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March 21

Chinese Lessons

It's the end of a long day. I had my Chinese lessons today. The first few lessons were kind of easy and fun....just learning polite exchanges and numbers. Then a couple of lessons ago, I had to start stringing sentences together. Then it wasn't much fun anymore. It got very hard and I felt very stupid. I struggled so badly last week with the lesson, that the tutor decided this week we should review the last few lessons. Which I need to do before I can move on. So....this is why I find it so hard. I have to translate many words at once, rearrange the order of the sentence, be mindful of the few exceptions of pinyin (it's like an anglacized alphabet....but with exceptions, like "q" is pronounced as "ts", as an example). So I get it all messed up. I can write down the translation, but then I have problems saying it. At least I can write it down in pinyin. I guess that's a start. I guess it will grow from there. But my head sure hurts after a Chinese lesson. I haven't stretched my noggin muscles this hard in years! I usually do my lessons in the morning, for 2 hours. I really should end the lesson at an hour and a half, because I hit a "wall" in that last half hour and have complete brain drain. That's usually when I try to distract my tutor and chat about Canada. She lived in Toronto for 3 years...she was a student at Sheridan College. She's told me all of the best Chinese restaurants to go to in the Toronto area. She can't be a day over 25...her boyfriend works with Doug. Very nice young girl.

After I say good bye to the tutor, it's lunch time. That's when Ayi thinks I'm open to learning Chinese because I just had two hours of Chinese lessons. We have lunch together and she tells me all sorts of Chinese words and their English translations, but none of them sink in after 2 hours of lessons. So I eat my sandwich and nod politely. I'm completely brain-drained at that point, feeling totally defeated by this difficult language by that time.

Today I think some of it sunk in finally....this stringing together of words in a different way. I walked the kids home from school and was trying out different sentences on them. Of course, they've learned a lot more than me and love to let me know it. Ahhhh.....to have a young brain again.

I have to get to bed now. It's 10:30 at night and Doug still isn't home. That usually happens about once a week. But, we will be in Thailand in ten days....laying on a tropical beach. We can't wait. Here's a picture of the resort's beach that I pinched off of the internet:

So I will say good evening now, go to bed and dream of Hua Hin, Thailand........waoshang hao.

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March 17

Thomas Plays Chess

A couple of weeks ago, Thomas came home with a big story about how there was an upcoming chess tournament. He explained that it was a tournament between all of the international schools in Tianjin, and that it was being held at another school. He said that he really wanted to go. I was a bit baffled by the big story, because I hadn't seen anything come home about it in his backpack. I asked him if he needed to be on the school chess team in order to participate, and he told me that he didn't. So I told him to bring any handouts he got about it home to me and we'll see what it's all about. Sure enough, he brought the handout home, so I filled out the permission slip and sent it to school with him. Again, I was baffled....I didn't know that Thomas was interested in chess. I fretted a bit about him going by himself, because he was going to be one of the youngest in the tournament. Also, it's not like him to want to participate in something unless one of his brothers or friends do. I don't think Thomas has ever gone off on a day by himself like that. Philip and Nick do, but never Thomas. A couple of days before he went, I found out that our Kiwi neighbor, Alex, was going too. So they went in together. It was nice to know that he had a buddy with him. I felt a bit more relieved about that. I had worried that it would be Thomas alone at a tournament amongst a bunch of Korean chess champs.

The tournament was today. Doug brought Thomas and Alex in, made sure they were registered and settled, then left. Doug reported that the boys walked in, and all sorts of Korean boys from their school ran up and said hi to them. I guess Thomas is getting more outgoing these days. Another worry of mine was that Thomas is so new to the game, that I feared he'd lose every match and be upset....maybe even discouraged from the game forever. Doug just went to pick Thomas up, and phoned to say that Thomas had 6 matches. He won 2, tied 1, and lost 3. I thought that was really good for a beginner, especially one of the younger players. Apparently his tie, or draw was with one of the strongest players in the whole tournament. I should have known that my most meticulous, logical child (proof: domino house picture to your right) would have a knack for chess. I'm very proud of that little guy. More importantly, he said that he had a very good time. That's what it's all about. He got a free pizza lunch, a certificate, and two pieces of candy. He made sure that he told me about that on the phone. I hope that this turns into a hobby for him...I would support him joining a chess team...he's not one for organized sports, so it's a very good option for a social activity for him.

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January Entries Restored

As some of you know, I had a lot of computer problems in January. In fact, most of Asia did because of an earthquake in Taiwan and some damage to some underground cables. I lost touch with a lot of people during that time because I couldn't access a few of my different e-mail addresses. Thanks to my friend, Ellen Wall, for not having cleared her inbox for awhile. Ellen forwarded them all to me, and I was able to post them here on this space for those of you who never saw the entries before. I think they were my most interesting entries, because I was in such shock of how different it was all here and felt a deep need to share it with everyone. Unfortunately, I'm already starting to get a little jaded and tend not to notice things as alertly as I did in January.

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January 25 Entry

Subject: Quick Update
Sent: Thursday, January 25, 2007 7:00 AM

Hi everyone,

A very quick update before the driver comes to get me & we pick up the kids at school. It's actually snowing here today. It's mixed in with a lot of fog (and maybe pollution). We had no water yesterday. They shut it off in our whole neighborhood to do some work. So, I sent the maid home early. There wasn't a lot she could do without water. The kids are adjusting well. Nick is on the student council, he's been to a few meetings and is now talking about how he's helping to plan for an upcoming school dance. I asked him last night if he was going to attend the dance. He wasn't sure if his friends were going or not. I told him to get their phone numbers and phone them from home before the dance to make sure they're going. I told him it's okay to be scared to go alone to a dance.....I would have made sure I'd walk into a school dance with a friend. That maybe one of his friends' drivers can pick him up on the way to the dance (we live really close to the school....his friends live pretty far away). He seems to have hit it off with about 3 boys quite easily.

Philip seems to be the most stressed out of all. The twins are very far behind in math here. They have a lot of Asian classmates that eat math for every meal.....really, after school they go to something called "Academy" and do more math. Philip was always top of the class before in math. He doesn't like being behind. I just keep reassuring him that he'll probably never catch up to these kids, but maybe some day when he returns to North America that some of this Asian math stuff will have rubbed off on him and he'll be super tops in math in N.A. He's also one of the youngest in the class. He hasn't failed anything, he just doesn't know what they're talking about sometimes. I'm sure the same is going on with Thomas, but he doesn't complain about it. That's Thomas, rarely complains.

Doug finishes his January travelling stint on Saturday. He comes home from Japan and stays put here for awhile.

We're currently trying to book a vacation during the Chinese New Year holiday in Sanya, China (Hainan Beach) for the third week of Feb. Very tropical, gorgeous western resorts....Hilton, Marriott, etc. We have a travel agent working on it, but the flights are pretty booked up right now. I hope she can pull it off. We could sure use it.

Gotta go,

Sue

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January 18 Entry

Subject: We got some of our stuff!
Sent: Thursday, January 18, 2007 12:39 AM

Hi everyone,

Great news! We got our air shipment last night. There was a Chinese girl dealing with it, it turned into a big paperwork mess (most things do here) and Doug called around at the moving company, found an Aussie to talk to, they got a V.P. involved, and we finally got it....this was the stuff we were supposed to get 7 to 10 days after arriving. We're still awaiting our sea shipment, we've been told the end of January (our beds are on that). At least we had some thick comforters on our air shipment, and it made sleeping on the hard mattresses a little easier.

Some interesting observations from the last week or so that make me giggle.....when I go grocery shopping, quite a few things happen that I consider odd. First, the locals openly stare at me. Second, they actually bend over and look into my cart (the other shoppers) and examine the contents carefully. I'm not sure what they're thinking, something like, "What is it that she eats? Why is there so much in there? What makes her so big and look so different than us?" Remember, the families are smaller, so no one else has to get a big haul like us. What also happens is there are far too many people employed at the supermarket. They think that the westerners sweat money. I'll pick out an item, and then there's a saleslady taking it away from me and nodding "no." Then she picks out the most expensive item and hands it to me. The kids, of course, are learning Chinese faster than me. They taught me to say no a few days ago, which is "boo." So I've had to get forceful to get my shopping done. Imagine me saying, "boo" in a strong voice. I feel like I'm playing a Halloween game or something.

