Tag Archives: life of a tai tai

Good Times at Family Mart

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At the end of the month I always have the horrible realization that it is time to pay the bills. Everyone has this feeling I suppose—the dread of parting with your hard earned money, the hope that it won’t take up too much of your time. In the United States, I used to have things organized so that I did most of it online. The mortgage gets paid automatically; the other things have scheduled payments. Aside from forgetting to put money in the account, my worst fear was forgetting my password or my user name for the gas company. For those few bills that still required a check to be written, I took care of that with my handy dandy checkbook. I could buy stamps and then put the bill in my mailbox for the mailman to pick up. If I was feeling like taking a little walk I could saunter down Roland Avenue, get a coffee at my Starbucks, chat with my friendly lady at the Deepdene Post Office (also named Gwen!), and then shop at the Children’s Bookstore after I had mailed my letter. So civilized when you think about it. And, I must add, so easy. So easy, in fact that I assumed China would be similar. Doesn’t everyone do things this way?

Oh, you all know by now what to expect here! The answer is no. No way. Paying my bills in Shanghai is nothing like doing this in the United States. China runs on cash. I do have what is essentially a debit card, but I can’t use anything resembling online banking because I can’t read characters. I apologize if all the native Mandarin speakers would scoff at my description of how things get done around here, but for an English-speaking White lady getting the bills paid ain’t easy!

Mark had been living in Shanghai for a while before the rest of us arrived, so he had managed to figure out a few things. Unfortunately, his apartment was serviced and so some of the things that became important for me were new for him as well. We set up the bank accounts (a story of epic hilarity and frustration as well), but couldn’t do much more than get money from an ATM or pay for groceries at places that accept Union Pay. This is basically the only type of card you can use in many places. Occasionally my AMEX or US bankcards will work, but sometimes it is Union Pay or the highway so it is helpful to have a Chinese bank account. However, most of the time I need to pay for things in cash and especially in the beginning this was frustrating. In the US, I carry very little cash. This keeps me from spending it. Here I need cash to pay for everything, which brings us to my bill paying dilemma.

In Shanghai I need to pay my bills in cash. Mark handles the rent and a few other things. Some of that is cash and some of that is wired directly. The utilities—phone, gas, electric—I pay and I do it all in cash. This is a multistep process that usually goes something like this:

  1. The bills arrive in the mail. The ayi checks the mail and then hides the bills for me to find somewhere around the house.
  2. I find the bills! I can’t read what they say, of course, so I must blindly accept that they are correct. Sometimes I get a bill or a note that I have never seen before. Guess what I do then? I either find someone to help me translate or I just pay it to avoid the hassle of human contact. Wheee!
  3. I go to an ATM to get money to pay the bills. To give you an idea of the ridiculousness of this, our electric bill is usually more than 2000 rmb a month. Most ATMs only let you get out 2000rmb at a time. To pay the bills and then also hand our ayi her wad of money at the end of the month, I stand at the machine asking it to give me 2000 rmb multiple times. I then stuff what looks like an obscene amount of money in my bag.
  4. Next I do something crazy! Most people send their ayi or driver to pay the bills for them, but because getting all this cash means I am already out, I just go ahead and pay them myself at Family Mart. What is Family Mart, you ask? This is basically 7-11. In Shanghai I pay my bills at 7-11, which, obviously, is weird.

Paying bills at the convenience store takes some getting used to. Family Mart is not a welcoming place. It is bright and smells like the crazy mystery meat that is sold there on sticks in these gross little cups of liquid. Is it broth? Is it water? I will never find out because I will never, ever buy this. There is the discomfort of pulling out a wad of cash in front of a dozen Chinese customers. This never gets easier as everyone here is in everyone else’s business pretty much all the time. No one averts their eyes. No one gives you a little space to spill the contents of your wallet on the counter and then proceed to count to a million. People sometimes see me and then deliberately cut in front of me because, hey this is how we do it in China, and I also look too White to cuss at anyone in Mandarin. My stack of bills is also a hint that I will be camped out for a bit with the cashier so they are willing to knock me over to avoid spending that quality time with me.

