A bit about our flight, etc

Would you let this woman on your plane?When you're 33 weeks pregnant, no one really "recommends" you fly anywhere. The airlines require a note from your doctor, and my note didn't say, "Yes, I'm fully supportive of this woman flying across the world in her condition," but it rather said that everything was normal and he was aware I was flying.

The picture above shows me in my most pregnantiest shirt-- the one I wear when I want people to let me cut in front of them in line or help me carry stuff. I know, I'm tiny. So when I wore my slimming black shirt onto my flights, no one even talked to me about my pregnancy or had me sign a waiver or anything.

Good thing I didn't birth anybody over the North Pole.

The next picture is right as we were leaving our apartment in Arlington. We were really happy to have my parents there helping us move.

We decided to take Penny's carseat on the plane, and it was quite a hassle. She did wind up sleeping for about 4 hours of the flight (total) (not enough, in my opinion), and I really liked having the carseat to lean against so I could sleep too. But it was big and bulky, and in the future we'll have 2 kids everywhere we go, and I don't see this as a possibility ever again.

And given Penny's wakefulness on the second flight (no carseat) and on succeeding train rides (again, no carseat), I have doubts as to whether she'll ever sleep on a moving vehicle again.
We had a layover of a couple hours in Beijing. They have a swanky new airport, and here are a couple of my favorite people in that swanky new airport.

And then we came to Shenyang. The final flight, since it was the middle of the night for Penny (and all of us), was pretty horrid. Penny cried and fussed the entire time. But it was only an hour, so we were minimally traumatized.

Settling in

I finally feel like I'm kind of getting settled in. We have a beautiful apartment. It's brand new and in a brand new building in the very center of downtown Shenyang. One one side of our building is a pedestrian shopping road, just like Wang Fu Jing road in Beijing, with all my favorite stores plus some outlandish ones like Cartier and stuff. Everything is very close, and I really do like it.

My first impressions were really good. The walls, instead of being the white-washed plaster I've often seen in Chinese apartments, are nicely wallpapered. We have lovely showers and a huge bathtub. There are fire alarms, sprinklers, and even hoses out in the hall. This is not the case in every building here. The apartment itself has beautiful-but-not-gaudy furniture. I took a couple photos of our living room. On the right you can see a tiny bit of the large-screen TV (one of 4) that came in the apartment.

And this next one showcases my photographic specialty of backlighting, but it also shows a smidge of the dining room off to the right.

Isn't it fancy! I love the patterned chair, and the couches are firm but comfy. We're going to have them take the coffee table away to give Penny a carpeted space to play, and then it would be even better.

I would put pictures of the rest of the house, but our UAB shipment arrived (6 days after we did), and its contents are spewed all over in a semi-unpacked state. Plus, I just haven't gotten around to taking any pictures.

The living room gives you a good idea of what the whole house looks like, though, and it leads me to my next point: there is a lot we have to get used to about this place.

Honestly, I've lived in China 3 different times before this, each time for about a semester or 6 months. I thought it would be a piece of cake moving in here. But this time it was a little overwhelming wrapping my brain around the fact that I'm here for two whole years. I'm in charge of raising children and keeping them safe, clean, and healthy. I'm investing a lot more of myself in this place than I ever did as a student. And there are some things that I could overlook for a few months that would drive me nuts to deal with for 2 years.

The first thing that got to me after a day or two was the color. Our whole apartment is grey: the wallpaper, trim, doors, bedroom carpet, curtains, bathroom walls and floors, lampshades. Black and white photographs hang on the walls. I'm glad it's a neutral color, but I kind of wish it was a happier neutral color. I put up some flower stickers in Penny's room, a large lemon clock in the kitchen, and we have plans to put our gold-colored stuff in the living room. When the rest of our stuff comes, we'll get out all our bright stuff. Bit by bit we'll liven this place up.

We're making a trip to Ikea this evening, and that will help us solve some of our moving-in woes, including storage issues, making a baby nursery, and generally making this beautiful space a little more functional.

In my last post, I mentioned that we live in a construction site. Here are a few pictures. This first one shows our apartment's main front door on the right. Then I think there should be a street on the left, and then an intersection right in front of you if you were to walk forward in this picture. But it's all dug up and being constructed. They estimated being done today, but I estimate they're nowhere near being done.

There's dust and dirt everywhere, and when it rains, it doesn't wash off, but just turns to mud.

This next picture shows an aerial view of that same intersection, I think. Not only is the intersection itself dug up, but the whole street for several blocks in every direction. This means that while the grocery store is less than 100 yards away, I have to walk about a half a mile to get there. But there's a Walmart in the other direction, so I just go there for now.