We're sort of in a double culture shock here. The curriculum at the school is strong in Australian references. Many questions make references to the game of cricket. I've never seen the game of cricket, don't know how many men are on the team, what instruments are used to play the game, whether it's played on a field or a pitch, what shape the field is, etc. But this is why we made this education choice, to expand the children's world. Boy, have we expanded it big time.

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January 14 Update

Subject: Johnston Update
Sent: Sunday, January 14, 2007 9:10 AM

Hi everyone,

I have a few minutes before I go out, so I thought I'd type up a little update of our adventures. For those of you new to my daily adventures, here's a quick summary......our regular foods are hard to find. We've finally settled on a New Zealand milk, and a margarine from Denmark. I'm still trying to cook on some bare essentials that we bought when we got here, thinking that our air shipment would arrive in 7-10 days, as we were told (how long ago was December 26th?). I hate 5 plates, 5 sets of cutlery (that wasn't easy to find, they mainly sell chopsticks here), 1 deep pot, 1 frying pan, 1 wok, 1 plastic slotted spoon (Doug bought that), and 1 wooden wok spatula-type thing, plus 1 measuring cup. I also bought a rice maker, 1 casserole dish, and a soup cooker (looks like a crock pot). I have no recipe books on me, and I can barely pull any up on the internet because there have been internet problems in Asia due to an earthquake in Taiwan. But I'm proud of what I have cooked. I feel like I'm on a cooking reality show....."okay, you only get these cooking ingredients, and these bare utensils.....make it yummy!" So far, from memory, and all from scratch, I have made chicken noodle soup (one of the best soups we ever had), many stir fries (beef with broccoli and cashews, kung pao chicken), spaghetti, cheesy chicken broccoli casserole, chocolate chip cookies (that was a feat in itself....I had the kids cutting up Hershey kisses to help me out with that). Sometimes we don't have some ingredients, and we improvise.

The kids all seem happy at their new school. The math is a bit tougher, and the Chinese homework can be really tough. Nick was given about 20 Chinese words, in those Chinese characters (congi, I believe it's called). He was given this huge English-Chinese dictionary and told to look them up, write down the English word for it, the stroke count and the pinyin (that's the English alphabet translation of a word....like "nie." Of course, he was taught some tricks to looking it up, but it's like cracking the DaVinci code or something. He was told by his teacher that if he got 4 of them, then he had done a lot of work. Doug and I read through the instructions, then tried to help him. Between the 3 of us, Nick got 1, I got 1, and Doug got 4 (his dictionary had bigger typefact.....Nick and I were cross-eyed by the end, our type-face was so tiny). But we all had a giggle trying to do it.

We had the best day yesterday. We rented "ice bikes" on a shallow lake in Tianjin. I never laughed so hard in my life, watching my kids fly by on these unique bikes on the ice. Nick really got the knack for it, and other Chinese kids were trying to race him. Nobody could keep up with him.

Oooopps, just looked at the time. We're off to a pizza party with the two other western families in our complex. They're all from New Zealand. Fun group.

I'll try to write again soon.

Sue & boys

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January 11 Entry

Subject: Update from Johnston's in China
Sent: Thursday, January 11, 2007 6:59 AM

Hi everyone,

Thought I could give you all an update, so you can live vicariously through us. I only have about ten minutes before the driver and I pick up the kids at school, so I'll try to type what I can.

Doug has been travelling all of this week. He spent a couple of nights in Beijing, and a couple of nights in Inner Mongolia, and went somewhere else in China that I can't pronounce. He gets home late tonight. In the morning, he has to work, but our air shipment has been at the airport in Tianjin for a few days now, they just want to see his passport and then they'll deliver it tomorrow night to our house. Yay! These are the items we deemed that we could live without only for a week or two. We were told that they would be delivered in 7 to 10 days. Hmmm....how long ago was December 26th? We're all very excited about getting our stuff. I can't wait to be able to cook with my regular utensils and have my plates, etc. I bought a set of five that we are constantly washing by hand so we can eat the next meal.

Speaking of housework, I hired a maid on Monday. She's wonderful. I couldn't live without her. I get phone calls in Chinese that I don't understand, and bills pasted to my door that I can't read. I hand them to her, and she'll tell me, "you have to go and pay the (telephone, heat, electricity, etc.) bill or they will turn that utility off." So I send my driver with an estimate of money to pay the bill, and we keep that utility until it happens again. He gives me receipts and I can't read them, so I have no idea when I have to send him again and how much I send with him.

I lucked out with the maid. She worked for a European family for a few years (Germans) and understands a bit of English. She works way too hard. Her hours are 9 to 5, and she only takes a quick break to eat lunch. I try to make her take breaks and have tea with me, but she refuses, there is more work to be done. I tried to send her home early yesterday, again she refused. She was in the middle of a job. It's a bit ridiculous how hard she works. She greets us at the door, and takes our coats for us. We try to shake her off, but she believes that is her job and takes the coat anyways.

So, I feel like I am living the life of a 1940's black and white European movie. Corporate father is away travelling, when he does come home, it's very late at night. The children have been given a biscuit and put to bed by the time he gets home. I'm surrounded by this hired help that I can barely speak to. Now I'm trying to find something to do with my time, because I figure this will never happen ever again in my life. Again, I'm thinking 1940's black and white movie.....I feel like I should be playing bridge with gloves on. I'm looking into some Chinese art courses, maybe start writing a novel, and, of course, I need to take some Chinese language lessons so I can start communicating with the people around me.

Ten minutes is up. How's that for some fast typing? The kids were all ecstatically happy and love their new school. They're all a bit behind in math (the Asian students have brought the math bar up here), but they'll probably soar in every other subject because it's an English school. Nick is even a member of the student council here!

Hope you're all well.

Take care,

Sue Johnston & boys

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January 2 Entry

Subject: Johnston's in China
Sent: Tuesday, January 2, 2007 3:52 PM

Hi,

We've been in China for about a week now. We're in our new house. There are a few "new house" problems to iron out, plus we're desperately awaiting our air and sea shipments (especially our beds.....the beds here are like rocks....I feel like I have internal organ damage when I wake up in the morning). The relocation company is going to set me up with a maid later this week, which I need just to read all of the household appliances (every little button is in Chinese). We're getting by, making guesses, and giggling a lot. There are two other American families here (but they are on the other end of town) that have been very helpful. The only other Western families in our complex (it's a new complex, so it will be interesting to see if fill up) are from New Zealand. We met one of the families yesterday and they're fun, easy-going people. They have a son who will be in the same class as Philip.

Our family driver doesn't speak much English. But he's trying to learn English and we're trying to learn Chinese. We meet in the middle and everyone cheers when we get ideas across to each other. I just realized yesterday that you don't just hold up your fingers to indicate numbers. Well, you can from one to five. But when you get from six to ten, it turns into a sort of sign language. I taught myself yesterday, with pictures I found in an expat magazine. I realized I had to tell the driver what time to pick me up, and that was the only way. He was so excited when I showed him the symbol for ten today with my fingers (put your index finger over your middle finger). Eight looks like your playing imaginary guns with someone.

The best thing about China is the people. If you have one little question, there are usually about 6 people that run up to help you. They're all very fascinated and excited by Philip and Thomas.....they get a real bang out of twin boys. Apparently Nick looks like some famous Chinese tv character, so he's got it going on, too.

We are still in the process of trying to set up vonage.....internet phone system.....when we do, we'll e-mail you the phone numbers. We chose one phone number in Canada (Chatham) and one in the U.S. (Peoria). It will cut down on long distance charges for everyone. In the meantime, for those of you in Asia.....our Chinese phone number is 88829623.

Hope you all had a great Christmas.

Take care,

Sue & boys

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March 16

The Vacation is Planned!

After two weeks of haggling over flight times and hotel rooms, Doug booked a vacation for us today. We are going to Hua Hin, Thailand for a week. We leave on March 31st, which is only two weeks away!

We are booked solid in this 4 star resort:

http://huahin.anantara.com/

And we are on a waiting list for this 5 star resort:

http://huahin.dusit.com/

We're so excited....after the Thanksgiving and Christmas vacations we had (or didn't really have), this seems like a great reward after all that we've been through to move here.

