laundry

I know that all my mom-friends will understand why I feel compelled to share my adventures in laundry--it takes up half our lives in any living situation (the other half is filled with preparing meals, serving meals, cleaning up after meals, ferrying the kids all over the countryside and the occasional cup of coffee, oh, yeah and fetching groceries!). Here the task is a bit more time-consuming due to the lack of a drier. Okay, we actually have a drier but it's quite small, not hooked up, has indecipherable labeling and most likely will generate even more heat than nature has already given us, so it's not being used currently. Above is my cute laundry sink, constructed of some kind of stone. It was difficult to get a good picture, but that small slab on the left side is actually a washing-board with ridges for scrubbing the clothes! I'd only seen one of those in use on Little House in the Prairie until last week when I watched one of my neighbors using hers. Did I mention that all this equipment lives on our balcony, 15 stories up?! I know it's not right, but I just can't keep from looking onto other people's balconies to see what's going on...usually not too much, but I keep looking anyway.
Now for my Chinese drier--I have two retractable bars that can be cranked up and out of the way when not in use or, as seen here, down lower so I can reach. Seems like a lot of people hang their clothes on their bars and then crank the bars back up. This may help the clothes dry faster as they are more in the breeze, but I'm not convinced that the clothing will actually stay on the bars and I really don't want to find out where our underwear would land if it was swept away! Also why I have yet to use the bar that is so close to the edge of the balcony, I stick to smaller loads that can fit closer to the wall. Notice the lime green contraption on the near end--it is a handy-dandy little wrack with dangling clothes pins, meant for drying socks, undies and other small items. I spent many long minutes in the laundry aisle deciding which one to buy. They come in all different colors and configurations, mostly made of very flimsy plastic. I considered a more sturdy looking metal model but decided just to go with the plastic since I knew it would be staying outside in all kinds of weather.
Now for the best part, the cute little washer. How lucky am I to have a "laundry room" with a view? At home I'm stuck in the basement...but have lots of room down there for baskets and such. This machine has two little lint traps inside that I try to remember to empty often. Seems strange to have them in the washer, not the drier as we usually have. Makes me wonder where the lint goes in my washer at home? I decided to go with Tide for the first round of detergent since I knew for certain that it is meant for laundry--reading the labels is quite a challenge! The bottle on the top is for stain removal. Had a fun time in the store pantomiming that one! I should have taken a photo of the controls on the washer...all in Chinese with no translations. One of Gene's coworkers in Michigan is from China and we sent him a photo taken with the phone that he graciously translated for me. He thought it was very funny. Now I'm off to remove the wet clothes and hang them to dry. Takes most of the day for things to dry here, even though it's very hot. I guess the humidity hinders the process. Should be interesting to see how this all goes in the winter months when the temps are in the 50s...maybe we'll hook the electric drier up then.

Funny, but still better than my Mandarin!

This is in no way meant to mock or make fun of anyone, I just found the following package comments to be humorous and thought I'd share them. Some people call these types of translations "Chinglish," which reminds me of my hopeless Spanglish when we visit our friends in Mexico! I'm sure this is about how I sound and why I get such funny looks when I try to communicate when we're down there. Here's the cute one, on a purse-sized package of tissues: "HAPPY TIME I am you friend. Best wish for you. Friends are the best blessing of all. They give me sunny smiles." And for the odd, found on what we thought were dish-cleaning scrubs since the front of the package says "housewares," the back reads: "Clean the Fouls Deeply. The product can remove skin patches quickly, promote the metabolism of the skin and maintain healthy skin. Cleaning supplies skin. Bathing with liquid soap and use of products to large bubble, so that the skin clean, smooth. Save dry after use. The use of dried preserved, and the repeated use of." The part about the "fouls" is our favorite. Apparently the brand name is "Happy Life CEO." This thing is pretty much a bath poof (I guess that's what they're called--not even sure in English!) but seems to be working just as well to get the fouls off our dishes! I'm eternally grateful for the food packages that list ingredients in English, even if the word choice and grammar aren't always perfect, so I'll just leave those alone lest karma decides to get me back!

