There Is No Joy in Haerbinville

It has been a busy first week since my return to Haerbin. Haerbin has been hosting the World University Winter Games for the last week. Athletes from all around the world have gathered to compete in hockey, curling, figure skating, speed skating and skiing. I took full advantage of the opportunity and took in a number of hockey games featuring Canada of course. I even managed to convince some Russians, Americans and Chinese to attend one game as un-official Canadians.


They came decked out with flags and tatoos totally hyped to cheer for Team Canada who were playing Team Kazakstan. Only one rowdy Russian chose to cheer for the hapless Kazaks, but to no avail. Canada had little trouble, defeating the Kazaks 8 to 2. The win put the Canadian team into the gold medal final against Team Russia. I was so confident that Canada would be in the final I tried to get tickets for this game from Canada but it had been sold out for weeks. I was quoted almost three times the ticket price from a local scalper.

Thanks to the kindness of one of the un-official Canadian Russians, Brian and I and four Russians managed to get tickets to the final. Up to this point Team Canada had pretty easy games in their pool winning all four games by huge margins. Alas they ran into a Russian powerhouse. The first period was fairly even with both teams handing out some serious body checks. But the Russians picked up their game a notch in the second period. Thanks to a five minute major the Canadians were able to escape the period tied 2 all. The third period was all Russia but thanks to a hot Canadian goalie, the Canadians were able to stay in the game till the 17 minute mark when a stupid penalty left them short handed. The Russians stormed the net to score the go ahead goal, then scored a second one in the last minute thanks to another stupid Canadian penalty. Final score Team Russia 4, Team Canada 2. I now have to cook pancakes for the Russians. If Canada had won I would be pigging out on bellinis, a Russian pancake like dish.

Sadly Nonie was not able to join me in Haerbin but her eye is doing well and hopefully she will be able to rejoin me at the end of March. Classes start Monday. We will be teaching Juniors this semester and not Grads as we had been led to believe. So it may be back to the drawing board for us. Nonie will be teaching the same seven classes as I am so it will mean the preparation of an additional 14 lessons plans for the classes. All classes are in the late afternoon and evening. Not as nice a schedule as the first semester as Nonie and I are both morning people.