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March 13

Vacation Planning

We're trying to plan a vacation the first week of April. The children have no school that week because it is their spring vacation. So, we wondered.....where can we go on this side of the world? After many hours of researching on the internet, we were able to narrow it down quite a bit. We found it very interesting that we even considered countries that had many political problems when we were children. Imagine thinking about planning a beautiful, tropical vacation to Vietnam, Cambodia, or the Philippines. But believe it or not, these countries are now full of gorgeous resorts on their beaches. Even Nick was incredulous when he would hear us talking about possible vacation destinations. "But mom....Vietnam? Wasn't there a war there?" So, after much research and debate, we are very close to booking a vacation in Hua Hin, Thailand. AOL.com just rated it amongst the world's top ten beaches. I'm keeping my fingers crossed that it all works out as planned. Hua Hin is in the gulf and is about a 2 1/2 hour drive from the airport in Bangkok. I'll have to let you know if that all pans out.

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March 10

Expatriate Literature

Once a month in Tianjin, a new issue of JIN Life; Expatriates Lifestyle & Entertainment Guide comes out. All of us Westerners talk about the latest issue...where we can pick one up (they're free, but only available at a few select locations in town), the articles in it, and the new business ads that are in it. It's a very exciting time when a new issue comes out, because it's about the only English language magazine in the area that we can find. When we get the magazine, we really pour through the ads, in hopes that there is a new restaurant in the area that will suit our palates, or a new or unique business. There are Classifieds that run in the back, often from locals seeking teaching/tutor jobs, language exchange, or just seeking friends. In the February issue, someone ran the craziest, funniest ad in the "Seeking Friends" area of the Classifieds. There was no contact # or e-mail, so it was obviously a joke. But it just tickled my funny bone, so I had to put it in here. Here it is:

SEEKING FRIENDS

Ugly old man seeking pretty young things. Me: fat, ugly, balding, lazy, exceedingly wealthy. You: young, stunningly beautiful, slim, short, and enjoy heavy housework. Prefereably uneducated and mute. Interests include fine french cuisine, backgammon, Chivas and coke. You will preferably have no interests. Call me anytime. I'm waiting!

Thanks to our friend, Kurt Tisdale, for pointing out that ad to us. He's Doug's old boss, and is in town on business. We had our driver pick him up in Beijing on Friday, so I made up a care basket for the 2-3 hour drive. I put drinks, snacks, and reading material in the basket. Of course, I had to put in the last few issues of JIN magazine, so that Kurt could see what Tianjin has to offer.

Kurt and Doug are off for a full day of fun today in the city. I said I'd stay behind and watch the kids while they bartered in the markets. They've been gone over six hours now, so I can't imagine what treasures they will come home with. The markets are full of jewellery, electronics, leather goods, artwork, etc.

Me and the boys had our Kiwi neighbor, Nicholas, over to play today. He sure enjoys playing with my boys. My boys really enjoy his company, too. He's a grade younger than the twins, but not quite a year younger than them.

I had my fun day earlier this week when the kids were in school. I went with one of the Kiwi ladies and a British lady (me mates) to the Shi Family Mansion....wealthy family that resided in Tianjin in the 1800's. Something like 280+ rooms. It was like a smaller version of the Forbidden City. It had a theater, an accounting office, and a school room. I really enjoyed the company of the other women. Claire and Liz had me giggling all day. They both have sharp, quick-witted senses of humor. Thanks Claire for the images. I pinched them off her website. I wonder if I'll have to pay royalties to her? We all acquired some beautiful artwork. Interesting pictures cut only from black paper. Tiny, intricate images done in great detail. My image had trees, kites, people, animals, and a laundry line on it. But the best part of my picture was that whoever glued and mounted it to the background of white parchment bent and folded the paper in such a way that the picture appears to have a wind breezing through it. So imagine trees, kites, and laundry with movement. Very unique and beautiful.

Doug just phoned.....they've been shopping up a storm. The Chinese love to put a red stamp on everything, they call it their official chop or seal. He had official seals made for him and Nick (Nick's birthday is around the corner), he bought me a Prada purse (real, I'm sure), and a few other baubles.

Nick's jeans from the U.S. were starting to wear out....he has 3 or 4 pairs that he favors. I bought some jeans yesterday that said they were men's (there was some English on them), but it didn't say what size they were. They fit him perfect. I guess he's the size of a small Chinese man now. I've saved the label, so that I can go back and buy him more. It took me awhile to get across to the salesgirls that they weren't for me, but for a small man. I finally found a picture of Nick in my wallet, showed it to them, and said shi er (12 - his age).

I should get going. The men are coming home soon with their treasures and pizza from Pizza Hill.

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March 06

Don Cherry in China?

Today I had to go out and get some groceries. I hadn't been out for a couple of days, because we got quite a snowstorm two days ago. The streets are really messy, with chunks of ice and snow scattered all over. I have not seen any snowplows. Just teams of people with spades hacking away at the snow. As we drove by my favorite Chinglish signs advertising a new housing development, I looked up to read the signs. These are the signs that read, "One of a world bay," and "World class zone of the rich," and some other stuff about "nobility." I noticed that some of the billboard pictures had changed. They always have large billboards of people enjoying luxurious surroundings. I had to do a double take when I saw one of the billboards. I thought to myself, "Could that be Don Cherry?" For those non-Canucks reading this, every Canadian knows who Don Cherry is. He's a former NHL hockey player and now he's a commentator for NHL games (if he's still doing that, I'm not sure). He also owns a chain of restaurants in Canada, called Don Cherry's or Don Cherry's Grapevine...they're sports bars and grills. Looking at the billboard, I had a flashback to my younger years, when I could hear his annoying voice droning on and on during the Saturday night telecast of "Hockey Night in Canada." I had to do a quick search on the computer when I came home, to see if I could retrieve the picture off of the internet easily. Sure enough, I could. It took me about 2 minutes to pull it up at www.doncherrys.com (click on "About our restaurants"). Although when I tried to copy and paste the picture to this blog, something popped up saying "Copyright. Our work is not public domain, and should not be taken from this site." But the question remains, why a picture of Don Cherry of all people? Does he look regal and noble to the Chinese people? Like I'm going to say to Doug, "Ooooooh, look, Don Cherry lives there, he looks so regal and noble. Let's move and maybe we can live near him. I hope that I can hear his voice on a regular basis. Blah, blah, blah." Does Don Cherry know that his picture is on a very largebillboard in Tianjin, China? Did this housing development pay him for his picture to appear on a large billboard? Would Don find this funny, or would he sue them? Would he be honored to know that he is the picture of wealth, nobility, and regalness? Or could it be that just as the Germans love David Hasselhoff, the Chinese love Don Cherry?

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March 02

Thomas' Assembly

Thomas' class hosted an assembly this morning for the elementary school (pre-K to grade 5). He has a young, enthusiastic American teacher named Ms. Shanks. She told me afterwards that everything in the assembly was thought up by the students...completely student-driven. They were amazing! They've been studying advertising, so the children made up jingles for fake companies. Thomas' company was called "Thomas' Toys." The jingle was done to the tune of "Jingle Bells," and started out like this...."Thomas' toys, made for boys, good for tomboys, too." A trio of girls from his class sang a song. They harmonized very well together. Two other girls did a dance to a popular Chinese pop song. They invented some new dance moves I've never seen before. (For immediate family....remember back to Heather MacKinnon and I trying out our dance for you when I was in 5th grade to KC & The Sunshine Band's "That's the way...uh-huh, uh-huh, I like it" and thinking we should audition for the local cable access show "Bee Bop and Bubble Gum" until you laughed at us so hard that we were hiding behind the living room curtains....poor Heather! That's what these two girls looked like....a lot of teachers and adults looking down, trying not to laugh.). Another girl played a selection of Mozart on the piano. I venture to guess that she's been studying piano since she could sit up. Amazing fingers! Then the whole class put on a play....they adapted "The Tale of Desperaux." Thomas played two parts....he was the father mouse and the king. He got very dramatic and animated on the stage. I was proud to see that he had the confidence to carry it off. The teacher and I remarked afterwards on how happy we were that everyone could hear him. He's such a quiet talker sometimes.

