waftingonthewind

How to Make a Robot

2011-09-16T08:45:00.002+08:00

by Zurich Marler

Get a hammer, "ranch," and then get a screw driver and then hit it with the hammer and put it upside down with the "ranch" and screw driver. And hammer (bang bang bang).

Make the legs, make the arms and make the whole body. And the head. And get get some glass and get some spikes. And don't hold them by the spike place. Hold them by the bottom. Not the top. Two of them.

And get red metal like Optimus Prime and get glue and mix it up. And then, put white allllll over it. Paint it how it wants to look like. (I'm going to be flying it and you're going to be moving it.)

And then make the seat belts. And carry cats and put them inside....Make anything you want. Draw it blue and put tape on it.

Make the seat belts, put the computers in. Put the wires in. Let is sit there and then when Daddy gets home, LET'S FLY IT!!!!

Fly it to America!

Then get out and see America. Then get back in and fly it back to China. And it will be a long way.

And then go back to America in December. Every single day. Right now when we make our robot.

Visit to the Wet Market

2011-09-02T09:28:00.002+08:00

Every Monday, Zuri and I hop on the bike and ride over to the "Korean" Neighborhood Center to buy our weekly fruits and vegetables. (It's only called "Korean" because so many Koreans live in this area and so there are a lot of Korean products and shops.) This week, I brought my camera and took some pictures. I haven't done this since we first arrived in 2005. I think I'm feeling very reminiscent lately with us leaving in December. I may make fun of China and its customs, but deep inside I've developed a love and respect of the country and people who have endured so much in their long history.

We woke up in the morning and I was so excited to see the sun and shadows. It has been rainy and gross the past two weeks. However, I noticed out my back window that it wasn't going to be sunny for very long. My camera cannot catch both the top and the bottom of the "clouds" at once, but I am convinced that is a pollution cloud heading our way. After a weekend of the factories being off (for the most part), we had some sun on Monday morning.

You can see the blue sky at the top here.

But Zuri and I braved the possible rain, probable pollution (it never rained and we had shadows all day, but it was just kinda overcast), and headed over to the neighborhood center.

The egg aisle. Any kind of egg you can possibly think of: from chicken to duck to quail eggs.

We bought vegetables.

This is the woman I buy vegetables from.

If Zuri doesn't eat breakfast before we leave, it doesn't matter because they give him so much to eat while we're there.

The fruit stand I like. I made persimmon cinnamon jam out of those delicious looking persimmons a couple of weeks ago. (Try to say cinnamon persimmon. You can't. It's just too difficult!)

They also gave Zuri a new kind of green mango. They are very good. Tangy and sweet and even more flavorful than a regular mango.

It took me a long time to get used to the fact that children (and actually, adults, too) can ride their bikes anywhere there's room.

I don't think I've ever taken a picture of a squatty potty before. They actually don't bother me. It's a lot easier on the muscles to squat over a public hole than to hover over a public toilet. You just have to roll up your pants before you go in.

We are in a very international area. I think it's funny there is a Korean gelato store (parlor?) in China.

When you have a flat tire and you're on your bike, don't try to ride on it. I once did and my bike slid all over the road (with Ezra on the back!). Instead, you should walk it back to your home, which might take a day. Or even better, call the Mobile Flat Fixer who rides his electric bike out to you and repairs your tire.

I was so happy when they changed the street sweepers' clothes from green and brown to bright orange. They had to have been run over quite a bit. These people...I don't understand this aspect of their job. They simply stand in the middle of the road to do their work. And it doesn't matter what road they're on, what time of day it is. If they need to clean this part of the road, then they do it. Cars zoom by and they don't seem to wince. I've seen them almost get hit (thank goodness I've never seen one actually get hit) as buses swerve around them and a car behind the bus can't see what's coming up in front of the bus. I cringe for them.

I say that, though, but people don't have the same fear we (as Westerners) have of cars either. This is not an intersection and those cars didn't stop. It was a mixture of the people rushing (only very little) and the cars swerving to their own left that allowed them to get by. I really think it has something to do with the culture. The number of cars have only recently surpassed the number of bikes on the road and when you're riding your bike, it is very easy to go around someone. And if you are hit by a bike, the consequences are less severe. I think Chinese people have this same attitude toward cars. Huge work trucks (think cement mixers and dump trucks) zoom through red lights to avoid stopping. The biggest thing wins, right?

I love her use of sunscreen to keep from tanning. The huge sun visor and the arm covers don't usually match.

The Chinese HATE getting tan.

Only the very bravest turn left from the bike lane. It's a little daunting at first. As long as you can get past the people who are turning right and don't stop on red to wait for you, then it is easier than crossing two lanes of traffic on your bike and thus, waiting for two lights.

Oncoming traffic also turning left.

If you're ever going the wrong way, you simply reverse back down the road.

More sun-haters, although I believe these were Korean women.

Toga Boy and I getting on the elevator. I couldn't balance the bike and hold my camera still enough to get a clear picture in the low lighting.

By the time we arrived back, our fruits and vegetables had been delivered.

I'm going to miss the ease with which we can get our fruits and vegetables.

Our new kitten/How to make Maggie mad

2011-09-01T08:51:00.003+08:00

Back in July, we had a pleasant 3-course meal at our French and Italian friends' house. It was delicious and inspired me to make some good mustard with dill weed, chablis and horseradish. And I only wish I could make sorbet like we had. It was a very nice meal and we were in a good mood as we walked from the taxi back to our apartment.

As we passed the guard shack entering our part of the complex, we happened to see a little baby kitten sitting next to the guard. When I say baby, I mean BABEEEEE. He was probably 4 weeks old. He was just sitting there, not moving. Having had a bit of wine, I picked him up and petted him and let Elias do the same. Elias and I returned home and got the kitten some cat food mixed with water. I'll never know how this kitten came to be sitting there, obviously dying. At that point, I decided that a little girl had taken the kitten from its nest and then had not been made to take it back. But it also could have been abandoned by its mother because there wasn't enough milk. (I saw the full litter a couple of weeks later--4 siblings from that litter the same age as ours and one almost full-grown kitten from the previous litter. My cat Gollywog used to nurse his mother with his younger brothers and sisters.) And of course, the mother could have been spooked while moving the kitten and couldn't find him again.

Well, having actually had a couple of glasses of wine with dinner, when we brought the food back to the kitten, I even mewed around for the mom to see if she was waiting in the shadows to come get her baby. No response. (And if you've had as many kittens and cats as I have, you'll know that this works.)

And also having had a couple of drinks with our aperitif, I decided to take this kitten home with us. We washed him, sprayed him with flea spray, fed him and Elias slept with him. Oh, he was an ugly little thing. His eyes were as big as a Chihuahua's because he was so emaciated. (Unfortunately, I didn't take any pictures of him at that size and age.) Elias named him Tundra.

Not long after that, we left to go to the US for a visit. Brad worked almost literally all.the.time. And Tundra became healthy, but also wild. It was a bad time for us to go home in the kitten's emotional development.

He has calmed down a bit now, but he still bites a little harder than I think he should. He doesn't use his claws, but he does purr and like to cuddle a bit. I think he'll get better and better, he just needs patience and time.

Sooooo, now that I've explained the history of our cat...

There is one way to make Maggie mad. Well, you can make Maggie mad by just pointing a remote control at her. You can look at her and she gets mad. (But in this predictability, you can also tell Maggie to give you five and hold up your hand, and she will. Not because she's giving you five, but because she's trying to scratch you)

Maggie has not and will not get used to Tundra. She hisses every time he walks by.

The other evening, they were sitting at the table about like this.

I walked over and started petting the kitten. I was talking to him as only a mother with no small babies can. And in this baby talk, somehow it came out, "And don't you be like Maggie. You be a good kitty cat! She's a bad girl, but you can be a good boy."

And at that exact moment, Maggie started wallowing around (as only a FAT CAT can do) and making this strange snorting sound through her nose! She has never shown so much personality.

But she wasn't looking for attention. No. Those were snorts of utter anger that I could POSSIBLY say ANYTHING negative about HER. And she stood up and slapped at the kitten on the table. She was jealous and angry and just plain ornery.

Of course, Tundra was so excited that Maggie wanted "to play" that he jumped up and tried his hand. He was, of course, only shot down. But he sure is cute. Maggie is in the chair below Tundra.

I think it's too funny that TunTun likes chop sticks.

The fight (of course) ended with Maggie running away from Tundra and I started playing with him.

Zuri LOVES this kitten. He wants to play with him all the time. What I can't get him to understand is that the kitten really doesn't need that right now, he needs love and pets. Zuri isn't mean to Tundra, Zuri just won't stop picking him up and carrying him around everywhere. And the kitten doesn't like to be picked up all the time.

He's still a wild cat that needs more taming. I really, really hope that we can find a home for this kitten in a calmer household. As much as I LIKE Tundra, he really needs something different right now.

Isn't he a handsome cat?

It's been a while...

2011-08-29T08:02:00.002+08:00

Yes, it's definitely been a long while.

I'm not sure why I stopped blogging or why I never really took to the blog my sweet brother set up for me (which I do appreciate) and it doesn't really matter. I have been thinking about all of the memories I have only because I blogged about them and how sad that I don't have them written down like that for the past two years!

But that all changes today.

This morning I woke up super early (by ten minutes, even though I had the alarm clock set 30 minutes earlier) and tried my hand at scones.

They were perfect. I couldn't BELIEVE how wonderful they turned out, especially since I'm horrible at making biscuits. But not anymore. They were crumbly, buttery, not too sweet...I was very pleased. The kids also loved them and smeared them with even more butter.

This is the recipe I used from Orangette.

New Blog

2010-01-08T05:44:00.002+08:00

My brother Drew has set me up a new blog that I can hopefully access from China. Check out http://www.waftingonthewind.little-site.net Looking forward to blogging again! :)

I miss blogging

2009-12-24T00:37:00.003+08:00

But unfortunately, the Great Firewall of China has all of blogspot blocked. I keep thinking I'll find another site but hate giving up this blog. They'll hopefully unblock it soon.

Until then, CHEERS!

It came from Ezra's mouth.

2009-05-14T19:19:00.002+08:00

Ezra, my five year old, said between mouthfuls of Japanese curry this evening, "Mom, The Great Wall is just made of bricks. How is that 'Great?'"

Zuri has pink eye and is on antibacterial eye drops. I hope the other two don't get it but the doctor said that there was a 50% chance that they would.

Ayi thinks she also has it and asked to use Zuri's eye drops. Is it wrong that I don't want to? I guess if *I* put them in her eyes ensuring that she doesn't touch the tip to her eye. It would save her some money...I told her to wait until she definitely had it.

The visitors

2009-05-12T20:48:00.004+08:00

Well, it's over. Mammaw and Daddaw (a.k.a the in-laws) have come and gone. Sorry it's been so long since I've blogged. They were here for three weeks and according to them, it was their best vacation ever! I had a wonderful time showing them around Suzhou and I would do it again in a heartbeat. I was sick for over a week of their time here and I thought it was hilarious (and took it as a compliment) when they told me they were glad I was sick because I might have run them to death had I not been.

Jet lag was super easy for them; I was quite impressed with their ability to go to bed and stay asleep and keep themselves awake until bedtime. WE all have difficulty being 12 or 13 hours off.

The first day, they hit the ground running. We took a bus trip through the countryside to XiTang Water Town. They enjoyed getting to see the "real" China from the bus: the shacks, the people, the animals, the garbage, the fields...and then, when we arrived at the town, they enjoyed the town. A classic Chinese water town, full of culture AND tourists.

Everyday, I tried to plan something for them to see that they had never seen before. Whether it was just a walk along the lake or a visit to a famous landmark or a massage or shopping, I hope we fit in everything they wanted to do!

Ezra and I posing next to a root carving called "Mother and Son" in XiTang Water Town:

The town itself:

Tom Cruise has run down this sidewalk, MI3 was filmed here:

Locals eating at a restaurant. We were in a boat below them in the water.

Narrow alleyways:

Ezra came with us:

Mammaw and Daddaw posing on a bridge over the water:

Humble Administrator's Garden is the most famous, largest and most expensive garden in Suzhou:

Brad took them while I studied for my midterm:

Daddaw and Zuri have a special bond:

Sometimes, he would only let Daddaw feed him breakfast or Daddaw would have to sit there and watch him while ayi fed him:

We tried to get Mammaw loose lipped:

Daddaw took over as the driver of the stroller:

Playing with Zuri at soccer practice:

At the Silk Museum, Daddaw reenacted the ancient process of making silk softer:

Inside the North Pagoda:

Outside the North Pagoda:

ShanTangJie is a famous street in Suzhou that still looks like it did hundreds of years ago. Mammaw enjoyed the cage full of snakes an awful lot. We also explored the back winding alleys.

ShanTangJie canal. Suzhou is the "Venice of the East"

On the train up through the countryside to Beijing. It was about 11 hours long. We just rented a whole cabin and slept overnight but Mammaw and Daddaw were up several times during the night looking out the window:

Great Wall of China:

I fell down and bumped my head on the Great Wall of China:

"I thought the Great Wall of China was boring, I prefer modeling,":

Daddaw looking handsome:

I made a scene running around on the top of a tower on the Great Wall of China:

No one ever cooperates:

I jumped on the Great Wall of China:

I looked pretty on the Great Wall of China:

I threw a temper tantrum on the Great Wall of China:

Up and down:

Next in Beijing we visited the Summer Palace, where the empress used to spend the summer. I just love this scene, even with all the tourists...can it get more tranquil?:

Mammaw stopping to rest: (She was laughing, "I didn't know we were going to Goat Mountain.")

I think this needs the caption, "I'm comfortable on subways!" But I also would like to point out that this was Mammaw's first time to fly, ride a train and ride a subway! Welcome to the Jungle!

Bird's Nest, where the Opening Olympic Ceremonies were performed:

*roll eyes* He's SEVEN, almost EIGHT, do you REALLY need to pick him up?

They weren't even facing so that the Bird's Nest was behind them. I assure you, the boys were just as much an attraction as the site.

My cute boys in the bath that night:

So maybe I was a little overzealous on some days, but I think all in all it was a good trip. Thanks for getting the courage to come over, guys. You created a LOT of memories for us! I'm ready and willing to play tour guide for anyone else who wants to come up too!

It has finally come and gone: the triathlon

2009-04-26T22:30:00.005+08:00

So I came in third which was also technically last in my division. There were lots of other people racing in the short, medium and long courses but only three women who did it individually on the medium course; everyone else did it as part of a team. (Or on another course.) It wasn't obvious that I was coming in last because people from other divisions were still going as I came off, so that was a plus.

I was extremely sad when I realized I had lost. I had to blink back a couple of tears of disappointment (nobody noticed, haha). I thought I was in second place and then I came around and saw that my good friend who was also racing with me was standing on the sidelines. For a split second, I thought she had quit but knowing her personality, the truth immediately hit home, she had been ahead of me the whole time. (It's hard to tell on a circular course.)

It took a lot to tell her congratulations at first, to be honest. Not because I was upset she had won but because two months ago, when I first started running and I was fighting having to stop every 100 yards, I would picture myself coming over the finish line with my hands held high in victory. And I didn't accomplish that.

But everyone was really nice and my friend who won is one of the best kinds of people in the world...and then I remembered that I had won a T-shirt and THAT was totally the only thing I had wanted to win in the beginning! That made saying congratulations so much easier and very heartfelt.

The final thing that made losing so easy was remembering a conversation I had with a different female friend of mine who had won the long course for the women. Last spring, I saw her practicing for a marathon while her sons played soccer. I mentioned that I had never run a mile straight in my life and she gave me lots of encouraging advice. A year later, she passed me once on the bike course and twice on the track and every time, she would say something to encourage me. She may do this for everyone she passed (and that was a lot of people), but remembering our conversation a year ago really made me stop to think about how far I have come and it encourages me to keep trying to get better for next year! :)

My final time for my first sprint triathlon (300m swim, 10K bike and 2.4K run) including transitions, was something like 55 minutes. I think 1st place was 50 minutes and second place a couple of minutes later. I think if I had realized I was in last place, I probably would have pushed myself a bit harder. Oh well, you live, you learn.
-----------------------------------------
My swim was ruined at first because of the high school kid I was swimming with. The whistle sounded and he took off like a bullet and I tried to keep up. It wasn't on purpose...it just happened on accident. After one length, I was out of breath and unable to swim. I honestly thought I might drown there in the pool. I have never had to stop the few times I have practiced but I had to stop for a few seconds, catch my breath and let my heart rate fall a little before continuing. After I got in my groove, I was perfectly fine.

