The Big Flight

The flight from Dalian, China to Portland, Oregon, went as well as could be expected. The check-in desk in Dalian had no record of my flight. After speaking to the supervisor, my ticket seemed to appear out of nowhere. Once we were on the plane, I was relieved to discover that the airline was clever enough not to sit anyone beside me, so Chase had her own seat.

Chase managed to pee through her diaper - right onto my leg - on the flight from Dalian to Korea. From there, I enjoyed a lovely 5-hour stay in Korea. We made lots of friends in the business lounge, but what she enjoyed most was the kids romper room. Those Koreans are brilliant, to actually create a space where children can get all their energy out between flights. Chase slept more on the next flight than she has since she was an infant (again, in her own seat).

I was paid a special visit from the lead flight attendant on the Korea - Vancouver flight, who made it clear he had intentionally kept the seat next to me vacant and if there was A-N-Y-T-H-I-N-G I needed, to let him know. It was clear he wanted to make sure that Chase and I were happy bunnies. And the fact he talked to us in a whisper made it pretty clear he was hoping we would also talk in whispers.

So after a 10-hour flight, I rolled off the plane with a well-rested baby in my arms. I actually got more sleep on that flight than ever before.

The next flight was on one of those little planes. Chase on my lap. The woman I sat next to didn't respect the confines of her seat. At one point I had to rest my left arm and I ended up lowering it slightly, only to have my arm touch hers - and ugh - our arms stuck together for a moment, because we were both so hot (it was while we were on the tarmac, before they had turned the a/c on to full). Chase slept almost the entire flight.

And now we find ourselves battling some pretty stout jet lag.

A Final Note On Dalian

Things I loved:
- Flora & Qin
- Our apartment (with four people to help bring groceries in!)
- The view from our apartment (overlooking the Yellow Sea and restaurant row)
- The food (in small doses)
- The people
- Travel around China
- The culture
- The tailor (Er Qi)
- The Chinese boudoir photo shoot
- The tea
- Walking along the Xinghai boardwalk

Things I tired of:
- Sketchy health and safety practices
- Eating only three salads in nine months
- Small xpat community
- Limited food selection
- The black dirt that never seemed to come off the floor
- The smell of sewage in our bathroom (gag!)
- The mosquitoes that with one prick make your entire arm or leg swell
- The tiny washing machine that didn't dry (=sandpaper towels)
- The holes in the ground (in lieu of toilets)
- General sanitary issues
- Grubby beaches
- The "marine layer"
- The water
- Being stared at and pointed at everywhere I go
- People trying to take Chase from me
- People reaching out and touching Chase's face, hair, hands, feet

Things that I will not forget:
- The extreme poverty: shanty towns and allys where people live on the streets
- The moms begging with a baby in their laps
- The Chinese New Year fireworks
- My friends
- The time we had here...

Silence Falls

So this will be my last entry, at least until we get "settled" in Denver. I head out to Portland on Thursday morning. Yet another 20-something hour flight with Chase - alone. Thankfully, I will be flying business class. So I guess that's good news for me; bad news for all those people who paid extra money to sit up front to get away from toddlers.

I have been running around like mad; picking up silk, ribbons, having pictures framed, packing boxes for short-term, packing boxes for long-term. Packing duffle bags for the next week. Spending a little time each night on Realtor.com, just to see what's new on the Denver market.

Chase has been great. Un-phased by the fact that things are slowly but surely getting put into boxes and getting stacked in our guestroom. She has been a little manic about making sure all of her most important things (3 massive language books, bunny, lola, molly, baba and bear) are all close to her at all times - perhaps in fear they will disappear into one of the boxes when she is not looking.

Chase has also done a lot of spinning - twirling - lately. She loves it. She can entertain herself by twirling for at least 10 minutes.

Flora has been teaching me real Chinese cooking, which is so great. Even though I'm a little tired of Chinese food, I will miss being able to eat real Chinese food when I want it - but now that I know some recipes, I'll be able to whip some up - using organic vegetables and free-range meat!

