Put me in the Zoo!

Welcome back! Man, it’s definitely been awhile since I’ve updated the blog hasn’t it? Sorry for that, life just keeps us hopping here! I’m slowly starting to learn some of the language here and can now get around pretty well in a taxi, as well as telling onlookers DON’T WANT YOU TO TOUCH or how old Aiden is. Feeling pretty proud of myself, though I have a LONG way to go! 

Are you ready to laugh and enjoy some of our crazy stories and frustrations…get ready! Life here is always interesting if nothing else. 

So…I was at the grocery store the other day with Julie and we stopped into a clothing store there. As I picked up a shirt that looked nice, the lady working at the store came over, took the shirt out of my hand and put it back on the rack. Confused, I went to pick up another one and she waved me off again, actually she blocked off the whole rack from me.  Then she proceeds to show me through “sign language” that she thought I was “too big” to shop at that store and didn’t want me to even look!!! Talk about making you feel fat and unwelcome! O goodness…I just had to walk away...and thus life in China goes! Say anything to anyone! Needless to say…I didn’t buy any “snacks” at the store that day…

Jeffrey had to go on an overnight business trip last week and Aiden and I went with him. Traveling with a 9 month old in interesting enough, but when you add in a whole culture not used to seeing “white” people, things get even crazier! We had to go to an opening ceremony and expo for the Agricultural Department here in China on Friday morning. The ceremony was outside and it was a beautiful day, but since it was nap time Aiden was starting to get a little fussy. He and I went for a walk to the back of the crowd to find a good place to stroll around and lull him to sleep…that didn’t happen. We weren’t there for more than 5 minutes when (no exaggeration) at least 60 people swarmed up trying to take our picture. I felt like a character at Disney World that EVERYONE wants to see and take a picture with or else the trip wouldn’t be near as good. Whew…it was overwhelming but funny at the same time. There was one guy who wanted to practice his English and started to apologize that they just haven’t seen a white baby before. I tried to joke with him saying that I was going to start charging for pictures, but he really didn’t get it…he just looked at me like I was just crazy for even thinking about it…well maybe I am a little crazy. Once the ceremony ended, we were able to find Jeffrey, along with Jane, our “translator” for the day. Poor Jane, who is Chinese, had no idea what she was getting ready to be in for. We stepped inside the exhibit hall and the flashes started! We couldn’t even go 10 feet without someone stopping us to take pictures. At one point, this particular guy who had been following us around most of the day, handed us a basket of pears and asked us to pose with it. HA! Apparently we were going to make the newspaper with that. Ha!!! We were cracking up at all the craziness…hoping we can get a copy of that paper but you just never know. Just put us in the zoo…I think its where we belong! 

Daddy and Aiden at the AgriExpo

 

 

 

 

I think that I just need a good cover story. One of the products they have here is Whitening Cream. Yes, I know…to us Americans that is an extremely strange concept…we all want to be more tan and here they want pale white skin. My plan is to get in touch with Pond’s and try to become their spokes woman…so every time someone wants to take our picture or asks where I’m from, I’ll just say, “I’m Chinese…If you use Pond’s Whitening Cream, you too can have white skin like me!” Think it will work? I’m sure that Pond’s sales would go through the roof! But then I guess you would have to add hair dye and colored contacts to that list. O well…it was worth a shot. 

As we were walking to the mall the other day, we saw such a funny sight! A rooster was tied to a moped! Can you imagine how they move together? Would the rooster sit on the seat with the driver? Or would he be running along beside the moped? Who knows, but it was sure a funny site to see. There are so many mopeds around here. It’s the main form of family transportation. We’ve seen upwards of 4 people together on one. Family night out on the moped! 

Rooster and the Moped!!!! Cock-a-doodle-do! 

 

 

Family Outing on the Moped!

 

I so wish each of you could come to visit…its so hard to really describe what life is really like here until you come and experience it for yourself! One thing that will be hard for you back home to really grasp (unless you have been out of the country) are the wet markets. The meat section is huge, but its all open air. Cut meat is out in the open for anyone and everyone to touch. Kinda gross if you ask me. That is one area that I probably won’t ever be able to get used to. I have to buy my meat pre-packaged…or right out of the butcher’s coolers at Far East. 