After the assembly, Thomas' class hosted a little get together for the parents in their classroom. I saw Sarah, the PFO (Parent/Faculty Organization) president there. Her daughter is in Thomas' class. She had asked me when I first moved here if I'd be interested in volunteering for the PFO. I truthfully told her that I couldn't make any commitments at the time, because we were "in transition" as a family....exhausted from living out of the contents of our luggage, awaiting our air and sea shipments. That was back when we were sleeping on the Chinese mattresses made of palm leaves. For those of you who didn't get my earlier e-mail's, that was a very difficult time for us. It went on for almost a month and a half. The mattresses were as hard as rocks. We were absolutely exhausted and our bodies ached. Plus we were in a brand new house that no one had ever lived in before, so we were therefore the first ones to discover all of the little problems the house had that needed to be ironed out.....mostly electricity and plumbing issues. Interesting sidestory here....the children get out of school an hour early every Wednesday. This Wednesday, I was there an hour early to pick up my children. I noticed a distressed child and the kindergarten teacher with her, who also looked upset. I asked the teacher if one of the mom's forgot about the early dismissal. She sadly told me that the child belonged to a family that had just moved here.....they're still living in a hotel, waiting for their house to get ready. But their children are at an English school, they are from Germany and only speak German, plus they are in China. They can't even read the school handbook to find out the policies. I winced and said, "poor family." We discussed how hard that is on humans....that first couple of months of not having a home set up properly. That's one thing about this school....they're so aware of how hard it is in the beginning. The principal kept running up to me whenever he saw me, asking, "Really, how are you doing?" Luckily, I was able to laugh my way through almost everything. I knew that if I stopped laughing, it would be the end of us all. So, anyways, back to seeing Sarah again, the PFO president. She asked me again today if I'd be willing to do some volunteer work for the PFO. I hummed and hawed a bit, then she explained that there are not a lot of parents that speak English at the school, and that if I could help in any way at all......so I opened up my big mouth and mentioned that I type fast and have done some writing for newspapers and magazines. So now I'm the secretary for the PFO next year. There's an upcoming dance for the Secondary School at the Sheraton Hotel. The dance has a latino theme. Somehow I volunteered my husband to be in charge of the music. Not that he'll be going there and acting as DJ Mixmaster Doug E. Doug, but with his 5000 songs on his i-pod and his CD burner, I thought maybe he could burn a few discs of latino music to help out. He loves doing all of that technological stuff anyways.

Nick is going to take part in the 24 hour famine next Friday night. If you haven't heard of it, I'll try to explain it to you. Secondary schools all over the world take part in it. You sleep at the school overnight and you can't eat for 24 hours. I guess then you know what starvation feels like! It starts at 8 a.m. next Friday, then we pick him up Saturday morning at 8:00 a.m. Here's a blurb from the school newsletter explaining it....."Fasting is the act of abstaining from food. Although it is commonly practiced as a religious discipline, people nowadays also fast to emphasize their ideas or to realize something important. Our school student council will hold a 24 Hour Famine for Grades 6-12, to provide a greater understanding of global hunger and poverty and the motivation to do something about it. Funds raised through the 24 Hour Famine will be used to fight against hunger." The students will be fed breakfast in the school cafeteria at the end of the famine. I hope they make a lot of food that morning....there will be some very hungry kids! Nick has a pledge sheet and is gathering pledges (he only has one from me so far). It's brought out the social activist that I've always known was in him. He's the type of kid that always has something to say about any injustices he sees around him. I'll have to make sure to feed him a big breakfast next Friday morning.

I came home at lunch time and had lunch with Ayi. Her daughter returned to school this week after a very long holiday for Chinese New Year. I started asking her the hours of her daughter's school. Her daughter is in high school and just turned 17 years old. She said that her daughter gets up at 6:00 in the morning to get ready to go off to school, gets home at 5:30 at night, then has homework until midnight. Day after day! I groaned. That poor child.

After the assembly, I went to the shopping mall to top off my groceries for the weekend. Four males can make a dent in your groceries pretty quick. I saw the oddest thing there. Very funny. They have an area set up in the mall to advertise and sell homes in the community where I live, which is called Original County. There is a tiny, miniature city....it almost looks like a lego structure of where I live. So I was looking at that, trying to figure out which toy home was mine. Then a video started on the television set. It was a computer-generated video of what my community will eventually look like when they get trees and grass grown here. It also showed the plans for a shopping mall, a swimming pool (it's built, but remains empty until more people live here), a golf course (it's ready.....we hope to play a lot of golf this spring and summer), etc. Then in the video, they show the actor Matthew Broderick (Ferris Bueller, the newer Inspector Gadget) driving around looking in amazement at all of the houses and amenities in our community. Now, how much do you think they paid him to do that? I'd heard that famous western actors will do short commercials for big bucks in Asia. That should help his wife Sarah buy some new shoes and purses, huh? I can't imagine what their credit card bills look like....she loves the designer clothes (she was the lead actress in "Sex in the City").

On Sunday, there is some sort of Chinese celebration on Ancient Culture Street. Doug said his Chinese co-workers said that it's a must for us to go for us to see Tianjin culture....dances, costumes, etc. Ancient Culture Street is a very cool place. Local artisans and street vendors sell anything and everything. If you want to pick up some Chinese folk crafts, like artwork, framed needlecrafts, wooden swords, Chinese harps, etc. it's the place to go. Also, if you want to buy a cheap fake knock-off of any type of purse, wallet, sunglasses, watches, clothing, DVD's, etc., it's the place to go. Their knock-off's are really good here....the men's Rolex watches look amazing and work, too. They love the labels here....I have a lot of accessories (purses, eyeglasses) with names like "Prada," "Burberry," or "Armani," on them. I like when they spell the brand name incorrectly. I've seen Burberrys, and Anike (instead of Nike....it even had the swoosh on it). I've heard a couple of times that the street markets in Tianjin sell their merchandise cheaper than they do in Beijing. Probably there are more westerners with big bucks that can pay higher prices in Beijing....plus I imagine renting the stalls would be more expensive in the big city. I have yet to compare prices and see if this is true or not. I have noticed that Tianjin vendors are not as flexible on the bargaining thing.....Doug and I try all of the tricks. We say, "Gui", which means expensive, and walk away in indignation. Beijing vendors will chase you after that. Tianjin vendors wave their arm at you as if they are done with your bargaining ways and let you go along on your merry way. It's such a long dance.....the bargaining dance, I call it. You go back and forth on a price, you walk away, they call you back, you go back and forth verbally again, you walk away again, etc. Sometimes you just wish there was a price tag on it, you could pay it and be done with it. I was told by my friend in Beijing that once you haggle good prices with vendors, that you should go back to the same ones so that you don't have to go through the whole process again. I like when the vendors call me their "special friend," so I get "special price." Then they ask me to send my friends, but don't tell my friends about the special price.

School's out soon, I better go. I'll get Doug to download some photos in a couple of days. Be sure to check our website again....probably by the end of the weekend.

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March 01

Our Translators

It's the first day of March and it's raining today. Not cats and dogs raining, just a slow, steady drizzle. We haven't seen any rain since we arrived here at the end of December. We were very surprised to wake up to it this morning.

I just had a Chinese language lesson with my tutor. I'm proud to say that I can verbally and write in pinyin (sort of like our alphabet, but with a few interesting twists) many ways of counting. I can count to 999, tell the time of day, the day of the week, the month, and the year. But I can't touch my children in their mastery of the Chinese language. These kids are absolutely blowing me away! I've started referring to them as "the cutest little translators I know." We knew that going into this....everybody knows that children pick up languages quicker than adults. Hard to teach an old dog new tricks, huh? I'm leaning on the children for many translations. Even though I know my numbers, it doesn't come automatically with me. I'm looking up off into space and mumbling, trying to retrieve things out of my cluttered brain. Usually, my driver or a vendor is standing their patiently waiting for me to spit out the translation. Not so with my children, I've realized. So when we're in a hurry, and we need to tell the driver when the next time is that we need him, I often say, "Quick Thomas, what is the number 9 again?" And he'll spit it out at me. Just automatically, not stammering like I am while the brain tries to make a switch of languages.

