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Views while Running

Coming back from a hamstring injury I worked at increasing total mileage and looked forward to running every place I went. A real motivation was the 300 km in 8 weeks challenge I out to my cross country team.

I started in Philly. I really do love that city. I posted pics earlier in another post.

I learned to get around Pittsburgh running between Ryan and Rebecca’s house.

By the bus station near liberty ave

Near PNC park

Along the heritage along the river downtown. Really nice place to run on both sides.

Running races with my friend Michele Belak.

Race to the Moon before the race which started at dusk. I came in 1st in my age group.

Bushy run battlefield run. I came in 1st in my age group and Michele came in 2nd!

I ran on some pretty hot days.

And also on Clearwater FL. This was on the bay to Gulf road.

I also visited my son at his work at the strip in Pittsburgh.

One day I traveled further to look at pictures of Becca and a few friends that were being displayed at Maggie’s farm.

Besides the pictures of birds I also snapped pictures of deer.

This is the little Fawn still with his spots.

Clearwater Florida

On a side trip for the beach vacation I have not yet scheduled for myself, Becca and I went down to Clearwater to visit one of her friends, Kai. Becca and Kai were in middle School together until she moved.

Lots of beach time. I love the warmer water. Even though I can only take the beach for so long, I enjoyed going for a few days.

I forget how being in the sun and swimming tires you out. I napped the rest of the day.

Plus the big lunch at Frenchy’s made me tired as well. I had never had a grouper Reuben. Yummy.

This little guy begged for food.

I ran a 7.25 mile run the next morning towards the Gulf. Of course I took off my shoes to run barefoot and dip my toes in the water.

Finally I had a chance to go paddle boarding that next morning. It has been a year and my skills in choppy water was rusty. But I went across the bay to a little island where the water was calmer to stand up. I also explored a portion of the island to get photos of birds and swam for a bit before heading back.

Yellow crowned night herons.

A pelican as I was paddling.

After a quick lunch we went to an escape room. It is pretty much the breakout boxes I do in school but the last code opens up the door so you can get out. Pretty fun. We finished in 39 minutes. it

Clearwater is beautiful with many places to easily walk. At sunset the view over the harbor is beautiful.

Ibis

More Ibis.

Last beach day, we went to St. Pete Beach. I was there last year for my IB training. I took a short run on the beach and snapped a few pics of birds. Becca and Kai went to a local boxing gym to check it out.

These are called Black Seekers.

The bird in the front is called a Sandwich Tern.

This is a little chick of the Black Seekers. The adults were not happy I stopped in front of this little guy to get his picture. I was given plenty of warnings with lots of noise and fly by.

The girls picked me up with lunch and we went to a local park to eat. Nice day. On the way back to the car we walked across a red ant nest. Those bites hurt. Good thing they were easy to knock off my sandals.

July 4th

Pre-breakfast run at PNC Park and the point.

Good thing I ran 10k before having this massive breakfast.

Yes, we had this for brunch this morning at Ryan’s. Pancakes with home fries, shiitake bacon, egg, and hollandaise. Quite yummy and very filling.

With talk on what we should do for the day we made a last minute decision to go to Ohio pyle.

We packed sandwiches and snacks and headed out. There was a chance of rain and of course it did but the bonus is that it was not crowded. We were wearing swimsuits so it did not matter to us. The rain did not last long though.

It still was a beautiful day. I love these guys and had a wonderful time.

We went to cucumber falls to climb rocks around the water fall.

We climbed behind the waterfall.

A view from the top of the waterfall.

Mexican War Streets

Since Ryan and Ky moved get I have liked this area of Pittsburgh for the architecture.

From Wikipedia :

The Mexican War Streets, originally known as the “Buena Vista Tract”, is a historic district in the Central Northside neighborhood of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, in the United States. The district is densely filled with restored row houses, community gardens, and tree-lined streets and alleyways. The area dates to around the time of the Mexican–American War. The 27-acre (11 ha) district was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1975 with 119 buildings deemed to contribute to the historic character of the district. In 2008, the district’s listing was increased to include an additional 288 contributing buildings over a 25.7-acre (10.4 ha) area.

