On the town in Kunming

We have arrived in Kunming without incident and our 3 star hotel has free internet so here we are. The weather forecast is rain and low 60s...so when we arrived we set out right away to the central square of the city, where we saw some old gates surrounded by modern urban development. Kunming is bigger and more modern than I expected.

There is more evidence of the diversity of culture that the Yunnan province is famous for. We ventured into the Muslim neighborhood and found a street market full of all kinds of foods.

Dried fruits, nut candies, glutinous rice dumplings served at New Years...stall after stall. We bought a ton of nut candy, having acquired a taste for it in Xi'an, but not being able to get good stuff in Xiamen. Feeding candy to the kids was a recipe for a successful explore of the old city.

We did not buy any dried fish, however....

Nor did we have room in the backpack for the roasted pig that Thomas wanted...

How about some Yak meat..only 50 yuan per kilo..

The old city is slowly crumbling, and newer developments are encroaching, but we really liked the old world feeling.


Some fried squid was tempting..

There were tons of pipe stores, well, actually "bong" shops...not sure exactly what is being sold to put in those things.

The market is called the Flower and bird market...and finally we did find some birds and flowers, just as it started to rain.

There were lots of crafts and artisans at work. It was hard not to buy a ton of stuff.

Thomas managed to acquire some meat on a stick...


And Helen saw her buddy the ubiquitous Huan Huan, as we made our way back through the upscale shopping area. We did take refuge in a hot pot restaurant and had a good dinner.

We topped off the evening with dessert at Haggen Dazs - which was insanely expensive at $4 each for a tiny scoop of ice cream.

Why I like Chinese

This is my character practice book, where I write the characters I am learning over and over again..

This is our Chinese textbook.. I am proud to say that Michael and I have finished this book just this week. In fact this morning we have a "test" from our tutor. There are about 175 characters in this book, Unfortunately while they all look familiar now, there are many I can't remember consistently. The more complicated ones are made up of smaller pieces, called radicals. The same radicals appear in numerous characters, and these are the ones I tend to get confused by. But one thing is interesting is that certain radicals have a meaning which helps you to figure out what the character is about. An example is Lao shi 老师. The Lao character has a cross sitting on a horizontal line with a diagonal line through it on top. That radical means respect, and the character Lao means elder..Lao shi is teacher (see the relationship?) Its fun to try and find the connections this way, although some characters are used just for sound and the game doesn't work.
I also like learning written Chinese to reinforce the oral language. There are just too few sounds in Chinese for all the words. Even if I could keep all the tones straight, which I do not much of the time, there are still a lot of duplicates, where you need the character or the context to know which one it is. Somehow knowing how it is written is a help with keeping them straight in my head.
I have a Chinese name 林 子安 ... Lin Zi An ...we worked on it with our teacher. Lin is the Chinese word for "forest" , and is also a common surname in China, so that seemed easy. An is phonetic for Ann, but also means peaceful/contented and Zi is just a sound the teacher threw in there to make it sound better. 林 峰 Lin Feng is Michael's name...Lin for Forest and Feng means mountain summit, the teacher thought it was a good choice for Michael's lofty thoughts, I guess. I have been using Ann Forest in China to simplify things, but it turns out that in China, women do not take their husband's name, so our teacher thought it sounds like we are brother and sister. You just can't win.
I do feel that I am at a plateau with speaking Chinese. I know enough words, no doubt mispronounced badly, to survive..find a bathroom, order dinner, ask what things cost...but not enough to ask interesting questions, nor understand complicated ideas at all..Plus I talk like a 2 year old most of the time, with the words in the wrong order, etc. Still I amuse the Chinese people around me with my efforts, which counts for something. But I am not sure how much progress I can make in the next few months. At least with the writing I feel the progress, as I am slowly able to read some signs, recognize other characters as I am riding the bus, etc.
So although I have not been posting, I have been busy. I have also been corresponding with some folks by email, and my mother in law got Skype, so my correspondence time has been busy. Tomorrow we leave for a week in Yunnan (check the map below), our big vacation. The campus is emptying out, even the convenience stores are closed, so it will be good to get away. Of course taking three children to a new place is not exactly relaxing, but it will be stimulating, I hope. Yunnan is a place famous for its natural wonders and colorful ethnic minority culture. We will go to two cities...Kunming, the capital, and Lijiang, as small city up in the mountains, closer to the Myanmar border. If you don't know where or what Myanmar is, think Burma. I am hoping to blog from there, as Michael is bringing the computer and the hotels have promised DSL, but we'll see. While fairly remote, Lijiang is a haven for Western backpackers and trekkers, so we are optimistic. We will return to Xiamen Feb 2nd, ahead of the Chinese New Near traveling chaos.