I'm VERY slow on the bike. I tend to blame my slow bike but actually, my friend who won it has the exact same bike, so I know, deep down inside, it's really the biker. haha

I'm also a slow runner--I'm working on it! :)

Thanks for everyone's support. I appreciated it!!!

The kids

2009-04-20T18:44:00.004+08:00

Soccer has started back up for the spring. We asked Ezra if he wanted to play and he said, "I don't want to play, just practice." Very well, son, it's just practice. (evil laughter). How much fun it was to watch him actually chase after the ball with the other born-in-2003's! Elias never uses more energy than is needed (I've seen the ball go right by him and he just watched it). He doesn't like soccer. Soccer has been a chore for us the past couple of years and we weren't even going to make him go this semester unless Ezra was also going to play (poorly or not). Ezra, on the other hand, WANTS THAT BALL! Of course, Ezra can change his mind in a heart beat...we aren't going to push him this semester to play if he doesn't want to.

However, Elias has pulled out blank music sheets this evening and is writing his own song tonight. In the past couple of weeks, his piano playing has taken on a new level. It is *almost* on par with mine. I can play more complicated songs by practicing, practicing and memorizing, memorizing. But our music reading is now about on the same level. He told me that he could tell he had improved. I've decided I'm going to continue practicing (and hopefully improving) with Elias.

Zuri's forte, in case you didn't know, is TALKING. Not only does the kid never shut up and repeat everything you say, but he also can carry on conversations. He especially likes to talk about food. If we are walking outside, he points out everything he knows...and if he gets bored, he starts telling me what all the animals say or pointing and talking about all of his body parts. (Sometimes in Chinese, but usually in English.)

Zuri woke up seemingly from a nightmare last night, could tell me that he thought the standing lamp by our bed was a man (in the dark) and then told me he was hungry, wanted rice to eat and chocolate milk to drink. He's a mess but I'm proud of him.

They are now watching "Bob the Builder" in Chinese. I don't know how much any of them understand, but it's good for them to practice listening! :)

I can't believe that a couple of special people will be arriving in China tomorrow. I think this might even be their first time out of the southeast US and I imagine they'll be taking off any minute from Atlanta and I can't WAIT until they arrive!!!

I need to get this out of my system: I hate headwinds. I despise them more than anything I've ever hated in my whole life! I don't usually hold grudges but I promise you that when it took me 10 minutes to go about 2-2.5km this afternoon on my bike, I knew I will never forgive them if they show their ugly head on race day!

yikes...

2009-04-16T19:02:00.003+08:00

I only have NINE more days until my race. I'm sooooo nervous! I'm driving Brad crazy. I can't remember if I've mentioned it here or not but I'm doing a sprint-triathlon on the 26th. I'm not in it to win, only to finish it having done the best I can do. Anyone who knows me knows that I am not an athlete. I'm a slightly-heavier-than-pre-pregnancy mother who has set a goal to be more healthy and trying to accomplish it. That being said, I've been working really hard on this. Six weeks ago, I couldn't run 1/4 mile straight and now I'm up to three miles.

At the risk of embarrassing myself...

The race involves a 300meter swim, a 10K bike ride and a 2.4K run. I'm not afeered of the swimming. I can do that in 8 minutes, which may be slow (I don't know) but I just do what I can. I can tell a definite improvement in my biking here recently. Every time I go somewhere, I try to pedal it as fast as I can, sometimes with Ezra on the back. I've "bricked" a few times, which is when you bike a fair distance and then immediately run. This feeling is like when I was a kid and tried to jump on the ground after having jumped for a long time on the trampoline. You just can't do it. So my post-bike mile run takes me THIRTEEN minutes. It takes me half a mile to feel normal again. haha. Hopefully, I'll feel a bit more competitive on race day and will push myself. Oh, and I've improved my normal mile, though. I'm now under 10 minutes (fresh) which is down from around 12 minutes in the beginning. I just look at how far I've come and know that I shouldn't worry about where I place; I should just be happy that I'm finishing!

My in-laws will be here for the race which means that anything I do will always be remembered. I just hope I'm not embarrassed! And if I am, they must remember to forget it. hahahaha!

If anyone has any advice to offer, I would greatly appreciate it either here or in an email. :)

Elias' to do list.

2009-04-12T20:27:00.002+08:00

I found this just now mixed with some art that Ezra had done.

What to do?
By: Elias
1. Easter party!
2. New folder (bookmarks)
3. Workout!

And it's over! (the second time)

2009-04-11T19:26:00.003+08:00

The Second Annual Marler Easter Egg Hunt and Brunch was officially a success, I think. I celebrated its success with a Mimosa afterwards. haha. Two weeks of planning and organizing and it seems like it's over in a snap. We had around 20 kids total (but some left before the actual Easter Egg Hunt) and lots of their parents and I hope they all had a good time.

We decorated paper Easter eggs and then played "pin the egg on the bunny." Next, we ate. I prepared egg souffle, bacon, croissants, donuts, fruit salad, cake, lots of drinks and then lots of food and treats that other people brought. We then made bunny ears by decorating paper ears and then taping them to head bands and had a game of "Bunny Says" which is just like Simon Says. Brad played some Musical Chairs with them.

Afterwards, I read an Easter book to the children while some parents hid the eggs outside. And then the craziness began. It was so much fun, though!

My high was kind of ruined when a kid stole eggs from Elias' basket while he was trying to see if any would shake out of a tree. His father was standing right there and didn't say anything. It wasn't because it was Elias' basket. It would have angered me no matter whose basket. This kid was being obnoxious the whole party anyway. I honestly am not mad at the child anymore; I wish I hadn't said anything now. It's going through my head over and over and I should have just ignored it.

But, the weather was GORGEOUS. I think this was the first time the weather has been pretty on Easter since we've lived here. It was so warm and sunny. We didn't get very good pictures but here are a few:

Ezra colored and cut out his own bunny ears. he was so proud of himself.

This is the only picture I have of Elias from the whole day:

I asked ayi to come today to clean and help with Zuri. We had soooo many eggs. Even the baby had a nice little basketful:

This is worth noting. One of the parents hid an Easter egg out in the water on top of a pipe! His daughter was so happy when she was the one who got the egg.

The boys are playing

2009-04-08T17:12:00.002+08:00

All three of them, together. They are all so hyper; this must be how trips to the hospital are made. Elias is even in Zuri's old walker. Goodness! I think this is the last time I give them chocolate flavored puffed rice (a.k.a Cocoa Krispies).

I've been busy this week planning the Easter Egg Hunt for this weekend. I got tons of bacon fried up today. We have pin the egg on the bunny almost finished and tomorrow, I'm doing the cake.

Looking forward to Saturday with a bit of fear. :)

2009-04-02T20:23:00.003+08:00

All three of my poor boys were home sick today. Poor little men! I've missed the past three days of class but hopefully, I can return tomorrow.

A Day in the Life of Carleigh

2009-03-30T21:00:00.002+08:00

I know I've got typos and I could have spent a bit more time, but that's time I don't have! Enjoy it. :) (Just click on the thumbnail below to view the slide show.)

Elias: The Little Businessman

2009-03-28T15:41:00.003+08:00

The other day, Elias got it in his head that he needed some more money. He asked me what he could do to earn money and I told him that he was expected to work around the house for free.

So he decided to make a whole bunch of paper airplanes and paper "twirly things," take them down to the sand pile where all the kids play after school, and sell them. I felt sorry for him because I knew he wouldn't sell anything and even worse, the wind was blowing pretty hard and I just knew they would all be swept away.

But he came home with 11 RMB.

Watch out Wall Street, Elias Marler is on his way!

I was in another wreck.

2009-03-22T20:30:00.003+08:00

This time, I was on my pedal bike, though. Four men on electric bikes decided to all go around me at the same time, but rather than all going on one side, they went on both sides and they were REALLY close to me. It was luckily the last bike that knocked me down and I hit my bum HARD. It hurts so bad! In true Chinese fashion, we just got back on our bikes. He spoke Suzhou-nese to me, as if I would understand that, but so that he wouldn't have to explain anything. I think--my brain wasn't really listening to him as I was trying to make sure the body parts worked--he also said, "Bu hao yi si" which in my opinion, is just like saying, "I'm sorry that happened," rather than saying "I'm sorry." I kept jumping every time someone else passed me.

We've had a good weekend. Ate Burger King for lunch this afternoon. Brad ate TWO Whoppers, more than half of a Junior Whopper, the rest of the kids' ice cream and tons of fries. I joked that he had about 150 fat grams but considering ONE Whopper has 47 grams of fat, I'm pretty sure he really did reach 150 grams. That's just gross.

Zuri screamed (literally) for some kimchi, so I gave him some and he now knows what "spicy" is. I kept pointing to it asking him what it was and he would say, "picy!" That kid talks so much. Honestly, he won't shut up. I think he's like a little girl. If he has nothing to say, then he sings. And if he doesn't feel like singing, then he just makes up gibberish. Sometimes, my brain just feels like it never gets a moment of peace.

Elias is one of those kids who always has food all over his face. How can he not feel it?

"Big Garlic" Revisited.

2009-03-19T14:41:00.002+08:00

I forgot to mention that "big garlic" is simply what the Chinese call regular garlic. Ezra's teacher explained that they basically pickle the garlic by putting it in vinegar for a few days. It must also have sugar in it because Ezra KEEPS eating it.

Today, he told me he had five cloves. FIVE WHOLE CLOVES of garlic. It is obnoxious. I walk by him and my nostrils burn. Literally.

Apparently, the Chinese believe that garlic kills viruses. It's true, Ezra hasn't been sick since he started eating the stuff but I'm not sure anyone else in the family has either.

Ezra now thinks it is funny that we talk about how much he stinks and I'm sure that encourages him to eat more. I just keep telling myself that it's better than if he was so embarrassed that he never would eat it again; the kid's got confidence. We were in the car the other day and my friend's son (who is Ezra's age but goes to a different pre-school) said to Ezra, "You stink! I'm sitting in the floor [away from you]...Here, take this gum." No one had mentioned it either. It's a raunchy smell.

Brad left the camera today! I tried to hide it yesterday under Zuri's coat but he found it, haha. But today, I got a few fun pictures.

I just don't understand what the Chinese have with neatness. They love gardens and nature and yet can't accept that petals on the ground is also beautiful. This guy was shaking the trees to make the blossoms fall off and then "raking" them up.

This isn't the weirdest thing I've seen on an electric bike. I once even put a lawn chair, the kind you can lay down in and only folds in half, around my neck and pedaled it on my bike to our new apartment. When in Rome, er, China...

And my pretty red-headed boy:

Funny thing happened today.

2009-03-18T18:59:00.003+08:00

My body has been aching pretty badly today. In fact, it felt the same way I always feel at the beginning of my pregnancy. I jokingly mentioned to my friend that I was going to take a pregnancy test (since Brad had the big V back in December but has never been tested to see if he's sterile Terrell yet). She said she had one from America in her closet that she didn't need and she'd give it to me. So I went into the bathroom and took it.

And it came back positive.

I was a bit freaked out, unable to decide which emotion I felt. My body was smiling and my heart was happy but my brain was thinking about breastfeeding for a year (or 19 months), diabetic diets, getting fat and all the other unpleasant things that come along with pregnancy.

I took another Chinese made pregnancy test and it came back negative. So I started reading about false positives. While they happen very rarely, they can happen in some situations, one of which is if the test is expired. I called Sarah and asked her to look at the box for the expiration date and she happened to look at the picture on the back of the box. Being an old pro at pregnancy and pregnancy tests, I had neglected to do it.

While most tests give you two lines if you are pregnant and one if you're not, this one gives a PLUS sign or a NEGATIVE sign as well as an additional line (that's let's you know the test is finished). So, I mistook the negative sign as my second line. I wasn't ever pregnant.

My reaction was bittersweet. I know that our family is complete and I'm ready to move on to the next phase of my life but I will definitely miss those sweet, cuddly moments with a small baby.

Zuri has potty mouth

2009-03-16T17:03:00.001+08:00

Today, ayi was vacuuming and Zuri couldn't hear the TV and he started yelling, "AYI! SHUT UP! SHUT UP!" and when she didn't understand him, he went to her and pulled her around to face him, "SHUT UP!" This is funny as I type it, but it's NOT really funny because A. I have no idea how he learned it and B. it's freakin' rude!

Pictures (Tai Hu, Elias' presentation)

2009-03-13T20:33:00.003+08:00

Elias had a presentation Thursday at school. He made a poster board about America and even his own Power Point presentation. He had downloaded the Star Spangled Banner as the background music. I made banana bread to feed the others American food. It was good and a LOT neater than I would have ever thought of him. Afterwards, we went to the gym and had a relay race. Of course, they transferred bears from one plate to another using chop sticks. His team won. (And he did better than a few adults.) The parents then played the children and it cracks me up how surprised Chinese/Koreans are when this white girl shows proficiency with chopsticks.

Here's what Brad makes (and what he's always doing with my camera):

I mentioned last weekend that we went to Tai Hu to see the Plum Blossoms with two other families both of which also have three boys under the age of seven. Here are some pictures of that excursion:

Ezra was doing his usual goofy smile for the picture and I told him to look thoughtful so this is his pose:

We had a great time!

Zoobedoo likes the green stuff.

2009-03-10T09:08:00.003+08:00

Zuri scared me this morning. I was cleaning out the cabinets (I have lots of containers full of crackers and teas that we haven't touched in a long time) and he reached up and grabbed my hot cup of coffee off the counter. He began wailing. I quickly jerked his clothes off. The coffee had landed on his face, neck and hands. They were so pink.

Ayi and I applied cold water and he calmed down. The pink is almost completely gone so it must not have been too hot. I'm so relieved.

He has done something TWICE now that is so funny. Here's our conversation, both were similar in nature with the same outcome.

"Zuri, do you want a haircut?"

"NO!"

"Do you want a cracker?"

"NO!"

"Do you want a diaper change?"

"NO!"

"Do you want a kiss?"

"NO!"

"Do you want to go play?"

"NO!"

"Do you want daddy?"

"NO!"

"Do you want a million dollars?"

"YEEEEEEESH!!!"

That's all, folks.

2009-03-08T19:08:00.003+08:00

We've been busy today! We woke up early and went swimming. I swam 18 lengths straight, which is almost 400 meters. The kids had a wonderful time. Ezra really is becoming a daredevil...Elias is getting good...Zuri floated on his own a bit for me.

Afterwards, we had to run back to our complex for Elias' piano lesson. He did good, I think, although it wasn't very long because we were a bit late.

From there, Elias and his friend had set up a play date. So we went over to their house for about an hour. Zuri and I stayed out in the sand pile for a little while because he was having such a good time playing with a little girl there. I really need to get him some new shovels and pails because I think ayi has left all of ours outside. I'll just have to remind her to be more careful.

We ate lunch at Mr. Pizza and got new movies and coffee from Starbucks. I convinced Brad to stay for a back massage at "Dragonfly" and I took the kids on home (check Elias' blog). After about a half-hour struggle trying to get Zuri to fall asleep (that kid is so freakin' stubborn!), I began straightening up the house. In the meantime, Brad came home and fixed my bike. I then biked for about 4 miles. I have always enjoyed biking but today it was so boring. I need to remember Elias' iPod next time (which also has my play list on it).

Back home, I studied some Chinese, Elias went to another play date, Ezra played some Mario Wii tennis and then dinner.

I am EXHAUSTED now. Besides wrestling Zuri to sleep(which is oh, so relaxing *roll eyes*), I've barely sat down all day.

According to WiiFit this evening, I weigh more than I have in a long time but I feel like I'm constantly having to pull up my pants so I guess muscle really does weigh more than fat. (I've been trying to do some hard exercise every day but I haven't mentioned it.)

Yesterday, we went to Tai Hu with two other families who have three boys all under the age of 7. We had three red heads, three cotton tops and three black headed boys (that's NINE boys). I'm sure we were the talk of many conversations. The kids had fun. I'll post pictures tomorrow but I'm off to take a hot shower and enjoy a glass of wine for now.

Blue SLIP

2009-03-05T17:39:00.003+08:00

Elias got a blue slip today for play fighting. Three blue slips and you're expelled. We had had a discussion with his teacher about how next time she caught him, she was going to give him one and Elias shaped up, even so much as to receive a second email home about how much improved his behavior was. And now this. I'm so angry.

I told him he was going home to public school if he got kicked out and he just wouldn't ever see us. His response?

"What's public school?"

The problem with dialects

2009-03-03T12:45:00.004+08:00

I was a couple of days late paying for Ezra's school. I went in there today to pay and there was another woman in there with her son who was also paying.

She knelt down next to her young son and started saying things in Chinese like, "Foreigner! Those are foreigners. Look at the foreigners." I've done similar things many times with Zuri trying to teach new words. Of course, I would never point out "foreigners" (even in America) but I don't think it's rude to point out the trees or birds to your child.