Late bills cannot be paid at Family Mart, those have to be paid somewhere else. I have no idea where that is, of course, so it is of the utmost importance that I make my trek to Family Mart before the end of the month. Handing the cashier a late bill requires more Mandarin than I can manage and the extra ire of my fellow customers.

Often either the cashier or another customer will comment on my expensive bills. They make noises and discuss amongst themselves. Watching an expat spend some of what most Chinese assume is an endless supply of money is fascinating. It requires comment. I understand this. It costs more money than it should to heat and cool our house. We should all just put on a jacket in the winter and get used to being sweaty in the summer. We won’t do this, of course, and so I keep being the object of opinions in Family Mart.

Mark contends that it is not the amount of money that I am spending that garners so much attention, but rather, the fact that I am spending this money myself. The combination of expat utility bills and the actual expat paying them is the part that is blowing people’s minds. You have the money to pay those bills but not the sense to hire someone else to do that for you? What are you, insane? I think we all know the answer to this question. Of course I am insane! I moved my family to China and now I am paying bills in Family Mart! That is all the proof you need.

Parenting Fail

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There are limits to my patience. I know this surprises you. After all my previous blog posts concerning my inability to just “let it go,” I am sure you were thinking that eventually I would be full of vanilla cupcakes and rainbows. While I am pretty certain no one was expecting sunshine from over here, I have found it hard to put up new posts because I am feeling so negative about China. And that isn’t really fair to China. While my rants about Shanghai are often funny, sometimes I can’t seem to see the humor in certain situations. When I get to that point, there is no turning back and my mood tends to poison the whole house.

I didn’t want to come back to Shanghai after this summer and was finding it hard to motivate to pack and organize all the things we would need and want once my direct access to Target was cut off. A few days before our departure I found myself waking up in the wee hours to obsess over all the things about China that drive me crazy. That state of mind has lifted a bit since the end of July, but not much. This wouldn’t be a problem if I were here in Shanghai alone or just with my husband, but I am here with those wonderfully impressionable children that I decided to drag along for this adventure. Part of my job as a parent living abroad is to make the experience as enriching for them as possible. This does not mean that I make everything easy or that I keep them from having those difficult moments, but it does mean that I try to keep my feelings to myself when I am particularly venomous about our host culture. Unfortunately, I don’t have much of a poker face. I am also (surprise!) a notorious complainer. These two things combined with our general lack of privacy here in our cramped living space means I have been doing a terrible job of focusing on the positive.

This brings us to a few nights ago when my unhappiness was really ticking along. One of the boys was also having a ShangLow day and was railing against the table manners of the Chinese. This is certainly something that you will never hear me defending, particularly as my Southern roots tend to make themselves apparent when it comes to moments like these. That said, I know it isn’t up to me to decide what is and what isn’t polite here in China. If you want to know about how to behave in the United States, feel free to ask. If you want to see me volunteer this information as we sit with a table full of Chinese nationals eating dinner, good luck. You won’t hear a peep out of me. This means my house is often ground zero for heated discussions concerning manners and what is and isn’t acceptable. Inside our house, the US rules apply although Mark has taken to slurping his soup and drinks as if he grew up in Puxi. The kids ride the line sometimes, but they are well aware of the limits of cultural exchange here at Chez Erickson. The child in question was furious, and deservedly so, at having witnessed what they thought were atrocious manners. Of course, the other individual in this scenario might have seen things differently, but I was trying to provide some good mama vibes. I held my own until faced with, “Name one good thing about Chinese culture!”

