But of course, there is a price to pay for this time off. That price is being forced to spend time with my husband's parents. We had to have a dinner with them, which wasn't too terrible, given the circumstances. MIL actually made good food and she cleaned up after herself. It was rather pleasant, actually. That was Sunday evening. On Monday, it is tradition to go on an outing with your family. I remember last year, we'd rode the bus for what felt like 1,000 years to go see the trolls at their house in Laoshan, which I refer to as 'hillbilly town.' It is so archaic, I can't believe something like this exists in modern society adjacent to a bustling place like Qingdao. But it's there. I guess that's where that mountain chicken lives, if it really exists that is. Though this house of theirs actually has a toilet that works. I was shocked!
Anyway, Jeremy assured me we'd just go to the beach and take some nice photos and then eat some fresh seafood. That actually sounded nice. But of course, it wasn't like that. Not at all.
Now that we have a car, it's convenient in many ways, but also, now we're obligated to drive them somewhere with us on this holiday. As my husband drives, his mother talks and talks and talks. Even my FIL looks annoyed that she just won't shut up. When she tells my husband to turn, he turns though, stupidly, he doesn't look and nearly runs us into a bus. I holler and remind him that maybe she knows WHERE the turns are but HE is the one who knows how to drive. Supposedly at least.
We drive and drive and drive and Raelynn falls asleep. I want to sleep too. I try to tune out MIL and her incessant yammering but it's really hard. Her voice and her accent make Chinese sound like an assault on your eardrums. It surely doesn't sound this way when my husband speaks it. After about an hour, she tells Jeremy to turn right into some rundown plaza. My husband explains that this is his mom's friend who makes tea. Oh. GOD. She is making us stop all over her old backwoods, inbred neighborhood to show the village people her grandchild.
The tea lady was really nice though and despite how annoyed I was with MIL, I tried to be friendly. She showed us around and my husband explained how tea is made. Have you ever wondered how they make tea? Yeah, me neither. But it was neat to feel the tea leaves before they're dried out. If we'd stayed any longer, I would have been bored into stone, but thankfully, we said goodbye and off we went. I tried to forgive MIL for being such an annoying, braggy cow, waking up the poor baby just so she could show her off. But then, no sooner than it seemed we were on our way again, she had us stop at another port in hell.
It was another friend's house, which was astonishing simply because I can't believe MIL has any friends. I mean, she has NO life! But MIL's actual friend there was really very nice. She made me instant coffee for absolutely no reason. I didn't ask for it, nor did I refuse the tea she'd offered me. It was a little odd. What was even more odd was the rest of this family though. If you're not already aware, the living situation my husband and I have is unusual in China. It's just us and our baby in our home. In some areas, things are changing so people are living the way we do, but it is much more common for you to live with your parents, even after marriage. So, this woman's 2 daughters lived with her. One was married with an anti-social husband who chain-smoked in an adjacent room during our brief visit, and a daughter who I mistook for a boy based on the way she was dressed and her haircut. The poor child seemed like she had absolutely no idea how to interact with people that weren't related to her. The other daughter was, quite honestly, bizarre. She was wearing a small house dress that seemed too small for her and under it, had a bra that seemed to be affecting her boobs much like Madonna's old cone boobs from way back when. I thought of my friend Aaron Gordon during this time and wished I could sneak a photo of her without appearing rude. The general vibe in this house was nice but socially inept. I was so happy when we left. We'd only been there 15 minutes but it was the longest 15 minutes ever.
Then again, when in the company of people you'd rather not be around, time seems like it goes on forever with no end in sight, doesn't it?
We finally hit the road and to my tremendous relief, arrive at the beach. Never mind that we could have gone to the beach near our house. No, we had to drive out to the sticks. And no sooner than we park the car, MIL has run to my side and snatched Raelynn from me. We stick her in the stroller and then MIL darts back into the car to fetch the most disgustingly ugly hat for a baby I have ever seen. I shoo her away with it and declare it should be burned. The material was like something for a bad prom dress on the 'burn this immediately' rack. So was the pattern. It was vomit-inducing.
Out on the beach, MIL runs off with my daughter all the way to the shore and I lost it. My husband was not very pleased by my behavior, but I was infuriated with his mother. How much nicer it would have been if she'd said to him, "Hey, you guys haven't taken her down to the shore yet, have you? Let's all go and enjoy this special moment together and take turns walking her along the wavelets." But of course she didn't. She hogged the moment all to herself and my husband was perplexed as to why I was so enraged. I would have been happy to share that moment too, but she's just such a clumsy fucking oaf with no concern for trying to make this family harmonious on her end. Sure, I can be a bitch sometimes, but I am always trying to work with her (to her face at least) and always trying to accept her culture. She doesn't give one fuck to learn not even one thing from my culture and THIS is why I get so pissy. At least my husband did intervene at one point and told her we wanted some photos and videos of Raelynn playing in the water. It never did occur to the cow that I would like photos of my time with Raelynn too and not to have all photos of that old witch and her trolltastic feet bouncing about the waves wirh my daughter.
Here are some photos from the beach:
After the beach, I knew that soon, we'd eat. And that was great because I was hungry. Oh but no! First, we had to drive all the way up the mountain, which I have to admit was really nice but I thought I was going to go crazy from hunger. FIL kept offering me these crappy things that look like dinner rolls (but taste like sawdust) and I politely refused them, though I was so hungry I did contemplate eating them. After another hour driving up and down this mountain, stopping once to take photos at the top, we went back down and found a restaurant. And that was the best part of the day. Raelynn slept through the whole thing and MIL kept wanting to hold her. Jeremy told her no and to drop it which made me even happier than fresh seafood and cold beer. When Raelynn did wake though, I let MIL hold her because I thought I'd be nice and let the old gal be the one to feed her the tofu and spinach soup I'd saved for her. She promptly went running, while Raelynn was still trying to figure out where the hell we were now, no less, to show off the baby to anyone and everyone in the restaurant. Here's a photo of that:
After that, we leave and I'm so happy, because I'm thinking we're finally going home. But no. We're not. I suddenly see things that look a bit familiar in this dusty old hellhole and I realize we're going to their crappy mountain apartment. NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!
That was just before 4pm. I was subjected to insanely boring Chinese programming (just 3 channels) on the TV, which my husband and FIL had set to this awful war movie (I despise war movies in any language); MIL's cooking (she felt the need to make more food since Raelynn had slept through most of our time at the restaurant); and then, I was forced to wait another hour there (with that damn war movie on) while my in-laws fertilized the vegetables they are growing somewhere in some crap patch of dirt behind this crusty apartment building. They reeked of manure when they came back in and tried to blame the baby, which really cracked me up. They claimed they only watered the plants but MIL smelled like she fell into a vat of shit. They took showers but put on the same clothes! GOD! These people! We finally got back to our home at 7pm. I have never been happier to see our tiny little apartment on the decrepit side of town.
That was Monday. Today is Thursday. We've been having a splendid week just the 3 of us, enjoying our time off from work. Though perhaps my husband thought he'd be funny and suggested we have dinner with his parents tonight. I was so relieved when he told me they were back out in hillbilly town. Now I just pray that they stay there through the weekend so I don't have to see MIL until I head out to work on Monday. I think I deserve that much at the very least!
I'll end with photos from the top of the mountain:
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