Anyway, one of the women working in the office said, "They don't understand." I get this all the time and I as usual, I just ignored it.

So then the mother started saying to her son, "Doggies! Doggies!" She was saying it over and over again and I began to take offense. Why was she calling us dogs? That's even ruder...is this some kind of name the Chinese call foreigners (like "long noses" or "devils") that I've just never heard before?

In true Carleigh-fashion, I couldn't help myself. I turned around and said in Chinese, "Are you calling us dogs?"

They all laughed at me. Apparently, in standard Chinese, the word for "big brother" (which is the relationship between Ezra and the little boy in China)is the same as the word for "doggie" in Suzhou-nese.

Guess ya really do learn something new everyday.

It has rained for over a week

2009-03-03T08:39:00.004+08:00

One rainy day, I came home from school and ayi and Zuri were watching a movie. They're not allowed to do this but I didn't mind because it was raining so hard. Anyway, they were watching it in French which cracked me up. Neither one of them cared what was said. Zuri is mesmerized by the movie "Beverly Hills Chihuahua." I've never known him to have such good concentration.

Yesterday was a good day in Carleigh-world. Last week, I had misplaced my favorite metal-ish, double-insulated cup that I bought in the states (because they're so expensive here). The first place I went actually LOOKED for it for me (and in several places). In the past, when you lose something here and go back for it, they just tell you, without looking as if they are all-knowing, that they don't have it. Alas, no cup. The second place HAD it! I was so happy; I had even run into a friend and told her that I thought it would be a miracle if they actually would return my cup.

Secondly, because it was STILL rainy, I asked the cab driver to wait for me. I told her that I would give her 5 yuan if she would. Later, she refused to take it! This is actually the second driver to do this in just a few days so maybe I should change my opinion on the "All Chinese are out to steal money from Westerners." There are some honest people out there, I'm VERY happy to report.

I keep calling him "stink pot"

2009-02-27T18:21:00.003+08:00

As I was walking up the steps to pick Ezra up from school today, I noticed that the outside stairwell stunk like Chinese B.O. It was horrible. I decided that someone with B.O must have just walked the steps. Then I walked into Ezra's classroom and the smell intensified and I realized it was Ezra's teacher. Seriously, it was the most obnoxious scent I've smelled in a long time.

But then, we got in the taxi.

I smelled Ezra's breath. It was that same smell. I had brought a book to read to him in the car and had to try to hold my breath while reading. Bleh. Gag me. It was something they had cooked for lunch.

Back home, if he didn't come near me, I was okay. As long as the child stayed at least three feet away and didn't breath in my direction, the smell was only vaguely annoying.

But as soon as I came back in the door from running errands, I could smell it horribly in my house. Ezra was sitting about thirty feet away on the couch but his breath and body were so covered up with that smell that it had permeated the entire downstairs!

I asked Ayi what it was that smelled so badly all over Ezra and the literal translation was "big garlic." Anyone out there know what the vegetable is or could be? I'll know to stay away from!

Elias, Santa Claus and the Wii game

2009-02-23T20:42:00.003+08:00

At dinner tonight, Elias said, "Mom, Jeremy says that Santa Claus isn't real."

He kind of stuttered along at first and Jeremy's mom had told me that Jeremy knew the truth, so I was totally prepared with, "Yes, he is real."

Then, Elias continued, "He says that HIS DAD said that his parents just hide the gifts and put them under the tree themselves."

Now, I think it's probably about time Elias stopped believing. But what I couldn't believe is that he was saying it in front of Ezra--and Ezra was looking at me expectantly. I shot Elias a dirty look.

I think, for once in his life, he actually took a hint and he changed the subject.

Now, how to broach the subject again? And will he immediately tell Ezra?

I don't quite get why he was bringing this up anyway...Friday, I got an email from Elias' teacher informing me that Elias had hit another student and that he has been doing it a lot the past couple of weeks. It was never in anger; this time, they had been playing during free time and ten minutes later, in the bus line, Elias was still raring to play and hit the boy in the back. So, I broke the fighting game that he's been playing on the Wii. I figure that is just punishment.

Oh, it broke Ezra's heart. He cried, no exaggeration, for an hour. I felt really bad for him because it's his favorite game. I would finally get him calmed down a bit and he would look at me and just start boohooing all over again. He kept asking for super glue to glue it back together.

After a good, long cry, Elias came in and announced that he didn't really care that I'd broken the game because he was going to email Santa Claus and ask him to bring them another game. *shocked*

So, because Jeremy had already told him ~*the truth*~, either he was saying that for Ezra's benefit (good big brother) or he was trying to prove to me that he cared not a bit that I had broken the game. (Whatever the reason, Ezra stopped his hysterics.)

I'm sure my eyes became slits and I spoke through my teeth, "Santa would NOT bring you that game and if he did, it would go IMMEDIATELY back into the trash anyway!"

Later, he emailed Santa a list of things that he wanted.

can i please have an ipod nano and a spy kit thank you. Elias

I'm so relieved he wrote "thank you" this time because last November, I had to have a talk with him about demanding gifts from Santa.

In happier news, he read a whole "Magic Tree House" book in under an hour this evening. I told him it was time to move on to harder books but he just looked at me like, "Yeah, right."

Today, yesterday and last week

2009-02-21T19:12:00.003+08:00

"Hi. I am Elias Marler. I am a male. I am not a vegeterian (sic). I like chicken the best."

I finished reading Charlotte's Webb to Elias and Ezra last night. Ezra cried and cried when Charlotte died. It was so sad. He's such a sensitive kid. I love it.

We actually had our first conversation about death a couple of weeks ago. We were watching "Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade" and at the end when the man drinks from the wrong cup and ages very quickly until he turns into a skeleton, I covered Ezra's eyes. Apparently, I didn't do a very good job.

It was a couple of hours later when I found out. He was sitting on the counter "helping" me cook dinner and he started asking all kinds of questions about getting old. He finally admitted to "peaking through the cracks" at the end of the movie. He asked about Brad and me growing old and dying. He began to cry. "I don't want you to die!" He thought that it would happen very quickly like in the movie. Then, he asked about Poppaw getting old and when he would die. It was all very sad. Poor thing.

We went swimming this morning. Elias is really good at swimming now. He can swim across the pool without any help and we told him he could get in the deeper pool as long as he stays near the wall. My little Ezra, who used to be so shy and afraid of everything, has become a daredevil and will try anything. That kid might be the death of me. Brad and I each got a chance to swim 10 laps.

This afternoon, we went to Elias' Italian friend's birthday party where I ate too much (real) pizza. He had a good time. Even in Italy, they know Tennessee through Jack Daniels. Too funny.

Til the next time!

xoxoxoxo

Zuri's new trick

2009-02-17T15:49:00.002+08:00

This afternoon he was asking for a granola bar but I didn't want to give it to him because they are so messy (it's the dry kind that have two in each pouch) so I was just letting him carry it around with him.

A few minutes later, I noticed he had opened it. I had no idea how he had done it and honestly, I didn't even think about it. Weirder things have happened. He made a huge mess but I just decided to just let him eat them anyway. He didn't finish them, just set them on the kitchen counter but brought another pack, walked over to the art table, picked up Ezra's kid scissors, and started trying to CUT OPEN THE PACKAGE! That's how he had opened the first one!

I was quite impressed. Ayi says he is "too smart." haha.

I forgot if I mentioned he has a three word sentence, "I want..." whatever, usually a duck.

Zuri's language development

2009-02-16T09:18:00.003+08:00

Ever since ayi has again realized that Zuri has good language skills and can speak Chinese, she has doubled her efforts to make sure that he learns. They read picture books together, she is teaching him his numbers and she talks to him ALL the time. Things like, "We just met. Let's shake hands." *shakes his hand* It's so funny and I'm so happy. I like to hear him repeat after her in his little voice, "yi, er, san, si..." to count to ten.

Yesterday, he said a new Chinese word--"zhe ge" which means "this." I asked him what he wanted and pointed at the crackers and said "zhe ge." I was impressed and had to brag about it a little bit to friends. He'll be translating for us pretty soon!

He also has a deeper understanding of the languages than the other two at this age. He already uses yes and no appropriately (he says it "yesh"). I forgot to blog about on the plane back from Guilin, he didn't want to sit still during the last half hour and he was yelling, "Bu yao! Bu yao!" over and over again (don't want! don't want!) much to the humor of the Chinese folks about him. I even heard, as we were getting off the plane, one Chinese person tell another, "That's the little boy yelling 'bu yao.'" Imagine being Chinese (and remember Chinese people are very racist by nature), hearing an annoying little kid screaming and crying on the plane...looking back to give his parents an irritated look only to see a little red headed boy! Actually, I didn't really notice any annoyed looks. I've said it once, I've said it before, Chinese people love children.

We went over to our friend's house last night. They made chicken curry for us for dinner. It was so good! (They even gave me some of the spices they make it with!) The kids played together nicely, even Zuri decided he was a kid and didn't want to be with the adults.

I register for school on Friday. I'm ready to go back.

Quote of the day

2009-02-11T20:54:00.002+08:00

Brad, on being the one in charge of the lantern for Chinese New Year (see a couple of blogs below):

“That was like my worse nightmare come true! I’m such a careful guy and to have to fling a lit lantern over the side is not my idea of fun.”

Quirky Kids

2009-02-10T14:59:00.002+08:00

Zuri and I have a fun game. We google pictures of various things that he might want to know about. We see different ducks, cats, dogs, horses, cows...you get the idea. I was checking my email and he stood at my feet and said, "I want duck!" just as plain as day. So we looked at ducks and kittens and dogs for awhile as he would say, "I want..." I decided to call Brad and let him hear Zuri's new sentence while Zuri could still remember it. I said, "Let's go call your daddy!" and he walked to the middle of the room and yelled, "Dadaaaa! Dadaaaaa!" Smart boy.

Ezra and I made watermelon hearts using a cookie cutter today. Ezra can eat more watermelon than anyone I've ever seen. We almost don't have any for tonight! Right now, he's in the baby walker (which we haven't used in months) allowing Zuri to push him around except really, he's walking as fast as he can making Zuri run along behind and he'll bang into walls and Zuri just laaaauuughs.

Elias can whistle now. He wants to grow up soooo badly! His latest annoying habit is to take things apart. If it's broken, he thinks he can fix it. From phones to the vacuum cleaner, I've had to deal with his new found love. He "fixed" Brad's computer and he has such an ego now! He thinks the rest of us are dumb and he is the only one who can fix anything. He's very upset Brad won't let him play with his new iPhone. The other day, Elias hooked up his Nintendo DS to the TV so that he could hear it while he was playing; and I must admit, I have no idea how he did it!

The truth be told...

2009-02-04T18:18:00.002+08:00

...I kind of have it easy with three kids because I have an ayi. She's been gone for over two weeks, though, for the Chinese New Year. I just haven't felt like myself here lately with the kids. I felt like a monster demanding, yelling and ordering around three wild heathens. I have searched websites on how to keep three children, all at different stages in their lives, entertained to no avail. But today was wonderful. I don't think I've had to yell once. I even got Elias to practice piano and Ezra to read without many problems. Elias has also read, we had a lunch play date, they've helped me bake a pineapple upside-down cake and make gumbo for dinner. Zuri has listened and not made too big of a mess. I've had patience and have entertained them. They helped me clean with no fuss. I don't know if it's my patience changing them or because they listen that is making me more patient and tomorrow, it may fall apart again, but either way, I feel like the kind of mother that I want to be.

I wanted to catch up on a couple of blogs: for the Chinese New Year, we went over to our friends' house who we also went to Guilin with. Sarah cooked a delicious dinner and bought a huge box of fireworks and sparklers. We went outside with the box, thinking there were many different kinds of them to set off like in America, and lo and behold, the box was one HUGE firework: it set off 49 explosions and sent them well above the 20-floor buildings! It was so funny. The kids enjoyed it.

Later, they also had bought these lanterns that the Chinese set off for good luck. You light this box in the center, it fills up with hot air like a hot air balloon and you let it go and away it flies. It's supposed to be good luck. Well, somehow, Brad became in charge of this. Now, why the most nervous person around would be put in charge of something that you set on fire, in hindsight, we have no idea. Not only is he nervous about fire, but he also hadn't really thought through how it worked.

So, he lit it, let it stay there for a few minutes and then kind of threw it off the balcony. There wasn't enough hot air in it and it sank, right onto the neighbor's balcony's satellite dish where the WHOLE THING CAUGHT ON FIRE! I could tell Brad was internally freaking out...they finally had to get water and poured it down onto the flaming lantern. It became dislodged and floated away...along with all of our good luck, too! Obviously, Brad didn't do anymore and I was very relieved when Song said they would wait until later to do the rest because otherwise Brad would have been a nervous wreck and probably insisted we go home because he wouldn't want to be anywhere near responsible for setting a building on fire!!!

My camera was acting up that night so all of my pictures are blurry but here's a picture of Brad letting the lantern go, just so you get an idea of what we were dealing with!

Later around midnight, the fireworks were going off full-blast, non-stop and I was outside taping it. (It is really an amazing thing and I have a video of it up over at http://www.dropshots.com/carleigh from February 2007 if you care to look.) He came outside, too, and when he went inside, he shut the door all the way, thus locking me out. No amount of yelling or screaming was making him hear me out there over the bursting of all of the fireworks. I had on no shoes or coat and it was around freezing. I threw things at our bedroom window (which probably dented cars below) and I tried to turn on the water hose at our window. He just could not hear me.

I knew that if I didn't get his attention in the next few minutes, he'd fall asleep and I'd die or end up with hypothermia out there overnight because once he's out, HE'S OUT. I thought about climbing up to Elias' balcony and even though it wouldn't have been a great fall (only one story because his balcony is above ours), I remembered a story about an expat boy who sneaked back into his apartment by climbing to the balcony and fell to his death, I just couldn't do it.

Luckily, there is a window that is semi-hidden behind a swing on our balcony that was unlocked and I pulled it open with my fingernails and crawled through. I was hysterical when I saw Brad. I said some things that weren't too nice and later had to apologize for but my GOSH, I was seriously AFRAID. :)

Anyway, it's dinnertime, Brad will be home soon and we're off to enjoy some gumbo and pineapple upside-cake a la Elias, Ezra and me. Cheers!

Guilin: There and Back Again

2009-01-31T17:41:00.005+08:00

Day 1:
And...we’re back! We had a lovely time in Guilin (or maybe I should say the surrounding area). Even Brad enjoyed it.

When we arrived in Guilin, I quickly noticed that the people are quite different from Suzhou’s. It seems their entire economy is based upon tourism and every single person wants to milk it for all they can. As soon as we got into the cab to go to our hotel and the driver realized I spoke some Chinese, he started trying to get me to buy tickets from him for the all-important Li River Boat Cruise. He wouldn’t leave me alone about it and when I told him to just take us to the hotel for the fortieth time, he decided to call an English-speaking friend who wanted to be our tour guide. When that didn’t work, he offered to take us to a bar (c’mon, we have three kids). Finally unable to convince us of anything, he dropped us off at the hotel and when we handed him the money, he (and the Hans’ cab driver) stood and stared at us as if we were dumb. They didn’t want to give us our change.

Playing on Xi Jie:

That was my first impression of Guilin--and my last impression of Guilin. We spent very little time in that city because honestly, I think we were all miserable while we were there.

Guilin's Twin Pagodas:

We booked tickets for the Dragon’s Cultural Show and after dinner at a restaurant that was recommend online—where the food was amazing--we were met by an “English speaking” tour guide who walked us to the theater. In Suzhou, we would have found a cab, handed him a pre-written card in Chinese that told him where to go, he would have taken us there and that would have been the end of it.

But that’s not how it works in Guilin. Everyone wants their piece of the pie and if the “tour guide” didn’t walk us there, the company wouldn’t have gotten their cut of the ticket price and it still would have cost the same for us. She stayed at the show to “answer questions” but while my Chinese has improved these past few months, it’s still not fluent so any question anyone might have asked might or might not have been understood. The show was very nice, though. It was a mixture of the different minority cultures’ (from around the area) dances and songs mixed with some acrobatics.

I thought Guilin was a horrible city and I woke up in the middle of the night and relived many times the scene on the street where Brad and I were arguing about what in the WORLD the “tour guide” was doing with us. The next morning when we hopped on the boat to head to Yangshuo I had nothing to say but, “Good riddance!” to Guilin.

