Summer Lovin' Had Me a Blast!

Strolling in the summer heat...a bit like Sex and the City

A visit from my pal was such an energy boost! Not to mention that it was summer in a big city!
Nicki and Lucas were en route to our friend's wedding in Michigan and a pit stop in Chicago for 5 days was perfect! Last time she visited was in Frisco during the snowed-out week---not the most exciting. 


Too bad my job has already started then and I didn't have that much time to spend with them. While I was at work, they visited around the city on their own... to the beaches, the parks, the mall. The day  I have off, we took a walk just near our apartment, talked and had the oh so delicious Gyu-Kaku for dinner!

Our many attempts, including one time when Nicki's sandals flew off

Our apartment building is the one right behind the lamppost in the background

A game of Werwolf, Tuesday's tradition!!

John, the Skeptical Cook. Katie, the Ginger

Hiro, the Japanese way and the Mighty Stomach

Some bowling action! Blur = speeeeed

More evidence of summerlicious!

Giant water slide blown up next to the kitchen for Family Day!

Some water fun between shows

In Lev goes into the dunk tank!

Ice cream van on site!!!

Petting zoo! Looks like the goat needs to be excused...

I love petting zoos...Especially I rarely gets to pet ducks!

Feeding time

Poker Tournament

A trip to the 6 Flags on the double dark was a popular decision! 

Li Wei is amazing on the slack wire, not so much here...

So who's going to get wet?? Steve is not going to have mercy on anyone!

Looks like Laura and sister is getting the biggest hit!

I said it coz I can, today I don't feel like doing anything~

Whirly ball... if only we discovered it earlier. Only been to it one time and how I wish they have it in every city! Good ol'bumper car + "lacrosse", simply amazing!

That's a wrap for Chicago, moving on! (but we miss this city)

Blown to the Windy City

The most looked forward city run for this year was definitely Chicago. It felt so good to be back in a big walkable city again! After Minneapolis, Gary and I went straight to Chicago to spend the week off, as my parents arrived the day after to spend 10 days with us! Haven't seen them for 2 years.

Taken at Navy Pier with part of the Chicago skyline in the background

In this city, I am officially an employee, as a Guardian on Tour. Who am I guarding?? The ginger ninja.

This is where Katie spends her free time: in the kid's tent on site

This is Katie Smith.


What does "Guardian" mean? What do I do exactly? Well, when an artist is a minor (under 18), he or she can either have a parent touring with him/her or Cirque will assign a Guardian for the artist. 


So I am her legal guardian, and I basically take care of her, take her to work, make sure she has biscuit and milk before bed, sign paper work, make sure she doesn't wet the bed, and at one point Bank of America offered to let me oversee her finances! I however declined them kindly, as I thought this would be a good opportunity for Katie to be on the right path of independence. 


She is the flyer(top) of the acrobatic sport group as a Flea. 17 Years old and she traveled all this way on her own! 

King of the castle

Fanciest bedroom ever - a boost for the height challenged!

As a Guardian, I am required to live with Katie, so now that all three of us are employees, Gilles had found us a massive apartment, with absolutely breathtaking view of the city and the lake, locating right next to the harbor. Bonus of staying by the harbor was that we could see clearly from our living room of the fireworks that were displayed every Wednesday and Saturday night during the summer. We knew we'd enjoy being in Chicago for the city run! And by the way, Chicagoans are surprisingly quite friendly considering it's a big city... compare to New Yorkers haha!

One of the views from the apartment! 

Watching fireworks from the living room

One thing, and the most important thing, my family loves to do: EAT!! 

食 "si-gc". Gary learned the sound of this Chinese character during my parents' visit, because that's all he heard when he listened to our conversations in Cantonese.

Here we were in Chinatown. I found on Yelp a restaurant serving dim sum, a meal I have missed for so long. Since then we have been back to this restaurant 4-5 times. The food was very tasty! Much more than ones Toronto and Hong Kong surprisingly, and we cannot believe the price! $35 easily fed 4 of us, and we're talking about a meal of 15 items/dishes, belly bursting full! 


We made good use of the kitchen and the dining table during my parents' visit. Below are some photos of our dinners at home (you may see mostly Japanese food as my parents had a stop over in Tokyo on the way to Chicago):

Sashimi

Japanese home cooked food

Lobster night 

Japanese beef don (rice)

YOU HAVE JUST WITNESSED GARY'S 

2KG WEIGHT GAIN!!

Chicago was definitely a popular city for visitors, thus Michel's parents were also there for the week off. So we did a roast dinner at our apartment and invited some of our closer friends on tour.

The papas

The cooks. 2 roast chicken, potato mash, turnip mash, shrimps, mushrooms.

The parents with their espresso

to  be continued on "Exploring Chicago"...

Gary's Mum and Dad Visiting!

Geared up for Texas!

Gary's mum and dad came to visit during our last week in Houston (and then off to holiday we go together)!

Although there wasn't too much to do around without transportation, there was definitely sunshine and hot enough to sit by the pool and relax :)

We did, however, watched 4 days straight of the show, of which Gary's dad Eddie was picked from the audience and stole the spot light for a little while.

Just sitting by the pool

Photo in the Artistic Tent

An evening at the Movie Tavern, where you can order food and eat while you're watching a movie in the cinema.

BBQ by the pool

I'm the chicken wings master!!

Last night at the Stats bar for Bingo! They reserved a table for us with balloons and cake!

Awww from Stats

Let the dabbing begin!

So it all looks little bit chaotic.. Here's what was happening in the photos to the left:

Gary, his parents and I,  were playing one of the "Horse" games (small games played between Bingo games). The game is to have one end of the string (which was tied to a spoon), thread down 1 person from inside of their clothes, and up the next, and down the next... you get the idea. After it was threaded through all 4 members, we had to thread it all the way back to win. 

Houston, we have a problem

We were actually faster than the other team by 2 people, until we were threading it back and somehow the spoon and the string got completely tangled inside Eddie's clothes (and he was the last one too!). 

He had 3 pairs of hand attacking him at this moment, exposing him to everyone in the bar! Good laugh!