Alice is 15!

 With the letters Ellie had used in her video,

I surprised Alice with "happy birthday".

We had fresh strawberries, whipped cream and an confetti angel food cake

to celebrate.  The birthday present will be waiting in the U.S. in June.  (She

wants the Millennium Falcon Lego kit).

It has been a good year for Alice.  

When I think about our lives last May, as we were trying to prepare to move 

without letting anyone know we were going to be moving, and how stressful everything was, I'm glad that's all over and gone.  

What a crazy time it was as she and Ellie did their joint recital. And went to a week-long

Especially For Youth in Minnesota.  And a week-long Girls' Camp.  And a 3-day youth conference.

Wait a minute!  I guess they had it pretty easy--they were always gone!

Then there was Packing.  And going to Idaho and Colorado. 

And then to China.

It is amazing to think we've been here 10 months.  

Alice and Ellie were a bit apprehensive in starting a new school, but

didn't take long to begin enjoying friends.  There were

many willing to include them.  I guess international schools tend to be

more inclusive--no one's been there long enough to be clique-ish.

Alice has been thriving like a transplanted flower thrives when

put into a bigger pot with rich soil.  

She is blossoming!   

You never know what you'll see on an outing...

On a recent Saturday, while the girls went to a KTV place for karaoke with the other

youth from church, Kevin and I had some time to kill, so

we walked down Tianjin's equivalent to 5th Avenue:  BinJiang Dao.

The stores are upscale, but there were also some cheap places.

Kevin got a leather wallet for 58 kuai--or just under $10.

But we are not real shoppers.  

It's more fun just seeing

what everyone else is doing on this walking street, 

which by the way is somewhat of a misnomer because "trolleys"  

--small trucks with benches in the back for tired pedestrians--come barreling through 

and you'd better be aware of them and get out of the way!

Suddenly, in the middle of the walking street appears

a couple, dressed to the max, with a couple of stuffed giraffes.

I'm not sure if they were modeling for a brochure or if these were their wedding photos.

Weddings are a REALLY big deal here

and the wedding business are huge. 

You can rent Cinderella's carriage, 

unless you'd prefer more traditional transportation.  

This is an enclosed chair carried by 4 men.

I didn't get the picture until after the bride had entered

the Buddhist temple (this was at Drum Tower Street).

We often see wedding caravans of rented red cars (red means good luck), with a

minivan leading the procession--with the back open and 

a videographer recording the whole thing.

Rich people might have red BMW's (or even red Porsche's), but usually they are Toyota Camry's or Corollas.  Depends on how much you want to spend.

And in the end, you are just as married if

you spend a little or a lot.  To my way of thinking, I would

rather have the money for setting up a nice household,

A few more memories of spring break...

None of us had eaten pineapple on a stick before, but now we have!  The vendors cut it in a spiral

shape to get all the brown "eyes" off.  You have to be careful buying street food

so you don't end up with a painful attack of e.coli.  So fresh fruit, peeled is good. 

But just before handing the fruit to us, the vendor dipped them in water.

and we didn't know if it was clean water or not.  (The only clean drinking water in China is 

bottled water--the water in the taps is not filtered or chlorinated).

Still, we chanced it, and it was alright in the end.

 I find old Chinese architecture always fascinating.

 The bells at that Bell Tower were immense and not at all like the bells that

hang in cathedrals or the Liberty Bell in Philadelphia.

 The Forbidden City,

 in much better weather than the last time we were there!

 It was fun seeing things in sunshine, rather than rain, and in blossoming springtime.

 And to end off the day in Beijing,

we went to the Pearl Market.  

Nathan was the first to discover that the ceilings were mirrored and

very entertaining.

We thoroughly enjoyed having family come to visit.

We'd be happy to have host more family or friends!

And I finally got the picture of Ellie's long dress...

Somehow, despite asking for a lot of pictures, it took awhile to get one in hand (or at least on my computer).

These are the seniors at Tianjin International School

the evening of their Spring Banquet.

Ellie will miss the good friends she has made here.

Xi'an and the Warriors

Day Two in Xi'an and it was time to see the terra cotta warriors. 

We signed onto a tour group associated with the hostel where we stayed,

which provided an English-speaking guide, transportation and know-how,

all of which were appreciated.  It was fun to get to know the others in the group.

