For Why?!?!?

It's the start of a 3-day weekend! Last night, I had a migraine and was determined that today would be awesome. But Seoul has a cough and runny nose so we've been chillin' at home. I decided it would be an ideal time to begin going through my crap and whittling it down. I know the next 2 months will fly by and I don't want to be panicking before we leave for the US.

So I started with a giant storage bag (the kind you vacuum-seal shut) that was under the crib. I noticed my fatheaded troll of a MIL had been in it because she took out the ugly polka dot pants she'd given Raelynn. She must have taken them home in defeat because they're not in Raelynn's closet again. Good. I'm not wasting precious suitcase space on ugly garments from her. I will be absolutely thrilled when that woman is not rummaging through my items!

Anyway, I pour out all the items onto the floor, much to Seoul's great delight, who has helped herself to some of my bikini tops while I begin trying on shorts and t-shirts. Oh what did I expect? That I would fit into my size 3 pants now? Ha. They mock me as I try to pull them up but I'm rather surprised that I can get them pulled up even partially over my butt. That's progress at least. But since it will be quite some time before I'm a 3 again, I put them in the pile for sale. Most of my cute Hollister t-shirts were a no-go either. I'm so booberific now that they appear like they have shrunken onto me. No, no. I'll go buy new ones at Hollister when I get back. They're in great condition so I'll sell these too.

And then I find some stuff that's just had it. It's old and ripped and I've no idea why we've wodged it into a storage bag. Time for it to be thrown out. I make a pile of things to be thrown away. I'm pleased though that there are a few things at least that I can wear again since having kids. Not many things, mind you, but I'll take it. And hey, at least now I have good reason to go shopping.

I sort the bag out and then fill it back up with carefully folded items to be sold. I feel productive. Jeremy comes in and I proudly show him my work. I point to the pile to be thrown away and he gets all concerned. "Oh no, we can't throw it away. We'll give it to my parents," he tells me. "Um, what? WHY?!?" I ask. He explains that in China, there is none of this culture of giving away or selling your things, or throwing clothes away. Even ripped clothes. "But these shirts are old and ripped! What in the world are they going to do with them?!?" One of the shirts in question is a black t-shirt that has faded to that grayish black and has lots of holes in it from being washed excessively. It's an old shirt I creeped from an old college boyfriend and it says "SECURITY" on it. For many years, it had just wound up in my closet as that t-shirt you wear to sleep. Somehow, it wound up in this bag. And now, he's going to give it to his parents. Because. I have no earthly idea why. What will they do with an old ripped shirt?!? I used to have one that said "FUCKER" on it (from a different college boyfriend) and if I find that one, they can have it because I HAVE TO see one of them wearing it. That would totally make my day.

But it just seems odd to give them old clothes they will likely never ever wear. Perhaps they could make rags with these old things, but they won't. They will use the same dirty rag over and over without ever washing it once we go. Jeremy and I wash our rags every week. I bet they will never get washed again once we move. Would my FIL actually WEAR any of these old shirts? He wears this one shirt of Jeremy's. OMG. I need to tell you about that.

HOW did I NOT tell you guys?!? About 3 years ago, MIL bought a decent shirt for Jeremy. It's a Tommy Hilfiger. It may or may not be a fake but if it is a fake, it is a darned good one. I was stunned that she'd picked out something that wasn't fug. Anyway, here is the shirt in question...

 This was on our 2nd anniversary, incidentally.

We had left Raelynn with the trolls so we could go out to a nice Thai restaurant.

Anyway, I hadn't seen this shirt in Jeremy's side of the wardrobe in ages. I had been wondering about it. I think he'd been wondering about it too. Guess what happened to it? His dad took it. No, really. He took it. I checked and checked the closet. So did Jeremy. This was not a case of his mom buying her husband the same thing. No, he randomly took it at some point. Why? We have no idea. When I ask Jeremy about this, he just laughs and laughs. Maybe because he can't explain it either. Now every time FIL wears the shirt over here, we laugh hysterically. It's just bizarre.

