CARRICK CORNER

Home of the Carrick Family Website

Wednesday 29th July, 2009

Tuesday, 28th July, 2009
As I sit here and look out my study window I see the rain drizzling down outside, the shaded front yard, beyond that, the occasional person walking by. It's a wonderful room, with a whole wall of windows facing the front of the house and another on the side.

This seems to be one of the last rooms we're getting to with our unpacking and setting up, but it's coming along pretty fast. I hope to find a nice comfy chair to place in the corner by the window so I can sit and watch TV while I bead or scrap-book.

It's raining again today. Mostly a light drizzle but it keeps the temperature down and makes staying inside and unpacking more tolerable. It does make the drying of laundry somewhat more difficult.

In addition to unpacking we're also painting Maxine's bedroom - purple! Even though we primed the walls it's still taking a few coats of paint and with the damp air it's really taking a long while to dry thoroughly before we can get the next layer on. We might be finished by tomorrow, with any luck. I painted the only paintable wall in the kitchen apple green - it looks awesome. The floors are checkerboard white and navy blue. I ordered roman shades in a small blue & white check with a green trim - I can't wait to see them! It's turning into one of my favorite rooms. If only the oven would work properly - I'm waiting for the day when I singe my eye-brows off!

Draperies and shades are really inexpensive here. For about US$600 we got lined Roman shades for 3 windows, wooden roller shades for 10 windows, sheers for 6 windows, lined drapery panels for 4 windows, and un-lined drapery panels for 3 windows! Installed too!
The "shopping center" where we got the draperies was a dingy looking building, maybe 3 or 4 stories tall. It's jam-packed with little stores, no bigger than a bathroom. They all have drapery samples from floor to ceiling in the various fabrics they offer. Even if you can't find the fabric at one store the person you're dealing with will go buy it from the other store and fabricate the draperies for you anyway, saving you having to deal with more than one store. They sell everything from sheers, to shades, to beaded curtains, in every shade, size and configuration possible. The only issue is communicating what you want! My doodles seemed to work well though.

Shopping has been quite an ordeal so far. We've been to a few stores, similar to a Wal-mart. I would say Target too, but that would be being too kind! For the most part they're okay, if you eat noodles, chicken feet, soy sauce, dumplings, or Chinese tea, because there are aisles and aisles of it! The meat and fish departments give me the eebie-jeebies! I just can't stand the sight of all the strange "delicacies" or the live things still crawling around - eeeeck!
We battled to find a lot of the basics since all the packaging is in Chinese and the labels on the shelves are too. You really have to examine the package, give it a poke, or squish, and see what else is around it to be able to determine what it is you're buying! Even that's not fool-proof though and you could come home with a huge bag of salt instead of sugar.
We can order food from Shanghai though and they deliver to your kitchen every Friday. It's actually a very good selection of products. Obviously, you might run into something being out of stock occasionally but for the more part I think we'll manage just fine. We have an IKEA in Nanjing too - we've been there twice already! We've also got a store much like Sams that sells everything in bulk that I might be able to use more when more expats come back from their summer holidays. We can probably share a lot of the bigger packages since we don't have the storage space for large items. Yesterday we also went to B & Q, which is like Home Depot. We shopped around and got what we needed, saving the Gardening Section till last. We walked through the doorway to find that it was all silk flower arrangements!  Not a single live plant in sight anywhere! So much for gardening - dusting maybe!

We're definitely an attraction wherever we go! It's quite an uncomfortable feeling, being stared at constantly, and talked about.  I've been able to recognize snippets of conversation and comments though. I'm waiting for the day that I can answer them back in Chinese!  The other day, when we were out shopping for draperies, we were going over a list of things with out relo lady that we needed doing to the house. This little old Chinese lady comes right up and leans in to see what we were looking at or reading, decides it wasn't that interesting and wanders off. Then a youngish Chinese guy comes up with his baby to meet the "mei guo's" or Americans - basically anyone who's not Chinese is an American! Most of the time people are quite friendly if you get chance to "communicate" with them, but we have come across some who have made it fairly obvious with their facial expressions of their disdain for us!

Our driver, Di Fa Boa, is a young guy, with a toddler daughter. He doesn't speak much English but we seem to be able to get where we need to go for the most part.  It's quite refreshing to have someone have the car ready with a/c running, to rush around to open the door for you, or to quickly gather all your shopping bags and take them to the front door! I could get used to this very quickly! There are no words to explain the complete havoc on the roads here - it's something you would have to experience to appreciate! I'm thankful every time I get in the car that I have a driver!