 Our transport wasn't fancy, or fast, but adequate--typically Chinese.

 The day was beautiful!  Early April, trees in blossom, fresh green covering the trees

fairly clear skies, and no need for a coat.  Glorious!

 And the warriors look just like they do in National Geographic. 

 It's just that there are SO many of them!

*** 

We were commenting on how the world's great monuments (pyramids, etc), were

done by slightly crazy tyrants who cared nothing for the 

suffering of those who did the actual work.  

This guy had all the workers killed so no one would know

about this vast clay army.  And that was after they had painstakingly 

made each face individually (could have been self-portraits!). 

To build the Great Wall, villagers were conscripted and often never

heard from again--it didn't matter if they were leaving wife and children behind.

 And perhaps you can notice how large they are compared to the people along the sides.

There are three different excavation areas, and there were crowds everywhere

since it was a Chinese holiday, Tomb-sweeping day.

 At a gift shop, an old man was autographing books--he's the farmer who

found something interesting in his field back in the 1970's.  

He's pretty famous now.

 Our guide also had prearranged a Chinese meal, and the food was good,

served in the traditional way with all the food on the lazy susan and you 

use your chopsticks to pick off what you want.  There are serving spoons for the

soupy dishes.  Each person has a small plate and bowl to keep refilling with food.

This makes it harder for me to determine how much I'm eating. 

 I'm used to setting certain portions on my plate, and when they're gone, I'm done!  So far though,

Chinese food hasn't seemed to cause any weight gain, in fact, quite the opposite.

***

It became obvious as the day progressed that our guide had "guanxi" with certain vendors.

Perhaps she got a kickback.  Maybe it was just that if she steered her tour groups

to them, they would get a better price.  But despite all sorts of food vendors, we "didn't want to

go to any of 'those', as this was the only good one."  Same story with the different

vendors of souvenirs--we were told all those others weren't good.

***

That evening, we collected our light luggage and made our way to the train station for the trip back to Beijing.  And wow!  Was the station crowded!

 The whole plaza out in front was filled with small clusters of people,

waiting before they entered the actual station.

 This is what it's like on a holiday!

 The old wall, still intact, encircles the inner city.  

If we had stayed another day, it would have been great to rent bikes and

ride along the top (it's wide enough for a small road).

And this is the perfect illustration of "Zai jian!" (Bye),

looking pretty chipper after the night on the train!

Spring Banquet Dresses... Finally!

Back in early March we made a trip to the dressmaker and though all the negotiations were done without a translator, we felt that the dresses would be what we wanted.

We had pictures of the desired style, 

and the measurements taken were very detailed.

Then a couple of weeks ago, I went to pick up the dresses at the scheduled time.

I was amazed that we didn't have to go in for trying-on sessions.  Just pick up the dresses.

Unfortunately, there were some alterations needed, but

they were done without additional charge, and the end result was fabulous!

Alice now has a very nice dress she can wear for church or other

dressy occasions.

And she has a string of pearls given to her by one of the English teachers

at church.  It was a nice accent!

 Elizabeth's dress had the most difficulties.  She didn't have a picture of it, as it wasn't planned until she saw the fabric in the dress shop.  It was a combination (red over coral) that she has always

wanted, so she sketched it out and worked it out with the dressmaker.

When we got it back, it was too loose through the bodice

and the lace and lining were sewn together on the skirt

which made it look bunchy and just wrong.  First trip back, they had to reset the zipper and take in the side seams.  The second trip back, I asked them to

separate the lace seam from the lining seam.  "But it will not look good!", said the

English-speaking dressmaker's son.  I explained that was how it needed to be

and they did it. However, it was still too loose.  So I made another trip to the cloth market and found some wide ribbon, exactly the right color, opened the side seams just enough, and added ties,
so Ellie could control how snug she wanted it.
Now the dress is so pretty and flowing!

It's Not Quite the Hogwarts Express...

Sunday evening, we boarded the Tianjin to Xi'an Train.

And immediately wondered if the lady with the food cart would bring

chocolate frogs or every-flavor jelly beans.

 I've only ridden one train before (not counting the small one that ran around my 

grandfather's farm in Idaho), and that was just a quick 1-hour trip to Paris from Orleans

when we needed to take Alice to the American Embassy to get her passport, almost 15 years ago.

