First week back and readjustment.

Our first week back was busy so I'll just run it through quickly:

Parched from arriving back to little water in the house, we ordered a barrel of water for the water dispenser - and it actually came!

The battery for the stove gas igniter ran out - and we were worried that the gas had been turned off without us knowing...

We worked it out eventually.

The kids reassured themselves that everything was still where it should be.Alex enjoyed a couple of playdates with one of her tongxue/classmates (whose father and grandfather speak english - nice for us!) both at Daddy's work and at the friend's house.

Mummy had another birthday in China - which meant more cake (the kids love chinese cake - Mummy not so much) this one was a marshmallowy confection with chocolate spirals that Alex coveted.
It also meant that Mummy got a counter-top toaster oven for her birthday.

Brett had an inner and outer ear infection which required two visits to a doctor plus oral and topical antibiotics (and the last of Mummy's ibuprofin :().

And finally, Mummy confidently took Alex to her japanese encephalitis booster injection and finally worked out the chinese system of throwing the medical record on the desk to indicate you wanted service and then waiting for the nurses (well they were wearing the starched outfit) to create order out of the chaos. They were somewhat confused as it was baby immunisation day (we had been in Australia when the booster fell due) but we managed to tell them enough information so they could find Alex's records (no computers here). Imagine this with twelve or so parents crowding around one small window waiting for their book to be picked up. Unfortunately Mummy was too busy congratulating herself to notice that the nurse was intent on giving Alex some, as the nurse called it, tanguo/candy (what was revealed to be an oral polio vaccine - after Alex had swallowed it). Oh well, at least it didn't involve a needle of dubious origins.