Rory seems to be doing okay in his new job. He hasn't really had much time to do anything with moving in, and all the farewell celebrations for the guy who is retiring. He's got one tonight and another Friday night. He's been enjoying being able to do odd jobs around the house like installing shelves, hanging racks, etc. With masonry walls there's no hammering in nails to hang pictures here! We have to get a new fitting and gas bottle for our BBQ and I'm sure he's going to be out there every night cooking steaks or burgers!

We have a mountain of moving boxes. The movers used so much paper wrapping everything - we even found a pen wrapped in a whole sheet of paper, as well as a zip-lock bag wrapped up nice and safe! Sooooo frustrating! Yet, Rory's computer screen was just wrapped in one sheet of paper and stuck in a box with the screen facing the outside of the box! No logic! I think Rory will be very pleased when he can get rid of all the empty boxes and can reclaim his garage!

Maxine and Sydney have been enjoying the soccer field and basketball courts that are not even 5 minutes from our house; in fact I think we can see them from Maxine's bedroom window. Pretty much every afternoon they've gone for a long while to shoot some hoops or kick the ball around. They've also been playing on the little kid's playground - on the little elephant ride! It's a gated and guarded community so we feel quite safe from the "outside world", but obviously still have to be aware of our surroundings. The guards do patrol throughout the day, and I'm assuming throughout the night too. They also call to let you know that someone is at the gate, like the TV installation guy, or IKEA delivery.
At the very least it gives you a few minutes to get out your pj's!

The dogs are doing well - I think they really enjoyed their doggy-day-camp in Singapore. Buster lost some weight - about 13 pounds! I think it was all the walking and swimming! Frisco is getting so old. He's almost totally deaf - you have to be right next to him before he can hear you, and he just dodders around all day.

We have a maid - or AYI, as they're referred to here. She doesn't speak a word of English - not even "hello" - but we manage to communicate somehow. It's forced me to use the little Chinese I do know, that's for sure! She started this morning and she's busy ironing. I went in to see if she was doing okay a while ago and told her she should have a rest, in Chinese, and she actually understood me! I don't even know her name yet! It's all very strange how things work here….she showed up yesterday and I didn't have a clue who she was. After a while I figured she was here to "interview" for the job. Since we couldn't communicate there wasn't much interviewing going on!  I was on the phone to the relo lady to ask what I should do, the maid was on the phone to her "person" to ask what she should do - after a while we switched phones so we could talk to each others "person" only to find out it was the same person - she was on her cell phone to me, and her land-line to the maid! And that's how it goes……craaaaazy!!!
I can't wait to get my Chinese books - they're in the air-shipment coming from Dallas. We're hoping for late this week or early next week.

Our Master Bedroom is wonderful - very big - enough for a full-seating area, dressing table, and king size bed - with room to spare! We haven't got any draperies up yet but it hasn't been a problem since we're on the second floor and we don't look out over anyone except a bunch a trees and beyond that, Purple Mountain. We're very spoilt with our view! We asked for our bedroom to be painted a soft sage-green before me moved in - I even gave them a paint swatch. Well, it's a fresh minty-green! Luckily it will still work with our bedding, but it was quite a shock when I first saw it!

Showering has been a challenge. Rory thinks he's got it figured out, but I can't get it to work…you have to turn the hot water on and let it run till it gets hot - about two minutes. Then turn the hot off, and turn the cold on and wait till that comes in - another minute. Then turn the hot back on a fraction of an inch. If you turn it too little its icy cold, if you turn it a fraction too much it's scalding hot! I think I've gotten more exercise than I have for months just hopping around in the shower! Rory's organized with the landlord for someone to take a look at the problem but I don't think it's going to be an easy fix.

We went out for lunch yesterday to Skyway Bakery, which is about 10 minutes from our house. They make very good sandwiches and it seems to be a local expat hang-out. It was nice to see some "white" faces again! We had sandwiches for lunch and ordered Sydney a birthday cake for tomorrow. We also bumped into some South Africans as we were leaving and chatted with them for a little while. Turns out he's the principal at the Nanjing International School where the girls will go, and his wife is a teacher there. They've been here about 3 years. We didn't chat for long since they'd just got their food and I figured we'd be sure to bump into them again at the school.

More updates to come soon……

Thursday, 30th July, 2009

The Italian meal was very good last night. The two glasses of wine and appertif were just as good! We came home and had birthday cake - thin layers of chocolate cake with lots and lots of creamy chocolate puddingy stuff between the layers, covered in a chocolate ganache. Okay for only one or two bites - not my idea of birthday cake which must be consumed in large quantities whenever possible!