I am actually quite sad to be leaving. We hope to return after things get cleaned-up a bit here, which should happen in the next 5-10 years, as China is starting to realize just how important it is to clean up their act. They even hired a PR firm recently to do just that (or at least clean up their reputation).

Now there's a wild account. I can just imagine picking up the phone to call a journalist, "Hi, I'm calling on behalf of China."

No Beach = Good Mom

Just a quick note to report that all of Chase's friends are feeling better. None of my friends seem to know what caused their kids to have such a high fever for three days, but they all came down with it shortly after visiting the beach (a trip we opted out of because it was hot, humid and involved a Chinese beach). So I'm feeling like a pretty good mom today.

Food Allergies And Eating Food In General

I heard on National Public Radio that food allergies are at an all time high - and strangely enough - the allergies are to foods that are quite common within each culture's cuisine. For example, North Americans are getting more and more allergies to eggs and milk, while in the middle east they are seeing more allergies to chickpeas, etc. Very interesting. They recommend broadening what you consume when possible.

The story made me think about the Chinese diet. And why, despite the fact we are eating cooked vegetables and tofu, we are still gaining weight. And then I realized that it's probably the fact that I've only had three salads in the past nine months (thanks to the "consume no raw food" unspoken law here) - and yes, it doesn't help our metabolism is slowing, we are not actually working out hard 5x per week, yada yada. But after taking cooking classes from Flora, I realized that it isn't helping that everything has SO much oil in it. I mean tons of oil. And eggs.

And have I mentioned the Chinese cook with peanut oil all-the-time. Which brings be right back to allergies. I have actually been giving Chase almond butter because I didn't want to give her peanuts until we were back in the US - "just in case." And now I find out she's been eating peanut oil all along - so no peanut allergies here (good thing, because I CRAVED PB&J the entire time I was pregnant).

Anyway, I just thought it was interesting that the Chinese don't worry about peanut allergies. They don't worry about feeding seafood to small children either. I don't think they worry about much of anything, to be honest.

Must be nice.

Chinese Boudoir Photos

Here's a couple pictures from my (very tame) Chinese boudoir photo shoot.
I can't describe how much I LOVED the blue robe.

Chase Updates

Chase's favorite books these days include "My First 1,000 Chinese words" book, "My first book of sign" and "My first 1,000 words (English)." She loves these books and hauls them everywhere. Her next favorites are "Meg & Mog," "Corduroy," and "Where The Wild Things Are." She loves rumpusing.

She loves her harmonica; she actually plays it, holding it with her right hand while keeping time to the music (hitting her left knee with her left hand). Definitely goes down in my book as one of the cutest things I've ever seen.

She continues to enjoy Chinese food. She actually won't eat vegetables unless they have garlic and a touch of oyster sauce on them. Then she'll eat the entire bowl and ask for more.

Chase has started forming an attachment to her doll Molly; she drags her around by her hair. I keep trying to show her how to hold her, but she keeps dragging her around by the hair.

She's named her pink bear, Lola, which I think is quite remarkable. Not only because she named her own stuffed animal, but also because she took the name from Kar Kar's kitten that she loved so much.

Chase really enjoys drawing, and has gotten quite good at scribbling. Her ability to hold the pen like a grown-up has really surprised me. She also likes painting and playing with colored tablets in the bathtub.

She loves her hula hoop. She likes to stand inside the plastic, blue, sparkly circle. She also likes to stand outside it. She likes to put her doll inside, as well as her books and anything else.

Chase is very good at sharing. Very good at playing with others. She has started to be more aggressive about taking things she wants in crowded kid filled situations, but doesn't mind if another kid gets to a toy first. She knows she's bigger than most of them.

Chase has also started to test us. She has identified three things that we keep saying "no" to, and enjoys pushing us as far as she can. Thing 1: standing on the couch. Thing 2: grabbing a very nice scroll painting on the wall and trying to pull it down. Thing 3: playing with the computer power cord while we use the laptop. She thinks it is so funny when we are serious.

She now enjoys throwing balls. Large puzzles. Blocks. Running. Shaking hands. Saying hello. Blowing kisses at everyone.