Day 2:
At the same time we booked the “tour” the night before, we had also booked the Li River Cruise with the hotel. Therefore, we did the same thing where we went through a myriad of “English speaking” tour guides. It wasn’t quite as irritating until we got on the boat and there were no tables where we could all sit together—not even one family all together. Sarah kept pressuring us to go upstairs but they kept telling us we couldn’t and then, every one else went upstairs and all of those tables were taken. It was ridiculous. We paid way inflated prices (450RMB/adult) and didn’t even have seats. Some people did move so that we had four seats on the boat together and the kids and Sarah and I squeezed in there for dinner. Then, come to find out, since we didn’t pay for Ezra and Dillon, they apparently didn’t get to eat. They wouldn’t bring us extra plates or glasses for the kids at all. Brad had a “talk” with them and they finally brought us extra plates for Elias and Jeremy, who we had paid half-price for. They only wanted to bring 8 plates and glasses to each table and four of those went to the people we were sharing the table with. We found the whole situation absolutely ridiculously over-priced and rude; they are unable to understand that if you’re going to charge Western prices for something, you need to also have Western service.

Cormorant birds:

I guess that if we had felt closer to God, like we expected, we might have been able to overlook some of this stuff. But it rained and was cold and so while many of the karst hills were beautiful, it was not what I imagined. We had read reviews of people saying to skip the cruise because it was too expensive, but we ignored them and were so utterly disappointed.

After six semi-unhappy hours on the boat, we climbed off in Yangshuo, walked directly to the Buffalo Bar, where we were greeted with a lovely Australian, “Good Day!” Sarah and I laughed later about how wonderful it was to hear that after the past 24 hours. The owner of the bar walked us himself to his retreat up in the hills.

Yangshuo is so much better than Guilin! Nestled in the hills, it reminded me of a Chinese Gatlinburg from when I was growing up. Lots of foreigners have retired there but it hasn’t lost its Asian flare.

Yangshuo from Li River Retreat's rooftop:

I loved the Li River Retreat. Had it been a warmer time of year, I might have tried to stay there an extra night. It had been an old farmer’s house that they converted into the retreat. It had a very rustic and homey feel to it. The lobby even had board games for the family and the view, I’m sure was out of this world. It was still rainy and cloudy, though, so we didn’t get to enjoy it.

In front of the Buffalo Bar:

View from our balcony at the Li River Retreat:

Families on the roof:

Later, we enjoyed an absolutely delicious Chinese dinner at Cloud 9 and then, after a few pictures on the famous Xi Jie (West Street), headed to a light show. Set against the karst hills, it is directed by the same man, Zhan Yimou, who directed the opening ceremonies for the Beijing Olympics. While it was raining and cold, it was amazing. My favorite part was when they draped red cloths across the rivers and rows of men on bamboo boats pulled themselves across. It was beautiful.

The only downfall to this was that we went to the light show via “tour.” If you go by yourself, bypass all of the tour stuff (every time!) and just do it all yourself, especially if you’re used to traveling or living in Asia. It IS possible, even if they make it sound like it’s not. They made us wait in the rain until enough people arrived before going to buy the tickets (the bigger the group, the more of a discount for the guide—but you still pay the same inflated price), and then, we waited outside the doors—who knows why until about the time the show started. Then, it was like trying to give birth—the path just wasn’t big enough for the flood of people who wanted to get through the turnstile. There was lots of pushing and I started yelling in Chinese at everybody. Ezra was in the stroller and I was very afraid they were going to trip over it and squash him. Brad was carrying Zuri and Elias was in between me and the stroller and so they were both safe. I felt like I was a preteen at a New Kids on the Block concert. It was a madhouse and Sarah and Song weren’t faring any better with their three kids, including infant Jason who Sarah was wearing. People were pushing her and the baby, too. Eventually, Song became traffic director and made everyone go in a wide arc around us. After finally being taken in, it was a long walk over to the stadium and even though we were an hour early for the show, it had already started by the time most people arrived. It was just “living in China,” though, and whereas pushing and shoving is part of their life, it enrages those of us who are used to more polite behavior.

Day 3:
I didn’t set the alarm but I still woke up before 7:00 and could only think about what we were missing by sleeping but I didn’t want to wake anybody and cause problems, so I quietly got ready and then went on a lonely hike through the hills to the neighboring village. I thought we’d go back or I would have actually entered the village because it was an interesting walk but we never did. It was still nice to walk by women tending the gardens and hearing the motor rafts go by on the nearby flowing Li River.

When I arrived back to the retreat, the kids and Brad were awake (Zuri had climbed on top of Brad and said in his face, “Mamma? Mamma? Babboo? Babboo?” to wake him up) and we all got ready, had a late breakfast and checked out of the hotel. We left our luggage back at the Buffalo Bar and explored the surrounding countryside. Today was much less rainy and we even saw a bit of blue sky. The karst hills are just beautiful! We hired a car, having learned our lesson about “tour guides” and went to explore Silver Cave. It was nice but I wouldn’t do it again. We stopped at various places and took pictures along the way of the “grotesque” landscape. (That’s the mistranslation that was used in many places to describe the magnificence of the karst hills.)

A minority group's traditional costume. The girls told us that it was 10RMB per girl and then none of them moved out of the picture, trying to scam us out of more money. Brad told them off.

Moon Rock is appropriately named because the shape appears to change as you drive around the rock due to another karst hill behind it.

Power lines ruin the view everywhere in the world:

KFC's are everywhere:

That evening, after a dinner at China Cafe, whose food wasn’t great but whose rooftop views of the city were definitely worth the price, we headed back down to the water to enjoy watching cormorant fishing. Oh wow. It only occurs after dark. The fishermen put rings around the birds’ necks so that when they eat a fish, it gets stuck in their throat and then they pry it out. The fishermen take the birds out into the water and herd them with their bamboo boat up the river. The birds gracefully glide and dive through the water and occasionally, the men will take the birds out using a thick pole and squeeze the fish out of their throat. Two other tourist boats ride on either side of the fishing boat and watch the whole show. It is cruel, but this is their way of life. We may have even eaten a semi-regurgitated fish. Later, we stopped onshore and got pictures with the birds. Zuri was NOT happy to be so near it, though.

Herding the birds:

Getting the fish out:

Fisherman:

Edited to add a video of the fishing:

Photo Sharing - Video Sharing - Photo Printing

A one-armed man who was doing art with his stub:

China Cafe's roof top view of Yangshuo:

We needed to head back to the dreaded Guilin for the next stage of our journey and were so relieved when the driver who was going to take us to the bus station agreed to drive us all the way back. The ride back was hilarious as the adults reminisced together.

We checked into the hotel, got the kids back asleep and then came back down to the lobby for a fun talk together. I gave Elias my cell phone and told him not to answer the door, to call us if anyone came to the door and Song and Sarah have one of those spiffy 12 mile baby monitors.

Day 4:
The next morning, again, we slept in. When we went to talk to the tour office about going to a minority village up in the Nanling Mountains, they informed us that it had already left. Well, at that point, Brad kind of got grumpy because he was looking forward to this side trip the most. While the tour office acted like we couldn’t do it at first, they did book us a private van and we took the 2.5 hours trip through the high mountains to the Longji Rice Terraces.

On our way up, Ezra got car sick and we stopped and let the kids play on the side of the road. Brad walked down to a little mountain village and snapped some pictures. This little girl was painting:

Tourist area and village up in the terraces:

The Yao people live in the mountains and farm rice by making steps on the sides of the mountains. As amazing at it was to see and to imagine the work they did and time it took to carve these steps in the sides of the mountains, I’m sure it would have been even more amazing in its beauty had we gone in a green season. We drove to the top of the mountain on winding mountain roads and just when it looked like we were at the top, we had to get out and hike another 40 minutes. The views were spectacular.

The kids rode the last bit of the way:

Lugging it to the top:

The Yao women are the true draw, however, to the area. They never cut their shiny black hair (except at certain times in their life, when they cut a big chunk and give it to someone to make theirs appear thicker…some of that was lost in a poor English translation but I think that’s what she said). They wear bright hand-sewn clothes, heavy silver earrings and are a true paradox of masculinity and femininity.

The real reason Brad likes to carry Zuri around:

A group of them, dressed in their traditional clothes (which they may or may not wear only for tourists), met us as we got out of the car. One of them really latched onto Ezra (and his blue eyes). Most Chinese people do, but this approximately 75-year old even carried him on her back to their auditorium where they performed songs and showed us how they wrap their hair around their heads.

This is right down Lazy Ezra's alley:

Doing their hair:

Edited to add video of the Yao women. More will be added to http://www.dropshots.com/carleigh

Photo Sharing - Video Sharing - Photo Printing

I, of course, bought one of the quilts the woman who carried Ezra had sewn and as we were about to leave, she reached in and shook my hand and told me thank you with so much sincerity that it made me feel bad for haggling even a little bit for the price.

************
Our China experience would never have been complete without this trip. While there are some situations I would have changed, I would happily do it all over again.

Jin tian tian qi hen leng!

2009-01-23T20:47:00.003+08:00

Oh gosh, it's cold, cold, COLD today! I look outside and see people riding their electric bikes (around 30mph) and wonder HOW THE HECK can they do it?

Well, not everyone does. We waited outside for about half an hour today looking for a cab at a place where we usually get one immediately. People who could afford it were taxi-ing it! It was a nightmare, actually, waiting out on the busy road and watching as full cab after full cab drove by and the three kids were freezing. Zuri was crying because he was cold, Ezra wouldn't put his coat on until we were standing out on the corner and he realized how cold he was and Elias, well, Elias was being Elias. Ezra was trying to put on his gloves, Elias was pulling them off or knocking Ezra's hood down. Really, the kid just can NOT keep his hands to himself.

Yesterday, I let Zuri play on the steps. Really, he's been such a handful lately and it was actually keeping him busy, so I just let him. He kicked my panties over the side of the balcony and then crawled down the stairs, picked them up and brought them back upstairs then threw them over again. He did this about ten times. It was too funny and stopping the game would have meant tears, heartache and sorrow for me. The kid is a mess.

Well, Brad is off from work for a week for the Chinese New Year. I've already mentioned we are heading off to Guilin next week with another family. Should be fun.

Xin Nian Kuai Le! :)

2009-01-21T12:30:00.003+08:00

Let's see, what's been going on around here with the kids? Zuri and Ezra were sick at the beginning of the week. They both had high mystery fevers, there were no other symptoms and within a couple of days, they were healthy again. Elias still has a lingering cough but slowly, slowly it is fading.

Elias has a Chinese New Year program tomorrow. He is singing a song with his class and holding a lantern at some other part. He just told me yesterday that he needs a traditional Chinese outfit and the costume of a dentist. I was a bit irked but we'll find something that will work around this house. Ezra was so happy that Teacher Kevin wasn't at school today because he's "sooooo hard!" Ayi won't be here tomorrow because she is going back to her old home to see her eldest son.

I volunteered at the orphanage again this morning. It figures my favorite child would be a little boy, wouldn't it? I've named him Justin. :) Anyway, I found out that he is blind in one eye and his other eye has poor sight. He's such a handsome little boy, too! He was the one I wrote about last week that was moaning. He was also moaning this week but not quite as unhappily and yesterday was his second year old birthday! I sang happy birthday to him in Chinese and English. I made sure he got a big bottle this week (because last week he just got a tiny bottle) and we worked on developing some muscles in that piece of skin we call a neck. Tummy time isn't going to do it; at two years old, his head is much too big for that. I've decided he's going to become my special project; I wish I had a medical background. I'm just so sad that I only get to see him once a week!

A new philanthropist movement

2009-01-17T09:32:00.002+08:00

WO KAI

Today is Friday.

2009-01-16T15:51:00.002+08:00

This week has passsed so quickly, probably because I've slept through a lot of it. This past trip home was the worst time I've ever had with jet lag. But I have had very little trouble with jet lag on this side. Kind of makes me sad because I like those few hours alone I usually have in a quiet house before everyone else wakes up. I must be very, very VERY behind in sleep because I have been sleeping about 11 hours every night...but I never have once crashed at 4:00 pm like I usually do.

My friend, who has three boys whose ages are very similar to my children, and I have planned a short trip to Guilin over the Chinese New Year. I keep getting more and more excited, even jittery, about this trip. It seems like it is going to be one of those moments where you feel close to your maker. This is a photo from tripadvisor that someone else took off the balcony of the hotel where we are spending one night.

First day in the Orphanage

2009-01-14T15:10:00.003+08:00

I thought I would have a more dramatic reaction leaving the orphanage this morning. But I had prepared myself for any possibility in that building.

It was hard being in the "infant" room, when the three/four month old baby flinched when I went to rub her head or when I saw the little girl's skin just hanging off her body due to lack of food. There was one little boy who just laid in his bassinet and moaned and moaned. It was a cry I have never heard before. Not a pain cry, not a hunger cry and not a cry due to being cold or wet. He was the first baby I picked up and discovered he was due to turn one in just a few days. He couldn't even hold up his flat head. I even double checked his birth date because I couldn't believe it.

In the "baby" room, I loved the smiles I got from a couple of little boys when I rubbed their heads. One of them couldn't stand it. Rubbing his back on top of his shirt elicited the same reaction as when I tickle my children full out. One of the little boys smiled the biggest smile and rolled his flat head over like a cat enjoying every instant of the rub down. They crave touch as much as they want their bottles.

I made a decision before I went. I'm going to try not to get involved in the day-to-day arguments the volunteers have with the staff. I know that the children are sometimes abused but I'm afraid that if I express too many opinions, the volunteers will be unwelcome and possibly even banned, which would be even worse. I will give these children anything I can in the short two hours I am there and hope that every little bit does, indeed, count.

jet lag, jet lag, go away.

2009-01-13T19:02:00.003+08:00

We're back in China and attempting to overcome jet lag. Our trip home was uneventful except I decided to carry on less bags, which meant I decided to only bring extra shirts for the boys and wouldn't you just know it: Ezra took a nap and wet the "bed", Elias spilled his whole cup of water in his lap and Zuri decided (as is now his habit) to pull his binkie up out of his diaper thus peeing all over himself and not in his diaper when it was time to "go."

Ezra and Zuri smelled like a Chinese public bathroom by the end of the trip.

_________________________________

Tomorrow I am volunteering in the local orphanage and I am curious as to what I will see and how I will react. Wish me luck.

I would like to thank the parental units who let us stay with them over the Christmas Holidays. We appreciate the cooking, cleaning and organizing that you do for us!!!

Couple of stories.

2008-12-21T20:42:00.003+08:00

We made it to America and I know I have never done it before, but there were a couple of things I didn't want to forget so I will blog.

On the plane, Ezra and Elias sat next to "Mr. Woods" and while he didn't seem to love kids, they kind of became enamored with him because he pulled out some sort of craft and started working at it and allowed them to ask him questions about it. Ezra KEPT calling me over for every little thing that he needed and one of the times I walked over, he had his finger jammed up his nose to his knuckle. While all kids do this, I think he does it so blatantly because all of his friends do it. (I've written in my other blog that I think it is The National Pastime .) To put it nicely, he dug out a piece of gold the size of my fist...and rubbed it on his shirt. I noticed Mr. Woods had seen what he had done and was disgusted. I held back my gagging reflux and said, "Ezra, you shouldn't pick your nose like that and you really need to ask for a Kleenex." He replied condescendingly, "Well Mom, at least I didn't eat it."

True, my son. So true.

************************************

On Thursday, Elias had his Christmas party. He and his friend wrote a couple of plays and performed them in the classroom. In fact, two classes divided into several groups, wrote different plays and all of the children performed. Elias' teacher was very nice to invite Ezra to sit in the front row with the rest of the class. The students sat in the floor around a circular area that was the "stage" and the parents sat around them.

Ezra had been to McDonald's for his birthday and had gotten a new toy in his Happy Meal. When Elias saw it, he immediately wanted to hold it but Ezra didn't want to give it up. A fight ensued--a wrestling match that ended up on the "stage." One of the little girls was so good-natured and just stepped over them during her performance. I was at a loss. I could have stepped up there and split them up and drawn attention to me and the fact that they were fighting or I could just sit back and video their rude behavior and try not to laugh too hard.

Unfortunately, I didn't hit the record button so I don't have the evidence at hand but trust me when I say my kids embarrassed themselves, me, the teacher, the school and their country!

More Family Pictures

2008-12-18T11:20:00.001+08:00

Chinese beggar

2008-12-18T10:57:00.003+08:00

I've been busy baking this week. Several cakes (for gifts and Ezra's birthday), peanut butter balls and the kids decorated Christmas cookies last night. I'm so tired!

Today, I was riding in the cab to bring Ezra's birthday cake to school for his friends. I passed a woman begging prostrate on the sidewalk. So deep in thought was I over this woman, I almost missed the turn to Ezra's school. But I decided I was going to do something for her.