Ouch. And here is where I drop the ball both as a parent and as a guest in a country that is not my own. For all the things I complain about, there have been some wonderful things that have happened here in China. I have some fabulous Chinese colleagues and friends who have opened their hearts to me and have helped me when there was no reason to do so. There are many things about Chinese culture that I respect and admire. I may not always understand China, but I can respect history. I can see the good in individuals even when the overall picture frustrates me. But do I say this? Do I volunteer this information to my child as he shakes his fist at the sky? No. I hesitate. And this is just enough time for his eyes to grow wide and his mouth to harden and for him to spit out, “See! Even you can’t think of one positive thing!” And I stammer and stall as I try to push down the part of me that is angry and annoyed and remember the part of me that can see the shiny happy stuff. But the moment is already gone and I have missed the chance to say what needs to be said, to put the train back on the track and convince my child to give things some time. I have done the thing I have tried so hard not to do and let my feelings become the conversation here at home.

 

Revisiting the Meat Section of Carrefour (Or Why We Don’t Buy Much Meat in China)

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Remember when I described the meat section of Carrefour? How the meat is in these big open bins and you choose the pieces you want? Here is more proof that I am not crazy and that Chinese shoppers value “creative” solutions to problems. Enjoy!

Hoarding, Shanghai Style

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Over the summer, a family friend asked about my daily routine.  How had I been filling my time in Shanghai, particularly since all three kids were in school most of the day?  I know most people expect an exotic answer.  I should have been doing things that one can only do here in China, right?  I should have spent my time doing things that make my old American life seem boring.  Sorry folks, my answer sounded surprisingly mundane.  My days last spring could have passed for those of your typical American housewife.  I got the kids up and hustled them off to the bus stop.  I went to the gym.  I thought about what to make for dinner.  It sounds boring.  Believe me, I know.  All these things might have been the same even if we had never decided to move to China.  But being in China adds an element that is difficult to really convey when I explain my life to people who don’t live here.  Even the most mundane tasks become special challenges.  And these challenges have begun to make crazy things seem totally reasonable.

I know some of you have seen the American tv show “Hoarders.”  Of course you have!  You can go ahead and admit it.  Everyone loves to see all the ridiculous or disgusting things the people on that show have packed into their houses.  They always have reasonable explanations for how things got so out of control, how “collecting” became something bigger or saving for a rainy day turned into being unable to open your front door.  They all had perfectly good reasons to start accumulating cats or to begin carpeting their floors with dirty laundry.  So how did they all end up with a house full of crazy?  And how does this apply to Team Erickson?  Well, apparently Shanghai has turned me into a hoarder.

Currently I am hoarding cheese.  Yes, cheese.  Specifically, I am hoarding that orange colored cheddar cheese.  I no longer care if it is mild or sharp.  It just has to be orange.  I know that cheddar cheese should not really be orange.  I know that white cheddar cheese tastes just as good, maybe better.  This means nothing to me.  What matters to me now is one simple fact: Blocks of orange cheddar cheese used to be available everywhere here.  Now, they are impossible to find.  Predictably, we now cannot possibly live without this cheese.  We need, need, need this cheese so when I find a store selling a few blocks, I buy them all.  Every. Single. Package.  I am not exaggerating for effect here.  I clear the entire shelf.  I leave a gaping hole where the cheese used to be.  I have no remorse.  I don’t think of the other expat moms also on the hunt for this cheese.  I don’t feel sorry that I have most likely ruined their attempts at taco night.  Sometimes I cackle as I haul my groceries home.  Cheese!  Orange cheese!

There have been other things I have had to hoard: sour cream, Progresso minestrone soup, our favorite kind of granola.  I made Mark clear the shelves of Pimm’s in anticipation of summer.  Other Shanghai moms have expressed their frustration when something we have all come to expect will always be around suddenly—inexplicably—disappears.  Multiple ladies are currently searching Shanghai stores for the orange cheddar cheese.  We share recent sightings, gloat over our prize catches.  Not everyone leaves a bare shelf, but most come very, very close.  During the sour cream shortage of 2012, one friend filled her freezer with the containers she found.  She created such an impressive stockpile that her husband became alarmed when he realized there was no room for any other food.  They had a freezer full of sour cream. She needed the sour cream, but was quick to explain herself to me.  “You’re from the South!  You understand.  How am I supposed to cook without sour cream?”  Oh, I understood.  I have filled Henry’s closet with cans of soup, organic long life milk and imported peanut butter.  I am in no position to judge.