It's raining again today. We'll probably go out to buy cleaning supplies for the maid so she can do something other than iron! I did sit this morning and make a list of little jobs that I need doing that she can help with, like load all my earrings onto the round turny thing, and take all the winter clothes out of the boxes and put them in the top of the cupboards, while I unpack things that I want in specific places. We're still waiting on our air-shipment from Dallas with my scrap-book cart and books and bedding and clothes……I wish it would hurry up a get here - I have boxes of scrap-booking and beading stuff I need to unload and I can't get shelves up in the study till I see how much space I have left. Grrrr.  The customs people are probably reading through all my murder mysteries, detective stories and espionage tales wondering who/what the heck I am!

We're unable to access Facebook here so the girls haven't been able to stay in much contact with their friends. We're hoping they might un-ban it as they did with other sites.

We have new neighbors. Jenny is Columbian and her husband, Lawrence, is Scottish. They've just moved from Sri Lanka and he's going to be taking over the position of the Principal of the school from the South African guy we met the other day! I haven't told the kids they're going to be living next door to the Principal yet! Yikes! I'm sure that will put a smile on their faces - NOT! They have two boys, ages 15 and 13. Hmmm!

I can get into this whole ordering food from Shanghai thing…….I sorted out my menu for the week on AllRecipes.com, checked what I already had in my pantry, then just checked off what I needed from Shanghai and emailed my list! Wah-La!!!! Grocery shopping done!

Friday, 31st July, 2009

Food delivery from Shanghai arrived this morning - we now have salad dressing and syrup as well as a few other items - but those were deemed most important!

We attacked all the boxes in the girls' study this morning and got everything put away, while our Ayi hung up all Maxine's clothes. We finished painting her room last night and moved all her furniture back this morning. It looks very nice - purple walls with black, white and silver furniture, etc.

Sydney's room is a rainbow of colors. It started out turquoise, white and some orange but it's evolved into a full-blown rainbow! It still looks really nice though - I love the turquoise on the walls.

The "handy-man" arrived today, along with the landlord. Neither of them had even a screwdriver with them so I have no idea what they thought they were going to get done while they were here! They seemed to have taken care of the front door handle - probably just put Rory's temporary screws back in it! The also "installed" the second fridge in the back room - entailed moving it from the garage and plugging it in; and they "fixed" the water problem in the showers by turning down the temperature setting on the water heater in the garage! He hummed and haa-d about the gas oven so I tried to turn it up while he was looking at it - he might be missing a few eyelashes this evening! He still just stood and stared at it though then mumbled something in Chinese that I was supposed to understand.....

Phoooey - our air-shipment is going to take longer than we hoped - perhaps even another week or so......

On a happier note, we got our wireless internet set up and now more than one person can access the internet at a time - phew! We also got the semi-legal - "illegal" satellite that everyone has, installed on the loft TV. Haven't made use of it yet - the girls have been rocking out with the guitar hero the whole evening! Curtains and shades get installed tomorrow morning. Yippeee!

Outside our kitchen window we have a small veggie garden. It seems to be a bit overgrown right now, with some kind of strange squash growing rampantly along the balcony! I'm hoping the garden service can haul it all out so I can start over. I would like to have some veggies, herbs and flowers growing in there. As soon as I can find out where to buy flowers and plants I'll also be able to fill my flowers pots that we brought from Singapore.
In addition to the thousands of cicadas, we get lots of mosquitoes here - maybe it's just our yard with it being so shaded, but fortunately they seem to be very slow moving mosquitoes! We bought a bug zapper so the kids, and Rory, have had lots of fun chasing after all sorts of flying bugs! We haven't come across any strange critters, yet.

Have I mentioned that I love my green kitchen wall??? It almost makes me want to cook more….almost….I'd much prefer to pull up a chair and stare at the wall! It's a very happy color!

With the move I've been pretty bad about keeping up with birthdays and celebrations, so if I missed yours I'm really sorry and here's a huge

Saturday, August 1st, 2009

Just when I thought I'd seen it all……..my curtain and blind order arrived on a motorcycle this morning! I thought Rory was kidding me when he told me to get the camera, QUICKLY! Lo and behold there was my curtain order bundled up in a huge bag, my shades rolled up and a few 10-foot long curtain rods sticking out the back end! Yikes! There seems to have been some manufacturing/communication errors along the way since we didn't get any wood blinds, only white shades. Luckily they're in rooms where it doesn't really matter too much. I was just so intrigued by their method of delivery....

This evening we went for pizza at one of the people's homes in our neighborhood. We met a few other expats there too, including a Chinese lady, Sally, who is married to an American guy who Rory works with. She has an 8-month old baby girl, Sophie, who is just adorable. We're getting together on Monday to go shopping for DVD's for the kids and rugs for me, if we get time. It was really nice to meet someone Chinese who can speak English fluently, plus the fact that she's from Nanjing helps immensely!

