What it takes to go swimming

At least if you wish to go swimming in the university's pool, you will need to have a skin health check (yes, another hospital - this makes number four!) and have a card that certifies you as "healthy". So the week after Alex and Sebastien had recovered from their virus we organized yet another student to help us get this check done at the university's hospital on Daxue Lu. Because we weren't clear on what exactly was involved and whether Alex and Sebastien would also need a check Sebastien and I picked up Alex from school early - around lunchtime - which she was only marginally pleased about. Given her lack of enthusiasm for school over the past couple of weeks I'd have expected a more effusive welcome - but no.

Anyway, we met Brett and his student at the hospital whereupon the student joined a queue (hospital payment windows seem to be the only place where chinese people actually queue in an actual line and take turns) and handed over a completed form and paid our money for our checks. We then headed up the stairs to the rooms where the checks took place. The males in one room and the females in the other. For me, the check consisted of sitting in a chair, taking off my shoes and having a couple of nurses eyeball the soles of my feet. That's it. For Brett, he had to also take off his shirt. And neither Alex nor Sebastien needed to be checked - though they did provide lots of entertainment for the staff (yet again we were told by nurses not to let Sebastien crawl around on the dirty floor - I mean this is a kid who's learning to walk and is constantly up and down). We then took the second lot of completed forms to a table in a foyer where we filled out cards, handed over money and passport photos of each of the four of us and after a quick red chop - voila - laminated skin health cards all ready for swimming. We believe that this is something that is necessary to do each year, bizarre though it seems to us. After all, what's to stop you picking up a fungus the afternoon you receive the cards? Anyway, we put this down to being just another bureaucratic wonder of China.

I should add here that finding a suitably clean swimming pool is a concern - standards are not what we have come to expect - and there is much chat amongst the expats about where the most hygienic pool is. Generally it is agreed that you must swim in the early morning at the cleanest pool to have the best experience.We haven't yet (til March 2009) used our skin-health cards.

The post in which Alyssa gets RSI of both hands

No - just kidding. Though I have been posting a lot (hey, it's what I do on my one "day off" a week) I have actually had many of them in a rough version in my drafts and have just polished them up a bit and added photos. But I still have many, many more. So onwards!

The end to a horrible week

And so it was that Sebastien broke out into a rash the same as Alex's - though not as inflamed nor obvious. And it's hard to capture in a photo - but I felt gratified that perhaps they had both suffered from a virus. Alex had made a new friend - Sam - and we'd met up with him for some english play dates. He also attends Xia Da's kindergarten though he'll only be here a year as his father is on a Fulbright. This week Alex cried about going to school. Very tough.

On a positive note, after a lovely playdate with Sam and his mother at their apartment, we went to the restaurant next door and had our final Bo Bing gambling with the University's foreign relations faculty getting together to eat dinner and gamble for more household items. Alex had a ball, winning the top prize of a blanket and we also managed to come home with more soap, toothpaste and toiletpaper. Sebastien passed out at last and we laid him on the small stage to sleep whilst the games were finishing up. We were thankful that our new friends (who hadn't done too badly themselves at Bo Bing) offered to take the lion's share of our items upstairs to their apartment and to bring them, plus a highchair from a previous Fulbright family, to our apartment over the weekend. It made getting home easier plus we had another play date to look forward to at our place.

This was also the weekend that the milk scandal opened up in China. So we threw some items out and started buying soy - at least until we came back from our upcoming visit to Australia - in the hopes that we hadn't been affected by the melamine.

And finally it was the weekend we celebrated Sebastien's first birthday at Pizza Hut (see the post on 21 October 2008).

Not a bad end to a horrible week.

More gambling

Bo Bing is so integrated in Xiamen life that even the management of our complex got into the spirit and organized some games. A little dampened by the weather (Typhoon Sinlaku made landfall in Taiwan then and a week later Typhoon Hagupit was to affect our weather - we've swapped earthquakes and tornadoes for... earthquakes and typhoons), it nonetheless went ahead with Bo Bing for the residents. The combined Xiamen/Kinmen Taiwan fireworks that were to be on, and that we'd planned on seeing pre-virus, were cancelled due to the weather.

Alex and Brett enjoyed the games and the spoils (Sebastien was still vomiting too often to venture out of the house - without several changes of clothing for both he and me). The wet weather did not dampen the enthusiasm of the residents - gathered to win more usual prizes of rice and oil among other things.
Alex enjoyed throwing the dice.Alex eating some mooncake (without the salted duck yolk in the middle).
Speaking of rice, while you're reading this play some games for rice donation to countries that need it: FreeRice.com.

In which we get to visit our fourth hospital in a month - twice!

Yep, you read right. Thanks to a mystery virus we were able to check out first hand the Zhongshan Hospital.

Alex had been at preschool barely one week before getting sick when we went to the library (see post of September 07 2008) which meant she was off from school for half of the following week. We had initially thought that she had a bad case of gastro from something she had eaten (especially because she'd been eating morning snack, lunch and afternoon snack at her new chinese preschool) but as the week progressed it became clear that her mosquito-bite-ridden legs were actually developing into a rash. Her teachers had been concerned enough about the mosquito bites to call Linlin and ask about them though upon reflection perhaps they had seen the start of the rash and something had been lost in translation? In any case, we had been busy applying repellent to her and were frustrated that she appeared home on the Thursday with what seemed to be several new bites (boy does she take after her mum - mosquitos LOVE her!). Well the next morning at 2am, Sebastien started vomiting - and continued vomiting. All over me usually. Poor kid was comfort nursing which only meant further vomiting of pretty much just bile in the end. And I was getting sore! Then Alex woke up and was COVERED in a rash - head to toe! So then we determined that a visit to a doctor was in order. Only in China, you visit a doctor in hospital. So we enlisted the aid of Linlin who took time off from work to take us to the best hospital in Xiamen.