I guess it's nice we'll be here for 2 years, because we may get to enjoy the finished product-- eventually.

We'll just say we're very community oriented here

I just got home this evening, and in the 5 minutes between getting off the train and getting into a taxi, and then in the 1 minute it took me to get from the taxi to my house, I got yelled at. A lot.

Penny woke up at 5 this morning due to her jet-lag. Then when it would have been nap time, she was playing with a friend while I had my doctor's appointment. The train trip home would have been another good time to sleep, but that didn't happen at all. But once we arrived at the train station, the moment I put her into her stroller, she was out like a light!

I really wish Chinese train stations wouldn't have stairs, but they do. And while I didn't garner much pity going UP the stairs, people did reach out to help us going down.

Anyway. We made it out to the street, and none of the taxis wanted to take me anywhere. Some were full, some didn't stop, and some didn't want to take me when I told them my destination. And during those minutes I was hailing a cab, the lady from the newspaper stand, the man on the motorcycle, and the man selling ji dan bing (egg pancake thingies) all hounded me for having Penny out in the cold. "Well, what am I supposed to do? I'm trying to get a cab here!" (I use quotes, but there is much interpretation.)

The pancake guy started pointing at a spot on the ground. I nodded. He pointed again. I asked him, "What do you mean?" He meant that if I put Penny beside his cart, it will block the wind. The newspaper stand lady chimed in, "Yes, and there aren't so many cars rushing by. It's better back here."

I took them up on it and then hailed the very next cab.

Once we found our way through the maze to my apartment (more on that later), and we got out.

There were a few people milling around, and once I got Penny situated, I turned around to face.... a donkey. I must have looked surprised (I was), and a man standing near me leaned towards me and yelled, "LU!" (DONKEY!) Yes, yes indeed.

Between the donkey cart and my house I had to cross one boardwalk (long story) and then walk inside my apartment. It takes about 1 minutes. But right as I went to cross the boardwalk, a tiny old man in a Mao suit started yelling at me about how Penny was going to be cold. "Yes," I agreed, "And we're almost home. We'll be inside in just a second. We're about to go in." He didn't think I understood him, so he kept going, but now adding gestures to make sure I knew. Cold, yes. Baby sleeping, yes. Shiver shiver, brrrr, yes. Cover with coat, yes. Yes, I know. I tried to explain more, and a younger guy walking buy just laughed at us.

It's a funny place sometimes.

Trip to Beijing

It seems too early in my China adventure to be taking a trip already. And after skipping a day over the international date line, running around jet-lagged, and having no idea what day it was for almost a week, some of my plans weren't as smooth as I would have liked them to be. But now I have a month until my next trip, and I will be a bit more organized this time around.

But anywhoo... I just got back from a whirlwind trip to Beijing.

I LOVE Beijing! I had kind of built it up in my mind as being everything I love about China, and I was ready to be disappointed. But this morning was a beautiful spring morning with a clear blue sky. I actually walked outside and blissfully breathed the fresh air. Ahhhh.... Beijing. (?) Weird, I know. But it was actually very clear and fresh today.

The last time we were in Beijing was in 2006. Since it was 2 years before the Olympics, everything was under construction, everything was dug up, and everything was slated to be finished by 8-8-08. That was 3 years ago, and it was awesome to see how spit-and-polished everything looks. Some people might not think it's so, but there's a lot of polish-- especially compared to Shenyang, where it's mostly just spit.

This morning Penny and I walked around a local neighborhood to find breakfast, and we stopped to sit in a courtyard and play. I try to point out all the gou gou (doggies) for Penny, but she hardly shows any interest. Then this morning we found a dirty old mother dog lying in the dirt, and Penny wants to do nothing but go pet the thing. The dog eventually ran off, and when a nice, clean, old-lady-led dog stops by, Penny shows very little interest again.

But she did eventually play with the doggie, a little bit.

Penny's pretty shy and doesn't really say anything when strangers come and talk to her. I'm happy with that, and I'm also happy that Penny now says xie xie (thank you) to people. We've been here almost a week, and she already says one word in Chinese!

For lunch (yesterday), we ate at a Xinjiang Muslim restaurant. I taught English out in Xinjiang in 2002, and I still absolutely LOVE their food. We ordered shou zhua fan (hand-grab rice/polo/plov/pilaf) and a few yang rou chuar (lamb kebabs). The kebabs were for me, since they're seasoned with hot chili powder that Penny wouldn't like.

She wanted to try some anyway, so I gave her some without much spice on it. She devoured that and then commandeered the rest of my kebabs.

So much for my chuar. I'll have to order twice as many next time.... and there WILL be a next time. I love those things!

