Am I in Hong Kong or am I in New York?

Saturday mom, dad and I went to Soho to get NY style pizza from a place that my dad had been before. It was amazing... didn't realize how much I missed NY style pizza... not. My favorite food is NY style pizza... yes NY. The NY part is KEY.

After we finished eating we headed to Gateway to the illegal costco (we think it's illegal). You aren't supposed to take pictures but I did... whoops. They sell all Kirkland brand food and anything and everything an American living in Ma'anshan would ever want. I felt like I was in heaven. Not that I know what that feels like... but I'm sure it's something similar.
As you can tell from the picture... I loaded up. The candy is for my students for halloween and for when they give a great speech, improve their pronunciation or volunteer a lot. I'm such a nice teacher. I mean I sacrificed 5 pounds of my bag weight for their satisfaction of eating American candy!

Anyway... the best thing I got at costco was DEODORANT. I was panicing a bit when I couldn't find any in Hong Kong.

When we got back from costco mom and I went to get our nails done. It was a HUGE disaster. They told us to wait 30 minutes so their nail lady could come. Well when she finally got there we discovered she had NO idea what she was doing. So I got my nails done and mom didn't. It was such a frustrating experience. For example... she put the cuticle oil on my actual nail, put the dryer on my nails and then tried to put nail polish over it... she didn't understand why that wouldn't work. So that will be the last time we ever go there.

When we got back I started to pack. Of course it turned into a stressful project because I was trying to bring all my winter clothes back plus all the food from costco. So I ended up leaving half my winter clothes at home and fitting all the food. Mom and Dad are meeting me in Shanghai in three weeks and bringing some of my other winter clothes, so I would say in the end it worked out!

For dinner we went to the Intercontinental to get burgers. I didn't think I was hungry until I had my first bite. Literally the best burger I have ever had. AND the truffle fries.... I'm wondering why I waited until I got back to Ma'anshan to write this blog post... I'm making myself super hungry for food that doesn't exist here!

Leaving home is never easy, especially now that my parents live in the greatest city. I already miss Hong Kong but thankfully I have my lake to walk around "replace" the harbour walks.