Beatrice--your friendly community store

I was so proud of my first solo grocery shopping excursion (other than a convenience store with it's 9-slice "loaves" of bread!) that I took a picture of the spoils. Yes, I'm a dork, but I'm also trying desperately to learn my way around Xiamen and feed my family! I had done some on-line research (thank God for the internet, I don't know what I'd do without it) and found out that there are Beatrice stores all over this city. It brought me back to watching the Olympics about 15 years ago when Beatrice was a sponsor and just about every commercial was about them--I had never heard of that company before! Now they were saving my life. I had recalled seeing a sign for my "friendly community store" one day while riding in the company van and decided to try to find it on foot. My timing was terrible since I had been doing laundry and researching all morning, so by the time I left the apartment at 11:30 it was blazing hot outside. I made my way to the main street, Hubin Bei Lu, frogger-style; ie, dodging cars, taxis and busses and praying the whole way across. I took off down the sidewalk, bobbing and weaving in an attempt to stay in the shade and out of the puddles (this was only our third day in the apartment, before the umbrella was purchased!). I was dismayed when I took a wrong step on a loose sidewalk tile and filthy water (at least I hope it was water...) splashed all over my feet and up to my knee on one leg. I pushed forward, squishing with each step. Must feed my babies! I was attempting to appear city-savvy, head up, steps swift and sure, eyes obscured by sunglasses so as not to attract any more negative attention than was necessary. No one has bothered us yet, but you just never know when someone might be looking for a hapless victim! Fifteen minutes into the brisk walk, after passing a giant governmental building, I was starting to doubt my senses of memory and direction, but I knew I shouldn't turn back yet. Five minutes later I found the store--I felt victorious! It was pretty small, as far as grocery stores go, but bigger, better stocked and better lit than the convenience stores near our home. I filled my basket with three types of noodles, soy sauce packaged with spicy garlic sauce to enhance said noodles, a strainer of sorts to drain the noodles, toasted black sesame seeds for garnish, four cute little spoons for the girls, a package of chocolate-coated snack cakes for their lunches, quick-cooking oatmeal along with powdered soy milk packets and dried bananas for Gene's breakfast, a grain and rice combination that looked interesting, dish cloths, clothes pins, bag clips and some handy-dandy scissors that double as a bottle opener. Whew! At the check-out lane I threw in two bottle of "bing shui" for the walk home--cold water! I avoided the entire frozen section that ran down the middle of the store, partially because it was covered in cardboard and also because it was a bit scary to try to decipher the packages. Also, anything I got would've been completely defrosted and half-way cooked by the time I got home. My purchases carefully jammed into two Chicobags (they don't freely distribute plastic grocery bags here, for which I applaud the powers-that-be!) I now had to get myself back home in one piece. I estimate the walk to be about a mile or so, but please remember that it was extremely hot and humid...cut me some slack! After I made it back home (still too nervous to take a taxi all alone) I triumphantly photographed my purchases and then cooked myself a lunch of multigrain noodles with soy sauce and sesame seeds. I can't recall a more satisfying lunch, even if it wasn't exactly nutritionally sound! I was so pleased that it didn't dawn on me until the next day that I didn't see any of the cheese or milk products that had been promised in my research!
Now that I've found other shopping options, I'm not sure I'll frequent the Beatrice store but it sure saved me the first week in our new home.