From what I keep hearing, this place sounds like "party central" when all the expats get back into town! Hmmm, that second fridge might come in handy afterall!

Sunday, August 2nd, 2009

Monday, August 3rd, 2009

The internet service seems to be quite intermittent here. Yesterday I didn't have a connection for a couple of hours, and then again this morning. We were warned ahead of time so we expected it somewhat but it's still frustrating when you can't get connected. What did we do before the internet????

After picking up Sally, and Sophie this morning we went to another grocery store - more Westernized - much like a Whole Foods. My kind of store J We found all sorts of delicious treasures!
We were all hungry after that so we all went to Deji Plaza - a designer store super mall - for lunch at a Thai restaurant. We had a mixture of different things - delicious green curry, spring rolls, satay, kailan, lettuce wraps and banana milkshakes! Yummmmmmy! Sophie entertained us banging her chopsticks on the table.

On our way home we called in at two not-so-legal DVD stores. Just one of the small benefits of living in China! Oh My Word! We spent about US$100 and got ooooodles of DVD's. We got the entire series of Lost, Heros, The Office, and about 50 other movies and TV series'. Each DVD cost the equivalent of about US$1.50 to $5.00. Now we need another DVD player because everyone wants to watch something different!
I've uploaded a picture of our "drapery delivery man"....

Tuesday, August 4th, 2009
I don't think our Ayi has ever seen a dishwasher before. She seems to be very afraid of using it. I tried to explain and show her how to load the dishes but came home to find they'd all been hand-washed and placed in there to dry. Oh well, if it gets used as a drying rack that saves me counter-space! I will try to show her again though but it may be that she sees it as something else doing her job, which is a common problem.
We've decided to give her a Western name. Most Chinese people seem to have one since we Westerners can't pronounce their Chinese names! I don't think she has one already. The girls decided on Stella…..kind of an old-fashioned name. It seems to suit her. The first thing that came to my mind was Marlon Brando bellowing "Steeeellllllaaaa" in "A Street-car Named Desire" as I'm sure it does for most people. Hopefully she'll like it when we tell her it means "star'. Apparently there's no fixed rule as to how they choose or get their Western names - if it sounds good, use it!  That's how Rory ended up with colleagues named Twinkle!

I've been very patient till now but I think I'm loosing it!!! Our oven and cook-top is gas and hasn't been working properly since we moved in. We've had the landlord here last week, who almost singed his eye-bows off, and today I almost gassed myself out the house after I thought I'd turned it off but hadn't because the button had stuck in. So, Rory contact the agent and tells her again that the oven is a problem because it doesn't light properly, the gas just comes out. She thinks it's a gas leak and sends the gas company out - two guys show up who are so squint they couldn't have put a matching pair of eyes together if they tried! I told them, and the Ayi told them, that there's no gas leak to go away. Half an hour later, after I spoke with the agent, I get another knock on the door. This time it's a private company here to check the gas line! He calls his office and explains that it's not the oven to an English speaking guy, so I can also speak with him! I explain once again that's it's not the line, it's the oven, which he tells me he can't help with!  AAAAAAARRRRRGHH! The agent tells me that the landlord is out of the country only due back the end of next week. If I could wait till then he may agree to buy a new one, but it's unlikely since this one is only three years old. I'm done being nice. I'm about ready to rip someone's head off!

Wednesday, August 5th, 2009

Frisco started having some sort of twitching / fits yesterday evening. We're not sure what it was but it seemed to come and go. It helped stop it if Maxine stroked his head while he was lying down. So, the kids slept on the sofas last night so they could be near him. Maxine was upset to start with but then took over the "mothering" role and looked after him all night. Sydney just couldn't handle it. She got very scared when he started twitching and just sobbed for ages. He seems to be better this morning but we'll watch him as the day progresses. We have no idea how old he really is because we adopted him in 2001 and we think he was at least 3 or 4 then, which would make him around 11 or 12 years old now.

We went to buy a new oven this afternoon. Now, I really have learned to lower my expectations, but this was just beyond anything I could cope with. Rory came home at 3 O'clock, and we started out at a huge appliance store, bigger than Best Buy, 4 stories high - but after trying to explain to numerous sales ladies we eventually figured they sold everything except ovens. So our next stop was RedStar Furniture Mart - the huge furniture mall. We headed to the kitchen appliance area and everything there was high-end, designer models, imported, etc.  At this point I'd lost it. We'd sat in traffic for over an hour, wandered around the mall looking for anything that didn't look high-end, explained, doodled, acted, anything to make them understand what an oven was, to no avail! I called the agent who had told us that this was the place to go - they have lots of kitchen shops there - I explained to her that everything was high-end and all I wanted was to replace the cheap piece of crappy junk that she was expecting me to keep. I told her that she was wasting my time, Rory's time, and that I basically didn't want to deal with her anymore. At this stage Rory had walked away, probably to avoid any overflow of the anger that was erupting from me! On his walk he found three ovens. Three. One was too expensive, one was white, which I didn't want, which left me with the only other model, which we bought. The added benefit - they're delivering it tomorrow afternoon. And we managed to achieve payment and delivery without having to call the agent for help!