To cut a very long story short - we visited two doctors, one for each child. One doctor determined that Alex had a shellfish allergy and was prescribed a steroid injection, claratyne for kids and calamine lotion (though the only thing she was scratching were the mosquito bites barely visible through the rash). We were told to have her avoid the wind in Xiamen and that she was also experiencing a typical reaction that many people experience when they first arrive in Xiamen. The other doctor said that Sebastien was suffering from a cold or had a bowel problem and offered to admit him for an IV - which I quickly declined. He was prescribed rehydrating salts (though he wasn't dehydrated) and a live (yogurt-like) bacteria in tablet form. Both doctors said that neither child was contagious (though I thought that they both suffered the same thing - a virus - and that they'd likely been contagious before). We took the prescriptions down to the pharmacy area of the hospital and Linlin submitted them. We then had to wait for what felt like an hour for them to be filled. Then we collected all of the items and paid what seemed a pittance for them. The steroid injection we then took to the "Injection Room" where nurses wait around to inject prescribed medicine into patients. Using Linlin as translator we ascertained what basically would happen and she even went back to the pharmacy for us to obtain the packaging for the medicine which we were able to read the chemical name of what it was we were meant to inject (which helped me make the choice to do it). I was nervous but the needle was new and unopened and I watched them do the injection. After thanking Linlin we went home. Sebastien was a mess - lethargic and still regularly vomiting - but Alex was fine, though spotty.

And that's the short version!

After all the mayhem, we had a call from Cherry at the university to say we had to get our attested marriage certificate (which we had just received from Australia - another long story: thanks so much Aunty Chelle) and front up at the Entry and Exit Bureau to finalise residency paperwork TODAY or we would be fined (note that this call came late afternoon) and all of this with two sick children. Nothing like stress to keep you on your toes!

Finally Brett's work was having a dinner at a local restaurant to which the entire family had been invited - so I stayed home with Sebastien still sick and Alex went with Brett. One benefit of going was that we learnt that we do, in fact, have guanxi (connections) as one of the professors of WISE is married to a high ranking official in Xiamen and she pulled some strings for us to see a special doctor for Sebastien at Zhongshan Hospital in the morning.

So with Linlin's help again we went in on the Sunday as Sebastien was still vomiting. We paid the money, took the receipt to the doctor's room and put it in the pile to wait our turn. Meanwhile we borrowed a thermometer from a nurse to find out Sebastien's temperature (a mercury thermometer - wouldn't you know it - that we broke when it dropped onto the tiled floor...which Brett cleaned up). In the end Sebastien had stool and blood samples taken, though I was hard pressed getting them to accept a sample of the diarrhea in his nappy/diaper - they wanted a "poop on command" performance! Although he had a couple of blisters at the back of his throat (we were mindful of hand, foot and mouth disease) he was diagnosed with a virus that should run its course over 3-5 days. I was convinced that he was suffering from the same thing as Alex - the timing worked as did the similarity in symptoms. I was hard pressed to believe that Alex had a shellfish allergy and a virus fitted better, though her rash had improved dramatically following the steroid injection and a couple of doses of Claratyne. A comment that this doctor made (that I thought was great) was that it was obvious to her that Sebastien wasn't dehydrated - after all, he was crying (tears down his cheeks after having his mouth forceably opened to check his throat). And so we went home to ride out this virus with the proviso that we could return if it hadn't resolved after 5 days. We were getting sick of changing bed linen - Alex had only vomited that one day, mainly because she then hadn't eaten - at least properly - for the week afterwards. Sebastien was comfort nursing as often as he could which whilst it was keeping him hydrated, meant more vomiting more often though usually smaller amounts. So I set him up on the floor at the end of our bed: Getting sick in another country isn't fun. Getting sick in another country where you don't speak the language isn't fun. Having children who can't communicate with you get sick in another country where you don't speak the language isn't fun. I don't recommend it.

Mid-Autumn Festival - Moon Festival

Held on the 15th day of the 8th month each year (like most celebrations the date changes based on the lunar calendar), this is a huge festival, second only to the Spring Festival or Chinese New Year. Along with the traditional eating of mooncakes and revering deities including Chang'e, Xiamenese enjoy a particular gambling game called Bo Bing which uses 6 dice to win various prizes. Everywhere you go shopping you hear the rattle of dice in porcelain bowls as people roll for the chance to win all types of items. And so it was that the university invited expat women to enjoy a dinner and evening of Bo Bing with the Association for Xiamen Expatriates (AXE) group of Xiamen. First our group met Cherry, our university contact just outside the administration building on campus and our van driver drove us to the Haicang Tourist Area of Xiamen where a section of land has been set aside to inform tourists about the history of Bo Bing. Unfortunately for us, the tour guide spoke in chinese though there were just enough of our group who spoke chinese to translate for us. We wound our way up the small mountain as we learnt a little about how Bo Bing came into being.