Aiden is definitely a growing boy! He is 9.5 months old now and changing every day. He can walk if he is holding one of your hands and loves to walk everywhere. We are working on moving him fully to real food, but that is being a tough transition. He loves fruit and will eat an entire (yes entire) banana at one sitting, but getting him to eat veggies (yes, he takes after his mother) or meat (who is this kid???) is another story. But he is a lively kid who makes us laugh daily! He has started saying “Uh Oh” and waves and everyone he meets. He still loves his books and climbing the stairs. He is totally a Daddy’s boy! I can barely get a hug in when daddy is around! I love it though and am so glad that he is a fan of his Dad! 

Daddy and Aiden at Dairy Queen

Aiden eating bananas!

This week has been a holiday week here in China celebrating their national day, 62 years of Communism. They must love this week since the fireworks have gone off in our complex at least 10 times a day. Whew…its crazy loud! But the nice part is, Jeffrey has been home all week! WHOO HOO!!!! We went yesterday to Suzhou with our good friends, the Sager’s. We tried out the Lion’s Grove Garden. Holy Cow was it ever packed! We quickly learned that traveling during the holidays here is not a good idea. One thing China is not is stroller friendly. Julie and I had a time maneuvering the boys around the crowds and all the steps. Then add in all the people taking pictures of all of us. We have a running joke of who is going to see whose kids on a billboard first. The garden itself was really neat and will be a good one to go back and see when there are NOT so many people around. Or…go back when you pack a lunch and can spend a lot of time in that area. Taxis were so hard to come by. It took us over an hour and a half to get a taxi to go get lunch. But get one we finally did and headed to…wait for it…a MEXICAN restaurant!!! O my mouth was watering at the thought! But low and behold…once we got there they were closed for a wedding being held there and we wouldn’t be able to get in until 3. So we went and grabbed a small appetizer and waited until 3. Boy was it worth it…that was some fabulous food and we had enough to bring home and have lunch today! Then we went to the next greatest thing I have found from America in China…COLD STONE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! What a piece of heaven that cheesecake ice cream was. Cold Stone is my favorite ice cream ever! I’m a happy girl having gotten all that goodness in. 

The crowd at the Lion's Gate Garden.

 

 

 

We did have another adventure a few weeks ago. Our driver, Chen, wanted to take us on a trip to see the Big Buddha. Crazy interesting experience. Remember me saying that China is not stroller friendly? Chen told us not to bring the stroller and we were glad once we got there. There were steps galore. So, Aiden was happily content in his carrier and Mama got a good work out in. Over 500 steps total carrying an extra 20lbs...thats a good work out. Looking at the site from a cultural aspect was really interesting, though nothing was in English, so we really have no idea what all we were seeing but it was cool. We went to see a show in the most incredible theater we have ever been in. It was a round room whose floor was a moving platform. Such a neat idea for a theater. 

Well folks, that’s all my crazy stories for now. There will be more…that is for sure. Stay tuned!

Daily Happenings

Our BEAUTIFUL "Typhoon" weather

Aiden loves his buddy Noah!

Where to even begin today? There are days that I just sit on our couch and stare outside out window…not really thinking about much just letting my mind wander. That’s how I feel at the moment. So much here is just out of control at the moment and TRUST is becoming an even bigger factor. Not necessarily in a bad way, just learning that my plans for life just don’t matter. HIS do! I confess that I’m struggling to sleep these days, waking up at strange hours and not able to go back to sleep. So I pray and then wonder why we are really here…what’s the purpose…what’s the end result? But then I remember that this is not my concern…my concern is just to daily trust and walk with HIM.

Well now that I have started on a crazy note…lets move on to more interesting things. Get back in the fun spirit!!! Well maybe the crazy won’t go away…at the moment the people next door are doing some AWFULLY LOUD construction and in the short time I have been writing this blog I have about jumped off the couch a few times…scares me to death!!! Whew…calm the blood pressure down! I’m just amazed that Aiden is asleep still through all of this …HALLELUJAH!

Jeffrey and I decided to have a stay at home movie night/date night this past Saturday. We actually had dinner at the table and then tried to watch a movie that we had just purchased earlier in the day from the DVD store in the area. We bought Fast Five and were so excited. But once we got it home we realized that someone had dubbed over the original movie with Chinese.  So sad!!!!! So the lesson is only buy TV series and not movies…is Fast Five even out on DVD at home? That might be the issue…we weren’t sure.  We did buy season one of Royal Pains and loved it! It always came on at home way to late for these early to-bedders. Its sad to admit, but we got so into it that we watched the whole season in 3 days! Now I’ve been keeping my eye out for the other seasons…we have to know what happens!