So maybe they will wear our old, ripped, outdated clothes. Or they'll just shove them in the cupboards and we'll find them when we come back to China to sell the properties or, his parents, whichever comes first.

My Incredibly Incompetent Assistant

Ever since the semester started, I've wanted to write about this but I thought, hey, give the girl a break. After last week though, I can no longer restrain myself from shouting from the rooftops that my assistant is totally useless.

I know, I know. I only have 2 more months of enduring her before we move away (HOORAY!) but I seriously am about to lose my mind. See, this year is different because my sweet Korean teacher and director, Christina, has to now teach Korean to our 7 year old class AND the 6 year old class. AND be a director. So to ensure we'd have assistance when needed, the school took the cheap way out and hired another Chinese teacher. Now we have 3 Chinese teachers, one for every kindergarten class.

This was SUPPOSED to make my life easier. But it hasn't. And Christina feels my pain. We sit and laugh over the things my Chinese assistant does. We laugh because it's funny. We laugh because we can't believe she could be that dense. We laugh because we can't believe this is happening.

So what did my Chinese assistant do? Well, for one thing, she's lazy. I've said it before in this blog - Americans get a bad rep for being lazy. And there are many lazy Americans. But in China, they take lazy to a whole new level. She's supposed to take out the trash in our classroom every day yet I need to chase her down to do it. She's supposed to stay in my classroom during English time but she often vanishes and it is ALWAYS when I need her help. When she IS in the room, she's playing around on her phone. I give her tasks to keep her busy and she always does a half-assed job on them or asks me if I'm going to help her. Um, no, sweetie. I'm supposed to be teaching these kids English. That's MY job.

My annoyance with her began to grow when they FINALLY hung my boards back up in my classroom, after 6 weeks of school. There had been a lot of back and forth with the chairman who wanted new boards but decided that hanging the old ones for now was better than having bare walls. So up they went. The problem was that the wooden borders made it look worn and old and it clashed with the new wood floors, wainscoting and wallpaper. So the other teacher had made borders and I thought that was a brilliant idea. I enlisted my Chinese teacher for help. I had to nag her several times but she finally finished cutting them for me. Then I asked her to put them up. She seemed confused as to why SHE should put them up. I have class, you dope! The students aren't here to sit and watch me have an awkward conversation in Chinese with you and watch us put these borders up! Derp!

I help her with some of them during snack time. Then I have a free period and I figure she'll do more with it later. But no. She doesn't do anything else for it. I figure when she comes back for my next English class, she'll get busy on it. But she doesn't even come back there and as I teach, I'm fuming that only one of my boards has most of a border on it. Lazy cow.

I had a lot of other stuff going on so my free time was filled with those teacherly tasks. But as I knocked out each thing I had to do, my borders just sat on the shelves, being ignored. I was so angry I just slapped them up there during one class when my kids were occupied with a writing assignment.

I created a birthday board with little cupcakes for each month. I made candles with each child's name on it and put them on the proper cupcakes. She laminated the cupcakes but only because I asked her to. I also asked her to cut them out, which she did begrudgingly. Prior to this, I'd made a "Happy Birthday" sign and asked her to laminate it for me while I was in class. I didn't realize then that I should have told her to cut it as well. She just laminated it and left it on my desk. Christina and I laughed about that one.

But this week, she made me so angry that I actually left the classroom. I had to. Because if I didn't, I knew I was going to scream at her and I couldn't do that in front of the children. What she did made me realize she isn't just lazy. She is also stupid. So incredibly stupid I simply cannot fathom what it must be like to be this dumb.

When they hung my wall boards, they also hung the ones in our gallery. Each class has to make a display on it. Teachers design the display and decorate it but we must use something the children make on our boards. So I looked online and found a delightful spring idea with a tree and butterfly cutouts as the leaves.