The China Daily provided a succinct summary of the legend (skip to the end of the blue type if you aren't particularly interested):

The 300-year-old custom of mooncake gambling dates back to the Qing Dynasty (1644-1911). The inventor, Zheng Chenggong (1624-62), a general of the Ming Dynasty (1368-1644), stationed his army in Xiamen. Zheng was determined to recover Taiwan, which was occupied by Dutch invaders since 1624. When every Mid-Autumn Festival came, the soldiers naturally missed their families but fought with heroical determination to drive off the aggressors. General Zheng and his lower officer Hong Xu invented mooncake gambling to help relieve homesickness among the troops.

The gambling game has six ranks of awards, which are named after the winners in ancient imperial examinations, and has 63 different sized mooncakes as prizes.

From the lowest to the highest, the titles of six ranks are Xiucai (the one who passed the examination at the county level), Juren (a successful candidate at the provincial level), Jinshi (a successful candidate in the highest imperial examination), Tanhua, Bangyan and Zhuangyuan (respectively the number three to number one winners in the imperial examination at the presence of the emperor).

Game players throw the dice by turns. Different pips they count win the player a relevant "title" and corresponding type of mooncakes. The lucky player who gets the pips to make it the title of "Zhuangyuan," will be the biggest winner in the game, and gain the largest mooncake.

In ancient China, to win the imperial examination was the only way to enter an official career which was the dream of most learners, since the examination system was established in the Sui Dynasty (AD 581-618). No wonder then, if a person won "Zhuangyuan" through the imperial examination, the success would bring great honour to both him and his family, followed with a high-level position and a great sum of money.

The game has something to do with the number "four." In mooncake gambling, the pips for most ranks of the awards are related to this number. For instance, one die of four pips wins you "Xiucai" and the smallest mooncake. And if you get four or more dice of four pips, then congratulations - you win "Zhuangyuan." The game provides 32 mooncakes for "Xiucai," 16 for "Juren" and the rest may be deduced by analogy. Only one player will win the lucky title "Zhuangyuan." That is why a total of 63 mooncakes are prepared for the game.

As a game well combining culture, folk custom and recreation, mooncake gambling soon got popular among troops. So General Zheng approved of the soldiers playing the game in turn from the 13th to the 18th of the 8th month around the Mid-Autumn Festival.

Since then, "Bo Bing" has become a popular traditional activity among local people. On every Mid-Autumn Festival, family members gather to gamble mooncakes, deep in arguments about who will be the winner. Also cake confectioneries will produce many kinds of gambling cakes to cater to the market. Xiamen people believe that the person who wins "Zhuangyuan" in the game, will have good luck that year. And the Mid-Autumn Festival is the second important holiday in Xiamen besides Spring Festival.

Nowadays, the mooncakes are not the only kind of award. With the upgrade of people's living standards, daily necessities, household appliances and even money can also be won.

We also passed through a museum of Bo Bing which had one introductory and one summary paragraph about what it contained in poor english (a candidate for my red pen!) and the rest was in chinese. We even got the chance to throw dice in a huge Bo Bing bowl that was three or four feet in diameter. We then moved on to the dinner.

The restaurant was how I'd come to expect, circular tables seating around 10 people, a bottle of orange drink, a bottle of coke and a bottle of sprite (all warm) on the table. A small wine glass was half-filled for toasts and there was no other alcohol to be seen anywhere - though I'm not sure that you couldn't have ordered something should the mood have taken you.

Altogether there seemed to be around 20 tables already occupied by ladies and so our group took a table and waited. I met some lovely ladies that evening - some of whom had been in Xiamen for a number of years and some of whom who had, like me, just arrived. We enjoyed a typical Xiamenese meal, heavy on seafood, were entertained by some talented traditional musicians (you can see the large Bo Bing bowl on stage held in a wooden cradle presumably to help move it), toasted with the president of AXE, and heard some speeches from various position holders of AXE - and then the gambling was on! Around and around the circle the Bo Bing bowl travelled and slowly we gathered what the rules were. The gambling was wild and furious at many tables as the experienced ladies celebrated winning toothpaste, shampoo and conditioner, facial cream, washing powder and soap, and even an electric hotpot/rice-cooker. Here the ladies are getting all of the prizes for our table out and we are working out exactly how hard you can throw the dice without them bouncing out of the bowl (for you then miss a turn if that happens). Up on stage was the "final" Bo Bing bowl where the Zhuangyuan from each table would go up to play against each other for the major prize (which escapes my memory at the moment). Our table was pretty slow as we took quite a while to work out the various "winning" combinations so towards the end of the evening most of the other tables were finished and we were still a long way from finishing - so they furnished us with two bowls to speed things up!Afterwards we made our way back to the van - taking an elevator all the way down instead of walking back down the mountain. The views of the Haicang Bridge and city were lovely and I'm sorry that my camera (or was it my skill) did not do them justice. The first photo is of the complex looking up from the carpark - the elevator is the tall lit object. The second is of the Haicang Bridge and the third is the city.Actually, with the combinations of dice rolls being the way to win this reminded me a little of Yahtzee - and also of an american game I was introduced to late in my US visit: Bunco (thanks Sarah and Donita!) albeit without the alcohol!

