No Choice can be a Good Choice

After visiting Suzhou for the first time, I came to the realization that no choice can be a good choice.  One of the goals during our home-finding trip was to stay during the weekend so we could experience fellowship with other believers.

Because of where we will be living, there are two choices if you'd like to fellowship, Catholic or not-Catholic.  That's it...no driving around to find the best music, no service hopping to find the newest building, no looking for the most dynamic children's program, best Power Point presentation or coolest handouts.  If you want to be with like-minded people you go to one spot.  And that's a good thing.

I will be forced to change my attitude, my expectations and look for Him because I have no where else to go.  Those who know me well, know that I am very emotional and on that Sunday I had tears in my eyes when the first song started.  When you don't know if you'll even have the option, you so appreciate the opportunity.

To be surrounded by people from literally from all over the world and coming together for the same reason, amazing! I am looking forward to growing and maturing because where ever I am, He is too and I am grateful for that.

'Lil Bit of Normal

Last week was, well, kind of normal.  It was nice for a change!  Although this has been a fun adventure so far, I have felt a little short-changed on my summer.  So many of our days have revolved around the move that we haven't had lots of those fun, lazy days of summer.  In the States I loved to have picnics on the porch, take the girls swimming and consume massive amounts of freeze pops.  Last week there was a touch of normal and it was really nice!

We swam in three different pools, met friends (day-old friends that is) to play at an indoor play place and have a picnic lunch, had pizza delivered to a pool with friends (now 2 day-old friends) and swam 'til dark, ate a home (finally), played on the playground, date night, movies and the girls and I got our toes painted.  Just all around nice.

Of course there were some adventures along the way.  Laughing at the three men that came to deliver our hide-a-bed and them telling me in Chinese that it was too big to put in the elevator (2 guys came later to carry it up 27 flights of stairs and slightly disassembled), interviewing and hiring an Ayi (household helper), getting large jugs of water delivered to the apartment (and learning to buy vouchers for more), shopping, introducing our driver to this year's VBS music and trying to learn how to text him using Skype and Google translate.

This week's to do list includes...surviving our first typhoon.

 

LBean and I practicing our cannon balls.
Please no comments on why my splash is bigger than hers!

Our fishy faces

 

Our first piece of mail in China, our address worked!  Thanks Kim!

We got our toes done at Lotus, LBean's were free
since I got my toes done too.  If you look closely
you can see a small white butterfly on her big toe.

This is the life!

My toes, with a flower and leaves painted on the big toe.
I can hear my mom's voice right now, "They look great, but
the color looks like you have a toe fungus."  Green seemed
fun and it reminded me of Chinese jade.  (Love you mom!)

Slaying the Dragon

The girls and our realtor, Doris,  during our first meal.

This week I faced another fear of mine...successfully cooking for my family in China.  I had been "warned" by several of the wives that, in the beginning, it is hard to cook in China.  You're disoriented, don't know where to buy things (and have to visit several stores to get everything you need), all of your pots & pans haven't arrived yet, there are extra steps to wash and sanitize cooking utensils and fresh fruits & veggies and the oven is measured in Celsius and not Fahrenheit.

You also have to decide how much you're willing to spend on the things that are familiar to you...are you willing to buy a $10 box of cereal or a $5 can of Rotel tomatoes?  For this Aldi- shopping girl, it's tough to spend that much on food (I spent $1.00 on a can of tomato paste that I know I could get for $0.10 at Aldi, oh well).

It's also a challenge because when you get back to the apartment you have to haul everything to the elevator and then drag it into the apartment, no pulling into the garage by the kitchen door.   I used to bring in the cool stuff first when I got to the house and then wait until the kids were napping to carry in the non-perishables.

Before we left for China I started brainstorming meal ideas based on things that I knew I could find easily in Suzhou and even enlisted some of my friends for ideas.  This past week I made it to Auchan (the large grocery store), Papo Franco (the bread shop), and Summit (an import store with all things American & European).