Note on learning Chinese:

Not only do I love lamb kebabs, but I love the character for kebab. Is it weird to have a favorite character? Because mine is chuan: 串 (kebab).

First impressions

It's great to be back in China. The first inherently Chinese thing I noticed, making me smile, was the rows of trees outside the windows as we touched down in Beijing. In the US, trees along the roadside or in a wooded area often grow as they please, but in China, they're in in straight rows like a military cemetery.

The last time we were in China was in 2006, and everything was under construction to be finished in time for the Olympics. Everything is still under construction, but we were really impressed with the new Beijing airport, obviously completed and incredible. The old one was a ghetto 1970's-esque place where I had my first experience with a squatting toilet. The new one is modern and stylish with 3 or 4 terminals, huge red pillars, international-style toilets, and escalators so new they run silently.

Shenyang's airport is more like Beijing's old one. I was fortunate to find the one international-style toilet, and even though there was very little space under the stall door, Penny still did her best to crawl under it. On my mental list of ways Penny may die, picking up germs from public Chinese restrooms is pretty high.

We went out shopping today, and in addition to hearing everyone saying how cute Penny is, I heard equally as many people commenting on my being pregnant-- AGAIN! We are quite the sight to behold, I guess. But the nice thing about being stared at is that I don't mind staring back.

We live in a fancy apartment building in the middle of the city, and there's a mall on the first 8 floors. Sarah, I'm telling you this for no other reason but to make you jealous, but if I walk out our front lobby, turn the corner, and walk about 20 feet, there's our local H&M. We have a guest room....

Whenever you move to a new place, you have to figure out how the grocery store works, what sorts of stuff they have, and where it's all situated. The same is true here, but in addition, you have to figure out WHAT things are. We bought a few yogurts because I love Chinese yogurt. We also picked out a few fruits to make it seem like we eat healthy. I searched high and low for the produce bags, and it turns out you have to go ask for them from the same guy who weighs, labels, and seals it once you've selected your fruit.

People are very interactive here, especially with Penny. We were using a grocery cart that has a little truck cab in front. If Penny would lean out and touch something or drag her hand on the floor (she really wants those germs!), someone would point it out to me. At one point, Penny had been walking around for a while, and she decided to get back in the cab. I let her climb and struggle, but a kinder soul than I stopped, helped her back in, and even buckled the seatbelt strap. There aren't many kids around, and everyone's delighted with Penny. In addition to the comments I already mentioned, if I ever had to go run and pick up Penny, someone would exclaim, "Wow! She is pregnant AND has to carry that child!" Um, my thoughts exactly!

Well, I have a lot more to say. I want to write down my first impressions while everything still feels new. But Penny just went to sleep, and I'm trying to sleep when my jet-lagged baby sleeps, so that's all for today.

Just got back from my first grocery shopping experience. It was grand.

Our apartment complex is in the middle of the city, right on the corner of a 3-street intersection. I don't mean one that looks like a T, but one that looks like an *. The fun part is that the entire intersection, plus about 3 blocks in every direction, is under construction. The whole street is dug up with fences all around it. This means that what should be a short walk across the street would actually take much longer-- if I had the desire to make it.

But I started small, exploring the shopping centers closest to our swanky downtown apartment.

Turns out that the first 8 floors of our apartment building make up a large department store or mall. There are some individual stores, but mostly there are booths of different brands. Sarah, don't be jealous, but if I walk about 10 feet from my front door, there's the local H&M just standing there beckoning to me. I went in but realized that while I might not find anything in my usual size, I definitely wouldn't find anything in my current size!

As we walked around, everyone commented on how cute Penny was. But what I heard just as often and in shocked tones was, "Woah, she's pregnant AGAIN!" It didn't sound like it was scandalous, but more like they were so shocked to see such a sight. I'm sure I would get sick of hearing this eventually, but I think the baby will come before then.

Pack-out

We now have no stuff. It's all on it's way to China.

We were pretty focused on which things should go in HHE, i.e., the items we could do without for several months. Most of our stuff ended up in that category. In fact, as they finished packing up our UAB, it was well below our 600-lb limit, so they started filling it with things from our HHE. This was fine with me, as all of it would eventually end up in the right place.

This leaves us with very few items left to pack in our luggage. In fact, beyond clothes and a few toys for Penny, there's not much that will go in luggage. We'll be nowhere near our limit.

Honestly, I love packing light, and there's not much I would do differently, with one glaring exception.