Preschool Orientation

They take things seriously here - a meeting was scheduled for parents the Saturday before school started and on the Sunday the students were required to come for a "get to know you" session and assessment of their skills. Luckily for me, Wang Nan came to the meeting to translate for me - it was a long talk about how our children were going to be going off to school and not to worry as they'd be taken very good care of, to be aware of how they will be feeling, instructions not to tell the children how much they'd be missed, information that 90% of children cry on their first day and this is to be expected, a run down of what their day will entail and what they would be expected to learn the first semester (colours, holding a spoon and a pen, writing their name - presumably in chinese, simple chinese character strokes) and information about how to catch the bus and to make sure we weren't late dropping them off or picking them up. What a whirlwind of information.

We were also provided with a list of things to bring with us the next day when Alex was to attend the school: a ball, a book and a toy. We found out the next day that these would be staying in the classroom for the year. OK. Alex warmed up slowly to the classroom, it was hard for her to answer the teachers as they were speaking almost all chinese to her. Hard for her to demonstrate her abilities when she had them in english but not in chinese - but I guess that will come. But in the end she was won over by the play area - with a shopping cart, doll bed and other exciting items that were similar enough to her american preschool to be welcome. Sebastien also really enjoyed crawling around the playgrounds and playing with Alex's slippers.In fact, it was difficult to extract her from her classroom to go home! But we did so with promises that she would be back the very next day!

And here's a video of them both enjoying the playground.

When afternoon means - evening?

Each day the cultural gap becomes clearer as we interact with different chinese people. Case in point the chinese preschool teachers. We had been told on the weekend when registering Alex that they would be visiting us for a home visit on Monday afternoon - and no, a more concrete time could not be ascertained. And so we had arranged for another student to be available for this time as, although we had asked that of the two "first classes", Alex be assigned to the class whose teachers spoke the most english, they spoke marginally more english than we did chinese. We had experienced a home visit when we had enrolled Alex in her american preschool so we had an idea of what to expect - we thought.

Now to us afternoon meant any time after around 1pm until around 5pm, though to be frank the closer to 5pm the less "afternoon" it would be. And so we were increasingly frustrated (well at least as the anal, obsessive, control freak I was) as first 4.30pm then 5pm rolled around with no sign of the teachers. How embarrassed I was growing that we'd had a student waiting around with us for so long to help us. And then - 5.30pm arrives and with it, the teachers. All three of them. Actually one teacher and a teacher's aide as well as a type of "life skills" teacher who would be responsible for teaching the children things such as buttoning clothes, eating with spoons etc.

The interview did progress pretty much as expected, Alex warming up to the teachers and interacting with them. Their main concern seemed to be that we not interfere with Alex's integration into the class and to ensure that she was potty-trained. We provided them with the phone number of one of Brett's colleagues Niu Linlin who spoke english and was happy to be our conduit for information - for which we are profoundly grateful. At the end of the time, the teachers headed off to catch a taxi and we went to grab some dinner from our new local "favourite" restaurant - when we saw the teachers getting into a taxi at the end of our driveway, Alex was so excited she was shouting "hey - it's my teachers. Look mummy, let's go see them." It was probably a measure of how excited Alex was to have teachers again - seeing as she had enjoyed school in America so much. And so we brought home our usual 5元 meal (less than one US$) for dinner and Sebastien managed to fall over and bloody his lip for the second time in 6 days. I shudder to think about how many teeth he's going to lose on this marble floor!

Boxing

Our boxes that we'd sent her from the States had arrived and Brett, armed with his passport, collected them from the university mailroom and brought them home. All thirteen of them - and most of them showing signs of wear and tear from their journey. Taped up with tape from the Chinese postal service, we're not sure where the damage occurred but I did manage to lose many magnets and other small items that had fallen out along the way. Opening them was like Christmas as Alex, amazed to see things that had been in our home in America, kept commenting - "it's just like we had in America" and "they came all the way to China!"

Now I feel like our apartment is more like our home. We had spent the morning walking along the water and watching all the boats fishing. Some of them look like there's nothing but rope holding them together. We also saw several wedding parties having photos taken and it seems that beach photos are common here - I shall write an entire post on the intricacies of the wedding photograph package!
That night was the closing ceremony of the Beijing Olympics - the entire fortnight had passed by with us watching almost nothing of the events and this was not to change this evening - and we had an early bedtime as Brett was to start at the office the next day and we were also to have our preschool home visit in the afternoon.

The post in which Alex gets registered for preschool

We received Alex's health report later in the week which meant that we were able to make the registration day at the Xia Da (university) Kindergarten. We were told that this is a sought after preschool for chinese people and it had an added benefit of being located on campus. Oh, and did I mention that it did not cost approaching US$10,000 per year as the local english school did? For preschool mind you!

And yet another student joined us to help us register - a process that would take upwards of 3 hours - and who would later become our semi-regular babysitter. Shi Jing Rong also biked off to get our various bits of paperwork photocopied for the process as we had no clue where the nearest copy place was.

We (or rather Shi Jing Rong) filled out an application form - thank goodness Alex had a chinese name "Gao Ya Li" as that made the process a little easier. Then we lined up with a hundred other parents to hand in the form, lined up in another line to hand in some evidence about where we lived and that Brett was employed by the university, lined up in another line to provide passport photos of Alex (a whole other system of photo sizes here - 1" means 1" square) and then we found out (at the end of 3 hours) that there was to be a preschool orientation the next weekend plus a home visit from her teachers. Hmm, might need the services of another student! After all that we went home and slept for 2 hours - still possibly jetlagged though it could also be the after effects of Sebastien's new wake-up time of 4am. Yep, he wants to start the day at 4am and no amount of cajoling will persuade him otherwise.Alex's class room: Small 1st Class: Xiao (小) Er (一) Class? (?)