We could have flown to Xi'an, but I wanted the experience of the sleeper train.

We did buy "soft sleeper" tickets (only 4 bunks to a room, with a door), as opposed to

"hard sleeper" (6 bunks and no door), or hard seats.  (Kevin and I got to share a room with

a Chinese couple.  Awkward at first but okay.)

 The compartments were cozy and comfortable.  Since it was General Conference weekend (but being

a half-day ahead, not all the sessions were finished yet), we downloaded the first session

and watched it as we traveled along.

The train is electric and so smooth that we were under way before we even

realized we were moving.

 When Nathan got tired of being too cozy in the room,

someone would stand with him in the hallway

and it didn't take long for a crowd to gather.  With cameras in hand.

He got that a lot, the entire week. Spread across China, there are 

hundreds of pictures of Nathan and whoever was holding him at the time.

 We were hoping for an Agatha Christie mystery to pop up,

but none did, 

 so we passed the time in a variety of ways. 

 And I found out that Nathan loves books--only 8 months old but will sit still 

for the entire book.  And even several books!

And the food cart?  No, not chocolate frogs or jelly beans,

just noodle buckets.  (Less than a dollar each).  And only spicy beef ones.  (In the stores there are all kinds of varieties).  These are ten times better than American ramen noodle packs.

At the end of the car was a hot water dispenser, as in boiling hot water.

Open your bucket, take out the collapsible fork and flavor packets,

add water and let sit for a few minutes.  Add both flavor packets (one is dry powder, 

one is liquid and oily), and voila!  Dinner!  And the next morning it was breakfast!

After dinner, we all got ready for bed,

Nathan got put to bed on the floor between the bottom bunks (with a blanket and suitcases

corralling him), and he slept well with the movement of the train.

The rest of us took a while to figure out we could close the curtains so

the lights of towns didn't blind us as we passed through.

Still, we were on the "slow" train, which meant it stopped at every town along the way.

Starts were smooth.  Stops were clang! bumpy! as the cars jostled each other.

And as that happened about every 30-45 minutes, all night long, it was a very long night.

Still, I'm sure I did sleep because my dreams contained trains, and stations, and so on.

The next morning, as we drew near Xi'an, we were dismayed to see flecks of rain on the

train windows.  The weather forecast hadn't mentioned rain!

But it all cleared away once we got there.

We had plenty of time to get up, eat breakfast (noodles again), before moving on

to the next leg of our adventure--seeing Xi'an, an ancient capital of China.

And my train experience was a memorable one.

It's so fun when family comes...

It's been quite a while since I've posted, due to technical issues as well as just plain being busy.

But the busyness was of the best kind--having family members come to visit.  

Alice asked me, as we were getting ready for Deborah and Adam to arrive, if I was stressed

about getting the apartment ready.  I looked around and thought, having an ayi to do all the cleaning was so great!  All I had to worry about was getting a crib, car seat and stroller for Nathan, and 

people willingly lent those things.  

And our ayi, Dong Mei, loved having Nathan here.    

Deborah and Adam came for our spring break--the girls had a full 

week out of school and Kevin had three days off work.

It was the week of Tomb-sweeping Day (4th day of the 4th month--or April 4)

plus Good Friday and Easter (hence the full week off for the school). 

We took the opportunity to do some things we hadn't tried yet, and

we were fortunate with good weather most of the week.

On the first day (Saturday) they were here, we rode the Tianjin Eye Ferris wheel.  It takes about 30 minutes to make one revolution (a thrill-ride this isn't!), but we really enjoyed getting a bird's-eye-view

of the city.

It's easier to understand a city when you can see the entirety of it

or when you can see that you can't see where it ends.

 Again, we were SO fortunate to have a clear day.

After using a wet wipe to clean all the railings, Nathan also enjoyed our car.

Our whole group was able to ride together, though all the signs had said

only 5 people to a car. (We had six, plus Nathan).

 The Ancient Culture street is near by, so we visited that as well.  

We went into the local temple and were surprised that it included several courtyards.

The air was heavy with burning incense, and there were several small grottoes where

people were kneeling and praying to local deities.

And when we returned home, the planters had been filled with pansies and petunias.

Seeing flowers is such an uplift for me,

and I'm so happy they were they for our visitors as well.

The grayness of winter has gone, spring is here!