People's Square

Just one more little note on running here. It is considered strange, very strange not admirable. Here you run to catch a bus. And several buses have waited or pulled over expecting me to jump aboard. You can't get away from people here; wherever I run people point, stare and take pictures. It is often more exhausting than the actual workout.

We went to People's Square on Saturday and saw the craziest thing. We entered the garden area and there were people everywhere with papers hanging above them or sitting in front of them. There were clotheslines with papers clipped all along them. Rich starts reading the papers and realizes they are personal bios. It is like a living classified section. People, mainly the parents of 'eligibles', are match making. They bring descriptions and pictures of their son or daughter and hope someone wants to marry them. It is eharmony Chinese style. Crazy.

We were playing around at a fountain in People's Square when an 'artist' asked for a dollar to draw a picture of the kids. A dollar is equivalent to about six yen. Sure, for a buck go ahead. I know my kids look alike but this guy drew four pictures of the same face with different hair and in Matt's case big 'ol ears. The kids loved it though, especially Lily.

We also went to Nanjing Road which is a huge pedestrian street that is packed with people selling every knock off you can imagine. Any requests? Just let me know.

Sunday we are off to church. A little scoop on church here. You can attend a practicing denomination if you were already a member of that particular church, outside of China. You can also attend if you marry a foreigner that belongs to a religious sect. No proselytizing. There are service missions that teach English but no religious discussion is allowed. We are just happy we get to go. We have about 200 people in our branch but we are spread far and wide. As I figure out the metro things seem a little closer.

Here is our sojourn to church. Walk fifteen minutes to the metro station. From our station we ride to another station where we connect to a different line. We have learned this is a journey best taken without the stroller. To connect to the other line we have to take ten different staircases. Some of them have escalators but not all. We could take the elevator but first we have to find someone that can unlock it, not worth the trouble. After we connect it is a 30 minute ride out to where we meet; which is an office building. We use a large conference room for sacrament meeting and Sunday school. Primary and the other auxiliary meetings are in various rooms down the hall. It works and it has climate control, bonus! From our metro stop you walk another ten/fifteen minutes to the building. All together not a bad trip, as long as it's not raining.

This guy is always asleep on the corner. He is a motorcycle taxi. Something I haven't used yet but I'm sure the day will come.

This is all of us in a regular taxi (Rich is up front giving directions). Sometimes it is worth paying a little extra to avoid all the steps at the metro. I love the look the driver gives us when we all pile in. If we hail one on the street Rich walks ahead or no one will stop. Once he has one we all run and get in before they can protest. My kids can enter and exit a car in five seconds flat; which is truly amazing because at home getting them in the car was a thirty minute ordeal.

Overall, we are having a great time. Everything is an adjustment and nothing is streamline, especially shopping. But we're getting there. We all miss our friends and family. Matt is having the hardest time without his friends. The girls have each other to play with but he is solo and we haven't met anyone, through church or otherwise, with a boy his age.

We felt very inspired to come here and I know the Lord has not forgotten about us now that we're here. We are praying to know His will and plan for us. Blessings to you all.

Stacie

Chicken feet, pig tails and laundry.

I don't know what this country has done to me but I am in bed by 9:00 and asleep at 9:01. That's why I'm a little behind on my updates.

First off shopping. It is unlike anything I have ever seen. There is a wet market, a dry market, a live market, a black market; markets for everything. We went to the wet market yesterday and let me tell you it is disgusting. I'm sure, soon enough it will seem normal as apple pie, but for now every turn was a Kodak moment. The pictures describe it better than I ever could.

All Lily and Matt wanted to do was hold everything; the frogs, eels, turtles. The vendors don't like that though; after all, this is someones dinner. If Rich had his way it would be ours.

They use absolutely every part of the animal.  Here are a few portions that I would choose to pass on:

feet (of any animal),

heart, lung, stomach and all sections of the intestinal tract,

and yes, even pig's tail, minus the curl, would all be off my food bucket list.

The part of the chicken that is the least desirable, and thus the cheapest, is the breast. They think it is dry and lacks flavor. Great, more for me, you go right ahead and eat the feet.

I have yet to see anyone eat a head but I'm sure they do.