Alex's kindergarten website: www.xdyey.com/
Alex's kindergarten year website: hi.baidu.com/xdyey

If you're really keen, throw them into google translate - it's how we survive :)

It's tough when your feet lose their squeak

When you're a little boy who just loves that his feet make a squeak when he stamps them, then the world is a little darker when one squeaker gets lost from one shoe. However you make do, go on and squeak with just the one foot - or you find other things to stomp on to make noise.

The time when we saw a bad man

We had an adventure that very first week we were in China - Alex and I had just finished our shopping at Walmart near the train station and were in the taxi (to whose driver I had iven our address written down in chinese) about to head to our brand new apartment. For some reason, a van had parked such that it made it very difficult for other drivers to go around to the exit behind the store and there we were, our driver trying to edge his way past. All of a sudden, the guy who we believe was the driver of the parked van lunged for the taxi and shouted all manner of things in chinese. Our driver, being neither the taciturn nor tranquil type, immediately shouted back at him making all kinds of gestures.

There followed an exchange of pleasantries (who knows, we certainly couldn't understand a word though both of us could garner an understanding of the underlying emotions) and physical violence which included the van driver opening the front passenger door of the taxi, leaning across and punching our driver in the face. All bets were off then and our driver jumped out of the taxi and a melee ensued. Alex was very upset in the back seat and I was sitting there with 6 bags of shopping wondering how in the hell I remove us from this situation.

Meanwhile, around 30 onlookers had gathered to check out what was happening and about now our taxi driver jumped back in the taxi with blood dripping from his mouth. I wanted desperately to get out of the taxi and grab another one to get Alex away from this action, but I also needed that piece of paper with our address on it back. Trying to make that known to an agitated and bloody driver who was still dodging feints from the angry and aggressive van driver was almost impossible. About now the traffic police showed up and were trying to organise things - and then our driver threatened to run over the van driver who goaded him by standing in front of the taxi and gesturing "come on" - to which the taxi driver replied by revving the engine and edging forward - whilst indicating to me not to get out as he was going to get going. This was not going to end well so I opened the door and wrestled Alex and the shopping out onto the street whilst the traffic police were trying to get the taxi driver to park the taxi.

Thankfully one of the onlookers helped me with the bags and Alex to flag down another taxi and we were then truly on our way. Now all I had to deal with were the questions - what happened? Why was that man angry? Why did he have blood? Is he (pointing to our new taxi driver) a bad man? Indeed, the question of whether someone was a "bad man" was going to be a constant for the rest of the week, especially when we were in a taxi which was quite often.

And so we arrived at our new apartment and managed to eat our dinner on the balcony overlooking Gulang Yu. The kids fell asleep and Brett and I enjoyed the first of many bottles of Tsing Tao beer watching the lights and the water.

That's not all folks!

Not only had we set ourselves the week to get into an apartment, but we also had to register our arrival with the PSB (Public Security Bureau), complete our required "health checks" for our entry requirements, get Alex into a preschool (which involved a health check for her) and get the ball rolling to get our resident cards (which we would be fined for not applying for if we missed the 21 day-from-entry deadline).

Once we'd signed our lease with the landlord, Brett went with Wang Nan to register our residence as "alien" with the local PSB office (down some non-descript alleyway) so I've no clue as to what he had to actually do for this. I just know that it took them a long time to do it (as with most things here in China).

Three different students had been assigned to come with us to a local government hospital and translate as appropriate for our health-checks. We had been told not to eat beforehand as we would be having blood taken (the students had brought along some food and beverages for us to eat and drink afterwards which was lovely of them). We had Alex and Sebastien along with us which was interesting too, though the two male students were fascinated by them. First you needed to register at the main desk and pay money for all the different services you would have done - then you went, with your receipt, to the various rooms to have the check done. My observation was that there didn't seem to be much happening as most of the staff seemed to be sitting at desks reading books or magazines or sitting chatting together. Also, it was not uncommon for us to be watched by four or five staff members, particularly as they were amazed by Sebastien and wanted to hold him. He was still just learning to walk so was very unsteady on his feet.

How very telling it was for us to be told by many people (including nurses) not to let Sebastien crawl or fall on the ground as it was dirty - exactly how dirty I came to realise when we had to give a urine sample and used their toilets. My first squat toilet (hadn't seen the pristine one in Hong Kong) and it was filthy. I also wasn't prepared for the open trash basket next to the toilet for all the toilet paper and other items as the pipes can't handle much going down them. Urgh! So having peed into a little cup (very reminiscent of being pregnant!) we placed the open cup onto a tray that already had about 12 other similarly filled cups on it - on a shelf in the open cupboard next to the toilets - nice.

Then we were shuttled in and out of about 8 different rooms, including x-ray (for lungs), an ecg, and an abdominal ultrasound. When it came time to have blood taken, Alex was very interested in the process - though Brett wasn't keen for her to see how he reacts to needles - so I had her sit next to me and explained what the process was to her. This paid off when she went to have her health check later that week.

It felt like I was in the 60s or 70s as all the nurses wore pink uniforms complete with starched caps and all the doctors and technicians were in white coats. Not a single one washed their hands whilst we were there, and there were no hand washing facilities in sight other than outside those toilets. The ecg machine was also something to behold, having seen my dad's at his surgery, I was a little stunned to have basically a pseudo alligator clip attached at my foot and another on my hand. Whatever gets it done I guess.