We sang (in English) Happy Birthday to Ezra, ate cake and then Ezra and I walked back toward the street to catch a cab. But on the way, we passed a woman making a Chinese pancake. I don't know what else to call it, it's like a pancake all rolled up with vegetables and gravy and an egg. She places a big iron pan over a large cylinder that contains a fire and cooks them right in front of you. The whole thing is on a cart and she rolls around from place to place cooking breakfast in the morning. They are really good and as long as they are hot, I have no problem eating them. Ezra has apparently never seen this before and he walked over to see what she was doing.

I bought one for Ezra to try and to give to the previous beggar I had seen on the way. I hesitate to give beggars food because I've heard people don't want food, they want money. But then, I hesitate to give money because you don't know where the money is going.

We walked a long way back until I saw the woman, all wrapped up in her winter clothes, still laying prostrate on the ground, her head resting on a plastic bag to keep rocks off her forehead.

I said, "Ni e ma?" (Are you hungry?) and set the food in her bowl. Right then, some other older women walked by and said in Chinese, "Ah, she's giving her a pancake." The beggar looked up. I couldn't see her face because her head was covered in towels to stay warm and I couldn't understand her because she spoke Suzhou-nese, but I could hear the gratitude in her voice. I turned around to see what she was doing and she was opening the plastic bag the pancake comes in and was watching us walk away through her towels.

It was quite an interesting experience. It made me feel good inside to give someone something they needed but I also hope it taught Ezra a lesson in humanity.

A few more family pictures.

2008-12-15T21:35:00.000+08:00

I'll upload the rest in the next few days.

Santa's Lap Just Isn't Big Enough Anymore

2008-12-15T21:27:00.000+08:00

Three pieces of cake. (I mean four>)

2008-12-15T21:14:00.003+08:00

I think that since the kids have been sick and haven't been eating much, I've made up for it. I ate three pieces of cake today. I made a pineapple upside down cake for a potluck with my class yesterday but still had the second one at home because I don't have an iron skillet--which would allow me to make one big one. I love pineapple upside down cakes. I also had a piece of Ezra's birthday cake. So make that four pieces.

I'm going to weigh 500 pounds if I'm not careful! I'm supposed to give a speech of sorts tomorrow but I just can't sit down to write it so I think I'm going to wing it. I've already know that I made a 94.6 in that class. Attendance made me lose a few points. I've had a lot of sick kids this semester!

Speaking of which, Ezra threw up yesterday. AGAIN. But this time, it was all in the taxi. He told us in time, I threw a bag at him, he hit it perfectly...and wouldn't you just know it? There was a HOLE in the bottom of the bag! So, unfortunately, there was puke all over the floorboards of the cab. They are plastic so all that needed to be done was take the mats out and spray them down with water. Brad offered to do it right quick but the driver just kept telling us to go, go. I handed him 30RMB more than what the fare was supposed to be...and he drove off in a huff. That's probably much more than he makes in an hour and we OFFERED to do it for him. He saw me take a 100RMB note out of my purse and I think he thought he was going to get that. He counted his chickens before they hatched, I do believe. We all know the dangers of that.

I think Zuri still has a couple of days left of diarrhea but please, please, PLEASE let this be OVER after that!!!

I need some sleep. G'night.

2008-12-13T20:32:00.002+08:00

The kids have had three viruses in the past two weeks. I'm so tired of cleaning up poop and vomit that I just want to...I don't know what. But Ezra and Zuri have no concept of "toilet" and even though Ezra tries, he is very rarely successful. Zuri, of course, can't even try.

It would be so bad but when they throw up in bed, we've got blanket upon blanket under their sheets because the mattresses are like bricks underneath. And so, yes, I have to clean all of that up when the vomit soaks through. I'll be honest, though, Brad has done a great job helping me clean up the floors and other objects the kids throw up on.

Oh, and the poop is everywhere too.

Brad and I have had a stressful past couple of weeks, what with his work, dealing with sick kids and me having final exams. So we planned our very, very first date night EVER since living here for tonight and decided not to change our plans. The places we were going were only about five minutes away by cab anyway.

We began our night getting "top to toe" massages and ended it at Starbucks with coffee. We even had our first coherent political conversation in about three years over dinner. It was very nice and very relaxing...of course Ezra called right after the massage on Ayi's phone, "I don't want to put my pants back on and Ayi wants me to." What in Heaven's name? He later said that he liked to talk on the telephone and he just wanted to talk to us. They aren't used to us leaving together!

Tomorrow, we are celebrating Ezra's birthday. I have so much to do next week, my own potluck on Monday, Elias wants me to make peanut butter eyeballs for his Christmas party (like I made for Halloween), I'm making a cake for Ezra's birthday at school, Elias wrote a play and is performing it on Thursday, I still have to attend class, have to cut olives because Elias needed to bring a pizza topping and he wanted olives but they don't have any that are already cut. I need to pack because we're leaving next week. I also need to finish Christmas shopping but I'm almost done with everyone on my list (who would want something from China), so that's not too bad. I also went to the Pearl Market today and got some nice gifts. It's just been busy around here!

Anyway, if I don't write for the next few weeks, don't be surprised. I hopefully will find a chance but if I don't, I never write anything while I'm in the states, so I'll see ya next year! :)

In case anyone was wondering,

2008-12-09T18:26:00.002+08:00

things haven't changed much around here. We still have a Chinese paparazzi! They love the Zoobeedoo.

I'm in there somewhere:

Family Picture

2008-12-09T14:20:00.000+08:00

House of Sickies

2008-11-30T09:16:00.002+08:00

It's been a tough week in terms of health around here.

Tuesday morning, Elias woke up and said he just couldn't get out of bed. His lymph nodes were swollen but he didn't know what hurt. I let him just stay in bed. He slept all day long. The next day, he stayed at home, too, but he was healthier.

Zuri also started teething during this time. This must be the worse pain for him. His solution is to moan. It's so annoying. I feel sorry for the little thing but imagine trying to cuddle with him while watching TV and have a baby who is constantly moaning (or crying) in your arms. He was nursing and nursing and nursing.

Elias went back to school on Thursday but Zuri now had whatever it was that Elias had. He was just lethargic and didn't look very healthy. I guess it could have been his teeth. It's just the other two never had any pain when teething. Just one day, teeth would appear but Zuri is having a really tough time. I kept thinking Zuri might have thrown up, but I wasn't sure (because it also might have been the cat but he sometimes would have little puddles of milk-like stuff on his chest). I barely got any early preparations done for our Thanksgiving feast.

We decided to do Thanksgiving on Saturday since Brad had to work Thursday. I woke up early, put the turkey in the oven and about an hour later, I hear Brad say, "Elias just threw up."

Afterwards, Elias seemed just fine. I cooked for six hours with only a couple of breaks (to comfort a still-moaning Zuri). I made everything from stuffed celery to pumpkin pie. The works. I tried to talk Brad into taking Zuri to the doctor, but he claimed that it wasn't necessary because he didn't have a fever. (I looked it up and usually with a sore throat, if there's no fever, it's probably viral and there's nothing that can be done other than wait it out.) Zuri looks really thin because he's been sick for several days now (a couple was just teething pain) and hasn't eaten very much. After a while, he would try to nurse, but he couldn't swallow and he would say, "Bobbin!" but then would get mad when I would offer it to him.

When it was finally time to eat, I looked at Ezra and could immediately tell that his lymph nodes were swollen. He ate a few bites of "The Feast" and Elias ate zero. None, zilch. Ezra just wanted to cuddle all afternoon and evening.

During this time, I changed Zuri's diaper, realized we hadn't changed it all day and it still only a small amount of urine was in it. I freaked out because the stupidest thing would be to let your child get dehydrated. I got him some apple juice and he wouldn't drink it because it hurt to swallow so I did something that I've read you shouldn't do...I put it in a syringe and squirted it into his mouth. I would wait until he was breathing out so he wouldn't inhale it into his lungs, though. He would cry every time. He was so mad at me. But after a few times, he got to where he would open his mouth and let me drizzle it in. He was very thirsty. He drank a lot like that and after about half an hour, he was running around here in a MUCH better mood.

He loves kissing booboos (he'll hit his brothers with something and then lean over and kiss them--over and over again). He started moaning at one point and climbed up in my lap, pointed at where his tooth is coming in. I realized he wanted me to kiss it and I did...it was so cute, that did the trick for a little while. He climbed out of my chair and played some more. During the night, he began to be able to nurse well again.

So we then put the kids in bed (Zuri wouldn't go to sleep for a while even though you could tell he was soooo sleepy because his throat hurt), and I heard Ezra yelp something. He had now thrown up all over his bed. We put them in the other bed, gave throw-up covered boy a shower, washed sheets and bleached the floors. Zuri of course woke up again.

Ezra came in our bed in the middle of the night carrying the garbage can we sat by his bed. He kept startling himself awake and wanting drinks of apple juice. I realized, after a few times, that he was proving his earlier-stated theory: "If you need to throw up, drinking water will just fight it back down your throat."

He didn't throw up again, haha.

So, this week, we've battled teething pain, sore throats, weird lethargy and throwing up. Everyone is on the mend except for Ezra.

I look in the refrigerator and see all of the left-overs and just can't seem to want anything to eat. Not because I'm sick but because it was so anti-climatic to cook for so long and then no one wanted to eat. I think next year, we'll just go out to eat because it's not the same without all your family anyway.

Bits and pieces.

2008-11-24T19:44:00.002+08:00

Well, stupid me missed a birthday party this weekend. I have no idea how I forgot about it. I felt just awful for the kids. We had RSVPed and everything.

Ezra has been getting in trouble for constantly getting into Brad's cologne. He doesn't just get a little drop. No, he gets a fistful and ends up smelling like a bad perfume factory. He smelled up the house one too many times and Brad threatened him with a spanking next time he did it.

We pulled out the all the Christmas decorations this weekend. Had a good time putting them up around the house.

Add to that, Zuri threw up this afternoon. I couldn't figure it out, he just randomly threw up and then smeared it all over the place but the unmistakable acidic smell of puke was all over his hands.

Later this evening, I noticed that Zuri smelled like our Christmas air freshener--to an extreme. Ezra had been reprimanded for spraying it all of the house and making me feel buzzed...and then it hit me. He hadn't sprayed the entire house, he had doused Zuri's chest and probably gotten it all in his mouth thus resulting in the throw up.

I'm so mad at Ezra.

Brad's in Shanghai. He had debated whether to come home tonight or not because he has to turn around and go back tomorrow morning. He decided to come on home tonight (with a little prodding from me). He just called: the van was hit by a big truck. There's not much damage but he'll be home very late.

Zuri knocked over the Christmas tree and picked up the ornaments and started throwing them saying, "BALL!" with each one. It's a tiny tree and it's up on a table. He must have pulled on the skirt. I guess I missed one of the breakable ones because I just turned around after hearing one smash against the ground. sigh. Our Christmas tree, which looked a bit better than the lopsided one from last year, looks shabby once again. Brad's the one with all of this Christmas spirit so maybe he'll feel like making it pretty again. I'm still trying to deal with Thanksgiving.

I love this weather, upper forties-lower fifties. The wind stings your face a little but it's not cold enough to penetrate your warm coat. When you go on a walk, your whole body stays toasty except for your cheeks and nose. It's just perfect winter weather. We have been having more blue skies here than at any other time I've been in China. All the pollution I've been talking about it just gone. My allergies have all but completely cleared up. It's been amazing. *I* think it's indicative of the economy: less production (and thus less pollution) in China.

Elias may have to quit Taekwondo. We're tired of him constantly hitting people. He's just playing but it's pretty annoying. Elias and Ezra are constantly fighting. I could stand the fighting if there wasn't a ton of tattling that went along with it. "He hit me in the nose!" "He pushed me down!" It's constant. I'm wondering what they think is supposed to happen when you fight?

Well, it's bedtime around here. I'm off to put the big boys in bed and get the rest of the air freshener off Zuri. I bet he's tired of smelling like a Christmas tree.

Spider Tag

2008-11-18T20:06:00.004+08:00

Ezra's great idea for tag this evening: the kids climb on the wall made of rope at the playground. One person is the Spider and the other children are bugs who are invading the spider's web and the spider tries to catch them. Elias thought it sounded like an excellent idea and wanted to play but the other kids wanted to play standard tag.

Oh well. God can't hand out imaginations to everyone.

Conversation with Ezra. after school

2008-11-18T12:45:00.004+08:00

"Mom, I drew a really good picture. Those things hanging down were his testicles."

"What? You drew a picture of his testicles?"

"Yeah, they were really long."

"Ezra, what are testicles?"

"Those things that come out of his body." (*motioning to chest*)

"OH! You mean TENTACLES."

"Yeah. He had long ones."

Brad called it: crazy

2008-11-15T22:13:00.003+08:00

There's this Chinese woman who lives in our complex who always wants to hold Zuri. She loves, loves, LOVES him. She is very pretty, dresses very chic, has lived in Japan and speaks some English.

Well, one day, I was talking to a friend and Brad was talking to another friend holding Zuri and the aforementioned woman came up. I'm not quite sure what went on and neither is Brad, but when she left, Brad said, "I think she's crazy."

A few days later, I went on a walk with Zuri and stopped by our compound's English bookstore. I had given Zuri a banana and a lollipop in his stroller and he was very sticky and covered in banana (even the peel was all in his lap because he insists upon having that piece, not the broken off piece). I wasn't really worrying about it but that crazy woman came in and some him in that state and oh, started saying the worst things about me in Chinese, "Your mother doesn't love you! Look how dirty she let's you get. She never cleans you does she? You want a Chinese mother, don't you?" She was cleaning him up with napkins and even though I tried to take the banana peel away from her, she insisted upon doing everything herself.

After a few minutes, it suddenly occurred to her that I understood what she was saying. She said in Chinese, "Do you understand me?" I laughed and told her that I did...really, someone saying bad things about you in another language just isn't that offensive. Apparently, she couldn't believe that I wouldn't be mad and she turned back around to Zuri and said, "She doesn't understand," like they have some kind of weird connection.

I came home and asked ayi about this woman and she said that none of the ayis like her. A few days later, she came up to ayi and asked to hold Zuri and ayi said, "Zuri doesn't want to!"

Really, I'm not sure she would steal the baby but she is awfully crazy.

Ayi also told me that a woman leaned over to talk to Zuri and she had on a really low blouse exposing her baboos. Zuri looked up and started saying, "Babbin! Babbin!" Ayi knows that babbin means baboos. The woman asked ayi what he had said and ayi said, "He said the English word for ball."

Dinosaur Land Pictures

2008-11-13T15:17:00.007+08:00

This must be the fattest panda I've ever seen:

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Ezra has a girlfriend, although HE says she has another boyfriend:

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There were dinosaurs everywhere:

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This doll was so weird-looking, I just had to get a picture:

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They had real-sized dinosaurs all over the place:

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There were over fifty different skeletons of dinosaur fossils. This is my personal favorite, it was his idea to pretend to run away:

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Very proud of his artwork:

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Not his girlfriend my foot!

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Ezra loves this picture. He thinks he is so funny:

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All day long, Ezra was really working on figuring out how to smile:

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Aaaaaaah:

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These could move their heads around and spit water. Ezra was amazed:

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Someone has a crush:

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Ezra had such a good time yesterday! I'm glad he got a chance to experience it. There were lots of rides but mostly only ones for older children. Maybe we'll take the other two back one weekend.

This, that and t'other.

2008-11-12T18:17:00.003+08:00

Ezra cried yesterday because I didn't cook rice with dinner. He's always loved rice but it's been so long since we've had mashed potatoes, I don't even think he knows what they are.

Part of me is sad and part of me is laughing.

For the past two weeks, Elias and I have been studying George Washington and Barack Obama. He's going to return to America and have no clue about things that normal Kindergartners learn about. At his age, though, he can now write a summary of the "I cannot tell a lie, I cut down your cherry tree" story, which is exactly what he did.

(And it was so good, who knew that "George liked to cut just about everything in his way?")

Next week, we'll tackle Thanksgiving. He knows all about Thanksgiving's "The Feast" (as he calls it) but I'm not sure he would know what a Pilgrim was even if one gave him an ear of corn! I'm trying to decide if we'll stop short of dressing up as Pilgrims and Indians...but maybe not. :)

Today, Ezra and I went to "Kong Long Yuan" or "Dinosaur Land" with his school in Changzhou. I'll post pictures of it tomorrow.

Is it so wrong of me that I told the teacher to go "round up" the other ADULTS because they were 20 minutes late? I had to get back to the Zoobo and I hate waiting when it's time to go home. The other English speaking woman and I were the only two people back on time and about ten minutes later, there were two other families on the bus. That's all. Before I knew what I was doing, I turned around and yelled at the teacher, "Did you tell ALL the people to be back here at 2:50?" The words were out of my mouth before I realized that I was speaking Chinese and the other two families could understand me how rude I was being.