city views

The view from our balcony at night; this is straight across the u-shaped complex, looking over the building that runs parallel to ours at Yuang dong Lake (I've seen many spellings for the lake's name, it's pronounced something like this). Either that building is slightly shorter than ours or we're on a slight slope which helps with our view. The pinkish building to the left (Rosewood Plaza, I think it's called) is just too tall and sort of wrecks our view! The girls' bus stop is right in front of the pink building.
We're very thankful for the shade-giving trees along our street! I saw this lady and many more like her on one of my early shopping expeditions. Notice how much she is carrying, in 90+ degree heat, without batting an eye. She has a yolk-type thing across her shoulder and one of the baskets is full of some sort of fuzzy, cherry-sized fruit that she is selling. The day we went for our health exam we stopped into Gene's office first and Wendy had a big bag of the fruit. We had to maintain empty stomachs so we did not try any, but were able to amuse the whole HR staff when Tracy asked me how to say the name of the fruit in English. Their jaws dropped when I said I'd never seen such a fruit in all my life! It's apparently very popular all over China. Notice also the "sunbrella" she is carrying. Very dexterous, these folks, and with good reason. I purchased my own umbrella, dual purpose for shielding both sun and rain with a silver inside lining to deflect the rays, on a shopping trip last week. I'll have to admit that my carrying hand starts to go numb after a while but the shade really helps me stay a bit more comfortable. We initially thought that all the ladies carried them just to keep from getting darker skin (so opposite from most women I know!) but have come to appreciate their many uses. We are waiting for the next rainfall so we can get pictures of the motorcycle-cabs with their double-long umbrellas that protect both the driver and the back-seat passenger! I'm thinking both hands on the handles is a better way to go, but there's something to be said for staying relatively dry too.
This is the view off the right side of the balcony, on a very hazy day. I took another one just like it for today's sunny view (but I'm awful at all this downloading business, so it'll have to wait for Gene to get home!). You can see the closer lake and then another body of water. I think they join up in several spots but I'm not sure if they have separate names or not. We are pleased with our neighborhood as it's on the quite side and it's easy to get cabs but it is not terribly close to grocery shopping. I'll fill you in on my many shopping adventures soon!

Health exam, China-style

One of the bellboys with all the stuff we lugged from Michigan (he's our new bff for all his help!)
This bruise looked so much more gruesome in real life!

The following is a recap from our first week in China: We arrived, very jet-lagged on Monday, had an appointment to visit the girls' new school (Xiamen International School) on Tuesday morning and were informed Tuesday that Gene and I would have to submit to a health exam on Wednesday morning, on an empty stomach, accomanied by a sweet, but non-English-speaking lady from the office. We begged to have a bilingual helper and were rewarded with Wendy. Her English isn't totally perfect, but it's sure better than our Mandarin! I was most worried about the blood-draw since I usually pass out during them...but I didn't pass out or even get too sick. Had to sit up, across a narrow table from the nurse (?) who drew the blood, no place to recline, but Gene squatted down beside me and I did okay. Little did I know that I'd sport a three-inch bruise on the inside of my arm for the next week and a half! Apparently there's not much concern about blood-born pathogens since we all just tossed our blood-soaked q-tips (cotton balls were not available) into an open garbage can. I sure hope the needles, etc were sterile! Also had an ultrasound of my ribcage area, some sort of ekg of my heart with sensors on my arm, leg and chest, vision test, height/weight and blood pressure and a full-body x-ray while standing on a giant machine in a metal-encased room--glad I've already had my children since I'm fully radiated now! The urine test was interesting--just put the very little cup on a tray with all the others, no lid or anything. I pray there's no cross-contamination with anyone else's sample! We had to go room-to-room for each of these tests and wait our turn with the 20-or-so other people getting tested. It was a long, narrow hallway, tiled white with metal bench-type things along one side. Each room had a sign sticking out from above the door frame with Chinese characters and the English translation. I started to get pretty nervous when I saw signs for "surgery," "injections," "counseling" and "gynecology." Thankfully we did not have to go into any of those! At first we thought that my exam was more costly than Gene's and that made me very wary of what they had in store for me! (we had to pay cash, up front, before the exams--about $100 apiece).
We were told on Friday that our results were in and that we had to go pick them up. This time the girls went with us and got to see the clinic (I was so glad they didn't have to have the exam too). We were floored by the long list of results; I think it was probably the most thorough exam I've ever had and I've had two babies! Funny how this supposedly backward country can get the lab results returned so quickly...doesn't seem to happen at home. We had a lot of fun in the van trying to figure out our results as we are not health care professionals, nor do we read Chinese. Seems that we had a few blood tests (out of about 25!) that were slightly out of normal range, but not enough to cause problems, we're both HIV negative, Gene can't see worth a darn without his glasses, our hearts are normal, kidneys are fine and a whole bunch of other stuff! All of this so we can apply for a one year residency permit (along with numerous other documents that I may detail later, after a long nap!). I don't think we even got to keep a copy of the results for our records!
By the way, we were told on the night before the exam that we would need to bring along four passport-sized pictures of each of us. Ummm, okay, how exactly do we get those?! We were desperate, so we asked the hotel staff to help us. After much banter between many people (the front desk, the concierge, some manager-types) we were able to get our needs across. They were so gracious as to offer (force the poor kid, actually) a bellboy to go out onto the busy street with us, after dark, to find the photo place. Turns out there was a little photo hut place almost directly across from our hotel (who knew?) and the bellboy was able to communicate our needs to the lady working there. We decided to go ahead and get eight pictures each, just for good measure. We sat for the pictures and then she proceded to doctor Gene's up, taking out shadows, clearing up a glare on his forehead, etc. Guess she thought my prisoner-like look was adequate because she didn't even try to fix mine. Perhaps she thought I was too far gone. Can't say as I blame her since I hadn't been sleeping enough, but she could've at least tried to fix some of the frizziness of my hair! We saw the bellboy at the grocery store the next day and took his picture when we left the hotel for good--he's our new bff. This experience is likely a portent of our time here--us asking for lots of help and (hopefully) getting what we need even if it takes a long time.