So, my cake and cookie baking might come to fruition after all!  I can start planning my first coffee morning, as soon as I get that Pound Cake recipe……and find out where to get good ground coffee…… J 

Thursday, August 6th, 2009

Grrrr. No internet again this morning. I wish I had some way of telling whether it's our service provider or our connection that's the problem.

It's becoming fairly obvious to us that this move is way more stressful than the last! The language barrier is just so exhausting. Everyone you speak to you have to first ask in English incase they do understand some, then ,inevitably, you move onto the little Chinese you do know, which rarely helps since they then think you can speak Chinese and proceed to waffle on endlessly. So your next step is actually taking them to something similar, and trying to hand signal the differences, etc. in order to make them understand. If all else fails, draw it. And even then it's not always possible. And this is for everything, from the worker who shows up at your gate and you have no idea what he's here for, to telling the Ayi to leave the dogs outside unless it's storming then she must bring in Frisco, to trying to ask a store helper where they keep the Glad Wrap! Trying explaining, acting or doodling that one!!! It's all sooooo exhausting.

Rory is finding it just as stressful at work. I think he really enjoys the job but the company is making drastic cut-backs and trying to save money wherever they can and it seems that the overseas postings are the ones facing the brunt of it. It just adds to the stress.

On a less stressful note….I've found a rug for the living room. I wanted to come home first to check to see if the colors would work and I think they'll do just fine. It's on special till Monday so I'll be going back out there again on Saturday to order it. Got too much going on tomorrow…..food delivery, coffee table delivery, visitors, shades being installed, kids to school for ID pictures, etc.

Still trying to figure out what to put in the middle room - it's a huge open space but we walk though it to get to the living room from the rest of the house, to the powder bathroom, to the kitchen, and so on. It's a real pain! I could leave it bare, but it looks like we ran out of furniture!

I used my new oven this evening. Sydney made cookies and I cooked supper without exploding the house! It's awesome!

Friday, August 7th, 2009

Our yard gate broke off its hinges yesterday. I have a feeling the rust had just been painted over when we moved in. It's been slowly sagging and yesterday it just gave way. They delivered Sydney's mattresses for her bunk beds this morning and they're both the wrong size, our visitors didn't show up, and the delivery of the coffee table has been postponed till tomorrow. If I didn't have to go to the school this afternoon I would just crawl into bed and stay there for a week.

Sunday, August 9th, 2009

Yesterday was a good day. We discussed Maxine's subject choices with her and Rory's going to speak to the Prinicipal on Monday to see what we can do about getting her into one of the art classes. Armed with the Coppell High School Course Selection print-out he's hoping he can explain the importance of being able to complete Art I, at the very least, in China so she can continue with the other advanced art courses in 11 & 12 grade when we get back.

We also went out and bought a table for the middle room. It's a six-seater round table with a built-in lazy susan. We figured it would be a good idea to have for playing board games or if we have people with kids over for supper - they can all sit together at one table. I agreed to it with one stipulation - that there is a constant supply of "fresh" cut flowers on it! Rory said he'll pay the driver to take care of it!

We also bought the rug for the living room - we needed it last night when we were sitting on the living room floor eating pizza watching movies! We also needed popcorn, which we'll be taking care of today when we buy a microwave.

We met our new neighbors, from two houses down. They have two very cute, very jet-lagged little girls. They're also waiting for their shipments so we're all in the same boat. We had a good moan and laugh about the "Chinese ways".

While we were watching movies two of the neighborhood girls called in to see if Max and Syd could go hang out with them. We couldn't have rushed them all out the door faster! A while later Rory and I sat trying to figure out who these girls were and exactly whose house they had gone to! They came back home around 9:30 with all sorts of "inside" information about the neighborhood, the school, teachers and kids. Alli and her friend said they would show Max and Syd around the school at open house on Tuesday afternoon. Alli told them about "the tailor" who will make any outfit you want for next to nothing! You can take a picture of a $10 000 designer dress and they can make it for the equivalent of about $30! Maxine is sooooo excited - she's got so many designs she wants made already!

So that was a wonderful ending to our Saturday. I'm hanging onto this thread of good cheer for dear life!

