by

Halfway to Shanghai

Let me clarify, I am not literally halfway to Shanghai. I am not writing this somewhere above the Pacific Ocean. I am however halfway through my scheduled time at the Foreign Service Institute, 74 days into training and 74 days out from the day we fly to China.

Halfway! Holy smokes!

I am surprised myself. I feel as though we have been here longer than that and the departure date is much closer. Probably because with each Friday I simultaneously exhale a sigh of relief as I look forward to a Chinese-free weekend (because I’m a bad student that generally does little or no study on the weekend) and take a gulp of panic as I realize I am one week closer to that Chinese exam. It’s that exam that determines whether or not right now is really the halfway point to an on-time here-we-come China departure or merely an ETD, heavy emphasis on the estimated.

Just more of that baited breath unknown that keeps life in the Foreign Service going ’round.

I have had a shift in priorities as my “To-do in Northern Virginia” list grows shorter and the “Prepare for China” list takes over.

Our Chinese diplomatic visa applications are complete and with the Chinese Embassy; I am just awaiting the call to pick them up. I am crossing my fingers they are correct the first time around. Two and a half years ago I went to pick up our visas with a Spanish classmate. Alas, the visas for her two daughters had been switched – the visa for the older daughter placed in the younger daughter’s passport and vice versa. They had to be redone. I would prefer not to have to do that.

Two boxes of things as well as my jogging stroller headed to Goodwill today. Saying farewell to the jogging stroller was a little harder than I expected. I know, I know, it’s a stroller. It is just that it had been C’s primary stroller, until I had to pack it up in the UAB. I spent the summer Home Leave extravaganza solely with the cheap-o, but surprisingly durable, umbrella stroller. No, I do not jog with the umbrella stroller, but then I do not jog with C anymore. As we are heading for Shanghai, a city of nearly 24 million where the Consulate has it’s own air quality monitor with daily updates…I do not see myself doing a lot of jogging out of doors.

The hoarding of additions for my Household Effects (HHE) shipment to China has also begun. As we get up to 7,000 pounds and I only have about 3,000 pounds of personal effects sitting in a warehouse in Maryland awaiting our departure to China, I have a little extra space to throw in a few more things. Things like three bottles of Extra Virgin Olive Oil and three bottles of Grapeseed Oil. I had two people already in Shanghai email me this might be something to include in my shipment. I have also stocked up on toothpaste for myself and C. Yeah. I know they have toothpaste in China, but some of it is unsafe. Not only did one of my Chinese teachers inform my classmate and I of this, but I also found several new stories reporting this online.

I have begun my stockpile of two years worth of tampons. I wish I were kidding. Unfortunately, I also heard from someone in China that some of these Chinese products are not the real deal. Online I found a link to the following news headline “China-wide fake sanitary napkin ring busted.” You did in fact read that correctly. It is not like they weight much of anything, and so into the shipment they go.

Hello Kitty, My Little Pony, and Doc McStuffins Band-Aids are also hot ticket items. Not that C has a lot of accidents requiring bandages —she does not—but she loves to wear them as decorative skin ornamentation.

Certainly I will be able to buy many, many wonderful products in China. I will also, of course, have mail service, including access to a Diplomatic Post Office or DPO, which generally has fewer restrictions and faster shipping times than the State Department mail or the “pouch.” (Hello Netgrocer, my friend, it has been a few years.) But hey, if I have the space in my shipment, I might as well stock up on some of my favorite products, right?

We all do it. We generally have something, some favorite brand of something that will just make some of those hard days overseas feel a little bit better. A few less shopping trips for days the thought of going to the grocery store in a foreign country seems the equivalent difficulty as splitting the atom.

I also need to begin preparing my cats Kucing and Tikus (Indonesian for “cat” and “mouse”) ready for another overseas trip. Yes, even my cats have been to three countries already and we are set to make it a fourth. They flew special cargo via Amsterdam out of Indonesia (I flew via Tokyo) and I was lucky to be able to drive them into and out of Mexico. This go around the kitties should be on the same flight. Laugh if you will, but I will likely be throwing in at least six months worth of kitty litter into the HHE shipment.

I have 74 days to prepare these and more. Well, I hope. Sixty four days until the Chinese test that will say yeah or nay on the departure.

The countdown has begun.

by

A REAL Halloween

All week I had been excited about the prospect of trick or treating with C on Halloween night. I had had her costume picked out since early September. She loves all things horse and cowboy/cowgirl related. The bonus was that as Halloween approached, she actually started talking about the holiday. The week of she actually began talking about trick or treating – and it was not because I introduced it. I have, for the most part, learned not to discuss future events with C because she has little or no concept of time and believes everything I talk about in the future is about to happen! Indeed, that morning she sat bolt upright and asked first thing to go trick or treating. I forgot my own rule and told her we would go trick or treating later, after school. Wouldn’t you know it, thirty minutes later I drive up to her school to drop her off and she bursts out crying because she does not want to go to school, she wants to trick or treat!

Realizing that C had a concept of Halloween for the first time and that it coincided with us actually being in the U.S.  filled me with a lot of unexpected happiness. In this Foreign Service life I cannot be sure when we will be in the U.S. at Halloween again. Sure, Halloween is celebrated in other places and even more places co-opt it as a special foreign event, popular in schools, expat community housing, and bars, but there really is no place that celebrates quite like the U.S. I mean that neither negatively nor positively; the U.S. celebration of Halloween is just unique.

In Ciudad Juarez they celebrate Halloween for instance. In fact it seems there along the border it is celebrated more vibrantly than the Day of the Dead. Many children in Juarez attend school in the U.S. (as did their parents) and people appear to enjoy this U.S. tradition. There is trick or treating and the handing out of candy. And yet, it is still, even so close to the U.S., not like in the U.S. In Juarez the children, instead of saying “trick or treat” roam the neighborhoods chanting “Queremos Halloween! Queremos Halloween!” (W e want Halloween! We want Halloween!). The candy generally handed out is of the hard candy variety. The kids seem happy enough with their spoils but having been fairly keen on trick or treating as a child, I know that in the U.S. the hard candy (those Dum Dums and Jolly Ranchers) that some people insist on giving out are more often relegated to the “last to eat” or the “give to mom and dad” pile.

It has been great to be here at this time. The leaves have turned gorgeous fall colors and most trees had shed about half their leaves. Pumpkin season seemed especially good. Although the weather hit a balmy 80 degrees the Tuesday before Halloween, the day of the weather had cooled considerably. It was chilly, around 50 degrees, overcast and windy. Yet this created just the right conditions for a “real” Halloween (except some children, like C, had to wear jackets over their costumes to keep warm, which usually bums some kids out). The fallen leaves were swirling. The crescent moon appeared hazy through the clouds. The air was cool and crisp. It was perfect.