What is really interesting is how my children can translate kangi characters, too. That's the beautiful Chinese writing that looks like artwork. We bought some DVD's. In fact, we've purchased many. They're very cheap here. We buy the season passes to many of our favorite television shows (mostly American and British). They often come as 5, 6, or 7 disc sets. So, we'll buy the 2nd complete season of "The Office," for instance. The outside of the discs have a smattering of English and Chinese on them. The numeric symbols for 1, 2, and 3 are quite easy to read.....one line for #1, two lines for #2, and three lines for #3. But then it all changes once you hit 4. They all look the same to me. So it turns into Doug and I asking, "Hey, Philip, which of these discs has a #4 on it?" Then Philip tells us. The children even try to teach us what the numbers are in kangi, but it doesn't stick to our brain as easily as it does to theirs. The children try to teach us, saying things like, "Mom, that's so easy....4 (or was it 5? see? I can't remember now) looks like a chair." Ahhhhh.....to have a young, fresh brain that is not cluttered with unnecessary trivia. I'm so envious how easy it comes to them.

When I have my language lessons, I'm often surprised how the French that I learned as a child comes back to me. It must be that I'm digging deep into a certain side of my brain that is the language center, and I start pulling out other languages as well. I've had it happen a few times that I'm counting to 10 in Chinese out loud, then #8, for example, "huit" comes flying out of my mouth in French, instead of "ba" as it is pronounced in Chinese. It hope I reach the day when this language stuff transfers over to another part of the brain where the translation is automatic, and you can think in that language. Don't know if that ever happens after a certain age.

I love that I can walk by Chinese people and pick out the odd word in Mandarin, now. I walked by a bunch of drivers at the school the other day at the end of the school day and heard the weird "laoshi." That means "teacher." Then I wondered what they were saying about the teachers. Hope it was all good. I went to the wholesale plant market yesterday (I have 4 vases full of mostly roses and other flowers), 2 orchids, a tropical plant that I can't name, and another purple flowering plant that I can't name, and I don't think I spent over $15 U.S. Almost everything I bought cost about 25 yuan....which is about $3 U.S. Roses came in bunches of 18. I love that I didn't have to pull out a calculator to get the vendors to show me how much the flowers cost. I was able to verbally find out how much the plants cost, pay the vendors, and exchange pleasantries (have a nice day, thank you, you're welcome, good bye, good morning, etc.). Then I came home and found out from Ayi that I probably should have paid even less for the flowers and plants. She speaks a bit of English, but I think she told me that I could have bartered even lower prices....10 yan for each bunch of flowers. I'll have to take her with me to the plant market next time. But part of me enjoys doing this by myself. I'm forced to learn the language to get by. I believe they call this "immersion" in some language classes. My husband has told me that some westerners can live in Shanghai for years and not learn very much Chinese. A lot of people speak English in Shanghai, so you're not forced to learn the language at all.

I have to get going. School ends pretty soon and I've got to go and pick up the children.

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February 27

Our Neighbors

There are many blocks of housing in our complex called Original County. There are only two other western families from New Zealand. They are in an another block of housing adjacent to us....probably a ten minute walk away. There are many empty houses around us, but we have neighbors on both sides of us. They are both Chinese families. We nod and smile and say "nie hao" in greeting, but that's about the extent of our socializing with them. I sense that they want to keep to themselves. Plus they are rarely home, they both seem to lead busy lives. Neither of these families have children, as far as I can tell. Not even sure if they have wives. They are both middle-aged men. The fellow to the left of us has a fish tank in his back yard. I like to watch him off my bedroom balcony sometimes. I don't think he knows that I'm watching him. It's very interesting the amount of time he spends doing stuff to his fish tank. I can't see inside the fish tank from my balcony, because he has it covered with a large wooden square that he props up sometimes when he's gucking around in there. He has all sorts of equipment that he uses in the maintenance of his fish tank. His equipment looks like swimming pool equipment....nets with handles to clean out weeds and dirt, hoses, vacuum-type attachments for cleaning it, etc. I think he stocks the fish tank with his future meals. I'm not sure when those fish see the light of day...probably before they hit the plate. I wish I could see the fish. I don't think they're ornamental fish...I think they're strictly the eating kind. I saw him once with a plastic pail full of long, skinny eel-like things swimming around in it. Then I had to go do something and never got to see whether or not he added these eels or whatever they were to the tank. I don't know if these squirming things were food for bigger fish, or babies that he wanted to fatten up. I'll have to keep my eye on him.

The only thing I know about my other neighbor is that he has two large, black dogs. They used to bark outside all night long. It got that we weren't sleeping. The dogs weren't, either. Well, they'd sleep during the day in the sun because they were exhausted from barking all night. The kids started complaining that the dogs had kept them up all night. This wasn't a good thing....especially on school nights. I finally had to do something, but I didn't know how to communicate with the neighbor. I called my favorite gal Rebecca from the relocation company and told her about the situation. I used the words "children" and "education", two very important words in China. I probably should have thrown in "boy children" as well, for good measure. She agreed that barking dogs shouldn't be interfering with the children's education. I told her that I didn't want a neighbor to be angry with me....this was scary territory for me...I'm a foreigner, and he belongs here. I wasn't sure what could be done. Rebecca, as always, handled it very well. She got someone to talk to him and convey to him that we didn't want any hard feelings, we just wanted our children to sleep on school nights. He said that his dogs would sleep in the garage at night and that he had no hard feelings about it. Whew! So, there are two dogs next door that must like me a lot. They get to sleep in a warm garage at night in the winter now.

The house across the street has been decorated and a "for rent" sign went up yesterday morning. It will be interesting to see who moves in there. The New Zealanders (we called them "Kiwi's" here) tell me that another Kiwi family is moving into our complex in the spring. I met them about a month ago, they are a very lovely couple. Their children are older and in university in NZ. They joked that us Canadians will be outnumbered. They're all such lovely people, I can't imagine a better group to be surrounded and outnumbered by. I made some joke back that they'll have to make us honorary Kiwi's...they told me that we'd have to eat sheep as part of the process. I'm learning some Kiwinglish, by the way. The Kiwi's have cute sayings that they use. My favorite is when they call someone a "hangman." I had to finally ask what that means. I was told that's when someone kind of does themselves in with their own antics. Naughty children are sometimes referred to as a hangman. "He's a bit of a hangman, he is," they'll say. Hopefully they don't think my kids are little hangmen.

Have to go....the driver's here. School's out in a few minutes.

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Gathering & Talking

I spent the morning "gathering." I'm able to find just about everything I need to make some decent meals in Tianjin, but there's no such thing as "one stop shopping." There are various shops scattered all over this city of ten million plus. These stores are not easy to get in and out of (often the groceries are on the third floor....why????), so I'm lucky to hit two of them in one day. There's a couple of different grocery stores (they called them supermarkets here....or "chou shur" in Chinese) that stock cheeses from the U.S., France, and New Zealand. One store in town has Hormel pepperoni, so I try to go there once in awhile. It's hard to find diet soda's here, so I go to yet another store for that. Coffee filters can be found on the other end of town. Cereals in a different corner of the city. I think you get the picture.

By far, the best supermarket I've found here is a local Chinese market. One Saturday, the whole family was in town all day. On the way home, Doug asked the driver if he could stop and buy beer somewhere. Our driver went off the beaten path of the main shops and zigzagged through some neighborhoods. He pulled up to a place and pointed at it. Doug and him ran in. Doug got his beer (some Chinese brand I've never heard of before), but when he came out, he told me that I needed to come back on my own someday, that there were individual vendors selling fresh fruit, vegetables, eggs, and meat. So, about a week later, I told the driver and Ayi that I needed to buy some beer. We have a hard time communicating with our driver, and he with us. There is a lot of charades, pictionary, broken English, and broken Chinese going on back and forth. I figured it was just easier to tell him I needed beer when we drove near that market. Sure enough, he drove to that market again. This has got to be the best fruit and vegetable market in the world! I don't think many westerners had gone in there before, because all of the vendors looked at me in amazement the first time I stepped in. The freshest fruits and vegetables that I've ever seen.....large pineapples, succulent strawberries, juicy apples, various types of lettuce (and they'll take off the browning outside lettuce leaves for you before they weigh it....I've never seen that done before!), red tomatoes, green onions, regular onions, potatoes and carrots fresh out of the earth, and all sorts of colors and sizes of peppers. You name it, they have it! I now go there regularly (I'm greeted like Norm at Cheers now...they know they've got me....they go under their counters to give me the even fresher stuff), but I've learned a few things. I go with a calculator and a large wicker basket. The calculator I use so that they can show me how much everything costs...I hand them the calculator as I do jabbing gestures on it. The large wicker basket is to hold all of the fresh bounty. There are no shopping carts here. My westerner friends say that I'm crazy, and that I should just send my Ayi there with money and a list. But I love this market...this is part of the experience of being in China. My Chinese is getting better because I'm immersing myself...I'm trying to wean myself off of the calculator. Also, I like to pick out fresh fruits and veggies myself, and see what looks the best and what's in season. Anyways, after that first visit, Ayi and my driver were laughing about something. I asked Ayi what was so funny. She asked me why I didn't buy any beer. I told her that I didn't want beer, I wanted the fruits and veggies, but wasn't sure how to tell the driver that. They laughed again.