Wednesday, Jamie had a business dinner and the girls and I were camped out at the apartment (but not moved in yet) waiting for the sofa bed to be carried up 27 flights of stairs.  It was time to slay the dragon and cook for the girls.  We had a fine feast of OJ, Bisquick pancakes (I stashed a big box in our checked luggage) and bacon.  The crowd went wild and the apartment smelled like heaven (bacon).

I did a bit better on Thursday night.  Jamie walked in the door and said, please let dinner be anything but Chinese.  Jamie has Chinese every day at work...plus two very large meals out, so he was ready for a change.  I'm happy to report that our BBQ baked chicken, au gratin potatoes, steamed green beans, and iced tea (un-sweet of course, we're Northerners you know) was fantastic.

And...if for some reason the cooking gig doesn't work out, we found out this week that during August the kids eat free on Monday nights at the Mexican restaurant, Tuesday nights is buy 1 get 1 free on large pizzas at Melrose's pizza (and they will deliver to the pool at the apartment complex across the street), and last but not least....there is always Sherpa's.  Sherpa's is a magnificent service.  Log on (or call), choose a Suzhou restaurant, order, and in 45-60 minutes a "Sherpa man" as we call him, will deliver for 10 RMB (less than $2).  You can see "Sherpa men" buzzing around town on their E-bikes (electric bikes) in their orange & black uniforms and bike helmets (no one else in China wears a helmet).  LBean has picked up on the symbol.  We ate lunch at a restaurant with friends yesterday and she looked up and pointed to the sticker on the window and said, "It's Sherpa!".   It's always nice to know there's a back up plan!

Where in the world?

Does anyone of my generation remember the computer game "Where in the World is Carmen Sandiego?"  I loved that game!  A good friend suggested that I post some information on the city we are moved to and include a map of the city.  So where in the world is Suzhou, China anyway?

Suzhou (pronounced "Sue joe" or "Sue cho") is west of Shanghai, on the eastern coast of China.  Beijing is to the far north and Hong Kong is to the far south and west.  It takes about 1 1/2 hours by car to travel from the airport in Shanghai to Suzhou.

Look to the left of where it says "East China Sea" and you'll find Shanghai.
Continue looking left of Shanghai and you'll she a huge lake, that is close to Suzhou.

Here is a close-up of the area between Shanghai and Suzhou.
Suzhou is on the eastern side of the large lake.
If you look on the northern part of the lake you'll see Wuxi (pronounced "woo-she") where Jamie will be working.

We are living in the part of town called SIP, which is short for Suzhou Industrial Park.  SIP is a joint venture between Singapore and China and is located directly on Jinjihu Lake.  Suzhou has an extremely large expat (expatriates are those living outside of their home countries) community.  There are several people from Korea, Germany and other countries in town.  Jamie's company has approximately 30 families in Suzhou with other employees in other parts of China.

This is a close up of the SIP area.  On the upper-left corner of Jinjihu Lake is the Crowne Plaza Hotel where we stayed during our home-finding tour and now during our first few weeks living in Suzhou.  Around the corner to the northeast from the Crowne is our apartment complex, Horizon.  The area to the west, surrounded on four sides by water, is the old town.  In between old town and SIP are the shopping complexes and wet markets that we'll be using on a weekly basis.

Suzhou has anywhere from 6-9 million people.  It's hard to have an official count because the population is always shifting and changing as companies bring in new employees and transfer others.  Because of the large ex-pat community and the influx of western companies, it is possible to find Wal-Mart, Auntie Anne's pretzels (LBean is thrilled), KFC, Cold Stone Creamery, Subway, Papa John's pizza, Mexican & German restaurants, and Starbucks.  This doesn't mean that Suzhou feels like central Illinois, but there are some comforts of home.

The currency for China is the RMB (also known as the yuan) and the current rate of exchange is 1 yuan equals .1545 US dollars.  China is mostly a cash-based society and it is very typical to pre-pay for things such as your cell phone.  For example, an iPhone is about $800, but then the monthly fee is very, very low.