Chase also gets bored easily. She loves the outdoors. We've been going on more walks. I've been taking her out at least twice a day. I can't wait until I can enroll her in swimming and a couple morning sessions of Montessori.

Mars

Just found out that Mars thing is a hoax. I deleted the original post.

Chinese Boudoir

People often ask me what I do with my days...

Well, today I had Chinese boudoir photos taken.

It took at least an hour and a half for the make-up artist to apply my make-up (aka, cover my face in skin-colored spackle, fill every pore, and then add fake eyelashes and blue eye shadow). For my hair, they used product that made my hair into a helmet (think Clark Kent), and then added four huge flowers, extensions, and various decorative doowaps.

When my hair and make-up was finished, I put on a gorgeous blue silk robe - the kind you see hanging on someone's wall.

I looked in the mirror - and couldn't believe the transformation. The bags under my eyes were gone. I did not have crumbs or spots on me anywhere. I had been transformed. It made me seriously consider spending an hour and a half doing my hair and make-up everyday.

From there, I was handed over to the photographer, a young Chinese guy, who instructed me to pose in various ways, using some lovely Chinese antiques for props. So I posed with a lute. At a desk. In front of a "balcony." At a window. At one point they handed me a Chinese paper and instructed me to appear to be reading it.

It was hilarious; I hope to be able to post a couple pictures soon.

Sickness Spreading

I was relieved to hear that Chase's best little boy friend doesn't have herpes. I must admit, I was a little freaked out when I heard he might have it. It was a day where no matter how many worry bead bracelets I wore, I was still going to worry.

I learned today that he has hand, foot and mouth disease. All of his other little friends have come down with fever and spots.

I, meanwhile, have my fingers and toes crossed; hoping this bug jumps right over Chase.

Education. Education. Education.

And so it begins... The quest to find the "right" school for Chase, and the "right" house in the "right" school district. And yes, I am on realtor.com every night.

First, I just can't believe we are actually going to have a house again. With our things in it. I am SO tired of furnished apartments. We haven't had our things around us in four years. FOUR YEARS. We have things still in boxes from when we lived in Boston. Unbelievable.

At any rate, in the past we really haven't given much thought to what school district our house was in, but now, I find myself obsessed with the public school system. But the more I research I do, the more interested in private education I become.

For example, there are five Montessori schools, one of which is bilingual (Spanish). Would I be a bad mom to stick her into yet another language (Spanish, Chinese, German)? Will I delay her language? So far, she's doing exceptionally well - with both English and Chinese. (I've also been told by a woman who studied early childhood education that kids compartmentalize languages, so exposing them to multiple languages may be a little confusing at first, but their brains will automatically sort words accordingly.)

I also stumbled across two international schools. The Denver International School, which offers bilingual classes in Mandarin (in grades 1 & 2, up to 80% is taught in Chinese), Spanish and French for kids from age 3, and the Bradley International Elementary School, which seems interesting.

Call me crazy, but I'm seriously considering we enroll her in the Spanish Montessori class M, W, F mornings and then do the Mandarin emersion T, Th and find a weekend playgroup. Or maybe vice versa, as Chinese is more difficult to learn and harder to find in Colorado.

I firmly believe language is one of the most important life skills a person can learn, alongside how to pick a lock and hotwire a car (kidding!). But in all seriousness, language opens so many doors, on so many levels. It connects you to the rest of the world, in a way that only knowing English never will.

And if you can speak three languages, there is a seriously cool summer job at the UN in Geneva you can apply for... no pressure, Chase!

Excercise

One of the things I love about China.

Every morning employees line-up outside. They are then inspected, lectured and then made to excercise.

The photos below are from a restaurant around the corner from where we live.

Clams

This man sells clams from a cart, attached to his bicycle.




















Chase and Chin Shoo Shoo (our driver, who we now call Uncle Chin), went in for a closer look. Chase wanted nothing to do with the clams. She was giving me the "get me outta here, Mama" look the whole time.

Small Wonder

Chase continues to surprise and delight us.

She is running now. At full speed.
Everywhere she goes, she needs to get there fast.
I wonder where she got this from (Hubs!)?

She is also growing out of her shoes at lightening speed.