 

China Crazy

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I will admit to always feeling a little frantic when it comes time to leave the US and return to China.  There are always things that needed to be done that never got checked off our list, people we wanted to see who we weren’t able to connect with, places we wanted to go that never quite worked out.  There is the sadness at leaving behind family and friends.  The last day or so I start to feel panicky.  The last few times it has been very, very hard to organize myself to actually get on that plane.  I don’t want to be dramatic, it isn’t like that scene from Dead Man Walking, but those last few steps onto the plane seem to happen in slow motion.  I’m not the only one who feels this way.  I won’t name any names, but other expats have mentioned feeling their hearts constrict in those minutes before the plane takes off.  I am usually the lady wrangling her kids while taking deep breaths and hoping they start drink service ASAP so I can get a glass of wine.  Yes, even on the morning flights.

So imagine my surprise when people posted this on their Facebook pages:

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2399317/Alaska-diversion-Delta-New-York-Shanghai-flight-passenger-Stephanie-Heizmann-Auerbach-charged.html

No, that wasn’t me. We were on a different flight, silly.  And we were in economy.

Of course, people began commenting on how sad it was and how there must have been something else happening.  Maybe she had taken some medication that interacted with the alcohol or maybe she had been drinking profusely in the lounge before she boarded the flight.  I don’t know, of course, and it is horrible that they needed to divert the flight and that she was arrested, but the overwhelming feeling that washed over me after reading the article was relief.  There, I said it, I was relieved.  Relieved that I wasn’t the only crazy one, the only one who occasionally thinks about flipping out on that return flight to Shanghai.  Even better, I am not the one who let the crazy out on the return flight to Shanghai.  Success!  Let’s all consider this a triumph.  Because there is crazy and there is China crazy.  I think we all know which kind of crazy I am.  (I am hoping you all thought “China crazy.”  You did, right?)  China makes you crazy.  You need evidence?  I submit the best comments concerning this incident gathered from friends and acquaintances:

“That’s what 9 years in Shanghai will do to you.”

“She must have been drinking that fake Chinese wine made with turpentine.”

“And they were in first class.  Those seats lay all the way flat!“

“Some people just can’t handle Shanghai.”

“China DOES make you crazy.”

And last but not least: “At least she ended up in an American prison.”

So now when we make the trip back and forth from China to the United States, I will have even more reason to try to keep my crazy to myself.  I certainly don’t want to follow in the footsteps of this trailblazer.   No copycat crime for me– no matter how much I might sometimes dread returning to Shanghai. Of course, if we are in economy then all bets are off.

Team Tofu

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We all knew it might happen eventually…  Team Erickson has become reluctant vegetarians.  Food safety has always been a bit of an issue here for us, but lately it has gotten too difficult to ignore.  We moved here concerned about the effects of pollution on ourselves and the kids, but that was all hypothetical.  I really thought our main food issue would be strange, new, exotic food.  Would the kids like it?  Would they even taste it?  Would I ever get over my street food anxieties?  (The answer to that last question is a predictable “no.”)  I had not thought about the availability of safe, reasonably healthy, affordable food on a daily basis.  There is always some sort of food scare here and we laughed it off initially.  People are injecting sugar water into the strawberries?  Sure they are.  There is some problem with the green bean supply?  Yawn.  Scammers are making fake eggs using chemicals instead of chickens?  Highly implausible.  Still, those stories began to weigh on me.  I have talked before about my shopping difficulties.  That hasn’t changed much.  I am still pounding the pavement in search of dinner ingredients.  Only now I have found that there are certain items that we were happily eating before that I can no longer convince myself to buy.  Like meat.