I had initially considered trick or treating with my sister, niece, and nephew, but they were heading out from 5:30 and as I am on the late language schedule at FSI, that is my finish time. I would not get home until 6:30. I decided instead we would trick or treat in the neighborhood behind the hotel. First, I figured the neighborhood backs onto an elementary school so there are likely to be plenty of children living there. Secondly, as it is townhouses, we could cover more ground, more homes, with less walking. I guesstimated a minimum of ten houses and a maximum of twenty.

As we walked over to the neighborhood with grandma, I noticed it seemed very quiet. Few of the homes facing the street had lights on and those with lights gave no indication they would be participating in trick or treating. I saw no children knocking on those doors. I did not even hear any children, which seemed a particularly bad sign.

As we turned on to the first street a house was decorated and had a porch light on with a bowl of candy sitting on the step. No person anywhere to be seen. I directed C to take a piece and she happily did so, dropping it in her pumpkin bucket (yes, the ubiquitous plastic pumpkin bucket). The next few houses were dark. Then another two houses again had only a bowl of candy left outside in front of the door. C went up and knocked on the door anyway, she was so excited. But no one came. Hmmm…this was really strange. I thought first this neighborhood must be filled with some of the most honest kids in America. A great sign for sure, though nowhere near as interesting as actually knocking and saying “Trick or Treat!” Then I wondered if actually this is what trick or treating had become in America. It had been awhile…

Finally we saw not only other children in costume but also a door with a real live occupant handing out candy. Thank goodness! I had begun to feel disappointed that C was not going to get her Halloween experience (nor would I!). After this house there was another and another. We turned at the end of the street and behold there many homes decorated for the holiday, with carved pumpkins on the steps, fake spider webs on the bushes, silhouettes of skeletons and witches in the windows. C began jumping up and down with delight, especially as there were several groups of other children out running from door to door.

Halloween was saved!

All was good until C tripped on a step that activated a motion sensor sound machine that emitted a scary sound and the occupant of the house, dressed in costume, stepped forward to offer C some assistance and give her some candy. C burst out in sobs and begged to go home. And thus ended our first trick or treating experience in the U.S. It could be our last for awhile.

At least we got a small candy haul (certainly plenty for a toddler under 3) and this morning I still got to deny her candy for breakfast, which is a time-honored tradition of American parents in the days and weeks after Halloween.

It was perfect. A real American Halloween.

by

Shanghai, September 2002, Part Four

As part of my blog I am adding edited excerpts of emails I sent on past travels.
As I prepare for C’s and my move to Shanghai in January 2015, it seems particularly apt to take a look at when I last visited Shanghai. It’s funny, but I keep thinking that I was in Shanghai “fairly recently,” but 2002 is not recently at all! I visited Shanghai for one week during a break in my graduate classes in Singapore.

I enjoyed re-reading about my adventure to Zhouzhang. I had forgotten how I had met the young woman I went with. Unfortunately, the following year I did not get back to China. SARS hit the headlines, causing panic and insecurity in mainland China, Singapore, and several other countries, almost like Ebola today.  I am hoping to visit Zhouzhang, or a water town like it, when my mom is with us in Shanghai.  

Yesterday I returned to YuYuan Bazaar, this time actually entering the gardens. They are very lovely and peaceful. I wrote in my journal and read a little in my book while in the gardens sitting by a carp pond. I heard a tour guide telling some tourists that a small pavilion situated on top of a man-made hill used to have a view of the whole city and the river. Now it has views of high rises. Sometimes progress isn’t so great. It is too bad that view could not have been preserved. I also did a little shopping at the bazaar, bought a few nice things. Then I went to dinner. While there a young Chinese woman was brave enough to talk to me. She first came to sit at the table beside me. I could see her looking at me and trying to make up her mind whether to talk to me or not. She finally gathered her courage, took a deep breath, then asked if she could sit with me. I told her okay. Then she asked me what book I was reading. So we talked awhile (though not an easy feat as her English is not so good, and neither is my Chinese) and she asked if she could come with me to the Bund. I said sure. Then we proceeded to get very lost walking around. We stumbled upon an outdoor modeling show, wore out our feet, and gave in to take a taxi. We sat down at the Bund to talk. She is also new in Shanghai, having just come from Zhejiang Province to study at Fudan University, which is one of China’s best universities. She is a very sweet girl who to me looks like Gong Li, the famous Chinese actress (of Farewell My Concubine, Raise the Red Lantern, Shanghai Triad, and To Live fame). So we made a plan today to go to Zhouzhuang, a water town outside of Shanghai municipality region.

I met Can Can this morning. We tried to catch a cab out to the bus station, but unfortunately neither of us knew WHICH bus station. It turned out there are about five. So we just asked the taxi driver who took us to a station near the stadium. It was a long taxi ride and we arrived after 10:30, when I had heard the bus departed, but it turned out to be the wrong station anyway (guess there are probably several stadiums in Shanghai too!) So Can Can suggested we try to find out how much a taxi to Zhouzhuang would cost, but none of the taxis would tell us and just tried to drive away when we asked them. So we decided that maybe if we found the right bus station we could catch the noon bus. So we jumped in another taxi and endured horrible traffic and several close calls to arrive at a bus station at the train station. There we were told once again we were at the WRONG station. Can Can asked the guy how much a taxi would be to Zhouzhuang, and he said it would be 400 kuai round trip. It seemed a lot, but then again it was just about $45. And time was of the essence, so we took him up on it.

Zhouzhuang is really cool! It is a beautiful little town and a UNESCO world heritage site. Rather like a Chinese Venice. It has canals choked with slim boats and tourists, and lots of old buildings. Apparently about 60 % of the villagers still live in the houses that line the canals. There are graceful weeping willows lining the canal, and small high arching bridges crossing the canal at intervals. The houses are whitewashed with dark wood paneling and Chinese red lanterns. The restaurants along the canal have wood deck-type chairs to sit in and enjoy the view. The boat steerers are mostly women, who wear traditional blue cotton clothes, some also wear straw cone shaped hats, and they sing traditional Chinese songs as they pole along the canal. It almost seemed too perfect, as though it were created for tourists, but it wasn’t. It is not as famous a place as Suzhou or Hangzhou, and does not get as many visitors. But that is part of its charm. Iit seems an oasis in China, Chinese and yet can transport one to a more traditional time. Not that the town is not chock full of souvenir shops and old women following you with trinkets and postcards. It is. Last year apparently Jiang Zemin visited and had tea there. I guess that makes it a legitimate tourist attraction.