Sugar cane and the side streets

The main gate to the university is now barely passable, as you can see -- I think they have torn up the street to replace sewage lines. It is a mess out there. By the way, that is not stopping pedestrians from walking through the construction site, although I elected not to take the stroller there. There is clearly not the same level of safety precautions for either workers or passersby in China, as I have never seen so much construction done up close. So our path between the supermarket and the post office, our two destinations for today, ended up taking us through some winding alleys behind the apartment buildings next to the campus. I,m pleased because I have discovered some more interesting sights back there, just when my regular routes had become somewhat routine. Today, and all this week I have both girls with me, as Helen is on a one month break from school.

Today I showed her the primary school where she would go next year if we were staying in Xiamen longer. We know a number of kids there, children of our friends on the campus. All her classmates will go there next year. The shop next door sells school supplies (I go there for my Chinese character practice books) and Yo-yos, which are a huge fad here, especially among the boys.
Of course Helen had her eyes out for snacks, because she always wants to try something new, and she knows I am a sucker for this kind of curiosity. We had already munched some baozi (bread with meat and or vegetable filling), when she spotted the sugar cane:

The seller takes a machete and trims off the outside and leaves a clean cut to gnaw on.

She insisted that it was delicious, and I did have some. While the juice was sweet, it is kind of like eating a stick, and you end up having to spit out the pulp. Yuck! Sophia rejected it too. Helen gnawed at it all the way home and then presented some to Daddy, who has been wanting to try some. As he said -- not very nourishing, but fun.

I am happy to have Helen around during the day again. She likes to get out and explore, which keeps me from being lazy, and her presence amuses Sophia (also antagonizes, but its a total package deal). On the street I ran into a woman who sells Chinese paper cuts from her home. I had met her at a luncheon that the uptown expats gave earlier in the month. She was there with the artisan who makes the paper cuts to do a demonstration. I asked her about lessons to learn how to make the paper cuts, since Helen is obsessed with cutting paper, which has replaced drawing in her world. Her kindergarten teacher taught her a few simple designs (and of course she likes to make snowflakes, American style) Anyone who knows Helen well will remember that she has had many incidents with scissors, including multiple incidents of cutting her own hair. Since Santa put scissors in her stocking she has been unstoppable. Anyway, my new friend called the paper cut teacher, and I am please because he will invite Helen to a class in the new year (after Chinese New Year). Right now, if you ask anyone to make a plan more than one day in advance, they say "...how about in the new year?" ...Because the whole population is getting ready to travel somewhere else in China to see relatives.
So of course we are leaving on Saturday for the Yunnan province to see some scenery and more traditional areas of the country.
Sorry about blogging only once every 3 days or so...I am more and more busy, it seems, and always vying for the computer with my children and husband! We had a quiet weekend, which was good for all I think. We even missed church to hang around the apartment and take walks in the neighborhood. Thomas in particular seems to need these "recharging" days -- he and I had some serious talks this past Friday about not whining so much and I was pleased to see him making a real effort to be curious and interesting.
We are still enjoying some sun. A winter storm is blanketing northern China but it is still quite mild in Xiamen, although more chilly weather here is expected later in the week. I keep wondering what the rainy season will be like!
There are some new links listed above. Both they are other families blogging from China, both quite interesting and much more thorough than me, with some good photos. The Lewises are in Hangzhou teaching English, and Christine is here in Xiamen (My Adventure in China). You can check them out on the days I fail to produce an entry for you! I have been in email contact with both, and enjoy the internet companionship of other moms as crazy as me, leaving the familiar to live in China with kids.

5000th visitor and Cai Laoshi's pictures

I am pleased to announce that the blog has made it past the 5000 visitors mark. I know that hundreds of those visits are my folks, Mom Forest and Aunt Marie checking every day, but there is also a small feeling of fame...recently I met a woman at church I had first met online via the blog..and a Kindergarten parent told Michael at Helen's bus stop that he had seen it. So naturally I should be doing a better job of posting more often. My apologies. One ready excuse has been that our internet connection has been slow at night during finals week, but that's only the half of it. In truth, I am in a bit of the winter doldrums. While its only chilly and not truly cold, we haven't seen the sun much lately, and I am at loose ends a bit...full of plans not yet realized for travel, a little bored with my local haunts, intimidated by my plans for studying more Chinese, etc, and a bit lacking in spunk. On a positive note, my cough has not developed into anything substantial, just a nagging annoyance, and Helen's lip healed with no loss of baby teeth from her fall. I am trying a Chinese remedy a friend recommended for my cold: its called Banlangen Keli, and it is a bittersweet tea mixture, which appears to be doing me no harm and maybe some good. At 3 kuai for 20 packets, the price was sure right.
Today was Helen's last day of school for the term. Her teacher, Cai Laoshi, has been taking photos throughout the semester, of my English classes as well as Helen's activities in the classroom. She sent me over 100 photos, many similar to ones I have already posted, but I thought a semester photo summary would be fun...