Do you like my new car?????? I wish! 

I had an interesting and heart stopping experience a week or so ago. One of our management guys came by and told me that in 30 minutes the police wanted to come and take my picture. At that point I wasn’t really thinking anything about it but then when they showed up 10 minutes later I had worked myself into a little bit of a tizzy….why did they want to take my picture??? Then they also asked to see my passport. I asked them to wait while I went to get it…did NOT let them in the house. Then I realized that I had NO IDEA how to get in our safe downstairs. I tried calling Jeffrey but he didn’t answer…took me forever of calling before calling one of his receptionist and demanding that she pull him out of his meeting. She didn’t want to and I felt horrible cause I think I got a little rude and had to apologize for that later. I was in PANIC mode at this point! Thank the Lord that I have a wonderful and calm husband to my hyper state of mind. He did his best to walk me through how to open the safe and what to do. But I still couldn’t get it open…I think I was way to keyed up, but I also think that I wasn’t meant to get in the safe at that moment. I finally went back up after about 30 minutes of making them wait only to find that the police had left and the management guy said they would come back later. I was FURIOUS!!!!!!!!!! But who knows what they really wanted since to my knowledge they have not come back. O well…whatever…right?

We have learned that if all Chinese typhoon’s are like that one we had here recently, we want one every weekend. That was the first time since we have been here that we have seen a BLUE sky! It was beautiful and made us feel like we were back home. We got some rain and wind but nothing major. Though we were all warned to secure anything that wasn’t tied down, so we put all of our patio furniture in the arbor or laundry room…and to confess, we have yet to move it out. I guess that is a good thing since now that the typhoon is TOTALLY passed, we are getting a TON of rain! Go figure! Ha!

Feeding myself

Since my last post Aiden has changed so much! He is crawling so fast and it is tough to keep up with him. He loves to “dance” and laughs so much. We had a visit from Jerome Beggs this week and Aiden LOVED him! He made a friend for life there! He gets so totally excited when Jeffrey gets home from work…totally adorable. He wants to feed himself with his spoon and makes a total mess. He still just has one tooth…he keeps rubbing his mouth like more are coming, but they are just slow. He says Da-Da all day long and loves to say it over and over. That’s his only word but he says it a lot! And he loves to clap. I heard him in his crib this morning when he woke up from his nap clapping away saying DaDa over and over…there are definitely days that I wish we had a video camera in his room to capture those cute moments.  I took him to the doctor last week for his routine check up and learned he weighs 19.4lbs! I knew he was getting heavy.  He loves his Walking Lion and walks all by himself with it and has a blast doing it. Every day brings something new and we love it!

I think that is all of our adventures for the moment. Stay tuned for more of our Life Across the Ocean!

Whatever!

Can you believe they feed this to babies??

Whatever! This word can have so many different meanings and connotations. It can be used as a general term saying that you don’t care what happens, you are good with anything. It can be used to show frustration, letting the other person know that you really aren’t happy with the situation but will go along anyway. And in my situation, it can be used to show that you know you aren’t in control of the situation but know something crazy is going to happen. This response normally comes with a shrug of the shoulders. Whatever has become the theme word of our time in China! Adding to this is a wonderful coffee mug that I was given before leaving for China by Wanda Dukes, my former manager at Garden Plaza. It is a bluish green colored mug with the word WHATEVER written on it. This was Wanda’s theme word and she gave it to me on my last day there as a way to remember her. She didn’t know how much I would use that thing over the next course of my life.

Fish, pig, cow and chicken flakes. Made for babies...???

He LOVES to stand up!

Now I brought a lot of different coffee mugs with me, but on almost any given morning (unless the dishes have not been done…no I would never leave dishes in the sink…never…..) using that mug for my morning cup of Dunkin Donuts coffee. It reminds me of a lot of different things. One…the verse taking about Whatever is good, pure, lovely….so on and so forth. That helps me keep my mind in check as well as my attitude so I will quit complaining. I know I know…all of you reading this would NEVER believe that I would complain about China, but alas I must tell the truth.  There are days that I find myself complaining quite a bit…so this is a good reminder. The second is the reminder that things over here are CRAZY and are probably always going to be CRAZY and I really don’t have any control over things. Most things work some of the time, schedules are always changing and everything changes! HA! So with a shrug of the shoulders you just say “Whatever” and just go with it…it’s all going to work out in the end one way or the other. Whatever our DAD has in store that is what I have to remember. So jokingly (and seriously) the theme word of our time in China has become “Whatever.”