Team Erickson is a family of meat eaters.  Henry’s love of pork is well documented.  Mark considers it the “trifecta” when he manages to have bacon at all three meals.  Lucas enjoys nothing more than a good hamburger.  Ava loves meat a little less, but still counts herself among the carnivores.  Me, I can take it or leave it.  Some things I love, but I can go without meat, especially here in Shanghai where the things I buy don’t compare in quality to the things I used to purchase in the United States.

So did I force everyone else to give up their beloved pork chops and chicken?  Hardly.  Did you hear about the 16,000 (!) pigs floating in the river here?  The 1,000 ducks?  That river eventually becomes the drinking water, by the way.  Did you hear about all the chickens they killed once our new round of bird flu surfaced?  We can’t do much about the polluted air– holding our breath forever isn’t a realistic option– but we can control what we eat and after a few of those stories we weren’t all that excited about meat.

Are we eating organic vegetables?  Who knows?  For all we know we are eating veggies grown entirely in toxic soil irrigated with the dirty water from some city roof.  Actually, I am pretty sure we are eating at least a few vegetables grown in this less than ideal manner.  We try not to drink the porky water with its high level of heavy metals and I don’t cook with it.  But the water that comes into my house begins in that river full of carcasses and we all use it to shower.  Is our bottled water any better?  I have to trust that it comes from where it is supposed to– a big assumption for China– and that drinking it won’t eventually have some detrimental effect.  Do I sound crazy?  I am sure I do, but let me assure you I am far from the craziest person here when it comes to this issue.  You should all be thanking me that I haven’t started forwarding all the alarming emails I get from the school and my neighbors concerning some new health scare.  Don’t open your windows!  It lets in horrible polluted air!  Open your windows!  Otherwise the off gassing from your carpets and paint will kill you all!  Going home for the summer is not enough time to detox!  We are all doomed!

The kids and I like to joke that we are becoming toxic superheroes.  After breathing polluted air, bathing in toxic water, and eating vegetables grown in questionable soil we can now resist any sort of environmental hazard.  After the next nuclear disaster, they can call Team Erickson to handle the clean up.  We won’t need protective suits.  We will breathe deeply and appreciate the relative freshness of the air.  I should really get to work on our costumes!

Hang Loose (Otherwise Known as Six)

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Along with the language, there have been a few other things that cause miscommunication here for me in China.  I do an obscene amount of shopping here.  Sometimes, I am in a nice Western style store with set prices, English speaking staff, and blasting air conditioning in the summer.  Sometimes, however, I am in a market or a warehouse, or on the street with vendors who might know a little bit of English, but not enough for me to get by with my extremely imperfect Chinese.  I am getting better at communicating, of course, and I am frequently amazed by how much I understand.  But the important thing to remember here is that these things are in context.  No one ever calls me on the phone to randomly start talking about prices and no one in the markets ever tries to start a conversation with me about things outside the realm of buying and selling.  This makes it easier.  There is no scrambling around in my brain searching for the few words I know in a sentence to try to guess at meanings.  When I am in a restaurant, people talk to me about what I want to order almost as if we were following a lesson in a textbook.  When I am buying clothes at the fabric market, people talk prices and quality.  I don’t always get it, but I can get by.  One thing I didn’t anticipate (an unfortunate theme thus far here in Shanghai for me) is the differences in hand signals and symbols.

I should have seen this coming, of course.  As an English teacher I have taught this lesson myself a million times.  I choose to focus on all of the vulgar symbols and gestures because those tend to be the ones my students need to know.  In Sydney the foreign students were always amazed that gestures they thought were harmless were actually the reason they were getting into so many fist fights.  Who knew?  Luckily, I have managed to steer clear of accidentally offending anyone (as far as I know!), but I have discovered that my ability to communicate with my Chinese salespeople and taxi drivers has been less than successful because of the way I count on my fingers.  I don’t know how to count correctly!