Our taxi driver followed us around the whole time. Apparently if two women from out of town hire a taxi driver for a long trip, it is like renting a dad. When I ordered a coke at lunch and it was very dirty on top and was flat right after I opened it, he argued with the proprietors to take it off the bill, and eventually they did! When we had told enough people we didn’t want their postcards and they didn’t go away, he shooed them away. He stayed just in front or just behind us, sort of like a chaperone. We even took him on our canal boat trip with us! I thought he would just wait in the car. Maybe he was afraid we would dump him and take the bus back to Shanghai and stiff him the fare. More probable than the friendly father figure, but I would like to think the former rather than latter, that he was watching out for us.

Traffic was slow on the way back and we were pretty tired. It was a good trip though and I am very happy I made the trip. See I was thinking I would come back next year, because I am planning on traveling a few weeks in China next summer, and will probably come in from Shanghai again, see Hangzhou and Nanjing, and swing over to Anhui to see my friend Jill who has just started teaching at a University there. So I think I could pass through Zhouzhuang again next year.

by

Shanghai, September 2002, Part Three

As part of my blog I am adding edited excerpts of emails I sent on past travels.
As I prepare for C’s and my move to Shanghai in January 2015, it seems particularly apt to take a look at when I last visited Shanghai. It’s funny, but I keep thinking that I was in Shanghai “fairly recently,” but 2002 is not recently at all! I visited Shanghai for one week during a break in my graduate classes in Singapore.

This is one of my favorite excerpts. I actually love the idea of people dressing identically, particularly in pajamas while out in public. In fact, I sort of plan to have C and I dress in pajamas, perhaps identical ones, and have a public outing at least once in Shanghai. I remember well the chair/clothes incident. I cannot say my Chinese has much improved. I hope the cruise has as it is again on my “must-do” list. I also remember Suzhou fondly and look forward to taking my mom there as I think she will love the gardens and C will love the carp. I should plan on finding the Garden for Lingering In first.

Here in China it is just adventure, adventure, adventure. Though I may have been a bit premature in saying how much I loved it. Yesterday some things started to get on my nerves, or at least I noticed things that would get on my nerves eventually. Or maybe I would love/hate them? They are part of what makes this China. There are a few silly things, like the amazing number of people who like to walk around together dressed identically! It is not just children, but couples, friends, old, young. This also goes for the propensity for women to wear panty hose that only goes to their ankles or below the knee when their skirts are above the knee. What really bothers me are the spitting, the smoking, the street arguments, the maniac taxi drivers, and the complete disrespect for the environment. Honestly crossing the streets is like taking your life into your hands each time. It doesn’t matter if you are at a crosswalk and the little walking man is green, taxis and scooters will run you over! I have had many close calls already. When I am in the offending taxi I just want to sink into the back seat so no one thinks I am some foreigner bent on taking out Chinese in the streets! And the arguments, ugh, you see a good one just about every day. Yesterday I saw some women with children screaming at each other at the top of their lungs while the kids cried. I couldn’t understand what it was about, but it seemed serious. Then again last night I was involved in my own little argument…..

I decided to take a night cruise on the Huangpu River. This is interesting for about the first 10 minutes, and then it just isn’t. The guide book says that the night tour is best unless one has a fascination for loading cranes. Well, in the evening you get to see the loading cranes in silhouette against the night, beautifully backlit, simply breathtaking! So I bought my ticket and boarded the boat 20 minutes before its departure, and it was packed. Not a spare chair to be found. Well, that’s not true. I saw some spare chairs around some specially set aside tables, and they had Sprite and watermelon!! I really wanted some watermelon, but I knew it wasn’t mine, but I did take a chair. No one was sitting in it, and I had a ticket just like everyone else. Of course as soon as I started to drag the chair away some guy comes after me, “Xiaojie, Xiaojie” (Miss, Miss) but I ignore him. Then he comes up to me and tells me to give the chair back (in Chinese). I try first for the dumb foreigner tack, I ask him why? In English. I have a ticket, why don’t I have a chair? He just points to the chair and grabs the back of it. I won’t give it up. The people next to me are on my side telling the guy to leave me alone and let me have the chair. Ha, success! The guy next to me asks me how long I have lived in China because my Chinese is good. I tell him “Bu gang dang” (No it’s not, don’t flatter me) the right thing to say. Of course I know my Chinese needs lots of work. But he tells me I argue very well. 🙂 Well, I don’t know about that. Maybe they didn’t notice because when I wanted to say “I bought a ticket too, so why don’t I have a chair (yizi)?” I ACTUALLY said “I bought a ticket too, so why don’t I have any clothes (yifu)?” Ha, ha, ha. Good thing I mumbled that last syllable because I wasn’t sure I was remembering the right word. I was just so flustered and speaking quickly. However, the chair guy came back when some more people showed up looking for those chairs. I saw him coming and held onto my chair tightly. He asked me to give it to him, and I just said “Bu, Bu, Bu!” (no, no, no!). My new best friends sided with me again right away, especially as the guy had tried to steal some of their chairs too. So I got to have a chair with a great view of the shadowy dock cranes.

Today, I took a trip out to Suzhou, about an hour from Shanghai by train. Suzhou used to be the premier spot in China for silk. Suzhou became very famous during the Ming dynasty. And there was some saying about heaven in the sky, but on earth there is Hangzhou and Suzhou. So it was considered a pretty nice place to live back then, and many rich people built beautiful gardens there. The gardens are the THING to see in Suzhou, along with a few pagodas. So I rented a bicycle (also a relic of the Ming dynasty) and headed off to see these amazing spaces of tranquility. Now the thing in China is that nice places like this, or well even plain old rocks that people want to put a sign on, have to have super spectacular names. So today I was to visit the Humble Administrator’s Garden, the Lion’s Grove Garden, the Master of the Nets Garden, and finally the Garden for Lingering In.

I headed first to the Humble Admit guy’s garden. And judging from the size and care put into it, I doubt he was really humble. It was a really nice garden and I wondered what it would be like to have it as one’s very own private garden. I spent nearly an hour there and was surprised by how quickly the time flew by.