Sunday, August 9, 2009

Maxine is doing some heavy wheeling and dealing with us…She wants to go back to Singapore over October break. Rory can't get off work so we would all be sitting here for 10 days anyway. She'd need to have her friend come up from Shanghai and travel with her. Sydney and I would go to Hong Kong for a few days at the same time; maybe try to get one of her friends and mom to come with us. Of course, Max's got a lot of baby-sitting to do to save money before she goes, and got to maintain her good grades, etc.

We got a bunch of stuff today…..microwave/grill combination; hair-curler for Sydney, hairdryer for Maxine, DVD player, cordless phone, shelves for the office. Phew - I'm glad I'm not paying J 
Sydney's upstairs curling away; Maxine is watching a DVD and Rory and I have just finished washing down the patio.

Monday, August 10, 2009

Yiiiipppppeeeee! Our air-shipment arrives tomorrow morning!  I'm soooooo excited and relieved. There's a bunch of stuff in there that the kids need for school on Wednesday!

I tried another grocery store this morning. It's right across the road from the school. It has some of the basics but I would still have to go somewhere else to get meat, dairy products and some of the fruits and veggies I'm looking for. So, I think I'll stick with BHG Market Place which seems to be more "westernized".

We've started to see some of the rain from Typhoon Morakot. I think we'll get heavier rains later tonight into tomorrow. I miss my DFW minute-by-minute weather forecast! You can barely find anything online about the course of the typhoon. We've been watching the weather on CNN and BBC for the most part. We've already lost one umbrella. Max and Syd walked he their friends house this evening and left it on the front door-step only to find it had blown away when they were coming home! I'm sure we'll find it in someone's yard tomorrow.

Sydney visited the orthodontist this afternoon to see what her next step is in her ongoing treatment. We're going tomorrow morning to the government hospital to have x-rays done - should be interesting! At least the dentist is going to meet us there. After that they'll take a look at her impressions and the x-rays and decide what needs to be done. I was hoping that braces in China would be somewhat less expensive than in the USA, but noooooo, they've twigged on to the "expat prices" and are charging about the same as what we'd pay in Coppell L

The girls seem to have made some nice friends already. Sydney was hanging out at the indoor pool with some girls this evening, and they both went to another girl's house to watch movies this afternoon. I just so happy that they'll recognize some faces on Wednesday and as Sydney said - to have someone to sit with at lunch!

Tuesday, August 11th , 2009

Wednesday, August 12th, 2009

Max and Syd went off to school on the bus this morning. Rory dropped them off at the main gate on the way to work. We spent some time last night finding the perfect "first day" outfit so all was good this morning!

I went to lunch with seven other ladies today to an Italian restaurant. The food was very good and we all had a good time. A few have been here for a year or longer while the rest of us have just arrived so we chatted about where to shop, where to get hair and nails done, etc.
We stopped at Times Grocer on the way home to have a look and pick up a few things. They have a fair selection of American and British items so I might be calling by there occasionally.
You can get cake mixes, cereals, breakfast bars, all sorts of sauces and canned goods, some dairy items too.

The girls got home from school about 3:40. It seems they had a good day. Lunch was good - Subway-type sandwiches were what they chose to eat today. They both have some friends in their classes and their teachers seem to be very nice for the most part; one or two very strict ones, which is okay with me. Maxine is very happy with her IT class. Turns out she gets to do web-design, digital photography and graphic design as part of the curriculum. So, in the end it might just be better than the Design Technology class that she had hoped to get into. Of course, I'm sure lots more info will seep out as the afternoon and evening progress….it always seems that way.

Thursday, August 13, 2009

Friday, August 14th, 2009

Surprise, surprise! I got all my errands run today! I went to IKEA for some bits and pieces, then onto BnQ for some shelving stuff, and across the road to Metro for some groceries. While at Metro I bumped into Andrea, who I was on the phone with, discussing what to buy at Metro for the Celanese family picnic tomorrow! I also managed, at last, to get passport photo's done of the girls! And, Sydney and I even baked some cookie bars!

I found all my recipe books in our air-shipment….my pressure cooker cook, bread-machine book, cookie book and grilling book! Since we have our gas connection for the BBQ we can grill some steak on Sunday! 

My grocery order arrived from Shanghai this morning. I was "planning" on making roast chicken for supper tonight in my new convection microwave. But, when the chicken arrived it had its head and feet still attached! Eeeeeeeeeck! I couldn't even put it in the fridge or freezer I was so freaked out. I just took it straight to the Ayi who said a thousand "xie- xie's"! I was more thankful to see the thing GONE!
So, in lieu of roast chicken, we're now having "breakfast for supper" since I have bacon, eggs that need using, mushrooms, and pancake mix. It'll be a mixed English/American breakfast/supper! Mmmmm……I love cooking.

