Last night as the Chinese New Year holidays continued, I braved the cold by walking down the street to a neighbor's house. The 5 kids there were waiting for me to watch them shoot off their fireworks... pretty sophisticated compared to anything I saw when I was a kid in the United States. They had invited me the previous night as well, but this night they were a little bit more wild in what they were doing.
At some point I looked across into the field across from where they were shooting to see a small fire some 20 yards into the distance across a ditch. I quickly alerted them and their mothers. It got big quick! Another guy called the fire department, who sent in two trucks which put out the fire before it could spread further south across the field in the heavy winds. One guy got injured slogging through the field. Hopefully he just turned an ankle.
Be sure to click here for my videos on my Chinese page. Too bad I only got the fire and not the small fireworks which proceeded it! The warmth from the fire sure made us forget about the winter chill.
Hmmm... my first Chinese New Year in the countryside. Much more interesting here than the city. :-) God's also been giving me lots of other opportunities to get to know others as well. My very kind neighbors to the right brought lots of delicious food over to see me through the week... never had that happen before in 10 years here. And others brought lots of snacks (some of which I ate and others of which I preferred to give away. Plus, I enjoyed a good time of worshipping the Lord with coworkers here in the store front of my home today... the neighbors were so curious!
As for the firecrackers, hopefully some lessons were learned about safety, but based upon interaction I had today I don't think so.