Now talking about Ayi and driver laughing together, it happened once that they got real chatty in the car. They were both speaking Chinese and they both laughed a lot. All I could do was look out the window and wonder what they were saying. I was chatting to my western friend afterwards, and we tried to imagine what the two of them were talking about and what they were laughing about. We ended up laughing, when we took various guesses.... "Why do these people eat so many dairy products and bread?" "What's up with all of the toilet paper they use?" "What the heck are they doing on the computer all day?" "What's the deal with all of the pre-packaged tomato (spaghetti and ketchup) products." "Why do they wear different clothes everyday?" "How could they possibly cook a decent meal with such little rice and oil?" (they sell rice and oil in gargantuan-sized bags here).

But I hope you readers don't get me wrong. We have two great employees. Ayi is absolutely amazing. She works way too hard and she's got to be one of the sweetest people I've ever met. I've heard a few stories about ayi's not working out with some families, but we sure are lucky with ours. Maybe it was a good fit for our family, or maybe it's her. I think it's her...she's just a very good person. Mike, our driver, always shows up on time. If I don't have a business card, it's very hard to tell him where to take me, and sometimes he'll get it wrong. But we usually sort it out in the end. He has a good sense of humor...I can see the faces he makes at the guards sometimes and I have to giggle. Mike is a very social man....I see him chat to every Chinese person he comes across. I'm very social....I chat to every English person I come across. I think this is hard on both of us, the language barrier. But I'm learning more Chinese everyday and he learns more English everyday. We meet in the middle somehow.

Speaking of social chatters, the people of Tianjin are known all over China for how social they are. Here's a quote from the book Intercontinental's Best of China: "People in Tianjin are also known as great talkers; they can yak on and on, which also makes them great arguers. Many of China's most famous cross-talkers, comedians who give hilarious pun-filled monologues and dialogues hail from Tianjin. Even if you're not fluent in Chinese, just observing the animated conversations of the locals will convince you that they've been given the gift of gab." This quote is so true. On many street corners, you can see large groups of men chatting together. It looks like they meet there regularly and are going to be at it all day. They look so happy to be sharing their stories. There's a sense of community in their gatherings. Watching them, you just know it's a necessity for their well-being to gather and socialize. Doug's American co-worker rents a townhouse across town. His landlord is a famous television cross-talker. I have yet to figure out who he is exactly and try to watch him. I should do that soon. My tutor gave me a good tip. She said that I'll learn Chinese faster if I watch some Chinese television. She said that was how she got her English better when she lived in Canada.

I should get going. Hope you all enjoyed the update.

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February 24

Our trip to Beijing

Well, we just got back from Beijing yesterday. We went for four days and three nights. We sure are tired, packing in so many adventures into such a small space of time. When we first arrived to Beijing, we hit a grocery store there that carries a lot of our western food staples that we were missing so dearly. The children were so excited to find Kraft Dinner, Chef Boy Ardee, and many other items. We then went to the hotel to check in, then had our driver take us to the Pearl Market to drop us off before he headed back to Tianjin for a couple of days off (and to kindly put all of our groceries in our garage). What a surprise when we learned that the Pearl Market was closed. Many businesses were closed because it's Spring Festival Holiday right now. Many of the people who live in Beijing go back to their villages to visit with their families during this week. For some, it's their once a year trip back home. We were told by many locals in Beijing that we were lucky that we didn't have to deal with crowds and crowds of people, which can sometimes be a problem in the big city. Luckily, the toy market was beside the Pearl Market. Of course, with our three boys in tow, we had to go and check that out. Our three boys were in video game heaven. Doug enjoys bartering with the merchants, and we all have a laugh watching his technique.

That evening, we went for dinner at Jenn and Scott Bailey's house. They barbecued steaks and burgers. Yummy! We hadn't seen them since last August, when they told us that they were moving to Beijing. I still remember them telling us, and me murmuring to Doug afterwards, "Wow, are they ever brave. Don't know if I could do that." Lo and behold a few months later, we were going through almost the same experience as them. I'm indebted to Jenn for all of her packing tips and pointers on what we needed to stock up on. She should really write a pamphlet or something as a support for the wives moving to China.

On Wednesday, we awoke to a fog so thick that you could literally use a knife to cut it. I later read that it brought Beijing to a standstill, closing some roads, and not many flights landing or departing that day. We wanted to go and look at Chinese furniture. We really need an extra wardrobe for clothing storage. Jenn recommended a great place called Aika, but warned us that the locals will try to bring us to IKEA, because they think that us westerners really dig IKEA. So, I asked the concierge to write out a card for a taxi driver and told him that we wanted to go to AIKA, not IKEA. Well, the taxi driver drove all over town for the longest time, and sure enough, we found ourselves at IKEA. This is something that happens quite a bit here in China. You want to go somewhere, but without a business card from that business with the address written in Chinese, it is hard to communicate that to any Chinese drivers. We need to learn better Chinese. We didn't really feel like shopping at IKEA, because we can do that almost anywhere in North America, so when we realized that the driver had no idea what AIKA was, we just asked him to bring us to the Canadian Embassy. We were told by a cultural counsellor in the U.S. that it's a good idea to visit your country of origin's Embassy when you live in another country. So, we get there and it doesn't open for another 45 minutes. It is nowhere near any businesses, so we were just forced to sit outside and wait. In the meantime, a Canadian fellow and his Chinese girlfriend were in the same predicament. Nice young couple that are getting married shortly. They were there to get their paperwork in order for the marriage. He's from Vancouver. They gave us all sorts of tips on where to get this or that. When we got into the Embassy, we were told that we should just register online. So, we wasted a lot of time going there. But this Canadian fellow gave us many great tips. His girlfriend got us a taxi and gave the taxi driver instructions to get us off to a great market. Everything imaginable that you would want to purchase.....clothing, accessories, jewellery, etc. They highly recommended an optical place where we got prescription sunglasses made up for all of us that need prescriptions (4/5 of us). My sunglasses say "Prada" and "Made in Italy" on them. Highly unlikely that they are either. But Doug bargained a great deal for us, and when we picked up the glasses the next day, we were all delighted that the prescriptions were correct. Nick looks like a secret service agent in his. Way cool. Philip and Thomas look like little John Lennon's. Very hip.

That evening, we met up with the Bailey's again at the Hard Rock Cafe in Beijing. There was a Chinese rock band there that played songs from the 70's and 80's. They were so awesome, we were all singing along. I think I'll always giggle when I hear "Private Eyes" by Hall & Oates now. Jenn and I had some sort of clapping rhythm going during that song. You know how it goes....."Private Eyes....clap, clap.....they're watching you....clap, clap.....they see your every move." Our kids thought we were insane.

The next day, we went on a guided tour of Tian'anmen Square and the Forbidden City. We got a lot of attention in the square for some reason. I think there were a lot of tourists there from all over China, and that maybe some of them had not seen many westerners. Very friendly people. We will be in a lot of personal photo albums throughout China after our trek through the Square. One family even followed us for awhile and just kept giggling. Of course, our having three boys garners a lot of attention. We then toured the Forbidden City. We walked for about three hours and still didn't see it all. I was very interested to learn that many of the emperor's had about 50 concubines. If a concubine produced a son, then she'd have a lot of power in her hands. Of course, after hearing that, I couldn't help but whisper to Doug, "See? I'm highly valued in many cultures.....producing three boys. You better treat me like the empress that I am." That comment gave Doug and our guide a good chuckle.