our stuff arrives!

Well, we didn't get our shipment delivered on Friday as we were promised. After hearing that some paperwork was "lost," Gene forwarded that email to the boss here and back home. Seems that some not-so-happy words were shared...and we're pretty sure the boss here made some phone calls or visits or something because as we were out attempting to shop on Saturday afternoon, we got a call on the cell telling us to get home because the shipment would be delivered at 3:00. We flagged a taxi just as quickly as we could, mango sorbet in hand, and rushed home. Seems that Sammy has much more "guanxi" (relationship/clout) than we do, which is no big surprise! We have no idea where the movers parked or how the got into our building (the main floor door requires a code; good thing, since our girls always need something to fight over) but they arrived with a pile of boxes right on schedule. We spent the next few hours putting clothing, games, books and kitchen items into their new homes...and discovering that we were not as careful as we had thought with checking the voltage (wattage? hertz output?) on many items. Thus, our two ipod alarm clocks, wii, coffee grinder and keyboard will not work without some kind of adapter! Boo hoo. We also had a few moments of abject panic when Gene plugged in the grounded power strip that we use for the computer and printer. A loud popping sound echoed through the concrete apartment and all the power on the upper level went out. Yes, this includes the precious a/c and the water heater for the showers. Resetting the breaker did nothing. Gene immediately got on the phone with Annie, the HR lady who is in charge of helping us, who called the rental agent, who called the maintenance department of the complex (we think). Apparently something had to be reset somewhere (I'm so mechanically inclined!) and we were back in business. I'm sure the maintenance guys think we're a bunch of idiots since we've already had them over here to fix the drip in the bathroom sink (he recaulked underneath, but it still drips!) and to get the hot water in the girls' shower working properly. I discovered this morning that the downstairs bathroom sink also drips onto the floor. Oh, the joys of renting never cease.
Now that we have our shipment, even though we still can't make coffee, the girls can participate in gym class with the shoes they sent from home and we will hopefully be able to play our video games some time soon. It seemed very silly to be unpacking sweaters and jeans in this high heat and humidity but I guess we'll be glad to have them during the damp winter months. We can now also cook meals that require more than one pan...maybe this shipment thing is a mixed blessing after all! This morning I'm off to attempt some more grocery shopping with the masses before the temp hits the 90s again. Wish me luck, all you car-driving, English-labeled-food-buying, single-family-home-living people!!