I headed then to the Lion’s garden and found it smaller, more intimate. There was a little sun breaking through the clouds (or was it pollution?) and it was warmer there.
Then there was a harrowing ride around the town to get to the next garden, the Master of the Nets. There I was distracted by the sounds of a nearby school and school children repeating a silly dialogue about one’s mother and a missing bag in English. I had an insane idea to find the school and break into the class and give the kids a real English lesson, but after going around to the front of the school I lost my courage and just biked to the next sightseeing spot, a pagoda and one of the city’s original city gates, all in kind of a complex. This was a pretty cool spot. The pagoda was really magnificent. But the best part was a huge pond with many carp in it. I saw some people near the pond and fish thrashing around. All sizes and shapes and colors (okay, not blue or purple- but all kinds of golds and oranges and reds) jumping on top of each other to get the food, so much that some were on top of the water and then began to thrash about trying to get back into the water.
By this time it was almost 5 pm and I was getting tired and wasn’t sure I wanted to see a garden that would cause me to linger in it. Then again as I bought a ticket that included this garden, I set off to find it. For being the largest garden in the whole town it sure is hard to find and no one seems to know where it is. After searching for 20 minutes or so, after another life endangering 20 minute bike ride across town, I gave up and decided the only place I wanted to linger in was the train back to Shanghai.

I also wanted to share a few more humorous things from today, such as the names of various places inside the gardens. For example, The Listening to the Sound of the Rain Pavilion, the Hall of Drifting Fragrance, the Pavilion in the Lotus Breeze, the Watching Pines and Appreciating Paintings Studio, the Chamber for Reclining on the Cloud, and the Pavilion for Asking the Plum (ask it what??). Then there were those that were translated but I still couldn’t figure out what they were: The Cymbidium Goeingii Hall, the Prunus Mume Pavilion, and (my favorite) the Malus Spectabilis Court. Sounds fun, doesn’t it?
There was also a list of Points of Attention posted at each garden:

1. Travelers must buy tickets before they enter the garden. They should be civilized and polite and conscientiously observe the social morality and public order.
2. No firearms, bullets, explosives or other dangerous articles are allowed to be brought into the garden.
3. Protect the world cultural heritage. Cutting, climbing, or damaging the construction and facilities is strictly forbidden. Flowers and trees should not be injured and no trespassing on the lawns is permitted. No entrance into the fence, climbing on banisters or picture shooting is allowed.
4. Defend public hygiene conscientiously. No spitting, urinating or dispersing of peels or rinds or skins of fruit and scraps of paper. Smoking is not allowed in the garden except in places where it is otherwise stipulated. (I then watched a group of six men enter and light up immediately!!)
5. Travelers are forbidden to sell articles and to conduct any business or charging activities in the garden. (But I suppose locals could?)

These are great!  Ah, China.

by

Shanghai, September 2002, Part Two

As part of my blog I am adding edited excerpts of emails I sent on past travels.

As I prepare for C’s and my move to Shanghai in January 2015, it seems particularly apt to take a look at when I last visited Shanghai. It’s funny, but I keep thinking that I was in Shanghai “fairly recently,” but 2002 is not recently at all! I visited Shanghai for one week during a break in my graduate classes in Singapore.

I find this excerpt interesting for a few reasons. One, these days in my Chinese reading class we have had several texts with criticisms of Mao Zedong, though his face remains on the Chinese bills. Second, my visit to the Shanghai Acrobatic Troupe – at the very least I would like to take C to see one of their performances. Finally, I really can hardly wait to go to the hair salon and have one of those fantastic head and shoulder massages. As a single, without child person, I took those WAY too much for granted.

I think the Mongolian women are working here and have essentially moved into the Pujiang hotel. I thought it a bit strange that they went out dancing every single night. Yesterday I thought what a boring holiday that would be, not seeing any of the sights, and surely Ulaan Bator has a few discos to keep them satisfied. But now I am quite sure they are working here, probably at a night club, so there is little hope of them leaving me in peace any time soon. I didn’t get much sleep the night before last because they were chatting away as usual, and then one girl came back at 3:30 am and clomped around the room awhile. The other girls came back at 5 am and thought it a good time to have a heart to heart conversation, in loud voices. I sat up and asked them if they wanted to talk could they do it outside, and again “sorry, sorry” and then they launched right back into their dialogue. Probably they are rather drunk and don’t realize they are talking so loudly?

By yesterday evening, around 7 pm, I was so very, very tired, and didn’t think I was going to make it through the acrobatic performance from 7:30-9, and I had a pounding headache. But I bought some medicine and went to the performance. It was incredible!!! Simply breathtaking. I was literally on the edge of my seat, with my mouth hanging open, and making audible gasps as they continued to do amazing stunts of strength, flexibility and grace. I would highly recommend seeing this performance. I couldn’t help but wonder though about the lives of these acrobatics. How is that they got into this line of work? I think in the movie “Farewell my Concubine” we see at the beginning the children sold to the acrobatic schools by parents who can’t afford to keep them or to pay for debts, and the excruciating training the children go through to be so flexible and strong. I don’t know if that is the case anymore, or if like in the recent book I read “A Son of the Circus” by John Irving, which is set in India, that the children are often street children and are “better off” in the circus than on the street. Hmmmm……. I don’t think there are very strict labor laws like in Japan. Although in Japan there are many pop groups made up of children, they cannot perform live after 8 pm in the evening until they are over 16. In this performance I saw there was a little girl, maybe 7 or 9 years old who performed the last stunt after 9, and what a stunt it was! She balanced on one hand on top of a pedestal for approximately ten minutes, sometimes changing hands with a little hop, and stretching her legs in all sorts of contortions. It was so beautiful. She appeared happy as she made her bow, and as I was in the fourth row, so I could see all the performers clearly. But is she really happy? You could already see the muscles in her little arms and legs. She is so powerful, but so tiny and fragile at the same time. A truly amazing performance though.

I wonder about the still lingering admiration of Mao Zedong in this country. Is this man really adored? Is he venerated still after all the harm he did to the country? It seems so because his face now adorns the money here. When I was here in 1994, and even in 1996 and 1998, there was no Mao face staring at me from the currency, though it seems beginning in 1999 his face is on all the bank notes, replacing the faces of Chinese minorities. Maybe they no longer feel they have to placate the minorities for poor treatment by putting them on the money? I went to the Shanghai museum yesterday and there was even an exhibit for China’s minorities, and really well done. But to put Mao’s face on the money? Why not Deng’s face instead? I don’t see the little red Mao mirror pictures which I used to see hanging in taxis in Beijing when I was here in 1994. That doesn’t mean that they don’t hang somewhere now, but why have them when everyone carries Mao’s face with them in their wallets? Is this part of capitalism with Chinese characteristics? Every time you use money you are reminded of the revolution, of Mao? Interesting.