Then we were told that the results wouldn't be available for a few days so we organized for the students to come and collect them for us.

All of that took half the day.

Although Brett tried to convince the administration staff that he was up for doing his faculty health check that afternoon, they were dubious and told him to do it the next day. But he persisted and did the same tests and exams at the University's hospital. We both wondered why the University couldn't access the results of the government tests (or vice versa) to prevent the duplication.

Later that week we had another two students take us to the Women and Children's Hospital for Alex's healthcheck. We ended up having to do her healthcheck over two days as she hadn't fasted for her blood test (iron check) and they only did that in the mornings. So on the first day we lined up and paid some money in the entryway then made our way up several flights of steps to a few different rooms. It didn't help that they were in the midst of renovating so we had to go to a couple of buildings to get things done. The two students did admirably in their translations as they filled out forms for us - requiring them to ask all kinds of things about Alex's birth and infancy that I'm certain aren't usual vocabulary to know.

Alex went to several different rooms to: have someone look in her mouth; and check that she was, ahem, a girl. Then we were told that we'd need to come back in the morning for the blood test and to ensure that Alex did not eat breakfast. So we headed off to Walmart to buy some items for our apartment (we'd signed the lease that morning and were moving in the next day) and dropped them off. Here is Alex after it's all done with her two new Chinese health books.What a busy day it was to be. Brett was to organize the moving of our luggage from the hotel to the apartment whilst I took Alex to the hospital for her blood test. There were very many kids at the hospital when we arrived. Must have been the "preschool admission" season. So we joined the queue and listened to the howls and crying coming from the "blood test" room. Alex was a little freaked out by it all and asking lots of questions about why the children were sad and crying. What do you say? Yes it hurts but only for a little while, no it only has to happen once, yes you have to do this to go to school.

And then it was our turn. I'd been watching the couple before us and so knew that the technician or nurse doing the stick took a new lancet from a container each time, opened it, used it and dumped it in the rubbish. It was only later that I spoke with someone who said that they'd wondered whether the contents of the bin were thrown away or "repacked". Wish I'd asked. Although the technician/nurse did wipe over her gloved hands with antiseptic, the gloves were the same ones each time. And so we sat down, me on a stool with Alex on my lap, and Alex bravely had her finger stuck and then squeezed for a few drops of blood for this test. She only started to cry when they milked her finger. Then they gave her a swab (small wooden stick that had a piece of cotton wool wrapped around one end) to hold onto her finger to stop the blood. I had brought a bandaid and so applied that which Alex approved of. After all that, Alex was able to finally eat her 'special breakfast' (oh the things we do to make hospital tests more palatable)!

Although Alex wanted to play on the small set of play equipment in the entrance of the hospital, I wanted to get on and finish up some shopping for the apartment. And so it was that Alex and I had our first Chinese adventure - which will have to be in the next post.

Our new home - for the next year

Hmm, now if you've been reading for a while, you'll realise that I posted on the 18th September about which apartment we chose and it even had photos and a video. So I shan't do a repeat. Whew - so glad I need to do one less post than I thought.

I will update our views on our apartment 6 months later to say that although we have two bathrooms, we rarely use the kid's bathroom due to an overwhelmingly noxious odor. It smells like a really bad toilet smell but no matter what we try we've been unsuccessful in eliminating it (making sure we run the water so it isn't sitting stagnant in the pipes, cleaning out the drains, putting in deodorizers, opening the window etc) which means that we will not be staying in this apartment after our year is up. Much as we love it otherwise, we just can't hold with the smell. So we shall be hunting again for an apartment though we would prefer to find one with a similar outlook and in the same complex. We shall see - we still have until July...

Searching for a home

We had set ourselves a week (at least that was the duration of our hotel booking) to find a place to live. We had initial thoughts of renting a furnished place for 6 months until we were better acquainted with the city and then renting something later where we wanted to be for the next (possibly) 3-6 years. Of course, we had also been told that there was accommodation available on campus at the University Guest House for Foreign Scholars (photo thanks to our American Fulbright friends - Sam, Jake, Ben, Ellie and Steve) which we had decided not to take up (I really wanted 3 bedrooms so that our home could be a true "getaway" from the rigors of living in a truly foreign place and they only had 2 bedroom apartments).

The plan was for me to keep the two terrors occupied so Brett could run through available properties, bringing a short list by the end of the week for the family to check out. So with the weather hot and humid, more so than in Illinois (remember this is the end of August) Brett set out with the capable assistance of one of his students, Wang Nan, to see what was on offer. I shall leave it to Brett to write the intricacies of dealing with the real estate agents in China, but suffice it to say that it is, different.

The kids and I ventured outside for very short periods, trying to be outside before the heat kicked in for the day and inside until evening. Interesting though it was to see the condensation blanketing the picture windows of the hotel, it merely served as a reminder of the coolness that the airconditioning provided. I was lulled into a false sense of security with the campus paths that were so lovely to stroll along with the double stroller. Once I left campus I realised the folly of my ways and exported it to Australia where there are footpaths along most roads.
The kids and I spent our time on campus which was big enough for us, jetlagged as we were, and had some interesting construction happening for our entertainment. Even our hotel room provided the kids with entertainment. And not just because it had a tv!

