Bu Xie, Zhou Yu Feng, & (hopefully) Relief for My Back

This is Bu Xie ("You're Welcome"), my good luck New Year Tiger (if you haven't figured it out, it's the Chinese Year of the Tiger). I don't know why he has a fish on his nose, but, anyway, I bought him in beautiful downtown Deyang, and he seems to have brought me luck!You see, I went downtown to explore and get international cell phone service. I rode the bus from the apartment complex to downtown (left). Riding in a bus, car, or taxi here in Deyang is an experience. Memphis drivers are models of caution and decorum by comparison! Along with said motor vehicles, there are bicycles, motorcycles, motor scooters, bicycle rickshaws, and pedestrians all in the same street! Horns are honking and lanes are changed constantly. You cross the street at your own risk because the bicycles, motorcycles, motor scooters, and bicycle rickshaws are apparently immune from traffic lights. I've sworn at many a one who has almost mown me down (swearing in a country where nobody understands you is fun ;-)!). When I rode in the taxis to and from Shifang, the cabbies must have wondered about my gasps, whispers, and muttered oaths as we narrowly missed disaster at each turn!
Anyway, having survived the bus ride, I wandered around and did some shopping. Bu Xie was my first purchase.Later I bought some shoes. My Chinese shoe size is 36! I'm a US size 6N, but here I have big feet for a female. In any case, the shoes are cute (sort of Mary Janes but soft leather uppers) and comfortable and fit.
Cell phones are big here (just like the US), and there were scads of cell phone stores big and small downtown. Blaring loud pop music outside the stores' entrances apparently is a marketing ploy whose appeal alludes me. I settled on (or Bu Xie led me) to a very large China Mobile store staffed with young ladies in uniform. I, the Meiguoren (American), walked in. Of course everyone looked at me (I'm used to it now). A pretty young girl asked in English if she could help me. I tried explaining that I wanted a plan so I could call from China to the US (and call locally). The girl, whose name is Zhou You Feng, and I went back and forth with her good but still limited English and my very limited Mandarin ("I don't speak Mandarin" is my best phrase in Mandarin) and a bit of drawing. There was soon a small crowd of young sales associates gathered around us, Zhou You Feng giving them play by play in Mandarin. I decided to say that I needed to call my mother back home since family, especially mom, is very important in China. Bless her heart, Zhou You Feng offered to let me use her cell phone to call my mom (I told her it was late at night back in Memphis)! To make a long story short, it turned out my Motorola Razr could work with a new SIM card. My angel Zhou You Feng guided me through all the rather complicated process. After getting the SIM card, she walked with me (carrying my shopping bags) the several blocks to the CM location where I needed to set up a long distance account. We talked on the way over about me teaching English in Deyang and her wanting to study more English (she didn't have time with her job). I told her that her English was better than a lot of my students (Truth!). In the end, Zhou You Feng and I exchanged cell phone numbers. She said to call her if I needed help with anything, and I told her to call me if she wanted to practice English. What a sweetie! Xie xie ni!
Gang, I'll tell you about the potential solution to my back breaking hard bed problem later...