Yesterday I saw another spectacle on the street. As I was about to cross a street, a commotion arose to the right of me. I didn’t see what initially happened, but saw a policeman grabbing at a man, trying to hold him in a vice. The man was resisting and asking him what was the matter. Of course, this immediately caught the attention of every Chinese person in the vicinity and a circle was quickly formed around the pair. I was waiting for the light to change and cannot deny my own curiosity as to what was happening. I was more intrigued about this crowd though, and almost thought to take a picture, but could imagine the policeman then turning on me, so I refrained. The policeman kept trying to grab the guy by the hands, by the neck and so on, and the guy kept trying to get out of these attacks, but he didn’t seem to be prepared to run, just wanted the policeman to let go of him. He accidentally pushed the policeman who then fell to the ground. I let out a gasp at this, because I expected the guy was really going to be in trouble now for having pushed the policeman. But the guy then starts preaching to the crowd, pointing at the policeman and stating his case. I assume he was telling the crowd how he was wrongly attacked by the policeman. This was getting interesting, and the crowd was getting larger. I gave up trying to understand and crossed the street.

Yesterday I also had my hair done. I just went in to have my hair washed because I wanted the head massage, but decided to go ahead and have a little cut. The massage was exquisite. Wow, wow, wow!!! There was a head, neck, shoulder, and upper back massage included in this. I had my hair washed, dried, and cut. All of this for the amazing price of 29 kuai, or less than US$4!!! But what was more interesting perhaps was my hairdresser told me my hair was beautiful, I was beautiful, and would I like to go out dancing that night?! He gave me his name card and told me to call him after 9 pm!! I didn’t call him though. Too tired. But it really made me wonder. I have been in Shanghai three days and I had several people stop to talk to me, and tell me I am beautiful. One guy with his two female friends told me they just had to stop and talk to me because I looked exotic. I have been in Singapore two months and haven’t had anything remotely similar happen. But all this adoration could go to my head! Overall Shanghai seems like an interesting place to live. Sure it doesn’t have quite the cultural component of Beijing, but it is appealing in its own right.

by

Shanghai September 2002, Part One

As part of my blog I am adding edited excerpts of emails I sent on past travels.

As I prepare for C’s and my move to Shanghai in January 2015, it seems particularly apt to take a look at when I last visited Shanghai. It’s funny, but I keep thinking that I was in Shanghai “fairly recently,” but 2002 is not recently at all! I visited Shanghai for one week during a break in my graduate classes in Singapore.

After the overnight flight on which I got only 2 or 3 hours of sleep, I was barely conscious of my arrival in Shanghai. As a friend told me, Hong Qiao airport is more like a bus terminal than an airport, quite unlike the beautiful new Pudong Airport on the other side of the city. At 6:30 in the morning there just wasn’t much happening at the Hong. I caught a cab to the city, because of course the cab drivers all claimed that there wasn’t a bus to the city, even when a bus drove by right in front of me!! At least I talked them down from the ridiculous price of 380 kuai to the city, because the guide book said it was 50 kuai. But I couldn’t get less than 100. And it wasn’t even a real taxi, it was a nice van. They, the nice van guys, told me the taxis were just for short distances. Hmmm, I think I will be going back to the airport another way. Though, to tell the truth, $12 is not a horrible price to pay from an airport to the city in any country.

The day before my departure I had checked online for information a hotel which was to have dorms. Their website indicated all the types of rooms were available for Saturday. I figured since I was checking less than 24 hours before my arrival, I could safely expect them to remain available after I arrived. Still when I checked in and asked for the dorm I was told they were full. I mentioned I had checked the computer the day before, and miraculously one bed became available!! I just love that, milk the foreigners for all they are worth.

At 7:30 in the morning my room was devoid of people. I thought it odd that in a 6 bed dorm everyone was up and about so early. But maybe they are like me when I travel: early to bed and early to rise? I stayed up to get some water at the little mini store which opened at 8, and then I took a nap until 11. That felt good. Once I got up it was still cloudy but I thought I should at least go for a walk. The hotel I stay at is quite close to the Bund, the riverfront symbol of Shanghai. I somehow thought the Bund would be a bit nicer than it was, so much hype about it I suppose, but it is a rather cool place to go for a walk, because so many people are about. On one side of the Bund, the same side of the river is a main road, and many colonial buildings from the early 20th century. Grand, imposing structures that have a proud, weary, worn feel to them. On the other side, next to the busy brown waterway, is the modern New Pudong area, with a huge pink needle like skyscraper, a building with two glass globes flanking it, and several more shiny new tall buildings. So the Bund seems to flank both the “old” and the new in Shanghai, kind of a walkway between them? Really cool. Today I took a picture of a set of quadruplets dressed identically and wearing funny masks. They were maybe 3 years old and so cute. I am a bit surprised by people’s reaction to me, they still stare. I thought since this is Shanghai and many foreigners live here, that there wouldn’t be much staring, but I am a celebrity again!! I even noticed a few people taking pictures of me when I walked by. But I thought it was kind of funny when I stopped to check in my bag and then was on my way again, and a group of young women became frantic because they hadn’t gotten their camera out in time. Just the day before, an old man and a little Chinese girl had stopped in front of a huge Soviet-style statue and it was such a perfect picture, I was fumbling about for MY camera, but wasn’t quick enough!! I was stopped by several people today to chat and for them to introduce themselves and practice English. One guy asks if he could accompany me all day and show me around. I politely told him that I prefer to sightsee on my own. And thankfully he accepted that. I have had others in Tunisia, Italy, and Paris who would not believe me when I said that, and I was followed for hours….. But not here, not yet.

When I stopped to talk to the first guy who introduced himself to me, and then three children hung around to try and listen in and demand I speak Chinese (which I tried!), of course a few people would stop and watch the spectacle. And when I stopped to take a picture of the four identically dressed boys (all in pink!) with the funny Groucho Marx glasses on, we became a circus act in ourselves. The parents beaming that a foreigner wanted to take pictures of their children, the children unable to all have their glasses and stand still at one time, and myself trying to take the picture. A regular three ring circus it was. I managed to extricate myself from the circus and still the crowd was forming, because it seems in China when a small group of people begins to form, others cannot help but go and see what is happening too, so even after there is little to see, the crowd continues to grow.