I love waking around the mostly brick lined roads with great architecture.

This building is set to be demolished. Such a shame as it has some really great elements.

The Mattress Factory.

Would love to see the inside of this house.

This is a beautiful building.

Walling around downtown:

Eating cheese plates made by my talented son.

Tomorrow I’ll try to run the streets. Hopefully without tripping…

Pittsburgh art part 2: the Warhol

All the years that Ryan went to school here, I so had not seen the Warhol. That changed today. I airways need to read about art as I am not wired that way and struggle to understand various art concepts.

I am familiar with some of his works but did not know if his artistic range.

Paint by number as a piece of art and important pop culture.

His perfected blotted line technique.

A gangsters funeral.

Elvis.

Iconic Campbell soup.

Silver pillow clouds where you interact with the art.

Pop culture of the 70’s.

Use of color and images in the background distort the fruit objects.

Mao Tse Tung

I actually lived the Warhol. I rarely read artistic concepts or try to understand the purpose of art.

Pittsburgh art part 1: the mattress factory

After a few days with Becca, I am now staying with Ryan and his fiance Ky. We visited the Mattress Factory (http://mattress.org)

This is a series of buildings that are art installations. They are art that takes a while from where the viewer is also part of the art through interactions with it.

Many rounds used mirrors for illusions.

Mirrors around a window changes what you see through the window and an object centered there as well.

Murals on the walls.

There was an exhibition from Greer Lankton who is transgender and an addict. Her art is pretty spot on for gender and other social issues. A very provocative set of works. Many of her pieces have sexual overtones.

Another artist James Terrell had light installations. The first one you were sure it was a projection. But it is empty space with a light installation inside which you see when you try to touch it.

His second light installation is a projection.

There are great views of the city from the balconies.

Like many other museums, even seating weaves art through it.

Other installation pieces used life artifacts and included movie and sound…

Even cleaning a small part of a window to peak through the outside…

In the third house…

Loved this one on evolution…

On the way to the 3rd floor, the stair rail ran water down bringing water from the outside in and using elements of nature.

On the 3rd floor, as you peer through windows your are sissi part of the installation for others looking and interacting…

For this one, I had to walk around for quite some time. First, concrete on the 3rd level is amazing the floor can take the weight.

Second, where you are walking around the bohemoth of the sphere changes what you see. The moon, a rising whale…

I struggle with understanding art but loved looking at the different installations and what the artist envisions.

I’m glad my son was able to take time to take me there.

ISTE

I was fortunate to fly into Philadelphia on the 23rd to attend ISTE. As I love Philly and looked forward to meeting old friends and meeting new ones, the serious jet lag is still worth it.

What I came to Philly with. The box are gifts and the olive bag is what I packed for 5 weeks of traveling.

Becca met me at the airport, drive me to her airbnb to shower and then start the day. What a great daughter. She had coffee and a snack waiting for me.

First stop was to check in to the conference and then get something to eat at Reading Terminal Market.

We also walked to the Liberty Bell. Where the constitution was penned.

Viewing the liberty bell national museum.

The house of Pass and Stowe where the bell used to reside.

Street entertainment.

Philadelphia sights.

We saw many street murals and this was very beautiful near a Cafe called Green eggs. They had an unbelievable corn grits with creole shrimp for breakfast.

Each day we would eat breakfast together and then meet up again near the end of the day. I would also look up friends throughout the day. I was not good at getting pictures though…

I attended great sessions mostly posters and playgrounds. I spent time learning about STEM topics, AR and VR…

I participated in a scavenger hunt with Merge cube. We had tasks to complete and document on Twitter. Using Morse code:

Finding the guy with the Merge cube hat. He had free app called Moment AR:

The great storytelling app:

And playing with the Merge resources:

From my Twitter posts, I was selected as the grand prize winner of a class set of Merge cubes and a year of software. This week be great to play with and now need to get it all back to China!