We've been told that the weather is very similar to South Carolina.  Milder winters with some snow and very hot and humid in the summer.  June is the rainy month and when we told people in Suzhou that we were moving in July they gave us a slight smile.  Most ex-pats leave Suzhou in July and August because it is so hot and humid.  I guess we need to experience it at least once!

I told someone here is Suzhou that being here in July and August is like going to the state fair every day...it's hot, humid, crowded and you have to stand in lots of lines, but you might get to have some fun adventures along the way and eat good food too.

Back to Reality

Reality has slowly started creeping back into our lives.  Jamie returned to work a week ago Monday and it was up to the girls and I to take on our part of the world together.  I thought I would face my fear head-on and Monday morning Jamie went back to work, I took the girls to an unfamiliar store to wander up and down the aisles.  Our one task was to get water bottles and a snack.  We were triumphant!  I wanted to look through the store without the pressure of having to cook a meal or rush back to pick up a child from school.  I successfully used our China debit card to pay and managed to find our driver again.

 

LBean was very interested in the fish at the supermarket and she even told me she wanted to buy one and "cut its eyes off".  She's spent a considerable amount of time fishing at Papa & Grandma's house and it shows.  One of the RT Mart employees tried to get EBean to touch a craw fish (or something similar to it) and as you can see in the picture she is giving me her smirk as she says "no" to touching it.

Another goal I had for that Monday was to clean up the hotel a bit.  With over 13 suitcases and a random assortment of food, important receipts, craft supplies and swimming gear our room was a bit unorganized.  We eat, sleep & play in one tiny room!




To pass the time the LBean and EBean have really enjoyed swimming at the hotel pool.  LBean is getting really good at swimming under water and EBean is learning to enjoy the water more.  It's also been fun because families from our apartment complex come over to use the hotel pool because the apartment's pool is broken and probably will never be fixed.  Are these not the cutest little water bugs you've ever seen?!

We got the keys and security cards (to open the glass doors to the apartment building) in the middle of the week.  I finally gained access to a washer and that meant some great things for a few people in our family.  Back to reality and laundry!  It also freed up some space in our hotel room and LBean made a new clubhouse in the hotel closet.

On Friday night our air shipment finally arrived!  The shipment actually flew into Shanghai on July 16th, but it took until Friday to get it released.  About 8 p.m. the boxes started rolling in.  We had just finished our first meal in the new apartment, a very fancy meal of pizza!  The girls were ecstatic and loved seeing some familiar things.  I included some kitchen things in the shipment and once I get them washed and sterilized in non-local water I can start cooking again.  We now have sheets, towels and mattresses for the girls.  As soon as our hide-a-bed is delivered from the local furniture store, we can move in.  The sea shipment with the rest of things should arrive this next week, but who knows how long it will take to get those things released!

Our first meal in the apartment.

This week's view of the laser light show,
from the living room.

Unpacking our boxes.

Setting up the household in the girls'
bathroom.

Whew, they can finally get their dress-up clothes on again!

Our weekend was a mix of fun and function.  We went to Metro on Saturday morning.  Metro is like the Chinese version of Sam's Club.  We were able to find some things in bulk and get some staples for the apartment like flour, canola oil and milk (which here the good stuff comes in a box, unrefrigerated).  We were "those people".  The foreigners holding up the line because the register wouldn't read a bar code and we had quite a line form behind us.

We raced back to the apartment (about 25 minutes away) to put away the cold things to try and make it to a friend's apartment by 1 p.m.  Since there isn't drive-thru fast food around, we stopped by Auchan on the way to apartment and Jamie ran in and grabbed KFC to go.  We gobbled it down in the car and Jamie and our driver took the cold things up to the apartment.

Striking a pose as they wait for the show to start.

Our afternoon plans were to go to the local art and performing center and watch the Disney Live program, all in Chinese of course.  The friends we met in Chicago on our flight to Shanghai came with us to see Mickey and his pals.