That's awesome, right? I thought it would be fun since I only have 7 students and we could see how many they could cut out. Anyway, I made a template and started tracing the butterflies so that my kids could just cut them. If I didn't have to let the students help, I would have just traced a few and then cut several at once. But that would defeat the purpose. Eventually, I was running out of time and had to go to my next class. So I asked the Chinese teacher for help.

My Chinese is not excellent. But it doesn't completely suck either. I called her over and showed her the photo above. I told her I was going to do this for my board and that I wanted the children to cut the butterflies. To be sure she understands, I point at her and tell her, "You trace these," and I hand her a pencil. Then I very sternly tell her "DO NOT CUT!" I tell her this 5 times. I point at the scissors and make the "NO" sign with my hands. And she tells me she understands.

I go and teach class and at the end of it as the children are packing up to leave for the day, Dummy trots back in holding the butterflies. She cut out every single last one of them. EVERY. SINGLE. ONE. I stare at her incredulously. What an absolute imbecile! I bet MIL was this dumb at this girl's age too.

I glare at her and tell her, "I said DON'T cut them." And she realizes suddenly, "Oh! Don't cut them!" THAT IS WHAT I TOLD YOU IN THE OFFICE! I SAID DON'T CUT THEM! GAH! But instead of shouting at her, I just stalk down the hallway to the office. Christina is in there and when she sees my face she looks alarmed. I tell her what happened and she's as annoyed as I am.

Now I had to start all over again, tracing on new little squares of colored paper because she screwed it up. She wasted all that paper, though I did turn it into hearts and made her glue them onto the border of our classroom mirror. Part of me wonders if she's really that dumb or if she just messes up everything so we'll stop asking her to do anything. I won't be surprised if Christina has her fired after this year. I don't think she's thrilled with her Chinese lessons either.

When I told Jeremy what I'd told her about helping me with the butterflies, he assured me she was the idiot here. He said I'd explained myself properly in Chinese and only a moron would have done what she did. So there you go. She's an idiot. I feel sorry for the teacher who will replace me but at least that person will have borders up on the classroom boards now. When I leave this place behind, it will be hard to say goodbye to some people at the school, like Christina, or Kelly - Raelynn's teacher. But I will not miss my lazy and dimwitted Chinese assistant, that's for sure!

The New Nastiest Bathroom In Qingdao

What's your biggest fear? Sharks? Plane crashes? My MIL and her cooking? How about having to go to the bathroom while you're out and about? And no, I don't mean #1.

Have you ever been walking around somewhere and suddenly, your stomach decides with an evil cackle of glee that it's going to drop and you realize that you HAVE TO go to the bathroom NOW? Hear me now, dear friends for I swear to you all that I will NEVER EVER EVER complain about any public bathroom in the US again. My worst fear right now is having to take a dump while out somewhere in China. There is a HUGE difference, believe me.

We went out to Taidong today to do some shopping for Raelynn's upcoming birthday. We went to the Babies, Women's and Children's store which has hundreds of vendors and lots of good deals. We'd noticed last weekend that Raelynn had outgrown her nice dress shoes so we thought buying her a new pretty pair would cheer her up. As we walked around through the different stores, I felt my stomach pitch. Crap, I thought. I'll try to hold it. But I realized that was going to be impossible. I turn to the guy manning the shop we were in and ask him where the bathroom is. He kindly points as he tells me to go left and then straight.

As it turns out, I could have found it based on smell alone. Chinese public bathrooms smell like death warmed over, rotten urine and low tide at the pier, and that's on a good day. Jeremy urges me to wait. "I can't," I tell him. I know I'm not going to walk into the Ritz or anything. I know it's not going to be pretty. I know it's going to be like one of these nasty bathrooms I've seen before. But honestly, I wasn't expecting it to be even worse than the worst ones I've seen.

I feel like I'm going to explode as I round the corner, Seoul curiously staring up at me from the carrier. "Sorry, girl," I tell her as we further immerse ourselves into the stench that had wafted into the corridor to welcome us to the bathroom. And suddenly, I stop short. There's a woman standing and waiting and as I line up behind her, I see the most horrifying thing a gal who needs to take a shit could possibly see in a public bathroom...NO DOORS ON THE STALLS. Not on any of them!