The first time it happened, I was at the flower market and arguing over prices with one of the vendors.  I was having trouble understanding her, and she didn’t have a calculator or pen and paper to help clarify things.  She kept putting her two pointer fingers together in the shape of a cross as she repeated the same information over and over.  Fingers in a cross?  What did that mean?  The same thing happened a few minutes later when a vendor gave me what I thought was the symbol for  “hang loose.”  It seemed a little out of place for what we were talking about. Hang loose?!  Sure, but how much were the flowers?

Later, my Chinese teacher cleared things up for me.  Apparently the Chinese use specific hand symbols for numbers.  Symbols that I was seeing, but not understanding.  One through five were the same, but I could start with the pointer or the pinky.  Once we got to six, things got crazy.  There was the hang loose.  Seven was like a shadow puppet.  Eight was what I would think was air guns.  Nine was scrunched fingers that I had a hard time replicating.  And ten?  There were three possibilities for ten, one of which was the crossing fingers using the pointers from both hands.  Or you could cross your first two fingers on one hand.  Or you could make a fist.  Which one was more common?   It depends, apparently.  So you might see any of them.   Three lukewarm cheers for variety!

So you want to know how to count like a pro in Mandarin?  Want to add those quirky hand signals?

Screen-Shot-2012-08-02-at-8.44.03-PM-640x289

You are welcome.

An Open Letter to the Eastern European Caricature at My International Gym

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Dear Fellow Gym User,

Please accept my sincere congratulations on becoming a member of this gym.  I think you will enjoy your time here.  The facilities really are second to none.  I am certain you will come to appreciate the abundance of clean towels in the locker room and the varied selections at the juice bar.

Now that we are on friendly terms, I hope you will forgive me if I admit that originally I had hoped you were just a hotel guest.  This is, after all, a hotel gym and plenty of people are here only for a few days and then they disappear never to been seen again.  So that first morning when you showed up, monopolizing several machines at once, I was hopeful that you were just passing through.  Normally, I try not to notice other gym patrons.  I try to concentrate on my workout with as little social interaction as possible.  But you managed to force me out of my routine.  From the moment you arrived on the scene my time at the gym was forever changed.

That unitard you were wearing was definitely a bold choice.  I have seen many things here in China, but a large Eastern European man in a tiny unitard is a first.  I was half expecting to see some amateur wresting break out on the mats over by the punching bags.  Imagine my disappointment when you merely paced around while the rest of us made use of the treadmills.  It takes cajones to pull that look off.  And you certainly have those.  That was difficult to ignore.  That outfit was tight.  And while I know there are many things in this country that involve extra services and hidden meanings, this is not a “gym” in the way that many of the places you might have recently visited might be “massage parlors.”  So those two beautiful Chinese girls?  Yeah, they are actually trying to work out.  I don’t think they were hoping you would come over to watch the trainer put them through their paces.  And the grunting?  You weren’t even exercising!   That was truly unnecessary.  But, to each his own!  I hope you didn’t catch the particularly sour look I shot you from over by the elliptical machines.  We didn’t know each other then and I had not yet come to understand your special charms.

After that performance, I wasn’t expecting to have you turn up the next morning with an even more impressive outfit!  That tracksuit was a thing of beauty—shiny and tight with elastic at both the wrists and the ankles.  Amazing, really.  Was it waterproof?  It was the kind of thing only Borat would wear, but there you were, rocking that outfit like no one’s business.  I was hoping you might actually work out.  There are weights here, you know.  You could lift some, if the mood struck you.  Or you could take a class.  I hear spinning is popular here.  Just a suggestion.  It might help with some of what I can only assume is an excess of pent up energy.  Or a serious mental disorder.  Why else would you have ignored all those fancy machines in favor of standing in that corner panting and sweating?  Yes, I noticed you had fixated on some more of those lovely Chinese ladies.  They do seem to be everywhere here!  Of course, they didn’t give you the opportunity to introduce yourself, what with all that exercising they were doing!  But don’t worry!  With your new gym membership you will have plenty of chances to bond with them over by the water dispenser.