My favorite part was when Ariel's sisters (from the Little Mermaid) broke out into Beyonce's "All the Single Ladies".  It was too funny!






We ended the week at Fellowship, minus the storms from last week.  Afterwards we went to a Malaysian/Thai restaurant at Times Square.  It was very yummy!

This dessert is not Malaysian, but tasty indeed!

 

Looking over all the pictures, I notice how we have our hair up in most of the pictures.  It is so hot and humid here, that I don't even have to beg to pull the girls' hair back!

Next week's goals include going to the wet market to get some fresh vegetables and fruits, finally take the girls somewhere so we can get our nails painted, interview an Ayi (a household helper), and pick up some bottled water (since we mistakenly purchased several bottles of sparkling water instead-oops!).  Wish us luck!

The first 168 hours

Our first week in China has already come and gone.  We packed a lot into seven days!  Although we flew out on Sunday morning, we arrived on Monday afternoon.  The 13 hour flight and 13 hour time change caused us to loose a half a day, a whole lot of sleep.

For the first two mornings our task was to visit various furniture stores to choose new things for our apartment.  We are bringing some of our own furniture (our beds, china hutch, couches), but other furniture will be purchased by the landlord and then remain in the apartment after we move out.  Furniture shopping with two young kids isn't any fun anyway, but throw in a lot of jet lag and you have a potential disaster.  We tried to make the most of it and was fun to see hear the girls' opinions on things.  LBean was really into the "princess furniture" which was the over-the-top Louis the 14th frilly and sparkly furniture.

I wish I could explain the size of of the furniture buildings that we went walked through.  Just to give you an idea, maybe the size of the Galleria in St. Louis and filled with only furniture stores.  And then, next to it another building the same size with more furniture.  Then repeat that on the other side of the street.  It's appropriately known as Furniture Row.

 




We had the excuse of nap time to go back to the hotel and rest in the heat of the afternoon.  Illinois and China have had about the same amount of heat and humidity this past week.  Then, we'd wake up around 6 p.m. and try to drag ourselves to dinner.

On Thursday morning we drove out to Dulwich College where LBean will be going to kindergarten.  We turned in our application and got to walk through a bit of the lower level of the DUCKS (DUlwich College Kindergarten School) building.  Then back to Furniture Row to finish picking out furniture.

Friday morning was our "health exam".  The government requires that adults applying for a residency visa participate in a health exam.  Our realtor, who should really be called a relocation specialist because of all the work she does (helps us fill out paperwork, find a driver, order furniture, visit the school, etc.) went with us.  It was an interesting experience in part because I didn't know what was involved in the exam...or how complete would it be?!

We moved from room to room visiting each testing station.  We completed a vision, hearing, dental screenings, blood-work, an x-ray, EKG and renal sonogram.  HIPPA laws aren't in affect here so I was present when Jamie had his renal sonogram and the technician complimented him on his lovely kidneys.  I hopped up on the table fully expecting the same result.  Hah!   The technician started calling out "kid-di-ney" like she was looking for a lost pet.  Uh-oh.  Then she called over another technician and they both stared at the screen, hemming and hawing in Chinese.  I have no idea what the problem was, Jamie thinks maybe they were concerned about kidney stones, and after they asked me if I had ever had my kidneys looked at (I had and they were fine), I was allowed to get up from the table.  During another one of the tests the technician told me to relax and I couldn't help it, I laughed out loud.  I wanted to say politely, "listen here lady, there is nothing relaxing about this process".  But, it's done and we were happy to move on with our day.

A fun part of the week has been exploring different shopping areas of the city.   We tried to learn where I will be shopping and what stores I'll need to go to for clothing, household items, and food.  We visited the Korean market near our apartment complex, the Incity mall (with Wal-Mart), Auchan (pronounced O-shawn), which is the Chinese version of Wal-Mart, and Times Square (an indoor/outdoor mall area with a Toys 'r Us).