Yesterday, I took a walk down Nanjing Lu, the main shopping drag of Shanghai. I stopped in and got a bad manicure and pedicure, but the most incredible foot massage ever! I think the pedicure was so bad, because normally they only give it to men. So my toe nails were at a rather longish length and I just wanted them cut nicely and some polish on them. They are sooooo short now, men’s length! And the polish, ugh! It was somewhat amusing to watch the man trying to put polish on my toe nails (especially as they were so short!). A woman working there saw how it was putting the polish on and told him to move and let her do it because he was doing a bad job. But she didn’t do all that great either. But the experience was worth it. The nails will grow back.

The hotel I am staying at is the Pujiang Hotel, one of the oldest hotels in Shanghai, and what used to be one of the most posh It used to be called the Astor Hotel and then Richard’s Hotel, and the likes of U.S. President Ulysses S. Grant, Einstein, and other celebrities stayed here. Now it is the location of some of the cheapest accommodation in the city. It still has the high ceilings and imposing rooms, but all are a bit worn for wear. It has a neglected feel and seems dark and tired, but it is also kind of cool. I wonder if Einstein stayed in my room? Though I have a feeling that it was the billiards room, because the light on the ceiling has that look about it. It has what used to be a fireplace, as well as a small alcove that can be closed off, which to me speaks of a small smoking room or gambling room off the billiards area. But I could be wrong, but it doesn’t matter, I’ll just think of it has the former billiards room anyway.

Ah, but what craziness my room is! Yesterday when I arrived at 7:30 in the morning, no one is there. Then at 7:30 pm when I returned, the others are sleeping. I was annoyed because I wanted to take a shower, but a pair of pants was floating in the bathtub. But I think, well, they ARE early to sleep, early to rise people. I am just going to go and do a little email, and then I will go to sleep early. But after email, I watched the Fellowship of the Ring in the bar, and went back to the room at half past ten, which had then become a flurry of activity! All the rest of the room members are women from Mongolia, and hard partiers from the look of it! They were all getting ready to go out, putting on make-up, in all states of undress/dress, and yakking up a storm!! They were talking so loud. The television was blaring. One girl in her bed chattering away on the phone, and almost as soon as she would hang up, someone would call again. I realized I wasn’t going to get any sleep right away, so I started to write in my journal. After half an hour though, my eyes were getting too heavy. I put my stuff away, and lay down, but the yakking did not stop! They even turned to me and told me sorry, they would be off soon, and then returned to talking to each other at the top of their lungs. Mongolian to me sounds like a cross between Korean and Russian, which isn’t all that surprising, but of course I did not understand a thing. But I didn’t care; I just wanted them to talk quietly. Half an hour later they will still going strong and I was about to scream. I asked them if they were going out, and they said in two minutes, sorry, and off they went again using up oxygen as though it were in short supply. About 20 minutes later they finally left. Though one girl arrived back at 5:30 in the morning and stomped about in her high heels as loud as she could, back and forth, back and forth across the room.  I cannot help but hope these women check out tomorrow.

Today I took the psychedelic Bund tourist tunnel under the Huangpu River to the New Pudong area and checked out a mostly empty mall and the Shanghai aquarium. The aquarium was really, really good. In my opinion it is much better than the one in Singapore, which really surprised me. Especially as the Shanghai one mentions conservation, while the Singapore does not. Yeah, China!

by

Three More Months

In my last post I waxed poetically about how nice it is to be here in Northern Virginia for training in the fall. Now, I feel like I want to whine just a wee bit.

Here I am starting to settle in. We have been here eight weeks now, basically two months. C is getting settled in her “school” (i.e. daycare). She names a few people as her “friends” (turns out several of them are her teachers, but hey, that’s cool). When both C and I and my sister and her kids are free, C gets to spend time with her cousins. Most afternoons during the week my parents pick C up from childcare, so C gets several hours a week with her grandparents. C is in swim lessons. She finished up the Beginner Mommy and Me class and today started her first Advanced Mommy and Me class.

We are settled into our apartment. Sure, it’s an extended stay hotel, but it is home. Well, for a little while longer. We have thirteen weeks left, basically three months. ONLY THREE MONTHS!

It seems like we were only just packing up in Mexico. Oh, right, we were. That happened only four months ago.

I looked back at the past ten years and I have moved TEN times.

If I go back ten more years, I have moved a total of 22 times in past 20 years. (This does not include my traveling such as the 11 months I spent backpacking in 2000-2001, my two months traveling through Spain and Portugal in 2002 or our nomadic Home Leave adventure this past summer)

How about that?
Whew!

(I know, I know. I chose each and every one of these opportunities.)

Even if I take out all of the pre-Foreign Service moving, I have physically moved six times in the past 3 years and 4 months!

I returned from Jakarta, Indonesia to start with the State Department and moved into an apartment at Oakwood Falls Church, Virginia in July 2012. In November 2012 I had to move out of that apartment into another one as Oakwood was renovating. Then in January 2012 I gave birth to C and moved out of that apartment to live with my aunt in Winchester, Virginia for two months (the reasons of which are complicated to go into – basically the government would not pay my per diem while on maternity leave). Then in March 2012 when C was eight weeks old, I moved back into Oakwood Falls Church. In July 2012 we headed to Ciudad Juarez, Mexico for my first tour, and then, of course, we departed there July 1 of this year, moving into our current accommodation at the very end of August. And in three short months we will be on the move again.

Don’t get me wrong. I do enjoy being here. I was not making things up in my last post. Also, a certain part of me must rather like this, the regular moving. However, every once in awhile I feel overwhelmed with the moving and I question my sanity. I wonder what it would be like to stay in one place longer term…

When looking at the Foreign Service for a career, the oft quoted time frame is that an officer will move “every few years” or “every two to three years.” However, the reality is that an officer will likely move more frequently. Most often the increased frequency depends on training in Washington, DC and certain posts with shorter terms.

When you join the Foreign Service you start in Washington, DC in training at the Foreign Service Institute in Arlington, VA. If this is not your home before joining the FS, then the State Department will move you there. You could be in training for six weeks or six months or one year. It depends on where you are assigned. Many who are assigned a Washington, DC post for their first tour move out of the State-department provided housing into their own housing. So even if you stay in DC for the first year (most of these DC tours are just one year), then in 14 months you have moved twice, and you are likely then preparing for a third move overseas for your second tour, again depending on how long you will be in training prior to that tour. Moves are just par the course.

I am excited to get to Shanghai and set up our new place. Being the crazed list-making fool I am, I do, of course, have a list of how I will decorate C’s room in Shanghai and a list of places to visit and things to do together. After all, we get to stay there for a WHOLE TWO YEARS.