Yesterday Penny spent the day with my mom, who came in to town yesterday to visit before we left. Penny was pretty chill all morning while they played at the park, and then in the evening, she was especially mellow. She was a bit warm when we put her to bed, and then at 2:30 AM, she woke up burning with a fever. But guess where awesome mom-of-the-year had sent all the contents of our medicine cabinet? To China. Argh!!

What I should say is that Kevin or I threw some clothes on right then and there to run for some Tylenol to help our baby sleep. But my 2:30 AM brain didn't hatch that elaborate of a plan for many more hours to come.

Penny slept fitfully-- and so did Kevin and I-- during the wee hours of the night, until I convinced myself at 6:30 to waddle out to the 24-hour pharmacy for some Tylenol. Then Penny slept in until 10:30 AM, and all was well again.

So, note to self: pack the medicine cabinet in the luggage.

Keep the whining to a minimum

It's really easy to complain to my blog. She feels my pain. She listens and doesn't correct my bad attitude. She nods and says, "Yeah, that really really sucks!" when I need her to. She doesn't one-up me, because she's never had experiences worse than mine. So, thank you, Bloggie!

Unfortunately, I have to remember that Bloggie has an audience, and while everyone in that audience cares deeply (thanks, guys!), it's not the most interesting thing in the world to read a long, rambling complaint post.

So I'll keep it to a minimum.

-Quick trip to grocery store. Penny pushes doll stroller. Cute as can be. Buy groceries. Penny refuses to walk home. End up carrying purse, 2 bags of groceries, Penny, dolls, doll stroller--oh, and unborn child size of large eggplant-- several blocks... in the rain. Not so quick after all.

- Pack-out this Friday. Need to sort and label all earthly possessions into 4 categories: luggage, UAB (arrives a week after us), HHE (shipped slow-boat-to-China), and Don't-Ship-This-It-Belongs-To-The-Oakwood-And-They'll-Charge-Me-For-It. Carefully sorted one box last week. Haven't sorted anything since. Penny boycotts naps. Weather turns hot and humid. Pregnant woman gives up and blogs.

And I was wondering why the dishes weren't getting clean!

But that does lead me to some good news. We're packing out this Friday. Then we leave for China like Wednesday or Thursday of next week. I should know that, but in case you were wondering, I'm just working on getting through this Friday. Then after that, I'll consider our move to China.

After yesterday's 3-hour tour of the zoo, I couldn't move for the rest of the day. Something tells me I need more exercise. So this evening, Penny and I went on a waddle through our neighborhood. I went around a different block than I usually do, and I was pleasantly surprised to find a quiet little neighborhood. Up until tonight, I thought that there was nothing within walking distance besides the metro stop, high-rise buildings, restaurants, and road construction. But even with my pregnancy-reduced walking range, there is a peaceful road to walk down.

Most of this road was lined with luxury apartments. I could tell from the well-groomed gardens, fancy balconies, and posh gates that they were well above what I could afford if I were staying on my own dime. But then suddenly there was an old, cheap, kinda ghetto place-- right there in the middle of poshville. I hesitate to call it ghetto, because really, it was the most charming sight on our walk. The apartments were small. The buildings were old, square and brick with boards covering where the AC units would soon be hanging out the windows. The parking lot was nothing fancy. But the place was well-maintained. The walls were painted. The windows were new. For what it was, it was maintained to be as nice as it could be.

The most charming part of it all, though, was the little community happening in the courtyard. An old Indian grandma came walking out and stopped to talk to me about Penny, my upcoming baby, and about her four children. Her English wasn't perfect, but she was friendly enough to still stop and talk. A couple of American families were sitting in their lawn chairs just chatting away the beautiful spring evening. Another immigrant mom was out on the lawn playing soccer with her two little kids.

Penny and I stopped to watch the kids and play a little soccer of our own. We briefly talked with the soccer family, and they nicely played baby soccer with Penny for a few minutes. Then another family came outside, and a real soccer game began.

It was refreshing to see the little community out there enjoying the evening.

Meh, not bad...

This morning I had a brief conversation with someone in the elevator in Chinese. Actually, that's not true. Kevin had this conversation while I stood by, smiling and nodding, and letting them assume I didn't understand. It's anti-social, I know, but sometimes it's nice to not be expected to contribute to a conversation. I'll just let my blue eyes and light hair do the talking for me, thanks.

But since I did understand, I wanted to publish a paragraph or two about it. Hopefully if you or someone you know is studying Chinese, you can use this tidbit.

In Chinese, you can answer a question with 不错 bu cuo, or "not bad," the same way you use it in English.

"How was work?" "Oh, not bad."

"Did you like the fish?" "Yeah, it wasn't bad."

or my personal favorite:

"Do you understand Chinese?" "Well, not bad."

