The Purple Ice Monster Hits Kaifaqu... and the people fight back!

We began to hear the wind over the fireworks at 5:00pm Sunday night. We marveled at the force of the coming storm, which was about to be the worst Dalian has seen in years. Each day since Chinese New Year, I made a claim that the constant firework displays would start to simmer down now but each day so far I had been proven wrong. Today, with all the hacov reaped by this 'Purple Ice Monster' included, was no exception. Over the course of the evening, I grew to believe that the stronger the storm blew, the more earnestly determined the people became to light their fireworks. As my neighbours lit them higher, they were countered with a horizontal hail rebuttal. Then, when the fireworks grew louder and more numerous still, we all got our power and water cut. Eerily back and forth the storm and the fireworks intensified... as if we were angry in Grade 5 again, saying... "oh yeah? Well..." ... "oh yeah? Well..." ... "oh yeah! Well..." ... "oh yeah! Well...". Lampposts broke at the base and crashed down into ice beds, the wind blew over and smashed our complex glass railings. The complex playground lay in a fun's-over pile swept up against the fence. Still, the fireworks continued. People spent three hours stranded at the shopping center, people held poles to not be thrown over, the whole city was in the dark, but still the fireworks somehow continued, loud and unruly like the wind. We lit candles just before the power went out. The doors and windows froze shut and we were thankful because it sealed the small cracks that usually allowed the wind to sneek through. We awed the storm for a few hours and then Jamie pulled out her guitar and I sat on the other couch, wrapped in a big fleece blanket, and listened to her play and sing songs until we were tired enough to sleep.
When we woke at 5:15 this morning for work it was still dark and the power and water were still off. We got ready for school by candlelight and it turned out to be a gorgeous, yet extremely extremely cold and windy, day. I took a few pictures of the Kaifaqu battleground. Though the storm left an ugly trail of destruction in this city, the battles winner can not be so easily declared because the wind is gone now, and all that is left to be heard outside my window is the confident, unrelenting fireworks.