During our shopping we have been very aware of the fascination with our girls.  As you can imagine, blond hair, light eyes and pale skin is very unusual here (and some consider it lucky).  Our girls, especially EBean literally draws a crowd.  Old men will stop walking to stare at them (it's not rude to stare in Chinese culture), people will take pictures (sometimes they try to be sneaky), and I've seen women double-back just to walk by a second time to see our girls.  I'm sure this will get very old during the next few years, but for now it's nice hearing "piao liang" (pretty) and "mei li" (beautiful).  Some Asian women try to lighten their skin to show that they are wealthy enough to not have to labor outside in the sun and American women try tan to show they have the time to sit in the sun and not work.  You can't win!

At JDL, a furniture store in Times Square.

At the carpet store in Furniture Row.

Friday night we walked to a near-by German restaurant at RainboWalk for dinner.  Sometimes its best to ease into a culture slowly right?! The restaurant is called Big & Whistle (not sure why), but I had heard that was originally called Pig & Whistle.  I have no idea what brought on the name change!  There is a good size German ex-pat community here and I must say we benefited from this.  Big & Whistle was fantastic!  Fresh, homemade pretzel rolls, mashed potatoes, peas & carrots and for me Sheppard's pie.  Yummy!  We have avoided any fruits or veggies that have been washed in local water, which has limited the variety in our meals.  It was great to see the girls chowing down on good 'ole peas & carrots.

People starting to gather by the lake for the 8 p.m. laser light show.

The Rainbo Walk building.  Great Mexican & German
restaurants and Cold Stone Creamery.

We walked back to the hotel along the lake where the laser light show is performed every Friday and Saturday night.  It was a bit loud for LBean, but in the future she'll be able to see it from her bedroom in the apartment.  It was impressive and we watched the finale from our hotel room.

The laser light show set to music and a little bit of fire thrown in too.

The view from our hotel room.

Saturday morning we had our driver take us to Times Square, an area across the lake with shopping (both indoor and outdoor), food and entertainment.  The top floor was almost like a children's museum and it will be a nice place to visit when it's raining.  We found the Toys 'r Us and then crossed a walkway and discovered another toy store.

Jamie got a new Lego set at the second toy store....one that can no longer be found in the States.  So everyone came away happy!

For lunch we were very daring and had...Burger King.  (Remember what I said about easing into the culture slowly?) 

LBean asked for this picture.

Our week ended with a bang, literally.  We successfully made it to Fellowship by catching a bus provided by the Fellowship near our new apartment.  Because of the time we had to get onto the bus, we were not only on time for fellowship, but early.  Shocking, I know! (Stop laughing all you WCC folks.) LBean decided that she would like to go to her class and Ebean sat with us.  Things were a bit different this week because the pastor was back in the States.  So, by the time the service was done, we collected LBean and walked to the bus stop, the buses had left and it had begun pouring.

As we left Fellowship I'm pretty sure that I was chided by a Chinese grandma.  She was upset that I had borrowed EBean's miniature umbrella (who was protected in her stroller) to cover my head.  Sometimes you don't have to speak the language to understand the intent.  Oh well, you can't please everyone!

We huddled in a public restroom with all of the Chinese workers that had come in from working in the park and LBean's Sunday school teacher and his family.  They had also missed the bus and were waiting out the storm too.  Between our ability to call the hotel for assistance and LBean's Sunday School teacher's amazing Chinese speaking skills, we agreed to pay the hotel to send their bus to pick us up.  Most of the city was using all of the available taxis and the other option was to walk the four miles back.  In the mean time, EBean slept through most of it and LBean ran around with her three new friends, the Sunday School teacher's children.  They enjoyed squealing every time it thundered or lightening over our head and peeked at the Chinese bride that was getting ready for her wedding pictures.  I got to talk with LBean's friends parents and make a new friend too.

Finally the bus arrived and the girls insisted on sitting together.  They were soaked, but very happy (which made me happy too).  The warm baths and room service we had at the hotel made up for the unpleasant part of the afternoon.  Plus, we made plans to eat lunch with our new friends next Sunday, hopefully under dryer circumstances!