Student presenters had some great topics. A group of girls from Mexico city experimented with music and pulse rate. They held experiments on the spot. This song brings your pulse rate down 10 beats per minute in 60 seconds. Pretty relaxing.

I love architecture. A few buildings caught my attention as I woukd run in the morning.

After a few days in Philly, Becca and I left to travel to Pittsburgh.

Liwan Lake Park

My friend Killian and I met at Liwan Lake Park. It is quite a distance on metro from both our apartments.

The best part of the parks here is that it is a place for older people to meet (other ages too).

There are many groups exercising. What would seem odd to us in the US, allows older people here to be free from many cardiovascular and joint related diseases. They perform activities that use natural body movements. It may look like they are clapping hands in weird ways or swimming through the air, but it works for them.

Dance also is very fluid movements.

These dancers have a paddle with a ball balanced in it. As they move they can’t drop the ball.

There is a large lake here with lotus blossoms.

The trees are amazing with the prop root system that provides support above ground. They look like the trunk of a tree.

It is a beautiful day.

Parks are laid out beautifully. They have a great sense of design and utility of space.

Fish sculptures in the lake.

A temple that houses great embroidery samples.

Scarves (weijin)

As we walked around the park we could see other dancers.

Others were performing Tai chi.

There are those that perform Tai chi with swords. Dull, of course.

Some were just exercising.

Colorful exercise equipment can be found all over the city for people of all ages to use. They focus on mobility and stretching.

Other pictures of structures around the lake.

This area was very beautiful with the design in the rocks.

They are meant to massage and relax the bottom of the feet.

Wr also saw boats and dragon boats on the lake.

Chinese poetry on the tiles.

There was a band and singers as well.

One woman was singing Peking Opera which has a distinct sound.

Moving…

Moving to a new apartment was interesting. No car but you can hire moving people or a car to help. I hired a driver for 200 kuai ($28.87). Pretty cheap but I did not have much stuff but so it was a lot to get it packed in the van.

I should have taken a picture of it before packing but in a hurry. Nicole helped me at my old apartment and Killian helped me at my new place.

My landlord had someone painting the living room, so I put the cats in a room and my belongings in another.

We walked around the neighborhood until I could go back and unpack. Killian showed me where he takes his cats to the vet. Pretty close to my apartment. There were some pretty cats there.

We stopped at Hefu noodle which is one of my favorite places to eat.

At the sports center we watched people playing ping ping which is very athletic here.

We then walked down to the old apartment and did crazy photo shoots along the way.

This is a tour of my new apartment after I put things away and furniture was moved back in.

A few days later it was my turn to help Nicole move. She is going to Egypt to teach and had a bit of luggage (there is a reimbursement from schools for these expenses.) I am happy fur her and sad to her go as we were running buddies. I will be going to visit her in Egypt.

Now to pack for going back home! I have the person who will be taking care of my cats lined up and need to get everything in place for them too.

My first year done

I can’t believe it is the end of my first year overseas. Much like other schools there is a checkout and saying goodbye to students and teachers. However, the teachers who are leaving are going every where around the world.

I have completed other first years, but learning what you need to know in a foreign country adds another level.

At the end of the day there was a goodbye mixer. A hallmark of all our meetings is potato chips, pretzels, and m&m’s.

Of course wine and beer.

We had time to say good bye and see what others are doing on their way home. Many more ideas for vacation!

Fiona is going to teach in South America and adrienne is going to Africa.

Glenn on the left is going to Toronto. Already have plans to go visit there. Others, Bei and Dan will be back next year.

Scott teaches chemistry and will be back next year.

Or departing athletic director who hounded me until I said yes to coaching cross country. It was a great experience.

Eli also completed his first year here. He is from Brazil. The party continued with karaoke on the bus. If course we had to tip the bus driver as we were pretty obnoxious.

After getting back I had to get ready to move the next day. However I made time to eat with some if my girlfriends and go to the pool.