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February 14

Philip's Class

Hi everyone,

Philip just brought the cutest thing home a couple of days ago. I had to share it with everyone. Philip's got this young, enthusiastic male teacher named Mr. Chad Walsh. Correction, it's Dr. Chad Walsh. He's got his doctorate in conflict resolution. So I guess there will never be any quarrels in that class, huh? He's an Aussie and he's the most beautiful man you'll ever lay eyes on. All of the mothers talk about how dreamy-looking he is. He can't be a day over 24 years old. Anyways, aside from being so dreamy-looking, he's a very good teacher, too. He set up the greatest activity for the children the other day. On a blank piece of paper, the children had to write their name on the top. Then this piece of paper was sent around the room. Everyone in the class had to write one positive thing about that student. Philip has a lot of South Korean students in his classroom. English is not their first language. So some of the comments are absolutely priceless and so sweet. I had to share them with everyone:

Philip is all day reading a book. I think so Philip is very good study.
Philip is good soccer and in P.E. time, he is play very well (game).
Philip is very kind and he is very
smart. He is a great friend.
Philip is very smart and kind boy.
Philip is very good study.
Philip is very like reading.
Philip is a positive and happy student. He asks excellent questions. He is doing well at school and enjoys all sports. He is fun and willing to take risks. (I would venture to guess that Dr. Teacher McDreamy wrote that one).
Philip loves reading book and a curious person.
You are a new student but you're very confident at speaking English.
You're funny and good.
You're are nice and funny because you act like a monster. (my personal favorite)
He is a funny kid.
You are new but you show amazing
work.
You are new at this school but you are good at English.
You are funny and are always smiling.
You are new student, you're working hard. I like that way to working hard.
You are very smart and funny.
You make me fun. (I like that one, too)
You always are happy. Have fun with Thomas!
You are very kind and happy. You have a positive attitude and are already adapting to IST! (that must be the brightest girl in the class that wrote that one....some big concepts there)
You are so kind.

So, Philip came home waving that paper with a big smile on his face. I've tucked it away to keep forever. It's just so cute.

Great news....we get

our sea shipment delivered to our house at ten in the morning tomorrow. Doug is taking the day off. Also, ayi will be here to help us.

Last week, I brought ayi grocery shopping with me. She's so helpful and the Chinese New Year holiday is just around the corner. We ended our shopping trip in the meat area. I told her that I'd like her to pick out a nice cut of meat for her family, and that I'd like to pay for it. Of course, we had to go back and forth on this for quite awhile. But I told her that she makes my family so happy, that I want to make her family happy. So she finally went and talked to the butcher. But she didn't like what he had to offer. She pointed to the back, and he argued with her. I asked her what is wrong. She told me that she thinks that he has fresher meat in the back. This went one for quite awhile. Finally in exasperation, he went to the

back. He came out with fresher meat. Then there was a bit of back and forth between her and the butcher. Exasperated again, he trimmed all of the fat off of the meat before he weighed it. I whispered to her, "Oooooh....you're good." She laughed me off. On the drive home, she told me that her and her mother will take the pork that I bought and will make dumplings with them on the weekend, that they will mince all of the pork by hand and then freeze the dumplings for Chinese New Year holiday. This was on a Thursday. Friday she came to my house, and told me that she brought the pork to her parent's house that night. They all wanted to tell our family a big thank you, and let me know how happy they were. I told her again that she makes me so happy, that I'm glad to make her family happy. So, she came here to work today (Monday morning) and had a little bag of her dumplings that were frozen. She put them in

the freezer. They looked like the tiniest perogies. I asked her how to cook them. She told me that she would show me at the end of the day. So I made my mother's chicken stir fried rice while ayi showed me how to cook these dumplings. It starts with a fry, turns into a boil, ends with a fry....all in a shallow frying pan. She had water and oil involved. So, I finally got to try the famous Tianjin dumpling. Really, open any book about China. Go to the back, and look up Tianjin in the index. Then when you turn to the page about Tianjin, it will go on about the local dumplings. It was crazy/good. Delicate flavoring....tiny shrimps with minced pork inside and a little bit of green onion. I asked her if she could show me how to make them someday. She smiled and nodded. She told me that a family that she used to work for (Malaysians) will phone her when they're visiting in town and put in

an order for her dumplings. I know that I will definitely have to learn how to make these dumplings.

I should get going to bed now. I dropped off 3 healthy kids at school this morning, and picked up two pale, lethargic, feverish kids and one healthy one. Nick and Tom looked like rag dolls all evening. There is a virus going around Tianjin that lasts about 5 days....fever, lethargy, sore throat, etc. I just hope that I don't get it. Doug went to bed early, too, saying he didn't feel that great. Should be interesting tomorrow.....big sea shipment arriving and two kids home sick. Anyways, I can't believe that we'd been as healthy as we were for this long during such a stressful time. I've heard some CAT wives chatter about "the moving flu." I guess we dodged the bullet too long.

Hope you're all doing well.

Take care,

Sue &

boys

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Names

Hi everyone,

Well, I've been all over the city of Tianjin this week and my head can't move quick enough to try to catch it all as the driver takes me here, there, and everywhere. Just thought I'd share the funnier things I noticed this week with everyone.

When the Chinese work with many westerners, they must know that we can't keep their names straight. Their names are like their language....subtle differences in tone can change the whole word. So they choose their own English name. Some of them make wonderful choices. Some of them get it kind of wrong. It's hit and miss. Older names seem to be in vogue with younger women. I've met many Helen's, Betty's, and Susan's. Susan is a very popular name here. It must be fate that I'm here. Wendy also seems to be a popular name here, but I've seen an interesting variation it. I've met a couple of young women named "Windy." One even has a nametag with that spelled on it. She works at one of our favorite restaurants. The name suits her. Makes me think of that song from the 60's...."Everyone knows it's Windy." Now for the men's names. I've met several with names that are commonplace for us. I've met a David and a Mike. But I've also met an Elvis and another nice man named Eleven. Why did he choose Eleven, I wonder. Is it better than Ten? Oh well, the locals here kind of giggle at my husband Doug's name. They wonder why he wants to be called a dog. Our last name, Johnston, is widely recognized and respected here. There was a British professor with the surname Johnston who was the private tutor of the last Chinese emperor. The Chinese proncounced his name as Jong-shu-don. We get big smiles when we tell people here what our last name is and use the Chinese pronounciation.

Speaking of meanings being lost in translation, what I'm probably enjoying the most is reading the "Chinglish" signs on the road. There are many signs in English, but they rarely make sense to me. I jotted some down yesterday. My favorite one is "Man Kneading Shop." I wondered to myself, "Is that a clay shop, or a bakery.....no, I believe it's a massage parlor." I'm still not sure what they're selling there. Maybe I don't want to know. I also passed by the "Tianjin Kernel Cucumber Research Institute." They're researching the kernels of cucumbers? Do cucumbers have kernels? Wouldn't that make a nice name for a children's show....Colonel Cucumber? There are many new neighborhoods being developed in Tianjin. So there are many billboards advertising these new neighborhoods to lure you to move there. These billboards have pictures of beautiful, tropical areas that are maybe taken from a photo shop computer program and blown up to billboard size. I haven't seen anywhere in Tianjin that looks like these pictures. But the ads they write up over these pictures makes me giggle. It says things like, "Enjoy the same class of private," and "One of a world zone of the rich." I have to take a picture of the ad for my community, which is called Original County. It's a big, long story that doesn't make a lot of sense to me. It starts off, "In Africa there exists...." There is nothing African about the design of the houses in our neighborhood. I promise I will get a picture of this sign and share it with you soon. I have to get Doug (or Dog, as he's called here) to show me how to use the digital camera, and I will share some of these signs with you. They're everywhere. When I use the bank machine, a warning pops up telling me to be aware of those peeping my password. I'll get working on collecting a file of these Chinglish signs. But don't get me wrong, they don't annoy me. They're very cute, almost lyrical. It makes me think that maybe the Chinese language is somewhat poetic and lyrical. I should find out soon, I've stepped up my Chinese lessons to twice a week.