Helen and her buddies on a field trip to the city park this fall. They are shouting "Che zi" at the top of their lungs..the Chinese word for eggplant that kids shout instead of "cheese". also the "V" sign is absolutely mandatory -- both my older kids can't stop doing it.

A patriotic moment during rehearsals for the flag ceremony before Helen's promotion to a speaking part.



The kids made masks as a Halloween activity during my English class. They also took turns dressing up and saying "trick or treat."

Here's the class posing with the coloring page I brought for the end of the Thanksgiving lesson, with the Thanksgiving prayer in the guise of a poem...Thank you for the food we eat/Thank you for the world so sweet/Thank you for the birds that sing/Thank you for EVERYTHING!



During Christmas week Thomas came to visit Helen's class with me and helped her classmates make Christmas trees. She was really pleased to "show him off." (and he was suitably embarrassed, but a good sport).

Our recent foray into kite making on New Year's weekend.

There you have it, Helen's school year so far in review. She got a report card with lots of positive check marks, and they are working on having her speak out a little more, which she can do a little when prompted. Still unclear to me how the wheels of comprehension are turning in her brain. She was not the earliest bloomer in language development anyway, and I am not sure how well the immersion is going from a linguistic standpoint, although my language teacher friends would encourage me to keep her hearing Chinese and keep the faith. For the next month she has only her tutoring and Chinese cartoons to immerse in..and whatever I can impart in my bad accent. From an identity standpoint, kindergarten is a complete success..I can see how her acceptance of the way everything is done is an acceptance of herself as belonging there..even though she doesn't understand everything that goes on...she will have the same memories of Kindergarten as other Chinese-born kids..in my book that counts for a lot.

More on red underwear, and Ann's midlife crisis

First - the underwear. This has generated a lot of comments, so I thought I would snap a quick photo to share. Think of this as one of MANY such displays. Of course there are other signs of Spring Festival preparation, but they are really just getting rolling.

It's been an interesting week here in Xiamen. This was us on Saturday:
After this unseasonably warm afternoon, we went to the SM Mall for dinner and some window shopping. Forgot my camera, which I would have liked because while its primarily a mall like any other, there are some unique features, including the best bread in China, the bamboo kiosk and most importantly, the Food Court -- which is a place I really like -- tons of Chinese, ethnic minority and other Asian food stands, and you just walk along and point to what you want and they deduct is from your debit card. Anyone who visits will surely get treated to a meal there, because it is such fun to watch them make the food.

On Sunday it turned cold, and Helen had taken her plunge from the bed and was a little moody (she has since made a full recovery). Michael and I went to our Chinese class and one of his students, Fu Qinqin, has been watching the kids for us each week. This time we were able to go out after class with our teacher and another student, and Fu Qinqin took the kids to McDonald's, where we met up. The kids like her, especially Sophia, who calls her "Foo HIN hin!" By mid week I was wearing my winter coat out in the evening.

Relating to my midlife crisis...many of you know that I am turning 40 in the coming month. I am blaming my sudden desire to go back to school on this fact. Plus I always liked school, and living on a college campus is proving too much for my willpower. This week I applied to enroll at Xiada in the intensive Chinese program. It would only be for one semester, of course, but my tutor thinks I can go straight into the second semester beginner class. I will be taking a written Chinese exam to see if I can place in that class, so I am studying characters like mad! Originally I needed to learn enough Chinese to survive, then my motive was to reinforce what Helen is getting, but somewhere along the line the quest to learn Chinese has become about me -- accepting the challenge, plus giving some rhythm and purpose to my days, now that the routines are established and just surviving isn't a full time occupation anymore. Of course, the issue is Sophia, and feeling a little bored at home with her, tied down by her 2 year old attention span! I think she is a little bored, too. I would like to get her into the campus nursery school, a division of the Kindergarten program, but the principal is not sure if there will be an opening mid year, also she is a few weeks too young, but they could probably overlook that now that she is potty trained. My other option is to hire a nanny/babysitter part time, which most professional families, both Chinese and foreign, have opted to do, because it is very inexpensive. Of course I feel a bit guilty about all this, since I know she loves being with me, but.......? For the time being I haven't committed, just weighing the options, but I can envision myself sitting in a classroom with my books, hard at work on those characters...
I will have to blog some more soon about our Chinese studies so far.

Other updates -- my mom is continuing to tolerate radiation therapy for her tumor, and we love talking to her on Skype. Thanks so much for the ongoing prayers.

Updates, air pollution and red underwear

It's Saturday morning, I have no new photos to load, so this will just be an update. It's been a foggy morning, unseasonably warm and sticky..we are getting mosquito bites again. In January -- that's hard to believe, even in Xiamen.