Leaving on a Jet Plane

The first week has been good, tiring, stressful, fun, overwhelming and a whole lot of other emotions.  Which is probably a good indication of how the rest of our time in China will be.

We flew out of Peoria on Sunday, July 17th.  Our flight to Chicago was at 5:45 a.m. which meant a very early wake-up time.

EBean & LBean snoozing away.  Even the blow dryer couldn't wake them up.

We had 11 checked bags, 2 car seats, 2 roller carry-ons, a backpack, 2 kids backpacks and one stroller to get to the airport.  Jamie and I worked well together to get everything up to the ticket counter, but it was a bit of a challenge because there were no luggage carts.  Thankfully we had checked in the day before online.  Up until that point there was no promise that the little commuter plane could handle all of our luggage.

One of the baggage handlers was called up to help at the ticket counter and we were very lucky!  They were in such a hurry to get all of our bags tagged and on the plane that they didn't weigh any of them.  That was great news for me!  I tried very hard to distribute everything evenly and stay under the 50 lb limit, but I was very close on a few of them.  (Imagine me hopping off and on a bathroom scale holding every piece of luggage.)  I really though I might have to open up some of the bags and shift around the large jars of PB, 5 lbs of coffee, books and other heavy cargo we'd stashed in our luggage.

LBean in front of all of our luggage.

A quick potty stop and we were the last ones to walk onto the plane.  The flight to Chicago is always a quick, get up in the air and then get ready to land trip.  On the way to the next terminal Jamie looked over and saw Gene Simmons from the band Kiss in the elevator across the hall.  That was a fun way to start the trip and then we decided on a place to grab breakfast.

Well, guess who was in front of us in line to eat?  Our new friend Gene.  He was polite and asked Jamie if he had cut in line (he had not) and then when I passed by with the girls Gene said that he also had two (kids) of his own...that he knew of.  If I had been quick-witted I would have said, "yeah me too"!

After walking down to our gate, we were very fortunate to start making friends.  We noticed a little girl about LBean's age playing by our gate.  I went and introduced myself and LBean to the little girl and her mother.  Come to find out, they also live in Suzhou and not too far (relatively speaking) from our new apartment.  Wonderful!  LBean joined in some games with her new friend and another little girl.  There were three little girls running around playing hide 'n seek (behind the trash can was the best spot), hot potato (really hot dolphin because that's what we had) and duck, duck goose.  I was so glad to have an opportunity to speak to another ex-pat mom and grateful to exchange contact info with her.

Playing "hot dolphin" (hot potato) and burning off some energy.

The plane ride from Chicago to Shanghai was long, about 13 hours, but pretty uneventful.  We took up residence in four of the five seats in our row and the girls got special "kids meals" to munch on.  They watched lots of movies on the iPad because the movie selection in the airplane was pretty poor.

We have traveled by plane with the girls before and so I know to bring snacks and an assortment of un-used McDonald's toys with us to pull out at any given moment.  I really didn't need to use my toys because not only did Grandma DiDi pack a bag on the plane for each girl, they also had busy bags from their friends Emmalee & Olivia, and wrapped presents from Miss Joyce.  It was great!  Both girls slept on the plane, but it took LBean 10 hours into the flight to fall asleep (and she had been up since 4 a.m.)

After we landed we had to go through immigration and because we had small children we got to go through the priority line and step to the front of the line.  We grabbed all of luggage (yes, they all made it!), picked up a baggage form at customs to authorize the delivery of our sea shipment, and met our driver.

Before we left the States we had just the right amount of room in the rental van for the four of us and all of our luggage.  It got a bit more complicated when we arrived in Shanghai because we now had a driver and we lost some of our extra space.  Jamie and the driver literally packed our duffle bags around me in the backseat and the girls had some of our smaller bags at their feet, but it worked.  We all cuddled up to a piece of luggage and snoozed our way to Suzhou.

We made it!