The one thing I can appreciate is the produce. They have such an enormous variety of fruits and vegetables, and they are cheap. People only eat them at home. We haven't had them at restaurants or at other people's homes. Rich says they appear cheap if they serve them. We went to a noodle house tonight and fed the whole family for $3.00. Even there we couldn't get vegetables. When the guy next to us had some in his noodles I asked Rich why he didn't order that dish. He said is has spinach but it also has blood. Yum! I can't think of a better combo.

The one thing I will never appreciate is seafood.  The variety is vast and it all smells like, big surprise, dead

fish.

The best part about the market is the swarm. We are such a novelty with four kids that every time we stop we are surrounded and pummeled with questions. I just smile and nod while they tell Rich what a great burden he has to bare. They also point out that the kid's four layers of clothing is not enough and they must be freezing. People are quick to share their opinion about your parenting and it is never praise.

I'm fascinated by the variety of locations people will hang their meat or fish to dry. I like that the guy with the bike is drying his socks and his chicken next to each other. Do you think the chicken will taste like feet or the socks smell like chicken. Appealing anyway you look at it.

We also loved the Obama poster we saw at the market. I couldn't have said it better.

A friend took me to a store where I could buy butter. The only problem is, it's incredibly expensive unless you buy it in a 10K block. That converts to about twenty pounds. I spent an hour chopping it up to fit into our tiny freezer. Even I, who loves butter, was a little grossed out.

Something else that is gross. The name of this brown sugar. Really, who buys this? 

On to laundry. I hate laundry. When we were staying at my sisters we had such a great arrangement. I did all the cooking and she did all the laundry. It was awesome, but now I am on my own without a dryer and a washer from 1965. It has two speeds, one temperature and this nasty little lint trap that is quite foul.  Not to mention the close proximity to the toilet, which is a story in itself.

People will hang their laundry anywhere. My kids think it is so funny to see underwear hanging out on the sidewalk.

We went to a park that is just a few blocks from our apartment. They make these suckers in about 30 seconds with nothing but a stick. It was quite impressive.

I am looking my best in my running clothes. I had intended to do sprints while we were there but there were so many people it was impossible.

Running here has been quite an experience. It is an ever changing obstacle course. There are so many people wherever you go that I am constantly dodging people, bikes, mopeds and cars. The cars are pretty good at following the street lights but the bikes and mopeds, forget it. They just go full throttle and hope for the best. The sidewalks are paving bricks; so I like to run on the road but that puts me in the bike/moped lane and they have the right of way and won't move. They'll honk until I get on the sidewalk or play chicken, I always end up being the chicken.

We met more relatives and had dinner at their home. It was not nearly as scary as the first. In fact, Rich's aunt made the most delicious pork chops I've ever had, at least I think it was a pork chop. They kids loved it because she dumped bags of candy in front of them and let them go to town. She's the new favorite aunt.

Well, that is it for now. Lots of love,

Stacie

Dragon Festival

Chinese New Year is not a one day event here. Everyone is out of school and off work at least a week, sometimes two. Today we went to a dragon dance with some friends from the branch. There were four dragons that went up and down the street. The kids were able to get right up to them so they loved it.

The metro ride was more entertaining to me. The doors open and you have seconds to get on or off before a limb is removed by the slamming doors. At one stop Rich had to shove Mia out the door so she didn't get smashed but he and his leg weren't so lucky. We had to pry the doors open so he could pull it out.

The peddlers were the other entertainment. These two girls just stood in front of us and played their harmonica until we ponied up some cash. People here tend to be very persistent.

Tomorrows exciting agenda is laundry and IKEA. Yeah, for IKEA, not laundry.

Hugs,

Stacie

2nd: Chinese New Year

Happy Chinese New Year! Welcome to the year of the tiger. The sign of the tiger represents luck and prosperity. I hope that is what is in store for us (and all of you) this year.

If you haven't noticed this blog is Stacie's interpretation of China. I'm sure Rich would describe things from a completely different angle. That being said I will try to give you a glimpse of Chinese New Year.

First of all the food. I'm so sad that I brought the camera to Rich's uncle's home but left the battery charging at ours. Without seeing it you can't fully appreciate the meal that was placed before us. Here is a small sampling of the fare: marinated jellyfish, raw shrimp (that you sucked out of the shell), pigs feet, squid, whole fish (head and all) watercress, raw salmon, coconut coated shrimp (that is all Matt and Lily ate), duck, some type of beef innards (I was afraid to ask which organ it was). There was also a huge variety of mushrooms and bean curd (tofu). Unlike at home the rice is not served with the meal, it is served at the end. Poor Mia nibbled at a few things and resolved to wait for the rice. Then she betrayed her race by asking for soy sauce to put on it. They had never heard of anyone doing that (crazy Americans).