Sunday, August 16, 2009

Yesterday we had "Celanese Family Day"……Chinese style! I have NEVER been so hot in my entire life! We traveled about 90 minutes to Tianmu Lake, sort of between Nanjing and Shanghai. If it had been cooler could have been a very nice, enjoyable day, but it wasn't! We got there about 9am, and waited in the hotel lobby for a while for all the buses to arrive from Nanjing carrying the 600 or so plant workers and their families. They had a bunch of teams set up on the parking lot outside the hotel where we were expected to stand until lunchtime at about noon. They'd organized games but we hadn't a clue what we were expected to do. I, along with about 50 percent of the rest of the people, couldn't stand the heat and went inside to cool down in the hotel lobby. I felt sorry for some of the expat parents who were there chasing their kids around, trying to keep the tots out of the koi ponds and off the Chinese Junk jade sculpture! At lunch we were ushered into one of the ballrooms where we were treated to a Chinese luncheon. We had numerous fish dishes, most including their heads. We also had some dishes we couldn't recognize so didn't touch. We eventually had some soup and veggies and luckily I'd packed some breakfast bars so we munched on those. In the afternoon we went to the "theme park" part of the lake. We followed the crowd and ended up on a ferry cruise of the lake. We had a running commentary in Chinese, at about 6000 decibels! We got off at the first island and got straight back on the next boat, where we got off at the next island. Eventually we found someone there who could speak a little English, actually they found us - we must have looked lost! They told us that there was no boat back - you have to walk back! I almost fainted at this point! Luckily it turned out that the walk was only about 15 minutes, but that was long enough in that heat! We made it back to the beer garden and wave pool where the kids had a dip before we walked back to the hotel where Rory had to help with the draw for the prizes. The day could not have ended soon enough! We got home, ordered pizza and crawled into our beds exhausted!

Monday, August 17th, 2009

A few of us got together this morning to go shopping at BHG. I was hoping to find a headless roasting chicken there, but no luck. It seems I have to get one all intact and have the Ayi decapitate it. So, I don't think we'll be eating roast chicken for a while! Of course I'm absolutely craving it right now! Uuuugh! KFC just doesn't quite hit the mark L

Tomorrow I'm planning on going to find some plants for my pots in the front yard. Amy, who works with Rory, wrote in Chinese characters where the driver needs to take me, so we'll see………

Tuesday, August 18, 2009

This morning I went to the welcome coffee organized by the PTA. I met a huge bunch of people; I think I remember maybe two or three names at the most! They seem like a really nice group of ladies, from all over the world - a lot of Europeans and Australians, some Americans and I also met some British and one South African. There's another PTA meeting next Tuesday morning so I'll go to see what it's all about. I think there's a lot of volunteer opportunities here, way more than Singapore.

Rory was supposed to go to Budapest next week, but, he found out this morning that to get a visa he would have to go to Shanghai for an interview, and then the approval could take about 15 days! So, he's not going….. J ……

Yesterday I labeled the laundry sorter with all the colors that I wanted the clothes sorted into. I'd tried other ways of sorting but the Ayi never really got it and I'd find all sort of colors and textures mixed together. It seemed that sorting by colors was the only way I could get across how to sort the laundry.....that's what I was hoping at least. I pulled out a load this morning and all my beautiful crisp white towels are now baby pink! She'd shoved white towels into the washer along with a BRIGHT pink pool towel, and stuck it on a hot wash. My white towels are all pink and blotchy like they have a disease.

I went to buy plants for my outdoor pots this morning, but (it seems every sentence I write has a "but" in it somewhere these days) there were only indoor plants - every size and shape imaginable, but alas, not an outdoor plant to be seen….so my quest continues. I fear that my lovely pots are going to be turned into storage bins for soccer balls and dog food! The Ayi threw away the polystyrene packing yesterday that I had kept from our shipment. It's ideal for filling up the bottom of deep pots without making them too heavy. It helps the soil drain as well. But (there I go again) I'll have to find something else to use now.

Sharrie gave me a wonderful book for my birthday. It's a cookbook, of sorts, where the author relates each recipe to a mention of it in a children's book. Yesterday I actually had chance to sit and browse through it for a while and it brought back great memories of many of the childrens' books I'd read like the Famous Five series by Enid Blyton, Paddington Bear, The Folk of the Faraway Tree, Mary Poppins, Little Women, Chitty Chitty Bang Bang.....
If you ever get the chance to read it, do. The author is Jane Brocket and the book is called Cherry Cake and Ginger Beer.