Here is the new "playhouse".The water that we purchased in the shop to drink came complete with pH strips to ensure your water's quality.Having lived in university accommodation in America and seen first-hand the difficulties of enforcing "no hanging clothes outside" rules, I now see why this is a cultural thing:This is one of the dorms - quite attractive really - there are other older ones on campus that I later found. Indeed, once I made it off of campus, I saw clothes being hung out to dry everywhere. An electric dryer is a rare thing in China.

Where ever we went, the kids were a novelty. And it was all a novelty to them - at that time. It didn't take long for Alex especially to get over the fawning attention two laowai kids get in China (especially the blondie).


Here is a video of us relaxing in our hotel room.


And a video of me interviewing Alex about China.


By the end of the week I was climbing the walls, the kids were over living in a hotel and Brett had a short list of around 8 apartments for us to check out. So off we trekked.

Building regulations in China don't require elevators in buildings less then 6 stories tall. So if a building didn't have an elevator, I wanted to be closer to the ground than the top. Having said that, we were very aware of the "scent of China" - a mix of sewerage, cooking smells, humidity and goodness knows what else - that permeated many of the street level apartments. One of the benefits of apartment hunting in the heat and humidity of August. So we wanted to "rise" above that smell or living there would be unbearable. All apartments had kitchens of varying cleanliness - all were able to be closed off to the rest of the house (presumably due to cooking smells) however some had the propane gas tank next to the range and others had it outside. Although all were 3 bedroom apartments, not all had two bathrooms. Brett had been keen to rent the apartment that had one western toilet as well as a squat toilet - me, not so keen. But I did like the idea of two bathrooms - especially as we'd decided to have someone in to clean our apartment.

We were unable to get a six month lease so anything we rented would be for a full year. Marble floors were de rigeur (well actually, the richer you were the more likely you were to have wooden floors). They were all furnished in varying styles though most were vibrant coloured leather couches with glass/metal tables. Air-conditioning was in all bedrooms and most living rooms. But not an oven in sight - and refrigerators were usually as tall as my shoulder or shorter. Some, but not all had electric washing machines and no electric dryers anywhere. A very few had some ozone sterilizing units for dish washing. Here are a couple of example places:
Here is a kitchen with old wooden cabinets (check mold) and a toaster oven on top of the microwave. The fridge, whilst taller than most, is quite thin.Here is the living room of the same apartment - lovely blue leather and metal couches. The balcony has been enclosed which gave you a little extra living space. Many apartments have metal grillwork on all the windows and balconies - we're not sure whether they are there for: 1) theft prevention; 2) suicide prevention; or 3) childproofing. All I know is that I didn't want them where we were as I saw them as a fire trap - preventing any escape from the balcony unless you had an acetylene torch.

However, the kids were very good with trekking for what felt like miles, meeting several different real estate agents and seeing so many apartments. Wang Nan was such a help we really could not have done better on our own - he was instrumental to us being able to discuss anything with the agents!

And so we finally were deciding between two apartments - one right outside the West (Main) Gate of the university (Xia Da) and the other three stops away from the university on the bus, overlooking the Gulanyu. The first building opened out onto the street, the second was within a complex that had a courtyard. The one closest to Xia Da had wooden floors and was on three levels, the other was on one level and had marble floors.

Next post - which one did we choose?!

Alexs words VII

The Wiggles are well known and liked in Australia - and we've come to know more about them this past visit to Australia. Both Alex and Sebastien are fans - Alex more so as she dances along to the songs that she sings. One of their songs is "Where's Jeff?" and Alex's version goes "Where's Jeff? Is he stupid inside? Where's Jeff? Has he gone for a ride?" (For those who don't know it should go "Is he sleeping inside?")

While in Australia, Grandie and Alex played a quick game of "Eye/I Spy" in the car that developed into "I spell, with a little something that spells like..." - usually followed by a letter and something that starts with that letter.

Conversation with Alex:
Me: "Do you like Captain Feathersword?"
Alex: "No, 'cause he's a boy."
Me: "You don't like boys?"
Alex: "No. Dorothy's a girl." (Dinosaur character in The Wiggles)
Alex: " I like Wags and Henry." (Two other male characters in The Wiggles)
Me: "Is Wags a girl?"
Alex: "I'm telling him to be a girl."

Welcome to - China!

And there we were, however many hours later; no luggage lost; no real sleep. We were thankful that the university had sent a van and driver with the person greeting us (a student) at the airport as every taxi we saw was a sedan - and there was no way we would fit everything in fewer than 2 taxis. We then sat back and experienced our first time with chinese traffic. It was quite a feat for two control-freak personalities, with next to no sleep, to sit in the back seat and watch the van wend and wind its way through endless traffic, often swerving to miss someone else's wending and winding. Breathtaking - and not in a good way!

We checked into the hotel with a minimum of fuss and made our way into our room.














Alex and Sebastien were amazed that there was a tv.

Our greeter conveyed to us that we were invited to a staff dinner in a couple of hours as a welcome dinner - great, just enough time to catch our breath and take a shower. But first we just wanted to collapse on our beds - and I so wish that I had video of this moment - so when Brett made a kind-of swandive onto one bed, we were both astonished when he bounced like he'd dived onto the ground. No soft bounce at all. Yes, we had now become intimately acquainted with chinese beds.