how the other half lives

We just returned from a 9-year-old's birthday party...and now we know how the other half lives! Amanda was invited to the birthday party for one of her classmates, to be held today, Sunday afternoon. We did not know what to expect, as the party was held at a hotel pool (thankfully, the hotel is a very short walk from our home). So we went to drop her off and intended to meet Gene's coworker for another attempt at buying a soft mattress/bed topper. Turns out the whole family was invited to the party so we completed our errand (still no mattress, but we'll keep looking!) and went back to the party. When we returned, Amanda was swimming with a bunch of kids from school and we had the chance to hob-knob with the parents, sip champagne, eat desserts from the buffet and enjoy the breeze from the 3rd floor roof-top pool deck area. All the people were very nice--we met families from Spain, the UK, Canada, the US and lots of areas of China. Many people offered to help us get settled in Xiamen and wrote their numbers in my little notebook, since I don't have a cell phone yet! We met the general manager of the hotel who offered to help Gene obtain some soft mattresses from his source, the local expat golf-outing organizer, the French pastry chef of the hotel and many parents from our international school. Not sure we can keep up with the Joneses (the Changs?) as far as parties go, but we sure enjoyed ourselves and were very glad for the invitation. Perhaps I should keep secret that my big 4-0 lands on the next big Chinese holiday--the 60th anniversary of the Communist party!

Getting here was half the fun

The last leg of our initial trip to Xiamen--first two characters say Xiamen.
You know it's bad when you can actually SEE the humidity!
Ice cream with toppings and fruit for dessert, served in real dishes!
Don't get too spoiled Amanda! She loved the seat-to-bed feature!

We had thought for several months that we would be leaving Michigan for China some time in early August since the international school's starting date was August 17. Though we had to change the actual travel plans two or three times (leave out of Chicago on NW, no, leave Chicago on Korean Air, no, leave Grand Rapids on NW...) we eventually settled on Sunday, August 9. I had been pushing my family to pack their actual suitcases in July before the air shipment was sent so that we could be sure everything we wanted to take would actually fit. (I remember well moving back to the states from Korea when I was 12 years old; we had to buy several huge and hideous suitcases to fit the rest of our junk and then haul them all across the world!) Mostly they heard blah, blah, blah, I guess, since we ended up with each of our rolling suitcase/carry-on bags jammed full and each shoulder bag equally jammed and two large suitcases that we checked stuffed full. I had visions of zippers bursting and various items flying all over the airport as we shuffled between four flights. Hauling all this stuff must have been practice for my future grocery-getting trips! Big city living is not quite the same as having to walk only from my garage to my kitchen with my purchases.
We had splurged and used loyalty miles/points to upgrade our tickets to business class. We figured that we'd treat ourselves to a comfortable ride (and also try to diminish the complaining from the kids) and decent food before our lives got turned upside down. Northwest business class is very comfortable, complete with a closet to put the bags in, seats that recline all the way into a bed of sorts, individual on-demand movies on a flip-out screen, comforters instead of tiny fleece blankies and more food and drink than we could finish. We tried to stuff some of the help-yourself snacks into our bags for later but it wasn't easy to find space! First travel glitch: the counter lady in GR said we couldn't check our two bags straight to Xiamen without getting them in Hong Kong (and elsewhere?) as Gene had arranged. She was not exactly pleasant. Gene got on his phone and contacted the NW elite desk and got the lady to discuss it with them. Thankfully, they talked her through it and all was in order again. We went from Grand Rapids to Minneapolis (lounged in the world club for a little while) and then had the long (11 plus hours, due to favorable winds) flight to Narita, Japan. Our friend, Jen Kroll, had made a care package for the girls full of small, wrapped packages for them to open along the way! This kept them busy and happy all the way to our hotel in Xiamen. Thanks, Jen! We did plenty of eating, relaxing and watching movies. From Japan (where there was the threat of a delay, but turned out okay) we flew to Hong Kong. Stand in lines for customs, dig around for the quart-sized bags, remove the laps tops, etc and then ride the shuttle van to the hotel. Glitch two: we had booked two rooms in Hong Kong for the night and had specified one room with two beds for the girls and one room with one bed for us, rooms very near each other, please. Got up to the floor and found rooms across from each other but only one bed each. Eventually a guy came up with a key to another room, way at the opposite end of the hall, with two beds, but we decided it was too far from us so we kept the original rooms. We slept fitfully and then rose for breakfast before our last leg to Xiamen. For this one we did not have the upgrade and were going on China Southern Airlines. We stood in line with everyone else, crammed shoulder-to-shoulder into an airport van that took us across the tarmac to the plane and then stood in line again in high heat and humidity to climb the stairs up into the plane. It was very full and only one hour in duration, but they managed to feed us an interesting meal along the way. Liz and I had some sort of greasy rice with vegetables and chunks of chicken that we picked out and a foil packet (like a ketchup packet but a little larger) labled "appetizer." Turned out to be some sort of brownish goo that smelled salty--we passed. Amanda was given a kids meal, wrapped up in a smiley-face package. Looked cute but she didn't want to try the ravioli-type stuff or the jello.
Now for the best part of the initial trip: when we finally got off the plane and filed down the escalators in the Xiamen airport to turn in our "health forms" that declared us free of the H1N1 flu, Gene and Liz seemed to have some sort of problem and were hauled off for a further health check. There were portable curtains set up in a maze-like configuration staffed with people wearing those attractive surgical masks. All Amanda and I could do was stand around waiting and worrying and getting onto our tip toes to try to see over the curtains. We were worried. After about 15 minutes, which felt much longer, they were released. Turns out they had registered just barely one degree above "normal" on the clandestine temperature-taker that all passengers must walk past. Then came the fun of trying to find the proper form that must be filled out in order to claim our air shipment, whenever that will arrive. After pantomiming our needs to several officials, we were able to get the quarter-sheet sized paper filled in, signed and sealed (and tucked into Gene's bag with all the other crucial paperwork).
We were greeted eventually by a nice lady from Gene's company (nice, but zero English skills) and the driver who crammed our bags into the minivan and drove us to our hotel. After 36 hours of travel...home at last!