She can't seem to consume enough yogurt in the day. So I have started loading it up with supplements. Sometimes almond butter. Sometimes a lemon-tasting cod liver oil. Sometimes blue green algae. Sometimes wheat germ or brewers yeast. At this point I could put anything in it, and she would eat it right up.

We've also moved her up to level 4 at Gymboree, so she's playing with the "big kids" now - four times a week. It's amazing to watch her learning from them.

I, meanwhile, am starting to have dreams about Jimbo the Clown - and he's scary!

What to say?

Not much to say these days. It's a little stressful here at the moment. But I'm not worrying. I have my Chinese worry beads bracelet, which is supposed to take my worries away. I think it works. Most days, anyway.

So it's a beautiful day in Dalian, today. Warm, but windy. Blue skies. No haze, or as Hubs puts it, "marine layer." We've had an ongoing discussion about this supposed "marine layer," ever since we arrived. I think that as it is thick enough to eat, it can't just be fog. Hubs believes what our Dutch maritime friend said - it really is harmless.

I simply can't believe that if San Francisco is feeling the effects of Beijing's smog - way at the other end of the ocean - that Dalian, which lies just an hour East, has "clean air and a harmless marine layer."

But enough about that.

I just know Chase will miss being the center of attention e-v-e-r-y-w-h-e-r-e she goes. And although I grumble at times, I will certainly miss a lot of things about China. I think China changes a person. Or maybe having a baby and then moving to China changes a person. I'm not sure exactly how, but I feel like I've changed since I've been here - moreso than when we were living in London or Zurich.

Hello America!

Not many small updates this time. One big one. We're moving again. This time to Denver!

A couple strange sculptures

Weekend Fun

We spent Saturday afternoon with our German friends. They are so great.
I will really miss them!

Swing!

More....

BEIJING — While visiting relatives a year ago, Du Haipeng, 5, came down with a sore throat. Doctors prescribed a Chinese antibiotic, Xinfu. The boy’s reaction to the drug was so violent, he had to be taken to a nearby hospital.

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China's Silent Victims

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A Chinese Reformer Betrays His Cause, and Pays (July 13, 2007)

“I remember clearly that I was shearing sheep when I got a call from my sister and her husband,” said Du Xinglong, 36, Haipeng’s father. “When I rushed to the hospital my son had already fallen into a coma.”

A week later, regulators banned Xinfu. Authorities eventually determined that the State Food and Drug Administration had granted the drug’s maker a seal of approval, even though Xinfu was not properly produced or sterilized.

The scandal was just one symptom of an ailing regulatory regime. Last year, the government uncovered 167,000 examples of illegal production and trade in medicine and medical equipment. In some cases, illegal factories are fined or closed; but their owners rarely face prosecution, and the problem persists.

Because of the public furor Xinfu set off, its producer, the Anhui Huayuan Worldbest Biology Company, was an exception. Several senior executives at the company were dismissed; its production license was revoked; and last November, according to state-run media, the company’s general manager committed suicide.

That was too late for a 6-year-old named Liu Sichen. She had been given Xinfu for a tonsil infection. Soon she fell into a coma, and after several days she died.

“She was about to go to elementary school,” said Sichen’s mother, Guo Ping. “Her father bought her a new pink backpack.”

In the end, at least 14 people died after taking Xinfu, and perhaps hundreds more were severely sickened. Du Haipeng woke from his coma after 22 days of emergency treatment. But he wasn’t himself. “He didn’t recognize us,” said his mother, Fu Liguang, 38. “Over the next two and a half months, he didn’t say a single word.”

Today, the boy rarely speaks. He wets his pants, and his doctors say he may have permanent brain damage.

His father has no sympathy for Zheng Xiaoyu, the State Food and Drug Administration’s former chief, executed on Tuesday.

“If he hadn’t approved that company our family wouldn’t be shattered,” Mr. Du said. “He should have been killed a long time ago.”

Rujun Shen contributed reporting.

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/07/13/business/worldbusiness/13victims.html?n=Top%2fNews%2fWorld%2fCountries%20and%20Territories%2fChina&pagewanted=all