My favorite part of the meal was the potato salad. I think that was made just for us.

They ate forever! My kids (and my) schedule is still a mess so by 8:00 I could not stay awake, especially when I couldn't understand a word that was being said. It makes the conversation less than engaging. The kids and I ended up asleep on the couch by 8:30. Everyone else sat at the table until after 10:00.

A little side note; the apartments are small, the food is potent and the TV is always on, at full volume, so your senses are inundated.

The other aspect of Chinese New Year is the fireworks. They are unbelievable. In the states, you would have to have a license and a special permit to set off the kinds of fireworks they light in the street here. They are going off everywhere, constantly between 10:00 pm and 1:00 am. The sound is unlike anything I have ever heard. It was like a war zone with constant gunfire and canon blasts. Even with concrete walls the sound reverberated through the apartment. The best part, it started again at 6:30 am. Not with the same momentum but enough to wake up the kiddos; if they had been asleep. The girls had decided to start a dance party about an hour earlier so the firecrackers just added rhythm.

Love, blessings and tiger kisses,

Stacie

1st Edition

Much Thanks to my sweet friend Natalie for posting this to a blog. The iron fisted Chinese have blocked all blogs, facebook and youtube.

Hello all,

Four airports, three airplanes and four security checks later we made it from SLC to Shanghai in twenty-four 'short' hours. The kids were fabulous. Each of them had a backpack and a suitcase to carry on the plane, including Piper. She was quite useless and riding in the stroller so Matt had to pull two suitcases and I had an extra backpack to carry.

I'm grateful we had plenty of time to catch our connecting flights since none of the airports are exactly family friendly. The best was LAX. The international terminal is in a different building than the one you arrive in. Which would be fine if their were a train or even a walkway that connected the two. However, there is no such thing and you are left to your own devices to get there. Again, not a big deal except for the before mentioned four children and ten suitcases. But my little troopers did it, without an ounce of complaining!

The rest of the trip was much the same. We arrived in Shanghai were Rich had managed to arrange two vans to pick us up. Good thing, since besides our carry-ons we had ten additional bags, each weighing in at 50 lbs.

You would think that 500 plus pounds would be plenty of weight and space for anything I might need. So wrong, as I have unpacked and looked around our humble abode I have realize I did not pack well. Here are my tips for anyone else considering an adventure such as this.

• Five, maybe ten outfits each. That is what I brought for Matt, perfect. The girls on the other hand each have at least twenty. I don't know how or why but those ladies have a lot of clothes and I found it easier to just throw the whole lot of them at my sister who in turn threw them in a suitcase. A little discretion would have gone a long way. I won't even mention how many outfits I have.
• Wipes, baby and disinfectant....lots of them.
• Legos, my poor boy doesn't have a single one with him. He has started to shake and is losing cerebral abilities.
• Cold cereal. I would have packed an entire suitcase with it had I know it costs $6 for a small box here. They know only foreigners eat it, Chinese like hot breakfast, so they totally milk it. When your children are on a jacked up schedule and waking up at 3:00 am, starving because they feel asleep before dinner was ready. It would be really nice if they could fix some cereal so I could sleep until 4:00 am. Live and learn.
• A drill and concrete screws. This one might be a little specific to me. The walls are all concrete covered with plaster. It is hard to hammer a nail into cement. Rich has no idea where to buy a drill. I'm sure a city of two million must have one but it has yet to be located.

After unpacking, figuring out sleeping arrangements for six people in two bedrooms was my next challenge.

Simple things, like blankets are not what I am use to. Take a look. It is kind of like a duvet but nasty. Instead of a nice fluffy down filling it is a heavy, wool thing. It has that dusty, nappy feeling that is more than likely a breeding ground for a phenomenal number of germs. You air it out and then stick it in a giant pillow case. The effect is quite charming as you can see. The Pooh pillows add a nice touch.

So that is the girls bed, on one side of the room, they'll be sleeping longways to accommodate three. Matt sleeps on the other side of the room, on this stunning couch. I will do my best to find out who manufacture it so you can all order one.

My next task is the kitchen. I'll fill you in when I'm done. Wish me luck!

Love you all!