And so it was that the entire family - jetlagged but freshly showered - made its way down the road to the faculty club and a private upstairs dining room for our welcome dinner. It was only a matter of minutes before Sebastien had fallen asleep so we created a bed for him by pulling together two armchairs. Alex followed him shortly thereafter. Meanwhile Brett and I were endeavoring to navigate unfamiliar food without making a faux pas. From what I remember of it it was delicious - and as expected seafood made up a large proportion of the dishes. It wasn't until a couple of months later that Brett and I worked out the finer intricacies of dining chinese style - where the host sits, who sits where, who eats and drinks when etc.

Eventually we plead tiredness and thanked the faculty and administration staff for a delightful dinner - it was terrific that they had organized this for us. Off we went to our hotel room - and our first night in China with a kid in each bed. Of course, the next night we'd worked out a better arrangement










and had Sebastien sleeping on a sheet on the floor in between the two beds - at least one adult would get a bed to themselves and (hopefully) a good night's sleep!

Goodbye America, Hello China

***
Wow - it's taken me a while to get back to the historical story but here it is.
***
So we're driving back to the airport - we were all awake for the 6.30pm parade, we managed to get a few souvenirs and we're thinking we will definitely have time for dinner before checking in the luggage, returning the rental car and doing the whole security thing with 2 kids, 7 pieces of hand-luggage plus a car seat and double stroller (we were planning on dumping Sebastien's car seat at the airport because 1) he has almost grown out of it; and 2) apparently cars in China don't have seatbelts in the rear so we won't be using it in China). Alex's seat, on the other hand, would be useful for the plane ride over and for our subsequent visit to Australia so it was coming with us the whole way.

We made good time and at 9pm Brett dropped us (me, 2 kids, double stroller, two car seats, 7 suitcases and 7 pieces of handluggage including two laptop computers - can you just picture it?) off at the terminal and after getting most items onto a porter's huge luggage cart, he went to return the car to Budget whilst I worked my way inside to the check-in desk.

Hmm, something's not quite right...Air China, China Airlines, China Eastern, China Southern...uh oh. The ladies behind the desk took a look at the tickets I handed over, asked me where we were flying to and kindly told me I needed to be in the next terminal along. I couldn't grasp it at first - how was I going to get all this stuff plus the two kids down and around to the next terminal - and hang on, Brett was expecting to come here to meet up with us once he'd returned the car...how was I going to let him know where we were?? Neither of us had a phone anymore.

The porter managed to cart the luggage that fit onto the cart to the next terminal, with me following in his wake, stress levels rising. Anyway, we checked in at the next terminal - and had a couple of guys who worked there deal with the luggage (one of the times I'm happy to play the "pity me" card). Sebastien was in his infant seat and I'd put him down next to the stroller (which had all the hand luggage in it and Alex in the front seat) whilst I checked I had all the tickets, passports etc and some snooty lady walking past told me that I was endangering Sebastien by setting him there - well thanks very much lady!

Once checked in all I needed to worry about was whether Brett'd work out what'd happened and make his way over here. Time was getting on - so much for making good time earlier - so I headed to the front doors of the terminal to see if I could spot him outside. Many well-intentioned people told me not to worry, that he'd be there shortly, but I was busy imagining what I'd do if he didn't: leave his boarding pass and passport with the check-in desk and board with the kids on my own, or miss the flight waiting for him to turn up.

But it all turned out alright as he sprinted up to our terminal - we managed to get through immigration and security just in time for our 1am (LA time) flight.

Whew - now I was ready for a trans-Pacific flight of around 9 hours - just have to get these two kids to sleep...










Oh, sorry...wrong two kids. :) This is possibly the most Sebastien slept at any one time the entire trip, waiting to board our LA-Taipei flight. Let me just say that Sebastien is not the traveler his sister was at the same age. He barely slept - and nursed whenever he wasn't sleeping. Thankfully Alex is now at an age where the inflight entertainment is interesting for her - so she was somewhat distracted.

So we flew LA to Taipei, Taipei to Hong Kong and then Hong Kong to Xiamen - well it was a cheap ticket :).

In Taipei we could watch the activity below whilst waiting for the plane:











Here's what our hand luggage looked like - Brett had dumped the infant seat in LAX - near a dumpster I believe - Minnie was the preferred friend as we'd just been to Disneyland. Alex was responsible (most of the time) for her own hand luggage:










I ought to write a post about discipline and unfamiliar places...it's tough to nut things out on the run, and usually it's not something Brett and I spend time thinking about before hand...we'll have to change that:












Alex worked out that she could kick the ground with her feet and tip the carseat over - she just didn't reckon on us leaving her there like that. What isn't shown here are all the disconcerted Asian people who are watching this unfold and can't fathom why we'd strap our child into a contraption and leave her a few rows of chairs away - or why we wouldn't immediately run to set her right way up (at least she can't fall any further).

Games we play: stacks on Daddy whilst Sebastien checks out the luggage trolley:










Here's Alex in Hong Kong, having found something to keep her amused whilst we waited to board the bus out to the plane:










Just the right size for her luggage!

And so we arrived in Xiamen, PR China at around 5pm the day after we set out. Totally spent, we were the last to get off of the plane and make our bedraggled way to the immigration and customs area. We were allowed through and discovered that Alex and Sebastien were immediately minor stars. No photos of this as we were just so tired, but they were surrounded and fawned over before we even made it out of the luggage claim area.

We burst out of the terminal into the heat and humidity of a subtropical evening. Fortunately, since two white children are a rarity in Xiamen, our prearranged student guide had no problem identifying us and helping us transport our luggage to the university hotel - our home for the next week.