Hard a scare last night when Helen took a plunge from her bed to the floor and split her lip open and knocked two baby teeth loose. She maintains they were loose already. I had visions of taking a taxi to the nearest hospital, calling our friend Tian on the way....but the bleeding stopped with an ice pack, and while its still a bit of a mess, we're hoping for the best. Really our lives here are built on the hoping for the best motto! There has been a clinic here that catered to foreigners, but it closed its doors last week, so of course this week Helen has an accident and I have developed a chest cold. Not quite severe enough to send me to a Chinese hospital yet! The language barrier is one reason, but also people say that the doctors use antibiotic IVS to treat everything ..people call it "going on the drip." Instead I am following the home remedy route..including tons of ginger soup.
Ginger soup is something Deborah discovered at our favorite patio restaurant. Its made with brown sugar, water and A TON of sliced ginger, simmered for a while. Ginger has obvious medicinal properties and the taste is very soothing, so since Michael discovered the recipe online, we have been making it. What did expats living here do before the internet?...it's such a lifeline and source of information for us on everything .. even the best way to catch up on local news.
Speaking of local news, here is a link to the article I mentioned last week about the chemical plant that will not be built in the Xiamen area due to successful mass protests here last spring.

http://www.nature.com/news/2008/080109/full/451117a.html

The protests were the largest in china since Tiananmen Square, but the government reaction has been quite different. Air quality is a huge issue in China. The reports of other Fulbright families, especially as the winter months brought with them lots of coal burning heat in the north, are fairly appalling. We are having more hazy days as well, but usually the air is quite breathable on the island -- on the mainland the air is visibly polluted some days. I can see why the people of Xiamen were so passionate about keeping the chemical plant out. And amazing that the local government tolerated the protests and acquiesced to their demands.

On a lighter note, I have been meaning to blog about the red underwear. The stores are full of red underwear and socks as the new year draws closer, along with the more expected household decorations. Here's the story...most people know about the Chinese zodiac animals if you've ever eaten in a Chinese restaurant in the US. When "your" year rolls around, you should wear something red every day of the year to maximize your luck. Hence the red underwear for people who might not want to wear the same color shirt every day. Helen's tutor told me that she remembers when she was a kid (turning 12, since there are 12 animals in the zodiac) she remembers the year her mother gave her a bunch of red underwear and a pendant with her animal on a red thread to wear all year). The coming lunar year is the year of the Rat (or Mouse, if you prefer) and guess who is about to get red underwear???? Our Thomas, the Rat amongst us! I was discussing this with my coworkers when I made another cultural discovery...you can find out how old someone is by knowing their zodiac animal. This caused me a little consternation when my boss stated that she was a monkey and I blurted out, "so am I!" and then began to laugh because I am obviously older than her, and now it was clear that she is only 28 and I am turning 40!

Teaching English to small children

I haven't said much about the work I am doing teaching 4-7 year olds English. Christmas was a big time for us -- since, as I like to say: "its always Christmas at Join Kids", just like its always Chinese New Year in classrooms that teach Chinese in the US -- at least from a decoration standpoint. The children attend a weekly 90 minute class with a bilingual (Chinese) teacher. Once a month I see each class for 45 minutes of "oral English". About 10 of Helen's classmates from the Kindergarten are also my students at Join Kids, which is fun, since I feel like a celebrity when they all rush up to me, saying "Huan Huan Mama!"

I think it has been a pretty successful so far. Not every lesson I have come up with suits every group, but most of the time it works, and I always enjoy them, and most importantly, we have a positive experience every time. Some of the children have very good ears and good accents, especially the youngest ones! I have also met several friends of Malinda's girls (last year's Fulbright family).

We try to be game oriented, and the teachers, especially my boss, are very dynamic and engaging. Near Christmas we had a couple of "open classes" for prospective students, and of course I had to be visible as the token native speaker. Since I wasn't teaching I was able to take some pictures. Actually, Thomas and Helen came with me that night, Helen just for fun, and Thomas to "help" in the other class by playing along and calling out some numbers in English during a game. Aren't the kids so cute!

"Santa" is an English professor from Xiada who helped to develop their curriculum and interviewed me..

I really want to try and upload a short clip of them teaching, but I have to wait for the early morning hours!

Just a couple more pictures for you -- Sophia and the Baby Deborahs (all her dolls are named that now, I think she misses Deborah as much as I do)..also her new tiny umbrella, which we bought while shopping downtown today, and Sophia drew the attention of everyone passing by waving it around and saying "its raining". We got off Zhongshan Lu and onto some side streets and found all kids of things, including a store that sells coffee and pasta, cheap clothing and a paper goods store with a whole floor devoted to Spring Festival lanterns and other decorations -- you can bet I went pretty wild in there.