shipment woes

I've decided to take the advice of the scrapbook gurus and "keep current" on postings, but will also recount earlier experiences as I go. Today's challenges: shipment woes. We very carefully planned our air shipment before we left Michigan, stacking items on our dining room table, adding and deleting over several weeks as new information about customs became available. Always conflicting information, but we tried to sort it out as best we could. We did what we never do and checked two suitcases, crammed full of things like pain medication, cold remedies, dish towels, pillow cases and the like. After changing shipping companies to save some money, we packed up a four foot by four foot container with winter clothes, kitchen essentials, board games, some books, desk top computer, wii video game, shoes and, very importantly, coffee grinder and coffee press. It left our house Tuesday, August 1. The shipment arrived in Xiamen on Friday, August 14...here we are on Friday, August 21 and the shipment was due to be delivered to our apartment this evening. Meanwhile, we've been living out of our suitcases and getting by on the few staples we've been able to purchase here. Gene has been emailing the shipping liason all week and she told us that the paperwork has been making its way through three tiers of government. Then, at the eleventh hour Gene got an email stating that the air-something-or-other paper has been misplaced and our stuff will not be released to us. Bye, bye, have a nice weekend, we'll look for it again on Monday! What?! We are trying to be patient but are growing weary...guess we'll continue to cook from our one pot, wear the same clothing (thankfully I've been able to decode the washing machine and perfect the hanging-to-dry-on-the-balcony-rack system), chop vegetables with my new tiny and not so great paring knife, drink tea and wait! I sure hope no one is dancing around in my sweaters or damaging my beloved coffee supplies!

First post from China

This is my first try at this blog thing, so be patient! At first I could only get the Chinese language version, so I've succeeded in tackling one problem. The idea here is to chronicle the life and times of my family while we're living in Xiamen, China without burdening uninterested folks with my many emails. Here's hoping I don't write anything that's verbotin in the "Middle Kingdom!"