Wednesday, 19th August, 2009

Yesterday, after emailing the very few long-time Nanjing residents I know of, Andrea and I went to a different plant nursery. I found some bright pink petunias, and purple and pink verbena. Each little 4-inch pot was only 1rmb which is about 15 cents! The larger half-gallon tubs were 10rmb - about $1.50.  I didn't price any of the larger pots.
They had lots of shrubs and some marigolds as well but I ran out of space J so I'll have to go back this weekend………tsk, tsk! Where is Rory's truck when I need it?????

Rory seems to be a lot less stressed now that the budget review is over and that he doesn't have to go to Budapest. As long as I can keep the maid from dying his shirts pink I think he'll be happy!

The girls are doing fine at school. Typical Sydney, she's lost her Student Organizer (!!!!) already, after being at school only three days! She came home on Friday and searched for it this weekend at home but couldn't find it here. She has to turn it in signed on Fridays so she's little stressed about not finding it!  Maxine started volleyball on Monday and I think the coach worked them really hard. She's still complaining about how sore she is!

This morning I had coffee with my neighbor, Jenny. She's very sweet, and I was surprised how similar our families were in likes, dislikes, hobbies and interests, even though they have two boys the same age as Max and Syd. Anyway, we chatted for a while until I had to leave to get ready. I went with Andrea and Anna to meet a few of the ladies in the beading group. Jitka, our hostess, has a serious stash of beads - and she got most of them in China!!!! Right here in Nanjing!!! AWESOME!!! I'd better warn Rory! Hmmm, maybe I shouldn't. The ladies were a lot of fun and we'll be getting together again next Tuesday, after the PTA meeting! And…..when I got home there was a vase full of beautiful flowers on our new round table! Thanks, babes!

Thursday, August 20th, 2009

Rory is in Shanghai today. He caught he train last night just after supper, and he'll be back tonight about 8:30pm. It's only a two hour ride each way so it's not too bad a trip. He's planning on going for one night every week.

Some of the other ladies did the gym class at our clubhouse the other day. Apparently it's a torture session! No air-conditioning or fan in the room either! Uuuuuugh! I'll be showing up with my own personal fan - or one of those silly caps with the fan on the front!

This morning I went out early to run some errands. It's nice having the shops open earlier here than the 11:30am in Singapore! We were expecting the gardener to come today so before I left I translated and typed up a few notes for the Ayi, saying that the gardener will be coming today, that he must rake all the leaves, remove all the overgrowth, and he must weed the front garden. When I came home I was very pleased to see that progress had been made on the front bed…..only to find out that the Ayi had done it! She'd spent the entire morning in the heat, cutting back shrubs, grasses and vines with a pair of scissors! I just about died for her when I realized! Obviously my online translation got lost in translation! I immediately gave her the rest of the day off and told her to go home and rest…lets hope that translation worked!

We had a big lightening and thunderstorm here tonight. The electricity went out for a while. I noticed a few houses down that their lights were still on so I figured it was just our house that was affected. Luckily I'd noticed a flashlight when I was looking through a box yesterday. We have a fuse box in the kitchen which didn't do anything when I flipped the switches, so we went on a hunt for another one. Kind of creepy in a new house in the dark. We eventually found another box with a flipped switch in the garage behind some boxes. Luckily Maxine could climb over them. So, we got everything back on but it was still storming for quite a while afterwards. Kept that flashlight close and all the appliances and electronics turned off. I'm not sure what, if any, lightening/surge protection we have here. Lord knows I need my computer!!!!!

Friday, August 21st, 2009

See a picture of my latest find on our gallery page…..I think every household needs at least one bottle, but for all those moms with teenage boys, I'll send a crate load upon request!

The "gardener" arrived this morning….it's a little old couple!  As if I didn't feel guilty enough after yesterday's fiasco already! Now this!  I feel like I'm putting my grandparents to work in the fields! Our landlord is so cheap, it's probably his parents!

This morning I went to the Top Regent Neighborhood Coffee and met about 30 other ladies from around my neighborhood! I'm going to have to start keeping cheat sheets of names! I think I met a lot of Franscescas, Frederikas, and Margaritas.  At least I'm not alone - it seems Andrea is as bad as me at remembering names! I made my favorite Almond-Apricot coffee cake to take - and it was a hit! Phew! There were plenty of other delicious goodies too - recipes from all over the world. Now for those who are not familiar with the term "coffee cake" it's not a coffee-flavored cake, but a simple cake made specially for enjoying with a cup of coffee and the chatter of friends. How can you go wrong with that?

I'm starting a Bunco group! There isn't one here and I can't live without Bunco! We'll play for prizes but each month the money in the pot will just pay back the hostess. With people constantly coming and going it seems the best way to set it up. Also, I want to play for prizes! There's no fun in just playing for money!