Australia Day 1 - Port Douglas Market

The best part of our 1st day in Australia was going to the Local Market in Port Douglas where we were able to eat a coconut!  First, they drilled a hole so we could drink the water - it was delicious! 

 

When we finished the water, they cut the coconut open and chiseled it into shavings.  We added some honey and enjoyed a yummy snack!  Ava particularly loved it and it looked like it had been snowing when she finished!

So far we are LOVING Australia!  Lots more to do and see before we return to China!

Home Sweet Home

We have been asked to post some pictures of our apartment here in Wuxi, so here they are!  Living in China is interesting ... thus far it is our experience that buildings are not well maintained.  When built they are typically gorgeous, but then they go down hill very quickly.  It is quite sad really, but I guess it keeps people employed since there is always new buildings being constructed. 

So what are some of the issues we've experienced with our apartment???  Well, I'll start out by saying that our apartment had been unhabited (by humans) for about 5 months before we moved in.  Of course I had to specify humans, because plenty of creatures found their way in during that 5 months!  Ryan has gone through so many cans of Raid that we should own some of the company by now!  We even had our apartment professionally sprayed twice.  In the beginning we found the usual spiders, small worms, mosquitoes, these small black flies and centipedes.  The majority of the centipedes were in the basement - which we never use - but a few found their way upstairs.  The centipedes ranged from 1-6 inches! 

We still find the spiders, worms, black flies, the occassional mosquito and now crickets!  One day we came home from a walk and Ava went right to the living room, picked something up from the floor and then thankfully reached out to give it to Ryan... yep, it was a cricket!  Thank goodness it wasn't anything that could bite her.  Perhaps we are "spoiled" Americans not used to bugs in our house because it doesn't seem like it bothers the Chinese people. They leave their front door wide open (and ours if they visit) and open windows without screens to get "fresh" air.

Another thing we have found living in china that if you have someone come over, they are there for one specific thing and will not do anything more than that task.  For instance, we had someone over to look at our AC units because they weren't working.  The person came over and fixed it, but later we asked about the filters in the AC and someone else had to come over for that.  It would have made too much sense for the same person that fixed our AC to also check out (and clean) the filters.

Other than that, it kind of feels like home.  Since this is only for a year (9 months now), it will work.

If we had to choose again, I am not sure I would have picked this place.  We love the location - there are many restaurants within a 5-10 minute walk, including a Papa Johns, Subway, McDonalds and KFC - and we like not being on the 24th floor of a large apartment building.  Plus, we have a LARGE kitchen which is almost unheard of here in China!  However, the garden which was a reason why I wanted this apartment, has yet to be used and is probably one of the main reasons we have all of the bugs!  Plus, it's a pretty big apartment which makes cleaning a big chore.  And I thought our house in Kalamazoo got dirty fast - I don't think I'll ever complain about that after living in China! 



   

Ava's Room





                                                      Our bedroom



Not Pictured:  Garden, Bathrooms (we have 3), Guest Room (on top floor) and Office (on top floor - but we cannot use it as an office because you cannot get WIFI on the top floor)!

 

Mid-Autumn Festival

We just celebrated our first Chinese Holiday: Mid-Autumn Festival!  The festival is held on the 15th day of the eighth month in the Chinese calendar, during a full moon, which falls in late September/early October!  It is also called the Moon Festival because of the celebration's association with the full moon, as well as traditions of moon worship and moon gazing.

The holiday brings family and friends together to give thank for the harvest (or harmonious unions) and to pray for babies, a spouse, beauty, longevity or a good future.

Mooncakes are a must have during this holiday and they are everywhere!  We saw people carrying boxes and boxes of mooncakes to take to friends and family.  There are several different kinds and I was able to try two different ones thanks to coworkers.  Typical Chinese mooncakes are round in shape, and measure around 4 inches in diameter and 2 inches in thickness.  Most mooncakes consist of a pastry skin enveloping a sweet, dense filling.  I am not exactly sure what was inside the first one I had - maybe a sweet bean paste.  The second one was filled with a minced meat, known as a Suzhou (pronounced "soo-joe") Style mooncake.  Suzhou is a town about 31 miles from Wuxi.

 

16 months, plus a few days

I cannot believe Ava is already 16 months old - which means we have been in China for nearly 3 months now!  Where does the time go?!  She is growing so fast - and learning so much!  Ryan is doing an AWESOME job with her and she absolutely loves spending her days with him.  She isn't getting as much time with other kids as we would like, so we did some research and found a Gymboree Play class in the area.  It is way too expensive, so we will work on negotiating a better price.  Assuming we can get at least 50% off (we were told that since we are Caucasian, they will really want us to join), we will start classes in October!

As we've said in the past - Ava loves to talk.  We don't always understand what she's saying (maybe she can already speak Chinese, LOL), but some words are very clear - for instance:
-  ball (ANYTHING round is a ball)
-  baby (she says this whenever she sees a baby, toddler or even just a stroller)
-  "ut oh"
-  all gone
-  cheese (one of her favorites)
-  milk (although she really emphasizes the "k" making it sound almost German) 
And many more words ...

And others are a little less clear - like "ming ming" (green beans - one of her favorite vegetables)!

Most of the time when you ask she will point out her head, hair, ears, eyes, nose, mouth, teeth, fingers, shirt, pants, knees, toes and shoes.  After she points out her own body parts, she will then point out yours (and anyone else around) as well!  