In English, this makes perfect sense. "Not bad" means, "Well, it's not great, but I can't complain. So yeah, not bad." We shrug and then say it with a slight pout.

After a few years studying Chinese, I've noticed the connotation in Chinese is quite different. When you say 不错, you ARE saying, "not bad," but you're saying it to mean that, "Well, yes. I can't think of anything wrong with it. In fact, it is so excellent that there is NOTHING BAD AT ALL about it. So yeah, not bad."

On the spectrum of good-great-and-awesome, 不错 in Chinese is toward the top by awesome, while "not bad" in English is barely even on the positive side of "meh."

For me, this explains why, after telling someone that my Chinese is 不错, the response is usually confused and awkward silence. I've since taken Kevin's lead and now describe my Chinese as 还可以 hai keyi, or "meh."

The Civil War

I've been watching bits and pieces of "The Civil War," the Ken Burns show that has been playing on PBS the last couple days. It really makes me think.

First, I had terrible history teachers growing up. I don't think I ever knew anything about the Civil War, beyond its being in the 1850s or 60s, the South vs. the North, Abraham Lincoln, and the abolition of slavery. Two years ago I was a teaching assistant in a Social Studies class with an amazing teacher. He was teaching the history of warfare, and I learned more from that class just focusing on the weaponry and technological advancements made during the United States' wars than I ever did in any other history class. It doesn't take much to teach me things I don't know.

Second, I love how the writings and journals from the Civil War days were steeped in language from the Bible. The educated leaders and lamenting wives quote from the Bible as part of their mother tongue. Even the coarse soldiers readily blaspheme with phrases they've known since day one. I go to church and read my scriptures, but sometimes I feel like I read them as carefully as I skim articles on the internet. The words run through my mind and then right out again with very little active thought happening during the reading process. I am familiar with the scriptures, but could I say they're part of my language and my person? I want to work on that. I started tonight by memorizing the 23rd Psalm. I recognized the familiar words, but as I sat memorizing, I realized I didn't know it as well as I thought. If I were really walking through the valley of the shadow of death, it wouldn't have been with me.

Third, I noticed how much history is simply in a regular letter home or a basic journal entry. My blog has taken the place of my journal these last few years, and lately I don't post anything unless I feel like it should be special. Often I write about what happened a few days or weeks ago, with so little emotion or thought put into it that I might as well be writing a to-do list or something equally lame. I like my entries that actually reflect what I'm thinking and feeling. I like to record the details only possible while I'm still feeling and experiencing what it is I'm writing. When I don't, you get entries like my last one about the trees. True, the primary purpose was to show the grandparents pictures of Penny with us, but it would have been that much better if I'd written something interesting and current to go along with it.

Fourth, I want to read more and educate myself. I recently hit a reading slump when I tried to read "Anne of Avonlea." What a boring book! The first one was so good, but the second one just stagnates. I'm still about 2/3 into the thing, and I know I will never finish it. I should return it and just borrow the movie already. But part of me doesn't want to read a new book until I've finished what I've started, and therefore I read no books but just surf the internet. The internet has more information than it knows what to do with, but as I shallowly skim articles and status updates, none of it really sinks into my brain, whether it's worth learning or not. That needs to change.

Trees

We saw the trees on Tuesday.

When Kevin came home, I'd already packed a picnic dinner, and we took it down to the Washington Monument area to eat. I love that Penny has more room to run around, especially after a double-whammy of being winter AND in a city where it is too cold and too urban to let a toddler run around. We're getting out more, and it makes me happy.

And look, I was there too:

Old Yeller had a happier ending than this sob story

This morning Penny and I had an appointment at FSI, which is where Kevin is doing his training. I was pretty proud of myself for getting there 15 minutes early-- not easy with a pregnant woman and a toddler.

But the FSI has some major parking issues, number one of which is that there is none available. The lots were all full-- even the short-term parking where I wanted to be in the first place.

To make a long story short, after failing to find the overflow parking lot on my own, asking directions from the guards, and getting lost after following them, 45 minutes later I eventually found parking and got to trek my way to the building, toddler in tow.

It was a bit of a walk, so I pulled out the stroller. Turned out the stroller didn't help too much taking the stairs down, under the street, and back up again. In hindsight, I would have just walked with Penny. But you know, a lot of this would have been a better experience in hindsight.

In hindsight, my best option would have been to celebrate my being 15 minutes early by keeping watch at the short-term parking lot. By the time I got there again after 45 minutes, half the spots were empty, and I pretty much wept. (Hey, I'm pregnant. It happens.)

But, joy of joys, I got to my appointment eventually, and now Penny and I are one shot closer to being immune to rabies.