Daddy and Aiden

I go about once a week to the grocery store with my friend Julie. This is a wonderful way to have a “girls night” as well as to stock up on food for the week. Though, it never fails that we either see something hilarious or something crazy happens. One of the things is the Chinese kids. Now I know I’ve mentioned “split pants” and I’m SLOWLY getting used to them…not quite though…but things get crazier. A few weeks ago we went to Auchon, one of the big stores in the area and saw a little boy JUST wearing a shirt and NOTHING else. Forgive me, but if you are just going to wear a shirt and nothing else then what is the point of the shirt??? Just go fully naked! We thought this was just a one time thing but we KEEP seeing it. Haven’t fully figured that out yet…maybe I don’t want to. HA! But on that same trip as we were walking through the fresh seafood area, and by fresh, I mean TONS of fish tanks filled to the brim with fish of all kinds, one fish jumped out of the tank and about hit me right in the leg. Embarrassedly enough, I screamed. Julie had her daughter AJ with her and she looked panicked!  But slowly all of our blood pressure started going back down and we had to laugh it off. Apparently this is a normal occurrence there since one of the employees calmly came over, scooped up the fish and put it back all in about 2 seconds. Needless to say…I haven’t walked back through that section yet. 

Don't I look cool in my shades?

Today as we went to the store, both Julie and her daughter Kailyn saw a mom holding her baby over a trash can and he was pooping. I’m extremely glad that I was in my own little world (don’t worry they know me there…) and totally missed that. But they were both TOTALLY grossed out! The bright side of that is that at least the mom had himover a trash can and not right on the ground as they do some times.

A whole crab anyone? Only $80 US!

Eating out here in China is always a fun and interesting experience. I am so grateful that almost all of the menus here have pictures along with the description, esp since the description is in Chinese. Makes it so much easier to figure out what you want to eat. Almost all restaurants are “family style” with a huge lazy susan in the middle. Everybody shares everything…so it always helps to go eat with people who you know like the same types of food you do. 

Mommy and Aiden

We went to a restaurant over in the Nanchan Temple area last week and boy was it SPICY!!!!!! At one point I ate something that was so hot I felt like my throat was closing up. Jeffrey was teasing me about being dramatic (can’t imagine why he would do that?????) but I couldn’t even answer him. All I could do was point to any bottle of water on the table and drink all that I could. It took quite awhile for that feeling to go away…needless to say, everyone else at the table stayed away from whatever it was that I ate! The rest of the meal was really good! My favorite part were these strawberry pastry like things that came out with dinner. Yummy!!! 

The "Western" restaurant! Ha!

Jeffrey and I did try a restaurant called "Western" just for the name last weekend. They had old wagon wheels every where and the waiters all wore Cowboy hats. The food, with the exception of the fries any my raspberry fruit drink, was not worth going back for, but it cracked us up none the less! 

Getting ice cream at the 7 Eleven

Aiden is now 7 ½ month old! Can you believe it? He is crawling around like crazy and pulling up on EVERYTHING. Today he actually cut his first tooth. Whoo Hoo! He still eats everything in sight, other than his bottle…he would give that up today if he could.  He LOVES his sippy cup though and constantly has that with him. He gets so excited when he sees it. All in all he gets excited about most things. The most adorable is when he hears the key in the lock meaning Daddy is home. Together they have their little rituals. When Daddy gets home he takes Aiden with him to go change clothes. Aiden sits up in the big chair we have in our room and plays with a special car that he only gets to play with there. He loves it. Then Daddy sets him down and he goes crawling to find Mama. He really enjoys for Daddy to hold him so he can watch Mama cook. He gets so intrigued with it.

Speaking of cooking…I’m trying to get creative and try new things. I tried this week to make sweet and sour pork…and it turned out great I’m proud to say! But if any of you reading this have a good recipe that you would like to send me, PLEASE DO! If I get some good ones I’ll talk about them in my different postings and let you know how they turned out.

Well friends…that must be all for now. Stay tuned as our adventure continues day by day.  I look forward to getting some recipes.