down well with Oliver and William. 

When we got to our room more decorations were awaiting us.  The room was fantastic, there were two double beds and a balcony with practically another bed on it!  Our bed was decorated with rose petals and swans made from towels and flannels!

Swimming gear was donned and we headed to the pool, which was pretty much the pattern for the rest of the week.  We had a club pool (with a sandy bottom!) for use by people in the club rooms only, but we had it to ourselves most days.   And just when we were feeling rather hot a pool attendent would appear with iced towels!

We also made it out of the pools to the beach for a paddle and a swim but only so we could say we'd been in the sea as the pools were far more tempting!

However, on our third day we decided to explore a bit of the island.  It is often called the Hawaii of China because of it's beaches and rainforests that exist in close proximity.  We went on a visit to a nearby rainforest.  It was amazing to see the tropical plants and wildlife, although in true Chinese style parts were rather landscaped, even the wildlife!  There were potted orchids, concreted waterfalls and saddled ostriches (which we hadnt realised were native to tropical rainforests!)!

One of the highlights was an Indiana Jones style rope bridge. I was rather nervous about crossing it but the boys, having not seen the flim, were keen!

On William and Oliver's birthday they lept out of bed demanding to be measured as they were both convinced that they would have grown in the night!  After reassuring them that they were big boys now we had a birthday breakfast followed by present opening.

The family pool opened for the first time during our stay on their birthday, having been closed for cleaning.  The timing couldn't have been more perfect as we had been swimming in the three other pools and fancied a change! Oliver and William loved going down the slide and swimming round the 'rivers'!

For their birthday lunch we went to an Italian restaurant for pizza, it was the first time all week that we had paid for food!

The staff spoilt the boys and gave them a Hagen Daz each as a birthday treat and they were allowed to choose toppings.

In the evening the staff in the club lounge produced a birthday cake and sang happy birthday!  They really were turning 5 in 5* style!

As we were staying in the club room our food was all included.  The breakfasts were fantastic and Bahgdad eggs became a firm favourite of mine.

We tended to picnic by the pool for lunch returning to the club lounge for afternoon tea where we discovered William had a love of oranges and Oliver and penchant for cashew nuts, he ate several bowls of them a day!

Each evening we had 'happy hour' from 5.30-8.  It was billed as cocktails and canapes but every drink you can imagine was available and the food was fantastic.  We felt very spoilt!

They even served dumplings one evening, much to everyone's delight!

Our last day was spent swimming in the sea and trying to get a last swim in at each of the pools.  It was a fab and relaxing holiday but the first beach holiday we have ever been on where we have returned home to hotter temperatures!  We are now in the process of convincing Sam that it should be an annual get away!

End of the Reception school year

As the school year winds down everything seems to get busy.  I have started doing some supply teaching at DUCKs including covering William and Oliver's class!  Even when I haven't been asked to do supply I have been in school for all sorts of other end of term activities.

Oliver and William had another sports day this term.  They had to go round various staions completing activities and stamping their sheets.

Oliver and William also completed their 10 week gymnastic class which they seemed to enjoy.  The instructors were excellent and it was great watching the improvements made by the boys over the 10 weeks.   They had a presentation in the last lesson and are keen to continue next term.

An important end to the year at Dulwich is speech day.  Each year has one and students are presented with certificates.  The head of senior school came to present the DUCKs students their certificates. 

 The children behaved fantastically, entertaining us with songs, waiting their turn quietly and the applauding the others collecting their certificates.  Unfortunately, the same cannot be said of the parents!  As soon as the children started performing they were up out of their seats, some on their seats videoing, photographing, calling out and waving to their children so that all Sam could get at first was the photo below!  Meeta and I had to actually ask the people in front to sit down so we could see our children!  Not only were these parents setting an awful example to the students, groups of mother's at the back seemed to think it was some sort of mother's meeting where they could stand with their back to the front, yak away to their friends then, when they spotted their little darling take a quick snap and get back to their conversation!

As a celebration of the end of the year, the class mums in reception organise an end of term party for all of the students.  We had games and lots of delicious food including sorbet and ice cream made by a local 5* hotel!  Unfortunately the rain meant it had to be an indoor picnic and the water fight was postponed (to the disapointment of the children and relief of the parents!). 

On the last day I had planned to make a cake in the shape of a Toucan, unfortunately our oven broke (again!) and I had to use a neighbours oven and only had time to bake a square cake.  I quickly iced each child's name on it which appeared to go down better than a Toucan would have!

We presented Miss Nesil and Miss Yuki with their end of year gifts and a few tears were shed over teachers and friends who are leaving.