I like that I can oftentimes live under the cover of English.

I know in China, people don't care so much if they're late and usually I can just accept it but I guess I just temporarily lost sight of that. Oh well.

In other news, Zuri's new favorite word is no. But not just, "No." He says it, "No, no, no!" when something isn't going his way. After Ayi realized that he could understand it, she started using it all the time so when Zuri says it, he doesn't pronounce it properly. It sounds more like, "Na-oh." Cracks me up every time...that is, until he comes in carrying a knife (butter) and when I try to take it away, he says, "Na-oh, na-oh!" and holds it tightly behind his back.

But I can see my efforts to keep him safe have been fruitless. He just came in here carrying three butter knives and a slotted serving spoon. How does he even know where they are?

Zuri (and Ezra) love 'em some Cripple Creek

2008-11-09T09:14:00.003+08:00

It's funny to watch them dance.

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(Please excuse the stretch pants violation!)

Pumpkin cookies

2008-11-05T14:01:00.005+08:00

Ezra KEEPS asking me if he can make candy but he doesn't want any help in doing it. He sneaked in the kitchen one day and poured masala powder and some Thai spicy sauce in a cup and tried to drink it. So I had to make the rule that he isn't allowed to do it without help...to a certain extent.

So I set the open can of pumpkin, the sugar, cinnamon, all spice, nutmeg and cloves on the counter and told him he could put those in. I thought he would put in some, taste it and decide to put some more in (or not) like we do when we make cookies together. I was letting him experiment. I left the room.

I learned a lesson. He has helped me cook cookies many times before and he knows the other ingredients that go in to them. So even though I had set out the other ingredients in another area, he still knew what to do with them. I came back only five minutes later to a counter covered in eggs and cookies with the most baking soda in them that I have ever tasted.

We went ahead and baked them anyway and I told him they were the best pumpkin cookies I'd ever tasted. Of course, cover something in enough icing and you can say that in all honesty about any food!

Two videos:

2008-11-02T19:16:00.002+08:00

The first one is Zuri being silly. There's nothing profound on it, just Zuri getting noses, talking a little, losing his temper due to Ezra's interference and lastly, he plays the piano a bit.

This is Elias doing taekwondo, er, I mean, playing soccer:

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Halloween 2008

2008-10-31T20:50:00.003+08:00

Elias is Four Arms, Ezra is Wild Vine (both Ben 10 guys) and Zuri is a dalmation. I had a woman down the road make Zuri's costume. It looks professional. She did it for about 8 bucks. Zuri's and Elias' look like Brad and I did them...and we did. haha.

They are curled up on the couch watching "Monster House" and eating Halloween candy and some eyeballs Ezra and I made today using a peanut butter ball recipe and white chocolate with M&M's as the iris. It was so funny, there is a 3 minute video of how to make the eyeballs and Ezra kept watching it to see what the next step was. If I didn't do it exactly like the woman in the video, he was sure to correct me.

The boys' newest cousin

2008-10-31T17:00:00.006+08:00

I have to return the favor...my brother is so funny. Look at this picture he posted on his son's, Xave's, website:

And by the way, their other new cousin, James, is also a handsome little devil:

I just have to do everything myself, don't I?

2008-10-30T19:45:00.000+08:00

Picture of Zuri

2008-10-29T21:59:00.000+08:00

Decisions, Decisions

2008-10-20T01:40:00.004+08:00

Once, when I was younger, my mother and I were sitting in her room talking. I was sitting on her bed and she was sitting across from me in her green, lazy boy-like chair. The foot rest wasn't up (it didn't have one) but she was leaning back in the chair creating a space about 4 inches high under it.

My cat, who is fat and gray now but was quite young then (always fat), walked in and stood in between us. As a joke, we both started calling, "Here, kitty, kitty, kitty!" to see who he would go to and thus, which of us he liked better. He stood there between us, he would look at me and look at her, look at me and then look at her...and then he made his decision.

He tried to squeeze his big, stupid head into that small space underneath her green chair.

I am only reminded of that right now because I have a quiz tomorrow on Chinese characters and I also need to finish up Ezra's Halloween costume. I thought about it and thought about it...and decided to blog instead.

But unfortunately, I have nothing to blog about...so "Friends" it is.

He can't reach the numbers yet...

2008-10-12T23:09:00.001+08:00

Zuri scared me to death this afternoon. Elias and Ezra were getting ready to go outside and play with their friends and they had called the elevator. We were standing outside the elevator talking to the mother of their friends.

The elevator came up, opened and before anyone knew what had happened, Zuri was on it and on his way downstairs all by himself. Oh buddy, he freaked out. We could hear him screaming.

I took off down the stairs, hoping he had gotten off just on the floor below ours, floor 8 (this isn't an exact explanation because there are actually 2 floors on each floor--you push 9 to get to our apartment but we're really on 17 and 18). No such luck, but the other elevator came to 8 and I hopped on it but it went up to our floor!! Brad said that Zuri's elevator had gone all the way down to 1 before it stopped (he was watching the numbers) and so I started to go there. For some reason, though, on the way back down my elevator stopped at 8 and so did Zuri's. Our elevators arrived there at the same time basically and I saw him run off towards where our door is on the floor above.

I only knew to get off because I could hear him screaming bloody murder. I was almost in tears because I was so happy that he hadn't gotten off on the first floor. Oh, there are some dangers there he could have gotten into. Or what if someone had taken him into their apartment? Do you know how hard it might have been to find him? What if he hadn't started screaming when the elevator started moving? We wouldn't have known where he went. We were so lucky.

He wanted to comfort nurse and nurse and nurse and would cry when I sat him down for around half an hour. Poor baby! He was freaked.

I wonder if someone found him but sent him back up to 8 thinking that's where we lived? I don't understand why his elevator stopped on 8. (I do have an explanation for why mine did.)

Anyway, all's well that ends well but it could have been disastrous. I know this is a bit confusing but it's a difficult thing to describe! He went down 16 floors and back up 14 all by himself on the elevator!!!!
__________________

And another thing!

2008-10-09T17:42:00.002+08:00

When I went to Elias' school today, one of the British teachers, who has a six month old, said to me, "Wow, you sure to make them all the same, don't you?" Then later, "Well my husband is Irish and I'm afraid that my son's hair will turn red like that."

I joked, "Hey, I take offense at that! Look at this beautiful copper color!" and rubbed Zuri's hair.

She started stuttering, apparently thinking that because I don't have red hair (mine has mostly faded) that she could say whatever she wanted. "Oh, well, that's a pretty color, I'm talking about the BRIGHT red and you know, all of the freckles."

Well, after this, I wasn't joking anymore. Yes, my kids have freckles.

Part of me wishes that I had told her the truth about her daughter. Because ya know what? I have never thought her daughter was anywhere near pretty. Even with red hair my kids are all three 100 times cuter than her pointy-nosed daughter (who yes, has freckles but not red hair). But I just couldn't fight insult with insult.

Bullies

2008-10-09T17:19:00.002+08:00

I can't STAND them. It's even worse when you are watching your son get bullied by a bigger, older kid, with the bully's parent sitting right beside you and you finally get up and go let the kid have it.

Yup. I had watched too many things happen to Elias in Taekwondo--the target waved threateningly in his face several times (Elias said he actually hit him with it), a heel attempting to come down on top of Elias' foot several times, and the straw that broke the camel's back: rather than clapping hands with Elias, the kid was slapping him in the face. He wasn't just playing around, trying to aggravate him. His intent was to hurt Elias, you could see it in his eyes.

I let him have it and when the teacher walked over, I started all over again so that there would be no question that I was unhappy and I heard the teacher say, "You can't come back if you do it again." His mother never even noticed! His older brother was also acting obnoxious--I imagine they need more attention at home.

The kid kept looking back at me with fear but he deserved a swift kick in the a$$.

Yes, my cooking has changed

2008-10-07T18:32:00.003+08:00

Tonight for dinner, we had a weird kind of amalgamation of food. We had cabbage sauteed Chinese-style with chicken, carrots and celery. We had a Dutch apple salad and we had some German fried potatoes...all of which I've learned to cook since arriving here. Truly eclectic. But the funny thing is, the kids ate and ate and ate. The two older boys ate their whole plate and then ate about half of a second plate. The only thing that wasn't eaten was the walnuts in the salad on Ezra's plate. Zuri also ate a lot of everything but I only gave him a little bit of cabbage for fear that his body wouldn't digest it.

Back to the grindstone.

2008-10-06T20:39:00.003+08:00

Well, now that we have officially ended the week off to celebrate the Chinese Independence Day (which, believe it or not, is actually when the Communist government gained control and the Guomingtang (KMT) were forced to Taiwan), it is time for everyone to get back to school (and Brad to work).

I could NOT wake up this morning. Zuri was up all night wanting to nurse and I am trying to sleep train him again. I also drank a diet coke pretty late at night so after he woke up crying but went back to sleep, I was up running on a caffeine high. Not much fun.

So, this past week, I think we went to six different dinner parties. As your kids grow up, they certainly bring a whole new level to your social life, don't they?

Sunday, I went to the fabric market with a friend and bought material to make the boys their Halloween costumes. I showed Ezra the green fabric, and he knew EXACTLY what it was for and freaked out laughing--Ben 10's Wild Vine. Elias will be Ben 10's "Fire Guy" (that's not his technical name) and Zuri will be a Dalmation. I REALLY need to get on this because I have no sewing machine and even fewer skills with a needle, haha.

But while we were there, I found some fabric that looked like I could possibly use it to look like fire in various places on Elias' costume. It's like fringe that stands up. It's red with a shiny yellow undertone. I asked the lady (in Chinese) how much per meter and she told me 8 yuan. So, I left and came back maybe 15 minutes later and asked for half a meter. Well, she thought I said EIGHT meters and started shelling it out. When I corrected her, she started making fun of my pronunciation which really pissed me off. I had said it wrong and I'm usually almost perfect but I certainly don't make fun of her for saying HILO! for Hello (although if it happens again, I will).

Anyway, she apparently had been counting how much money she was going to make on eight meters and now it was suddenly down to half a meter. I'm usually so careful but I learned a valuable lesson: apparently when you leave the store and come back, the price just might double. I was pissed and told her I would not come back. Really, she just handed me back the wrong change and so my only choice was going to be to get the police to come to get it back and what was I worried about? $1.50.

But honestly, the more I think about this woman, the more I want to go to one of her competitors and just hand them 100RMB note right in front of her. Bi-atch.

The Chinese said, "Happy Independence Day!" yesterday

2008-10-02T20:50:00.003+08:00

So, I never knew a stay-at-home vacation could be this much fun but boy, we've been having fun this week! We had to work/go to school Saturday and Sunday, but we have had outings every night. Tonight, we went over to a couple of friends house who made us some gumbo. They are from the north and they wanted to make southern food. I thought it was kind of funny because we don't really consider gumbo as southern food (yeah, Cajun people live in the south, but they aren't southerners) but ya know what? I NEVER want to turn down free gumbo. haha. I made a seven layer salad.

The other night, Brad cracked me up when we went to a friend's house for a bbq the other night and the party consisted of a New Zealand/Singapore family, an Australian family, a Brazilian family, a British family, and us, the American family. In a rare occurrence around here (usually there is no separation by sex), the women sat around the table and had no problem finding things to chat about. The men sat around in the living room and Brad said conversation was so difficult! He said they started with music. No one knew the same music. Then they went to sports. No one followed the same sports. Politics? Nope. There were many other attempted conversations that kept dead-ending. He was ready to go waaaay before I was.

So, what do women find to talk about that is interesting, no matter what country you're from: recipes, child brain development (we're also all teachers), differences in men and women, books we've read, drinks we like to drink, etc. Women can shoot the shit about anything, can't we?

I learned you must never ask "could" but ask "would" when asking a man to do a chore. But I cracked everyone up with the story about how that day I had asked Brad very nicely to bring the vacuum cleaner up. "When you have time, will you please bring the vacuum cleaner upstairs?" Now, everyone knows that means in the next few minutes...an hour later, I came downstairs and got it myself. I told them MY mistake was not saying, "Bring the damn vacuum cleaner upstairs NOW!!!

On being literate

2008-09-26T16:38:00.003+08:00

I would venture to say that most people can't remember when they were illiterate. I remember my first thought when we landed in Shanghai and I was looking at all of the Chinese billboards: "Wow, Chinese characters have fonts!"

However, after a while, you stop noticing them and become used to always being in the dark. Now that I'm beginning to learn Chinese characters, my eyes have been opened! Ezra, you know, is also becoming literate in English and I think it's so cute when he sees a word he knows when I'm reading a book to him, "There's 'can'!" But the funny thing is that I catch myself doing the same thing. ("There's li!")

It is so interesting to feel what becoming literate is like. I've got a while to go seeing as there are over 3000 characters but ya know, small steps can feel like leaps and bounds sometimes.

Are all children full of drama?

2008-09-23T19:43:00.003+08:00

I picked up Ezra from school today at noon and his teacher asked me when he was going to stay all day. I said, "Whenever he wants to." Later, I told him that if he ever wanted to stay later, just to let me know and he could ride the bus home at 4:00. His response?

"I'll NEVER want to stay at school longer!" as if I was the enemy and he was vowing never to turn to the dark side.

We have huge issues with him just randomly taking off his shoes places. He has now lost one of his sandals and must wear socks and tennis shoes to school now. There's NO WAY he will even attempt to put on his own shoes so Brad has had to start getting ready a few minutes earlier. (Since we put our shoes on (and take them off) at the door.) He and Brad have a deal: as long as Brad will carry Ezra to the bus stop, he won't cry when he gets on to go to school. *I just rolled my eyes a little bit.*

My school is kicking my butt. I have to study, study, STUDY to learn these characters. I can NOT zone out or I miss something important b/c they don't lecture in English (one can't even speak English). It's quite an experience. If I decide to go next semester, I want to enroll in the Masters Program because Brad and I feel like I should be working towards something.

In fact, I'm off to study now.

Elias' favorite sport.

2008-09-21T22:02:00.003+08:00

Believe it or not, Elias' favorite sport is basketball. He spends all of his free time playing basketball at school with his friends. Oh my. Brad bought him an indoor goal today and he insisted upon putting it together himself--refusing help from anyone. I think I'll just let him figure out for himself that height is a requirement in this sport.

Definitely not our culture

2008-09-21T08:11:00.003+08:00

Brad just blew a gasket. The boys were still asleep at 8:00 (they went to bed at 8:30 last night) and the neighbors started setting off fireworks. He went down there and threw a fit! After yelling at them (all adults), he then said he did some kind of dance over the firecrackers while they were popping. I was scared but now I'm mostly embarrassed. We do kind of stand out around here!

At least they stopped.

I think I'll just go eat worms!

2008-09-18T20:45:00.002+08:00

Or anyway, that's the way Zuri is acting in this video. He never crawls so it's even funnier to watch him try to race away on his knees. He is already VERY good at throwing temper tantrums, isn't he? But actually, at the end, he was saying what a chicken says (babababa) and doing a little hand dance ayi taught him and stuff like that. He certainly didn't stay upset. I tried to upload all of it but dropshots won't let me. cry.

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My vent for the day.

2008-09-18T16:08:00.002+08:00

One of the reasons I have breastfed for so long and one of the reasons I chewed up meat to give to Zuri is because of the melamine scare last year. I thought: if they've put it into dog and cat food, what is to stop them from putting into pureed baby food? It is supposed to make the protein content look higher. All they would need to do is put in ground up paper (or we'll give them the benefit of the doubt and say rice) along with a bit of meat, then they add some melamine and lo and behold, when you do the tests, it looks like it has the right protein content. (I did feed Zuri the veggies but only because there was no reason to put melamine in vegetables.)

Even the wealthy Chinese order their milk powder online from an outside source. Or one family at Ezra's school did last year but I don't assume they are the only ones in China to do so.

When I read about other expats who have been feeding their babies Chinese formula, it makes my blood run cold. I wonder if they live in some kind of bubble and they have learned nothing about the Chinese culture while here? I mean, I love the Chinese culture but I know that they have no issues with cutting corners and taking people's money while they do it.

I am outraged about the melamine this time. I think mostly because they've known there was a problem since FEBRUARY and did NOTHING. My theory is because the powers that be didn't want bad press for the Olympics. I even think they wanted to wait until after the Paralympics but when the baby died, they realized they needed to recall it now. At least they're taking a little responsibility. sigh. This country.

update on my boys

2008-09-17T17:03:00.002+08:00

So I have been putting off writing because I can't get my freakin' camera to upload some funny video of Zuri throwing a fake temper tantrum. He's such a drama king. I've also been very busy.