Basically, though I am tired just thinking about this next move even as I start preparing for it (it’s time for the time-honored tradition of applying for our diplomatic visas!) I am keeping in mind that right at this moment many of my FS colleagues are preparing for or in the midst of their own moves. There are friends raiding Costco for must-have food items in bulk. Others are having their final farewell parties and dinners with friends at home, in DC, or at post. Or even saying final farewells to favorite haunts and foods that will be unavailable or difficult to procure in post X. Many weighing suitcases and boxes in bids to estimate if their carry-on, Unaccompanied Baggage (UAB), or Household Effects (HHE) will meet the maximums. No move is the same, but it is comforting knowing that I am not the only one doing this. Also, that I have survived moves in the past and most probably will survive the next.

by

Of Two Minds

It is really nice being in the United States. I cannot say I love studying Chinese (there are good days and not so good days), but I do enjoy being in Northern Virginia. Autumn is such a lovely time here. I missed autumn in Mexico. Contrary to what many people thought, it did get cold in Juarez, but there is no changing of the leaves, then crispness in the air and cool, drizzly days. It was really, really hot and then it was not quite so hot. It rained maybe five times a year and I did not even carry an umbrella.

So although recently it has been rainy and cool, even this self-confessed tropical weather chaser has liked it. I have even bought C her first rain coat and it made me ridiculously happy to do so.

I really like living in Herndon. We are very close to where I grew up. I regularly drive past the Pizza Hut I worked at the summer between my freshman and sophomore years of college. Across the street is the shopping center where the parents of one of my best friends in high school had their Chinese restaurant. C’s swim school is located in the same store space as the Hallmark my mom used to take my sisters and I to spend our allowance. In the same shopping center is the McDonald’s where they gave me a free small fries when I showed up in my Halloween costume (I dressed up as a bag of McDonald’s small fries!) There is also the Giant Food Store my best high school friend worked at for years. The shoe store where I had my first job is now a dry cleaner; the first pizza place I worked is now a Pollo Peru, but the reminders are still there.

I lived my whole childhood in the same place, in this area. Even Falls Church, which I drive through each day to and from the Foreign Service Institute, is not only where I lived when I last did my Foreign Service training, but where I lived with my aunt and uncle one summer in college. I love the Lost Dog and Stray Cat cafes. There is a wonderful park in Falls Church across from the library. I used to walk down there when I lived with my aunt and uncle. I feel my cheeks burn when I think about the time I made out with a boyfriend there. (And they are burning now) When living there 2011-2012 I picked up pregnancy books at the library and just a little way up the street a policeman at the town hall helped me install C’s first car seat.

Washington, DC too is close. As a child, I spent many a day at museums on the National Mall. I still remember the summer my dad worked at the Air and Space Museum and he took me to work one day. We visited the Smithsonian castle and the National Museum of American History many times. Yet the National Museum of Natural History was the runaway favorite, most especially the Egyptian mummies, the dinosaurs, and the live insect section. Later, as an adult, I lived in DC for four years and the Spy Museum, Newseum, and National Portrait Gallery became new favorites.

There are memories really on just about every corner; I have a history here.

I have found myself daydreaming about what it would be like to really live here again, not just to be here on a temporary basis while training at FSI. I try to puzzle out where I would like to live. In the heart of DC in a chic neighborhood like Eastern Market or Georgetown? Falls Church with its small town feel right outside of DC? Reston, in the area right around the pedestrian-friendly shopping center? Or right here in compact, convenient, and historical Herndon?

What really hits me is that C will not grow up in just one place. She will not really have a home town. She may or may not ride her bike around the neighborhood. It will depend on where we are living at the time – if it is the kind of place kids ride bicycles or not. It is highly unlikely her elementary school classmates will also be in her middle and high schools. She may attend as many as three or four elementary schools.

It is not a bad thing. It is only a different thing.

Yet, I find myself feeling wistful.

Then I think ahead to Shanghai. I have heard such good things about living there. I have already compiled a lengthy list of things for C and I to see and do, one for almost one-third of our 104 weekends. I can hardly wait for us to take a stroll along the famous Bund, possibly wearing matching pajamas. I look forward to taking C to the Wild Animal Park and the fantastic Ocean Aquarium. I see us taking in a show of the famous Shanghai Acrobatic Troupe. And finally the cherry on the top of my I-am-taking-my-Disney-loving-toddler-to-Shanghai sundae: Shanghai Disneyland is slated to open in late 2015.

I think of all the opportunities that C will have. She has already been to more countries by the age of two than many Americans will visit in their lifetimes. She will visit many of the finest places in the world, be they amazing cultural or natural sites, famous or not. She will meet and make friends with people from all over the world. Heck, by this time next year she will probably be speaking Chinese!

Although a single town or area will not have landmarks of her childhood, she will have such landmarks all over the world. That is amazing to think about.

by

10K is the New Half

Today I ran the Freedom’s Run 10K in Shepherdstown, West Virginia. Originally though, I had signed up for the half marathon. It was to be my West Virginia half and one I was pretty excited about. (I even checked with the 50 States Half Marathon people to make sure it qualified for West Virginia since the majority of the run is actually in Maryland.) Runner’s World magazine ranked it among their Top 25 Half Marathons as well and named it a Bucket List race. Who would not be tempted by that? Certainly half marathon enthusiasts would find it hard to turn down. I absolutely did.

However as race day came ever closer I realized I just would not be ready. This felt different than my concerns before the South Dakota half. This was not just nerves; this was hard reality.

Who would have thought it would be easier to train in Ciudad Juarez, Mexico, former murder capital of the world and an always dusty, sandy high desert locale, and while traveling around on my crazy Home Leave? I did not. I envisioned fabulous long runs along tree-lined, beautifully maintained Northern Virginia running trails. I did not factor in juggling my Chinese training and study schedule and being a single mom of an active toddler.

I tried to train C to sit quietly in the gym with her iPad and Stuffie the Black Kitty but that turned out to be a laughable proposition. I sometimes managed two miles with several pauses in-between to tell C to sit down, put down the weights, not to touch something, get off the other treadmill, and so on… <sigh> THAT was not going to be a reliable way to get my run in.

Again I went to the Freedom’s Run website.

“The Half Marathon is very challenging”

“The first 3 miles are flat on the C & O then the difficult Antietam Battlefield section begins as you join the marathoners.”

“Once leaving the Canal the course is very hilly and rolling through Antietam Battlefield.”