We haven't officially started potty training, but she now says "pee" when she walks into the bathroom. And I usually have her sit on the potty once/day.  Nothing yet, but we've gotten close twice  (once she peed on the floor after I took her off the potty and once she walked into the bathroom, said "poopy" and then actually pooped, in her diaper not on the floor, thank goodness)! So maybe it is not too far off which would be nice!

Unfortunately an impromptu visit to the Dr gave us an updated weight/height check on Ava!

Weight - 10.2 kg (22.5 lbs) --- at 12 months Ava weighed in at 20 lbs (40th percentile)
Height - 81 cm (31.9 inches) --- at 12 months Ava was 29 3/4" long (75th percentile)

The Dr, who didn't speak English even though her business card said she did, was concerned about her weight.  It was obvious when she tried to squeeze fat on Ava's belly ... her thighs are still chubby though :)  Considering she has gained nearly 2.5 lbs in 4 months and eats well most days, we are not worried.  For as thin as most Chinese people are, they sure do like chubby babies!  We were anxious to see how much she'd grown as up until a month or two ago she could walk under our kitchen table!   

It's hard to believe that Ava will almost be 19 months old before she is back in the US ... She'll probably have lots of new tricks up her sleeve by then! 

Canteen

Now that I've been working in China for 2 months, I guess I should start sharing some of the differences I've noticed between working in America and working in China.  There are of course several, so I will start with one for now: lunch!  While I was preparing for this assignment, my American colleagues that had spent time in Asia told me to take advantage of lunchtime and use it for relationship building (critical in Asia).  This alone was going to be a difference because, in the US, I often spent my lunch eating at my desk while I caught up on work or ran errands.  IF the weather was nice (the few weeks of perfect Michigan weather when it's not too hot and not too cold), I would eat a quick lunch outside with a few coworkers and then retreat back to my desk to catch up on things.  I almost always brought my own food, usually a sandwich or leftovers from the night before. 

So here in China (and Korea), free lunch is provided to all employees every day in the canteen (I always considered the canteen our vending machines, lol, but here it's the cafeteria).  And, for the most part, the food is okay.

Lunch consists of standing in a queue waiting your turn to get your chopsticks - although the VERY first thing I noticed is that most women bring their own spoon and the men eat with chopsticks!  Since it is pretty much the only time I get to practice with chopsticks, I always use them!  Rice is a staple so that is of course offered every day and then you point to one of two main dishes (meat).  Usually I have no idea what they are but I guess that's part of the fun!  Sometimes I will ask a coworker to help or I just take my best guess!  Next, there are two or three types of vegetables, a bowl of soup (which I have yet to try) and a piece of fruit. 

The second thing I immediately noticed is that NOBODY drinks anything during lunch.  I guess that is what the soup is for ... when I asked about this, I was told that drinking while you eat isn't good for you.  Hmm, guess I learn something new every day :)  Of course I down a glass of water when I am finished eating.  (It was the same in Korea too, except when you're done eating there you go into this little room where there are cups and a big jug of water for you to get something small to drink) 

Anyway, back to the food ... I usually always like the vegetables (but I am still not a huge fan of tofu) and sometimes I completely opt out of the meat and just get extra vegetables.  The green beans, cabbage, zucchini and potatoes are always my favorite!  I typically avoid the seafood as I am afraid I will swallow (or choke on) the bones!  Although, speaking of bones, a lot of the meat served at lunch still has the bone - chicken, pork, beef, seafood.  While I tried the foot of a swine (pig) once, I will opt out of that dish in the future.  To me, it was very rubbery (reminded me of fat) and after I saw some hair (pig hair, not human hair) on the bite I was about to take, I just could not bring myself to eat anymore!

The last thing I noticed during lunch is that everybody sets their tray on the table with the rice closest to them.  I have not seen one tray (besides my own accidentally) where this is not the case!

After lunch we stand in the line to empty what you haven’t managed to digest into the waste bucket.  I once asked what they do with all of the leftover food.  I was told that they feed it to the pigs ... nothing goes to waste here!  Every day after lunch, I take a short walk with 1-3 other coworkers and then on Mondays, my friend and coworker, Grace gives me a Chinese lesson.  We are starting with the alphabet! 

Celebrating our 4th Anniversary!

Thanks to a friend who offered to watch Ava for the evening, Ryan and I had our first date in china!  Thank goodness we reserved our driver for the occasion (we normally don't have him in the evenings) as it was pouring outside!  We would have been drenched by the time we found a cab!  We were amazed at how quickly the roads floaded.  We are not sure if it is the infrastructure of the roads/plumbing or if all of the construction (there seems to be constant road construction - guess some things are the same) is blocking the drains.  Either way, we passed people standing in the streets and the water was 1/2 way up their shin!  And as other cars passed us, we felt like we were in a car wash as the water just engulfed the car!  Of course some roads were much worse than others, but amazingly we still saw a few mopeds and bicycles out on the roads!  They just throw on a rain poncho and go on their way! 

We ended up checking out a steak restaurant that had been recommended to us and it was delicious! We both ordered the local snow dragon Kobe Filet mignon which was incredible!  Usually we go to Webster's for our anniversary and this was just as good, although we did miss their mouthwatering mashed potatoes... we finally bought a potato masher at Ikea this weekend so we hope to make some of our own mashed potatos this week!

To celebrate at home we found our favorite champagne and a coworker made us a cheesecake! Of course we didn't have the champagne glasses or cake knife from our wedding (I usually get all of that out for our anniversary) or our wedding video to watch, but we looked at pictures and remembered our magical day!  I'm not going to lie, I missed not being able to wear my wedding gown while eating cake and drinking champagne! Lol. Maybe I'll have to wear it when we are home for Christmas :)