We had a practice pop quiz in class today and I have discovered that even though I can read the characters we're supposed to know, I can't pull them out of my brain and write them down. So, more studying.

I have a toothache and I'm scared to go to the dentist because he apparently gave some kid two root canals on his front teeth that were NOT required and the teeth had to be pulled so as the new teeth could come in. I would just hate to have bad judgment made on my already sad teeth.

Elias is enjoying school an awful lot. Our neighbor is in his class and they play together a lot. He is extremely busy. Between Taekwondo and Chinese tutoring twice per week, practicing the piano and homework every night and piano and soccer on the weekends, I'm surprised he has much time for anything else!

I'm going to need a calendar once Ezra joins in. That is, if he has any interest. They actually told him that he could play soccer a bit this year and he wouldn't even go out on the field and try. When Elias and his friends have a soccer game, they always ask Ezra to play but he prefers to sit on the side and watch.

Ezra is also beginning to enjoy school. He does the cutest little activities. Last week, they went on a field trip to Suzhou University (they are actually on the campus of the university but not my campus) and he was the star. All the students wanted to get their picture made with him. His school is EXCELLENT and I am tempted to send him there next year for kindergarten except he wouldn't work on reading English like he would at Elias' school.

They used to tell me last year that he would speak to his friends in Chinese but this year, they hadn't told me that and I was afraid that the teachers last year were mistaken. But today, his teacher told me that he was speaking in Chinese to his friends. I was one HAPPY mother--smiling from ear to ear. Apparently, it just took him a couple of weeks to get back in the swing of things.

I am much more confident on my electric bike now. I still think it's too big and need to plan ahead where I'm parking so I can be sure I can get it out or else I'll have to ask someone to lift it for me but other than that, I zoom around almost like I was brought up on it. I'm still afraid of buses though and will avoid them at all costs. I will stop my bike and wait if I see one even remotely near me.

I have quickly learned that if I lack patience with Zuri, he freaks out. He does NOT like it when I'm impatient. If he is standing up in his high chair and I get angry with him for standing up over and over again, he dissolves into angry tears. I can't believe three children can be more different. This one is in love with sports. He's dribbles the ball (soccer style--running after it kicking) and Elias said the other day he was trying to dribble it like a basketball. He still loves passing the ball back and forth. He also LOVES to walk backwards. It's the cutest thing; he just will randomly start walking backwards.

He recently started this thing where he looks at people and squints his eyes closed with a mock smile. I swear, he's making fun of us! He says "xie xie" or "thank you" (either/or) every single time you hand him something. The other morning, he woke up and touched his own eyes and said, "er duo!" which is definitely as cute as it could be except "ER DUO" means "ears." He will sometimes say "Hungee!" and "biper!" when he's hungry or needs a diaper change. He will also stand at my feet and squeal at the top of his lungs for the same reasons leaving me to guess what he wants. Last night, he was nursing to sleep and Elias and Ezra were being loud and I said, "Shhhhhhh!" Zuri stopped nursing and looked at me and said, "shhhhh!"

I can't say enough about the leaps and bounds my kids have made the past couple of weeks. I'm very proud of them.

I can't sleep

2008-09-11T00:22:00.002+08:00

And so I decided to blog.

Actually, I think maybe if I write down what I'm thinking about, I'll be able to sleep. I'm thinking about how afraid I was on my bike today...or rather, how afraid I SHOULD have been. My brain is going over all of the "what ifs" and so I can't sleep.

There is always construction all over China, but in Suzhou, they are supposedly putting in a subway system right now. This has Brad dancing with joy but he doesn't have to ride his bike through it. At almost every single intersection, there are big walls which are hiding what I guess are deep holes going deep underground to the tunnels. Sometimes, the bicycle lanes are non-existent (or very narrow) because these barriers are taking up the actual road for the cars and so they squeeze us all in together.

So, I was driving along with Ezra, minding my own business and I see up ahead a small backhoe parked on the side of the bicycle lane digging a hole. All the other bicycles ahead of me go past it but as I am approaching it, it starts to reverse into the bicycle lane (rule of the road: biggest vehicle wins). So, I'm thinking, "Shit!" Luckily it stopped, but as we went by, it's freakin' digger part rotated out into the road and I swear, came like two inches from hitting us. Okay, it wasn't that close but I really thought it was going to hit us.

So, further up ahead, I see a heavy truck that parked in the bicycle lane and blocking everyone so I do as every other person does and leave the bicycle lane and ride into actual traffic. I got behind a big, huge, double decker bus. After my experience the other day, I definitely don't want to go around this thing so I just sat and waited as people get on and off the bus.

So, this is the part I'm thinking about. What should I have done? I keep going through my head all the possibilities of bad things happening (this is why I sleep with the TV on) and thinking, "What if I had accidentally juiced it again?" I don't know why that keeps going through my head, but it does. And all I picture is this big, huge blue wall of a bus in front of me and my bike sliding up under it and wondering if Ezra would have jumped off.

I was extremely lucky that I wasn't covered in the nasty, black exhaust that those buses usually produce.

Now maybe I can sleep.

My poor spice cabinet.

2008-09-10T14:48:00.002+08:00

I made some Spanish rice the other day and wanted to make it a little spicy, so I added some ground red pepper to it. I just cook all the ingredients together in the rice cooker. As I sprinkled the red pepper in, I happened to notice that some of it floated on top...and I realized, my red pepper was infested with bugs.

Gross.

I, of course, threw it out and then looked it up on the internet and found that there is a bug that infests all types of peppers, including paprika and chili powder. I can not get lots of those spices here and I always bring them over with me from home. I carefully inspected all of the rest and didn't see any other bugs in them but just for good measure, I threw them in the freezer for a few days so that if there are some, the infestation won't grow (because the bugs will die in the freezer). The thing that irritates me the most is that my mixed spices, like taco and cajun season also contain red peppers.

Ayi told me it was okay to eat them. But I just can't do it. Now everyone knows what to get me from Christmas. I threw out sooooo many spices. *cry*

It's freakin' hot today. It's been so mild this last of summer but it's hot today. So hot, in fact, that my air conditioner is hardly cooling. Zuri can't stand for anything to be plugged in so fans don't stay on to circulate the air better.

I'm thankful that on day three of going to school, I have made it there, then to Ezra's school and then back home without any wrecks or other mishaps. But don't you ever think for a second that I let my guard down. It's a very stressful ride for me. I guess it wouldn't be so bad if it weren't like I was trying to turn left from the far right hand lane (that's where the bicycle lane is) across Hwy 153 during rush hour traffic. The rest, I can stand, albeit grudgingly. Someone else mentioned finding a human shield and yup, that's exactly what I do!!!

School days.

2008-09-09T13:02:00.003+08:00

My first two days of classes have gone quite well. Zuri doesn't mind at all staying at home; he may cry when I leave but Brad is still here so it's not for that long and then, he doesn't cry at all when Brad leaves. He and ayi go outside and play for a couple of hours. He's talking so well now--and in both languages. He told me "xie xie" this morning when I handed him his apple juice just as perfect as you please.

Ezra told me yesterday that he didn't like school. Of course, I was very concerned and I asked him why, ready to quit my own school, "Because we always have to do stuff." He's only there for 3.5 hours! (And one hour is lunch and playtime and the first 30 minutes is also free time to play with their toys but he wants to bring his own toys.)

As for my own class, well, I sat in class rolling my eyes all of yesterday and the first half of today. It was so easy and I was a bit disgusted. Then, out of the blue, she asks students to read the Chinese characters and write them on the board. *AND THEY CAN.* I internally FREAKED out and began hastily trying to memorize them before she called on me to read them. You see, I'm in class with lots of Asian foreigners and many of their characters are the same as Chinese characters (especially Japanese) or maybe they've studied it in high school a bit (like we would French or Latin). She did call me up to read to the class off the chalk board and I only hesitated on one but goodness, I was NERRRRVOUS! I guess I need to study the day before to learn the characters for the next day so I won't be in that situation again.

Elias is beginning Taekwondo today after school. I wonder how it's going to work out...I told him he may NOT practice on his brother. I hope he doesn't push the limits.

Small city now becoming a big city

2008-09-07T18:17:00.004+08:00

Guess what I found for sale outside our favorite restaurant today? OKRA!!! I have never seen it in China before. She told me that she would have more for me tomorrow and I'm freezing it to have all winter (along with my lime juice).

Brad's birthday has turned out really good.

Tomorrow is my first day at school and I'm afraid about all of the logistics. Having three kids and "working" is going to be a challenge. Wish me luck!

This and that

2008-09-06T22:23:00.006+08:00

My computer is running extremely slowly here lately because the hard drive is almost completely full. So I had this brilliant idea to erase my music. I had remembered some time ago that iTunes converted all of my music--6000 songs (thanks Mom)--to a new format and so I decided that they must, therefore, be on my hard drive twice. I asked a good friend of mine if this was the case and he told me that it was. I double-checked the path to make sure I was deleting the right thing and then I deleted all of the "My Music" file since we only use iTunes anyway. The only catch was that all 20GB couldn't fit into my trash can so it would have to be deleted permanently.

So, I took a big leap of faith and did it.

When Brad tried to play music later, it was all gone. Yup. Gone. Zilch. Nada. And permanently deleted. Did you read that? PERMANENTLY. I took the "leap of faith" but only because deep down inside I could remember something my father said about "undeleting" files many years ago when talking to my sister. But guess what? When I googled that, it seems you need some special software and I don't go well with special software. (I once formatted my hard drive with the special software.)

Also, for some reason, Brad did something to our iPod and it only had 2000 of our songs (it can hold 80GB) on it but I did manage to get those back on the computer without syncing it. He's happy, though, because all of his Beatles songs are intact and he no longer has to listen to "Jessie's Girl" or the theme song to "St. Elmo's Fire."

Aw, come one, you KNOW those songs are CLASSICS!!
________________

One thing I love about living here is that there are certain things that would embarrass me back home that don't embarrass me here. Case in point: I happened to notice yesterday that all of my tampons were poking up out of my purse. However, Chinese don't know what tampons are and so I only flinched for a split second. I didn't even try to put them back in the little pocket. That's a far cry from the embarrassment I felt when I realized the tampons I had stuck in my back pocket to be transferred to my purse had remained there while I had taught three classes...sticking up conspicuously like, "Hey! Your teacher is on the rag, so DON'T MESS WITH HER TODAY!"
________________

Elias, Ezra and Zuri have a new cousin! He's a real cutie and I can't wait to meet him. Congratulations Drew and Kate!
________________

For anyone keeping up with it, I tested in on level 1 for Suzhou University. I have been told that I can pretty much choose where I want to be and so I was going to march my bum right down there Monday and tell them I wanted to be on level 2 but I've changed my mind. I'm going to learn as many characters as I can and just not have to worry so much about learning to speak the language since I'll already know most of what they're teaching. I don't really know many characters and I guess I shouldn't try to run until I've learned to walk, right?
________________

We ate out tonight at a cozy little fusion restaurant where you could get things like Kung Pao Chicken with Lavender or Beef with Little Buns. VERY GOOD FOOD. The restaurant sits right on the canal that is lit up nicely with neon lights. The kids played inside with some blocks or ran around outside. Zuri was a bit emotional but after he fell asleep, we enjoyed a nice conversation with our friends. The breeze blew nicely across the table and I felt very contented after a grumpy afternoon.

That's all from this side of the world. Good night.

Our language skills

2008-09-05T08:59:00.003+08:00

So Zuri is well on his way to being bilingual. Do you have any idea how happy this makes me? I speak Chinese to him as much as I can and today I realized that maybe I need to speak more English. Haha. He plays all kinds of hand games that ayi has taught him, she can ask him "Er duo nar?" and he can correctly grab his ears--without fail. When she says, "Chu qu wan le!" He goes to the door and grabs his shoes to go outside and play. I know that it's impolite to brag (not that that's every stopped me before), but she loves teaching him new things and I think it's because he's such a quick learner.

Yesterday, she told me her son (the one here in Suzhou) is dumb. I told her that she could change all of that and MAKE him smarter by teaching him what she knows. She gave me several excuses why she couldn't (one was because she was so tired from working and another is because she also is dumb--which isn't true, in my opinion).

Elias' tutor has started coming back again. He told me that Elias has learned much more since last spring. I hear them upstairs carrying on conversations with each other. Elias is also reading Chinese characters.

As for Ezra, well, I think his speech is hindering him. I just don't get it. I don't think he really cares one way or another so all of this full immersion just isn't doing the trick...YET. Brad and I are REALLY working on his speech and making him say words properly. I think that when no one understands him, he just gives up. In fact, when someone asks him his name he says, "I don't want to tell you because you won't understand me." I'm a little frustrated.

I don't really know about Brad's. I wish he would take a class on the weekends because, like me, he really wants to learn. We'll see.

As for me, my goal is to become fluent in Chinese. I'm at a point now where if I don't understand something, I can ask them what the part is that I don't understand and probably 60-70% of the time I can catch the drift from the second explanation. I'm not ready to philosophize or go to med school; I'm just talking about every day conversations.

People may wonder why this is important for us. There are many, many reasons. First, it's cool to be able to say, "I lived in China and yes, I can speak the language." Second, think about the doors speaking a second language opens for you! If China continues on the path it is on, the kids will have their pick of jobs when they graduate college. Third, I can't learn about the culture as well if I can't speak with the peasants (my goal). Fourth, even if China doesn't continue on this path, then I know that learning a new language is making brain connections that the children will use to learn other languages that may become important in the future--it simply makes you smarter. There are other reasons but these are the main ones (and the ones I'm thinking about right now).

And now, I'm off to Auchan. yuck.

Wreck.

2008-09-04T16:40:00.003+08:00

I got in a wreck today. I jumped off before I got hurt though, just a small cut on the top of my hand that I'm not really sure how I got it.

It wasn't my fault. The bus for some stupid reason was in the bicycle lane. I was stopped at a red light and on the wrong side of a bump in the pavement. The bus was turning right but it cut the turn really short and hit my front wheel. I was trying to back up some and therefore, was pulling on my handle bars. The "gas" is pulling back on the right grip...and so while I was trying to walk the heavy thing backwards, I accidentally goosed it right into the bus. (So that part was my fault.) I jumped off while my bike went flying and the driver stood up and started yelling at me. I motioned that I was okay and then I realized, he's yelling at me to get the Hell out of the way...he doesn't care if I'm hurt or not. I'm glad the woman beside me started yelling at him for me. haha.

I just lugged it back over the little bump and he went on his merry way.

I had my placement test today. I could answer all of the questions they have to ask us to determine our placement. That's great news. The bad part is that I had to turn in the written test with only my name written on it. I know about 70 characters but not a single one was on the written test. Sigh. It's posted now but I can't go over there until tomorrow. So I'll know then.

Wish me luck!

My new e-bike.

2008-09-03T17:11:00.002+08:00

(To fit all five of us, Ezra would go where Zuri is, Brad would drive, Elias would sit where Ezra is and I would hold Zuri in the empty spot. Not very safe but I've seen worse!)

I have managed to avoid picking up Ezra from school on my e-bike one way or another so far. I guess because it is like the Harley of electric bikes. It scares me to death and those of you who know me well, know that's hard to do. I still managed to find the courage to max it out today at 51km/h (32 mph). I have had to learn to turn it off before I get off or I'll accidentally hit the "gas" and make it go forward dangerously. I can't even put on the second kick stand because the bike is too heavy for me to lift. (Although luckily, I can take it off using the weight of the bike.) Yesterday, my friend's driver saw me struggling with it and parked the van and came over to help me get the thing turned around so I could get home. It's embarrassing! (But I really appreciated him.)

I get on and initially, my handle bars wiggle all over the place and I let my feet dangle until I get sturdy.

Today, I think I could have walked to pick up some bread faster than I rode my bike because I had to try to find the path of least resistance (in other words: not very much traffic).

I've found the rules of the road have changed now that I'm on my Harley. People don't go around me anymore, they expect me to avoid them. (For some reason, this isn't a mutual arrangement.) Every time I hear a horn or bell, I just KNOW it's about me and I look around and wonder what I've done wrong. I probably make myself more dangerous by doing all of the cautious things that I do, like slowing down at every single intersection, but I'm just too afraid. Someone has told me that I'll get used to it but I just don't see myself EVER driving downtown in rush hour bike traffic on this hog.

Stay tuned.

After Ezra's school.

2008-09-01T23:48:00.003+08:00

I picked him up a bit early because it didn't take me as long to get there as I thought it would. He had changed to a smaller class, which made me very happy. He had finished lunch and was sitting in a chair reading a book in Chinese. He was very happy, smiling and had lots to talk about. He had only been there two hours!