“As one 2009 participant stated aptly ‘Freedom isn’t easy.’ These words will be your mantra through the scenic Battlefield.”

Um, yeah. Not only was my training crazily random and many would have a hard time calling it training at all…but the course would kick my a** even if I were training. It was time to email the organizers and drop down to the 10K. The elevation of the 10K chart indicated it would be plenty enough of a challenge.

And it sure was! Temperatures were perfect and the course lovely. At least half the course followed alongside the Potomac River on a tree-shaded road; the leaves in red and golden mid-Autumn splendor. The course though was HILLY, the organizers were NOT kidding. One particular hill, on the way back into town, seemed to go on and on and on…

As I had looked ahead to this half I had also made a decision to not participate in any more organized runs. I simply do not have the time to train. But…after three 10Ks in five weeks I must admit the distance has begun to grow on me. It is still a challenging distance, particularly with my current situation, but it is a distance I can train for and run without taking up quite as much time as a half marathon.

So, yes I have signed up for yet another 10K in four weeks. They had a long sleeve pullover and a distance I could not resist. I am on the lookout for more.

I will miss the half marathons. I may not run another until next summer, after my Chinese training, after my Chinese test, after we have moved to Shanghai, after I have had a chance to settle in and find out if and how I might train for one. I certainly would like to give the Freedom’s Run half another go. Until then, the 10Ks will have to tide me over.

by

Learning Chinese and a Poopie Diaper

I have been struggling with how to portray how I feel about my return to the Foreign Language Institute for training to top up my very stale Mandarin Chinese. Perhaps my most difficult issue was how to explain how hard this has been for me without sounding like a majorly sad grump. Because I will tell you, I have had some majorly sad and grumpy days.

For example, I had my first tear-stained breakdown. Yep, it happened. Thankfully it did not occur in front of any of my colleagues but rather in front of a member of the Chinese Department staff as I tried to explain my very real fears that I will not pass the Chinese test in January. She was very kind and told me not to worry, which only made me suspect she has no idea how badly I speak Chinese.

I also threw a pen in class. I am not proud of it. I could not help but think later that it while it was probably too mild a throw to make it in to some kind of “Diplomats Behaving Badly” montage, it most certainly was not one of my finer moments. I certainly did not make a conscious decision to throw the pen but after feeling browbeaten to create one too many a Chinese sentence in a grammatical structure I simply did not understand with a limited vocabulary of half-remembered words and phrases learned as recently as 2002…and then having the teacher cut me off two words into my response, I had had it. And the pen launch sequence commenced.

One of my biggest struggles has been finding a time to study. I tried studying in the evenings as C watched a DVD and then after she went to bed. Firstly, you parents out there must be laughing your socks off imagining me trying to study with a toddler in the room. Yeah, it went about as well as you imagine. “Mommy, change DVD, change DVD, change DVD.” “Mommy, snack, snack, snack!” “Mommy, mommy, mommy, mommy, mommy…” Secondly, my attempts at raising a jet setting night owl toddler have been too successful and I was too tired to do anything after she went to bed because it was also my bedtime.

Then I decided to wake up early in the morning, around 5 am, study until C woke up around 7:30, take her to child care and then drive on to the training institute for a little more study until class began at 10:40. Except on day one of this brilliant plan I woke up at 5:30 and I heard the sweet little call of “mommy?” at six.

@$&#

Plan #3 has been to wake up at 5:30, get C to daycare by 6:45, drive to the training institute, arriving around 7:35, then studying in the cafeteria until class at 10:40. I study again for at least an hour in between my morning class and afternoon class. I also listen to Chinese in the car either to or from the training institute. I downloaded some popular Chinese songs and language learning podcasts, burned the textbook and other dialogues to disc, and purchased the soundtrack to Frozen in Mandarin. We are expected at the very least to study for 8 hours a day including our 5 hours of classroom time. This schedule means I can generally manage to get those three extra hours in. This has been mildly successful, at least in relative terms.

Yet every single day I eat a huge helping of humble pie in class and continue to harbor serious doubts about my readiness to test in January.

This morning I set about to take C to swimming class (I have at least followed through with this ONE thing from my “back in the U.S. to-do list”). I got myself dressed and her dressed. I took us out to the car and buckled C into the car seat.

Then I realized I had forgotten my towel.

[Note: I did not bring towels the first day of swim class because I expected, for some reason, they would be provided, and had to run into the nearby supermarket to buy a set of hand towels. I felt like schmuck.]

So I unbuckled C from the car seat and walked back to the apartment to get the towel and then returned to the car and buckled her back in. Only to realize I had forgotten a spare diaper.

So I unbuckled C from the car seat and walked back to the apartment to get the extra diaper and then returned to the car and began to buckle her back in. Then I smelled something unfortunate. C needed a diaper change.

<sigh> I wanted to just pack it in. I wanted to just get C out of the car and give up on the swim class at least for today and maybe forever. There was even a millisecond there I considered I might never leave the apartment again. I took a deep breath and convinced myself to keep going.

So I unbuckled C from the car seat and returned to the apartment, changed her diaper, and then returned to the car and buckled her back in.

We were late for swim class.
But we still got there and were able to participate.

This week my Chinese study has been derailed several times.

Last weekend C had a fever of 102 all day Saturday and 103 most of Sunday. Instead of being a docile and very sleepy sick person she became an extremely demanding one. Not one minute of studying that weekend. <sigh>

I arranged for my parents to watch her on Monday instead of taking her to daycare, so I actually departed home at 9:20 that day, after some haphazard studying in the apartment that morning. <sigh>

Early Wednesday morning, C woke up and demanded food. I mean she literally sat bolt upright in bed at the witching hour of 3:40 am and said “FOOD!” and would not go back to sleep until she had had some “Dora snacks” and a juice. So I let her sleep in a little and departed for daycare at 8 am. Then on the way to the daycare center that morning the low air light came on for my tires. I stopped to have them checked and every single one of them was low. <sigh>

On Thursday C woke up in the middle of the night upset, the fever was back. I gave her medicine but could not get back to sleep as I had developed a terrible stomach ache. So I called in sick and took C to the doctor. I imagined I might get a little studying done but again C would not nap, was extremely demanding, and, as an extra fun bonus, shoved an edamame bean up her nose in the afternoon. <sigh>

Right now I am feeling the best I have about Chinese in the four weeks I have been studying. I have no idea why.

On the drive back from swimming class today I thought the whole episode summed up how I feel I prepare for Chinese every day – shit happens but I AM trying.

That’s all I can do.