So let me just close by welcoming you once again.  Asia is always in need of more men making confident fashion choices in unexpected places.  You are certainly a trendsetter in that area.  While I have been less than impressed with your exercise regimen, there are plenty of trainers here that can help you with that!  Just make an appointment.  And I am sure those ladies you fancy will soon come around to your unique way of presenting yourself.  How will they be able to resist your bravado?  Your steely gaze?  Your sweaty but silent advances?  If you keep coming back, again and again, eventually they will get used to you.  I am certain the same will be true for me.  I am positive it is only a matter of time before you and I become fast friends.

Yours in fitness,

Gwen

 

The Euphoria Lasted About 5 Minutes

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Last night I asked Mark how it could be possible that we have only been back in Shanghai one week.  One week?!  It feels like a million years.  He agreed so I felt a little less dramatic.  I managed to resist using my hands in very theatrical ways so he couldn’t accuse me of making the situation worse.  Yes, our collective excitement has already worn off and we have so many more weeks to go before we leave China again.  I have the added pressure of defending my dissertation in early March, so I can’t do what I would like to do and wallow in my unhappiness while moaning about how hard it is to live in China.  The ayi would never allow it anyway.  She would be unable to resist asking me all sorts of personal questions to get to the bottom of things.  Am I sick?  Does my head hurt?  Have I eaten anything today?  Was I trying to sleep?  That is too bad because she needs to make the bed and I should really try to get some exercise.  But I digress.

The thing that pushed us all over the edge–today is Ava’s birthday.  She is nine now and while birthdays are always a celebration, China can always find a way to make me feel less than celebratory.  In the US, I went all out for birthdays.  As a mom–let’s be honest here—I used to kill it.  We have the family tradition of the birthday boy or girl waking up to fresh cinnamon rolls and streamers festooning the dining room.  I used to plan elaborate parties and bake magnificent cakes.  Suffice it to say, all this is more difficult here.  My oven conspires against me resulting in cinnamon rolls that were today labeled “puck-like” by Ava and her siblings.  I couldn’t disagree.  The proof was almost too difficult to eat.  I am less plugged in to the school situation and so this morning when Ava asked if I would be making or buying treats to bring in for her class today, I was struck dumb by the realization that I had planned to do neither of those things.  I had actually planned to do nothing because I had forgotten all about that!  She was less than impressed.  She wants a slumber party but can’t narrow down her guest list.  My mother rightfully pointed out that this is a welcome change from last year when she was newly arrived and hadn’t had time to make friends in Shanghai.  While this is true, I can only focus on how much harder it is going to be to host a party for a bunch of screaming 3rd graders without the benefit of Party City or Michael’s.  Tough times, indeed.

And this comes on the heels of a China day where there were no taxis to be found so I walked to school (uphill both ways!  in the snow!) cursing every Chinese person I passed along the way.  It was unreasonable, I know, and it was even more unreasonable when I arrived home and was irritated that the ayi wanted to have a discussion about the vacuum cleaner.  How dare she!  And this after she showed up this morning with a huge pack of special cookies and the biggest stuffed bear you have ever seen.  She was late and I think she was concerned that I would be angry with her. I actually love to have even five minutes alone in the house so I had been hoping she would be even later!   She would never have guessed that plan.  When she came in with her arms full of all that stuff my face must have registered some sort of wild emotion.  She blurted out that it was for Ava’s birthday and then seemed to doubt that she had the correct day.  She was right, of course, which only added to my guilt.  How did she know it was Ava’s birthday?  Luckily, she didn’t head into the kitchen and bake a cake—that would have been the last straw.  I am sure hers would have been delicious and a pleasure to eat.

Happy Birthday, Ava!  Your mom is officially crazy.