Anyway, on the way back, my back tire lost all of its air. I kept riding on it. I was going through construction where the bike lanes aren't always defined and I refused to walk. When we were about a block from home, it finally gave way and started sliding all over the place. I just thought I would bend the rim, I didn't think it would become dangerous. So I asked Ezra to hop off and pushed it the rest of the way.

The best news is, we bought an electric bike instead of repairing that one. Now it will take some finagling, but we can all five fit on this bike. It gets away from me very easily and I'm actually a little bit afraid of it. It's freakin' giNORMOUS. The clerk told me I needed one that was a bit smaller but I wanted to be able to put all three kids on the bike and go...maybe I'm regretting this decision. Tomorrow, I'm going to take it out and practice a bit before I go get Ezra. Maybe I'll see if I can find the university. I wonder if I'd get any stares if I tested out the rain jacket. I've never used it on this bike and would hate to get stuck in a down pour and not know how to use it.

I think, though, that first I need to get ayi to teach me some things about it, like where all the locks are--it requires a key in the ignition and we put two other locks on it but I think there are two more which are, unfortunately, greatly needed in this great country called China.

First days of school!

2008-09-01T09:57:00.003+08:00

Elias' went off without a hitch. He was up before I was and ready by the time I got out of the shower. His new uniform isn't as bad as I thought it was going to be but I'm still not extremely happy with it. I put him on the bus and went back to get Ezra. I really, really, REALLY wanted to take Elias all the way on his first day of school but I would be cutting it really close with catching Ezra's bus so I decided against it.

We did get to meet his teacher on Saturday. Her name is Ms. Butler. She's from Australia. She's very friendly, VERY tall and very pretty. I think Elias will like her. He only knows one other kid in his class but I'm sure that will change.

As for Ezra's school, I wasn't too impressed and am beginning to doubt my decision to send him to a local school. First of all, the bus was 25 minutes late (which meant I DID have time to go to Elias' school). The bus driver was new and so I decided to let that slide although 25 minutes is a bit ridiculous, especially when the kids were waiting on the busy street. (And Ezra's best friend, DingDing--the one who never walks but always runs--was there helping him get into trouble. That kid is a mess but Ezra thinks he's so fun. sigh.)

Anyway, when we arrived, there was only one woman waiting for us at the gate but there were 11 kids going to 11 different places. We had no idea where to go. In fact, Ezra and DingDing ran off to the playground and no one stopped them or tried to help them find their classroom. I was very angry. I finally found out where Ezra's classroom was and went to get him but DingDing went running toward the front gate. The woman was about to lead me to Ezra's classroom when I told her she needed to go find DingDing first. I'm wondering what would have happened if I had not ridden the bus?

It was very disorganized. I led Ezra up to his classroom, where class had already began because the bus was so late, and what do I discover? His teacher speaks PERFECT English. He's even better than Ezra's teachers last year. he's probably live in the US for a while. The whole reason I'm sending Ezra here is for the FULL immersion into Chinese language for a few hours per day.

After finally leaving Ezra, unceremoniously because the whole class was sitting nicely in seats for circle time watching us, I went back to the front office and told them I was angry. She said that it was because it was the first day of school. I just left it at that and changed the time the bus picks him up to 8:20. She said that bus was full and I said that we couldn't go to school here then because 8:50 was too late. She then said that it was okay...I'm really not feeling good about this AT ALL. Tomorrow, I am hoping will be better because we'll be there on time and perhaps the teachers couldn't wait any longer for the kids who were so late at the front gate or something. I mean, they did have their classes to start.

And guess what? We were never told this but we also could have gone to HIS school on Saturday to meet his teacher and get his uniform. We wouldn't have felt so displaced that way.

Anyway, I'm thinking it might be better to send him to SSIS.

Ezra's graduation from his old school, CareHome, was on Sunday. He was so nervous. At first, he refused to even go sit with the other students.

His favorite teacher, JiaJia Laoshi:

Today has gone by quickly.

2008-08-27T15:56:00.003+08:00

Poor Ezra went to get a physical today and they didn't prick his finger, they drew blood! Poor thing. But honestly, I'd barely had time to make him look away and ask him what color something was when they were finished. He was so good that he got a dinosaur toy. I kept telling him that I was proud of him because he was such a big boy to which he kept replying, "No, Mamma. I'm still a little boy."

We got in and out of the hospital, even though there were a gabillion people in there, in just half an hour. I find it so strange that Chinese women are so modest yet nurse openly without a care to cover up. Men come up and stare at the "baby" and it doesn't bother the women or their husbands at all.

Elias played Wii while we were gone. I think people should show this pictures to adults to talk them out of buying one.

Zuri loves, loves, LOVES to read!

Zuri can now climb up on the kitchen table. He's such a freak show but you gotta love the little thing.

An email I received

2008-08-27T13:55:00.002+08:00

I find this email so cute. We should call it a kidgarden.

Hi Carleigh,

Ezra need to take physical examination before entering the Kidgarden. We will make one day to hospital next week.

And do you have inoculation card for Ezra? Kidgarden also need this.

We will also prepare 4 photoes for Ezra. I keep them which you gave me last time.

Elias' Birthday Party

2008-08-26T20:32:00.002+08:00

He had soooo much fun! I just let the kids all run wild in the restaurant. I asked them to stay in the "kid area" but I'm sure they still drove people crazy.

Elias is SEVEN!

2008-08-25T14:04:00.003+08:00

Apparently, falling last week in the stroller made Zuri's upper two teeth pop through. It looks a little weird, like the teeth are popping through too high in the gums, though. He'll probably need braces after this. I'm happy to say, though, that as of today, he now has three upper teeth and two lower teeth. I'll be happy when he is able to chew food better. Zuri began walking last week and refuses any other mode of getting around. It just happened overnight.

Ayi is back today. She brought us some sesame oil from her "old home." I have a love/hate relationship with sesame oil. I can't stand the smell of it until my brain processes what it is and then I enjoy it. It smells a little burnt. She told me that her younger son wants to go back to her old home next year to live with his grandparents because she spanked him. It must be hard. She also told me that her grandmother's feet were bound. I would pay for the trip if her grandmother would come here and let me see them. I'm kind of gross, aren't I?

Elias is seven today. So hard to believe!!! I know that "good" mothers use this time to talk about what a sweet baby he was, but I have to complain! He is growing up way too fast. He WANTS to be an adult. He asks about adult things and he has reverted back to the "why" stage just to carry on conversations b/c he LONGS for them. One of his favorite things to do is sit on the couch with Brad and talk about stuff. He stands behind me and reads what I'm reading or writing. It drives me crazy! It's like having a shadow that is leaning on me. I'm reading "Wild Swans" right now and there are horrible accounts of the communist war here in China that he shouldn't read. (If you want to know more about China, I highly recommend this book. It's banned here.) I'm taking him out to eat tomorrow night with some friends. I'm going to let them sit all by themselves and order whatever they want and give him some money to pay for it. I think he'll like that.

Ezra is reading so well! "Yook, Sayee! Yook! Tsee Pot go. Go Pot, go!" I don't know if I mentioned or not that my mother bought him a compilation of "Dick and Jane." I'm trying to figure out why we abandoned that mode of teaching reading? The best thing is that he loves to read. He'll get the book and go sit down and look at the pictures so that when we get to them, he already knows what's going to happen even though he technically hasn't read it.

They didn't have the lens I want but they've ordered it for me. I can't go down and pick it up today but perhaps tomorrow I'll post new pictures. I hope she doesn't sell it to someone else as has been known to happen many times to us. *roll eyes here*

Lots of IN-FOR-MAT-ION

2008-08-21T14:37:00.005+08:00

Why, you may ask, have I not posted any new pictures of the boys lately? Well, that would be because my doofus husband, whom I do love dearly, left my camera attached to his computer at work and when he stood up, it fell off his desk. He even let me blame the damage on Elias for a while before coming clean! I have discovered, however, that I only need to buy a new lens; the body is undamaged. Hopefully by this weekend, I will have a new, better lens.

I was going to post video of the boys today. Ezra is beginning to read, Elias is reading really well and Zuri is walking. But why is it the kids never cooperate when you want them to? Ezra and Elias were reading poorly and Zuri was screaming crying walking toward me.

I have unfortunately discovered that Betty Crocker Vanilla Icing contains very little milk. I have created a new dessert made just for me--a couple of Graham crackers smothered with icing. Just what I need.

We went for a play date yesterday. Being the intelligent woman that I often mention, I managed to blow up their Wii by plugging it straight into the power strip (it only takes 110V and China uses 220V)and while I was trying to work this out, Zuri crawled up into his stroller, fell over backwards and busted his gums wide open on the tile floor. It bled and bled and bled. I felt just horrible. But a couple of hours later, he was eating salty french fries with ketchup from McDonald's so I think he's going to be okay.

I hate McDonald's toys. As soon as the kids forget about them for two seconds, they go into the garbage (or recycling). I sneaked the latest toy into the garbage can hoping that no one noticed it there. For some reason, Elias actually threw away his banana peel without me having to ask but he didn't notice the toy. But Zuri, whose favorite past times are playing in the garbage and emptying our drinking water from the bottle, told on himself for playing in the garbage--not by bringing the toy to me as Elias or Ezra might have done...but he came in carrying the old banana peel. He's SUCH a handful!

He drives me crazy when he stands outside the shower, where he can see me perfectly, and screams bloody murder but when I put him in the shower with me, he cries just as much because he hates the water. I have no idea what he expects! This morning, I tried something new. I turned the water on and let him crawl into the shower of his own volition. It actually worked but I took a quick shower and didn't touch him the whole time. Maybe we'll try that every time.

I wish the kid would get some more teeth. Two bottom teeth just aren't enough for the food he wishes to eat. That being said, sometimes, when he nicks me while he's nursing, I'm so happy he doesn't have so many teeth. I have no idea when I'm going to get that kid weaned.

I haven't had an ayi this week. It's been so long since I mopped these floors and folded clothes, I had forgotten how to. But Brad told me this was the cleanest the house has been since we've moved in. I'm not quite sure how to take that. haha. Chinese don't like to use too much soap and unless I specifically tell her to, she just uses water(with the exception of the kitchen and bathrooms).

Well, some of our friends are back from holiday in Turkey. I am so glad. Not only because we really like them, but also because I'm tired of answering Ezra's question, "Are M&C back from Turkey yet?" Sounds so funny coming from a 4 year old's mouth. We're off to play.

Cheers!

2008-08-17T17:25:00.002+08:00

Zuri has really gained some courage and is trying to walk now. A week ago, we claimed he was walking, but now, he's really getting it down pat.

We bought WiiFit today. We got it home and it's all in Japanese. They told us it was in English. I'm hoping we can just take the disk back over and exchange it without loading everything else up. Or maybe we can find a copy of it in English somewhere. We're enjoying playing it but I think we'd like it more if we could understand what was going on.

One morning last week, Zuri was asleep and Ezra came in and laid down beside him. He wiggled his fingers over the top of his head and said in a spooky voice, "I can feel his dream!" Ezra's been cracking me up with so many of his cute sayings lately.

We got a whole bunch of new clothes made at the tailor this week. Brad got some, um, eccentric pants made which I have a feeling will be a waste of money. He looks like Rodney Dangerfield.

My Lunch Date Today

2008-08-14T17:49:00.001+08:00

Ayi sat down at the kitchen table with her lunch today and I could tell she was really sad. I asked her what was wrong and she started crying. She and her husband had been arguing about money, she said. He told her that she was taking money (“deceiving” him) and that she spent too much. She said, “I have to buy shoes and clothes for the kids to go to school!” I felt really bad. She makes almost twice as much as some degreed Chinese people but she has two kids and I thought that maybe it’s much more expensive than I had previously imagined.

I asked her several times, “Is there anything I can do? How can I help you?” No, she would say. There’s nothing you can do. And start crying again. She told me that she was really tired all the time; that she was sick last week and she asked her husband to wash the clothes and he didn’t do it and also some other things he wouldn’t do. So I said honestly, “I’m sorry to say this but your husband is lazy.”

Well, that’s when the truth came out. He’s lost a lot of their money playing Mahjong with his friends since he’s been laid off these past few months. I didn’t know what to say after that.

I oftentimes buy her children the unusual fruit or good cuts of meat (or even dinosaur T-shirts to match Ezra's) that they can’t regularly afford and I always feel a bit guilty and think to myself, “She would much rather have this money.” But now I am reminded there’s a reason for gifts like that.

Bad, BAD Tooth Fairy!

2008-08-13T22:00:00.002+08:00

Elias lost his second tooth yesterday and that slacker Tooth Fairy didn't come. We figure she must be sick. But even worse, Elias put his tooth back under his pillow and then ayi made up his bed and the tooth is GONE.

Mamma has paid for her sins this evening sifting through the vacuum cleaner dust looking for the non-existent tooth...my throat and ears have now started itching with these allergies I have developed in my old age. My saving grace is my electric toothbrush which I use on my throat, roof of my mouth and tonsils. I think having the inside of your mouth itch is about the WORSE place you can possibly have itch--well, second only to lost limbs that still feel like they need to be scratched. I guess I should count my blessings.

Buses ROCK.

2008-08-12T14:22:00.002+08:00

In all of my infinite wisdom, I never thought that I could have done what I did today. Being in an adventurous mood and wanting to teach the kids all about the aforementioned wisdom, I decided to take the bus rather than a taxi home from picking up some bread and rolls at our favorite bakery.

There are two buses that stop right outside our apartment and since the entire bus system is in Chinese and we can't read that, I had made a mental note of which numbers we needed to get on. Well, due to a taxi stopping in front of the bus stop and me not knowing you have to wave down the bus to get it to stop at the bus stop, we missed the first one. The next one that came around, we made sure to make it stop.

We got on and luckily, the driver was very nice and even picked Elias up to put his money in the slot, and off we went…in the wrong direction. I thought to myself that it will just go a couple of blocks in the wrong direction and then turn back the other way. Nope, it kept going and going and going…left Suzhou Industrial Park completely. There weren’t even real bus stops anymore…there were a few small signs but sometimes he’d stop and there would be no indication at all that that was a bus stop. Soon, there was no one left on the bus—just the three kids and I and we were out in the middle of nowhere.

The whole time, the older ones (Ezra especially) were freaking out. How will he know where our house is? Did you tell him where to go? Why is he stopping here? How do these people know to get on this bus? Why did we have to pay? The number of questions these children asked was endless. Well, eventually, they calmed down…but by this point, I was a little worried.

The bus driver finally stopped the bus outside of a whole bunch of construction work (like that’s uncommon in China) and began to tell me that we have to get off of the bus. I still have no idea why. I mean, I thought that buses just went in one big circle following their route and that eventually, we’d just end back up where we started. Maybe he was out of gas or something. At each stop and red light, I noticed he was turning off the engine.

I’m sure if I had pushed the subject, I would have eventually understood the reason but I didn’t care at that point in time. All I knew was that we were out in the middle of nowhere and being asked to get off the bus. He told me he would help me across the street with all the kids and that another bus will be along in a little while.

Luckily, right at that moment, an empty taxi came along. Our misadventure on the Suzhou bus system was complete. We hopped in the backseat and went directly home where I happily enjoyed a nice, cold bottle of Perrier.

Our satellite

2008-08-11T17:16:00.002+08:00

I noticed many, many months ago that when they installed our satellite, they put the dish up only using three of the four screw holes on the rectangular base . I kept wondering when or if it was going to fall and hoped that there were no cars or people seventeen floors below when it occurred.

But before anyone starts picturing a massive crash, lemme tell you that nothing happened. The satellite's functioning is dependent upon the dish being attached to the wall properly. I found this out last week when we lost all signals to our satellite and thus, missed some of the Olympics. The workers showed up to do the repair and requested a hammer and began banging on those SCREWS to get the satellite to begin working again. Yes, it was working again but how long will screws, that are coming lose and have been hammered back in, hold? I was totally blown away that they thought this would repair the problem. (Hahaha, not really, I've lived here three years--I know how things are done.)

I'm quite sad that I don't get to report that the satellite then fell to the ground. Apparently, they got their brains turned back on and decided to reinstall the dish completely. They removed it from the concrete wall and then even put new screws (I'm completely surprised that they didn't put the old rusty screws back in). Don't go giving them too much credit, though, they still tried to save a bit of money by only using three screws. *roll eyes* This country...

Two Elias funnies.

2008-08-10T16:44:00.002+08:00

"My shoulders hurt because my arms are so heavy because I'm so strong." And later, "I'm really strong. It's really easy to hold my whole body up."

"Zuri thinks it's a lot of fun to play in the garbage. But I don't think it's fun at all."

We swam at the pool today. We thought about buying a membership but a family membership only includes two children. So we'd have to buy a family membership and then a WHOLE OTHER membership. If the Chinese were allowed to have more than one child, this wouldn't be the rule.