Well, I'm off to study some more Chinese. My tutor gives me a pop quiz at the beginning of each lesson.

Zaijian (Goodbye),

Sue & boys

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January 26/07

Hi everyone,

We had quite a bit of snow today, and the roads are slippery. I've made the safe decision to stay close to home today while the kids are at school. People don't drive very good here.....I've seen a lot of accidents. I don't even want to see what's going on today on the roads. I'd have trouble driving here, too. There's a huge bike issue here. Tianjin locals only started getting automobiles about ten to fifteen years ago, so many of them still use bikes to get around. There are all sorts of bikes....electric, gas, powered scooter, etc., but they weave in and out of the auto traffic. There are pedestrians walking in and out of traffic, many have a job of putting advertisement cards on your windshield. Then there are the guys with donkey carts selling vegetables. I've even seen one sleeping while the donkey pulls him. Imagine that....donkey cart auto pilot. Sometimes I don't even want to look out the window when the driver is driving us around.

I am going to the school today about an hour early. There is an assembly for some Tibetan exchange students that have been attending the school for a week. They are going to put on some sort of song and dance for our school in their traditional outfits. Now, I've seen their robes that they wear and those were very interesting, so I thought I wouldn't want to miss this. I may never meet Tibetans again.

Speaking of interesting cultural experiences, my husband has been having quite a few. He has travelled all over Asia for the month of January to meet all of his business contacts. He has gone to Chengdu, where he went to see panda bears. He also went to Inner Mongolia, and was invited to dinner. He couldn't understand why his Japanese co-worker said that they didn't have time for dinner, because he thought that they did. His Japanese co-worker, Yao San, later told him that it might have ended up being sheep's brains, which is quite a delicacy there, so he was trying to "save" Doug from having to try that. Doug found Shanghai to be very westernized. He told me that if I ever felt like I needed to go to a big city for some better shopping, that we could go to Shanghai on a long weekend. That it the air flights are only about $50 return per person. We might have to do that some day.

I stocked up on a lot of stuff before we moved here. The one thing I didn't buy was a new purse, because I knew that I could buy one here, and it would be fun to barter for a good one in the street markets of Beijing. Apparently I can also go about an hour away to Tanggu, where there are street markets with real designer purses (I think that's what my driver was trying to tell me). Anyways, my old purse starting falling apart on me, and I had to get one quick. So I asked the driver to bring me to the street markets of Tianjin. Now, we bought him an electronic translator, and we bought one, because his English is poor and our Chinese is very poor. So he brought me there, but then he wanted to type me a big message. So I waited while he typed. Then he showed me the message and I had to smile and nod yes. It said something about, "conscientious buyer beware....what appear to be real always isn.'t" So then I showed him my frayed purse that was falling apart and told him that I was just buying a purse to get by, until I got to Beijing for real ones. That's when he told me about Tanggu. So, in the Tianjin street market, I bought a fake Burberry. It's so obviously fake, it's funny. I liked the size of it, where the zippers where, and the compartments, plus the look of it. But it says, "Burberrys" on it. Love the "s" they tagged onto it.

I started language lessons this week. My tutor is a young woman named Claire. Her English is very good. She lived in Canada for 3 years and studied at George Brown College outside of Toronto. I find Chinese very difficult to learn. There are some pronunciations that I'll never get my mouth to do, because it's never done them before. I even ask Claire, "where's your tongue when you do that?" and I'm trying to look in her mouth. Some sounds I've never heard in my life. She bought me a book to help teach me. It came with an audio CD. So I put it in my computer every day and practice saying the sounds back over and over. Still can't seem to get it. As I suspected, the kids are getting it a lot quicker than me. Our little artist, Thomas, is getting over 90 on every Chinese test. He even gets tested on the conji characters (that's their written language). Philip probably has about an 80 average in Chinese. Nick never seems to get tested in Chinese. Which is very interesting at this school.....those are the only marks I've seen. I see my children's papers are marked in red pen by their teachers, and the teachers write the corrections in red pen beside their work, but I don't see a final mark, like "87" written anywhere except on the twins weekly Chinese test. It's kind of refreshing and not as stressful.

I went to a bookstore that said, "Foreign Language Bookstore." I was very excited. There were 4 floors of books, and all of them looked Chinese. I finally got to the top floor and found a few English books, but not very many, maybe about 50. I was hoping to find some magazines or newspapers. But, no luck. I do miss that....I'm a reader. I miss my daily newspaper. I had figured that I could read news on the internet, but I still can't access many sites from North America. There was an earthquake in Taiwan the day we arrived in China, and many cables under the ocean sustained damage. I guess it's tricky business repairing them.

Nick is very excited about an upcoming school dance for the middle school. He's widening his circle of friends. Initially he was talking about Michael from Scotland and Alex from Australia. Now he's also hanging out with William and Oscar. I have no idea where they are from. The twins mainly hang out with our New Zealand, neighbor, Alex. They also talk about a couple of kids from France. All of the kids go on about the South Korean students. There are a lot of them at all of the international English schools here. They try to talk in Korean all day, and the teachers have to be strict about the "English only" rule.

I am turning into quite the cook, because I have to. I've had to go back to basics. We haven't been able to find a decent pizza place here. We ordered from one place, but it tasted like there was a dirty dish rag involved when it was made. So, I finally found some yeast last week. I got my mother to email me her pizza dough recipe that she makes in a breadmaker. But we could not get the breadmaker running before Doug travelled out again. We are still waiting for some transformers, converters, and transformers that we put on our sea shipment. So, I made the dough by hand. That's a lot of kneading! It turned out fantastic. I told Doug that if he gave me a month, that I would be throwing the dough in the air and singing Italian songs. I haven't seen my kids eat so good in the last month as when I made that pizza.

My maid watched me make the pizza dough. I asked her what her specialty is in cooking. She told me about the Tianjin dumpling. I asked her if she could show me how to make it someday. She got very excited, and told me that would be a great idea.

When I got my air shipment, my maid and I (I'll call her "ayi"....which is what we call her, it means "auntie"....I hate saying "My maid") were unpacking our Pfaltzgraff dishes. She told me they were beautiful, then told me that we could drive an hour away from Tianjin and buy dishes just like that. I turned the dish over, and it said, "made in China." I told her that I would love for her to take me there some day. Can't believe our dishes have crossed the ocean twice.

We are trying to plan a vacation for the 3rd week of February. That is the Chinese New Year holiday here, and just about everyone has a week off. We want to go to Sanya, China....it's a 3 hour flight south of here. It's called the "Hawaii of China." Very tropical and beautiful. Many five star western resorts, such as the Hilton, Marriott, etc. The flights are booked up pretty solid. Our travel agent (she's in Hong Kong....has worked for my sister-in-law Cheryl's brother John for years) has us booked on a flight there and a flight back, but has us pending on some other ones. The dates weren't quite what we wanted, but this has been thrown together so last-minute. We may end up going there a bit longer than we wanted.....9 days. I can't imagine going on vacation for 9 days. I'm such a homebody now after being displaced into hotels on our Christmas holidays.

For those who know me well, you know that I'm a knitter. I found a wool shop yesterday. All of the wool is made in Tianjin. I bought the most unique wool. Hard to describe.....it's a few different types of wool interwoved somehow....I got a cherry/white/purple mix. I bought 4 big balls, not sure what I'll do with it until I get my pattern books. Mitts and a scarf maybe. I'm still not that good with money, so I wasn't sure exactly how much I was paying at the time. I got home and figured out the conversion. It was under $5.

Some things are so crazy/cheap here, that you think a mistake must have been made. For those of you who love plants and flowers, I wish you could have been with me on Monday. I went to a wholesale plant/flower/vases/pots market. I bought about 20 fresh lily flowers to put in a vase, a vase, 2 huge pots, potted azaleas, and two very tropical flowering-type trees. It came to under $20 U.S. The flowers are different varieties here. My lilies are huge, I've never seen lilies this big. Doug loves all of that stuff....plants and pots. I'm going to have to bring him soon. He'll be in 7th heaven.

I should get going. Hope you're all doing well. We miss everyone!

Sue & boys

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