I found this photo here, from someone who apparently had a similar reaction to finding a bathroom like this. I didn't have my camera with me and even if I did, I had more pressing issues like trying to poop without being watched.

In the bathroom I encountered, the stalls were taller at least but there were no doors. If it were a matter of having to pee, I'd have held it. It was either poop here or poop in my pants. I scurried to the last stall because there was no stall across from it. A shred more privacy than the others, I thought. But as I hurried to do what I'd come to do, some of the others doing their business had spotted me and my darling baby come through and I could hear their commentary. Oh what a pretty baby! Look at that baby! All the while, I'm thinking, NO! DON'T look over here! I'm trying to poop in peace! Yeesh! GO AWAY! 

I guess I should be grateful that there were stalls at all. A friend of mine here had once told me about how she and her husband had been on a bus in a rural part of China and when the bus made a pit stop, she desperately needed to pee. She followed the other women to the bathroom and discovered the bathroom was no more than a room with holes in the ground. The other women all crouched down and pooped, talking to each other as they did. THAT would be the only thing more disturbing than what I experienced today.

To top the whole crappy (pun intended) experience off, there was no sink in the bathroom. NO SINK. Fortunately for me, it's not my first day in China so I am never without hand sanitizer. And because I have 2 kids I always have wet wipes. Still, the whole thing left me with a disgusted feeling. I'm not sure what was the worst part - having to poop like that while out, having to poop like that in a bathroom like that, having to poop like that in a bathroom like that while other people are actively talking about me and how pretty my baby is, getting ready to pull up my pants when some woman and her young son come to wait for the stall I am using and then start talking about me and how pretty my baby is, the lack of a sink...yes, I think ALL of this put together makes me say with certainty this is THE nastiest bathroom in all of Qingdao.

What A Pisser!

This month is already halfway over and I realize I've been slacking on the posts. Sorry, I've just been a bit pissy about certain situations that I have little to no control over and am just trying to cope with that. But as a wise (or drunk) person once said, "It's better to be pissed off than pissed on." I couldn't agree more. And I'm sure the stairs in our building would wholeheartedly agree.

For the last couple of weeks, someone has been peeing in our stairs. I've mentioned before that our building is 8 stories with no elevator. On each floor, there are just 2 units. This is very typical of Chinese buildings that were constructed 15 years ago, like ours. The first time the pissing occurred, it was on the 2nd floor landing. I saw it when Raelynn and I had come home from school and it looked like someone poured powder laundry detergent on it but had otherwise not cleaned it up.

I later found out from Jeremy who'd been informed by his mother that the people on the 2nd floor were pissed off (and rightfully so) because they were, in a way, pissed on. The culprit? It is rumored that a young boy on the 7th floor is to blame. He's older than Raelynn by at least 3 years, probably more.

Just about every day, there's been a new puddle of pee in the stairs. Once, it was between our floor and the 5th floor. The other night when my husband came home, I was busy nursing the baby when I heard Jeremy come in and put his things down. Then I could hear him going up the stairs and calling out to the folks up there, shouting about who peed all over the stairs. No one would admit to it. What pigs.

While many people here just endure stupid shit like this, including my husband on certain issues, Jeremy did not sit back on this one. He wrote out an angry note and taped it downstairs on the 2nd floor landing where the most urination has taken place. I had an inkling what it said but to be sure, I asked him and he said it basically translated to say that this is disgusting, this is our building and whoever is peeing in the stairs needs to have respect for the others in the building. He also added some mild insult at the end, according to him. I see my Miami is rubbing off on him. Passive Aggressive Notes: China Edition, here we come. I'll try to snap a photo of it. When we went for our evening walk, he didn't feel like stopping to take a photo for me as we passed it.

As we walked, we discussed the territorial pissings. If this happened once or twice with a small child, I'd be more forgiving. But this boy is old enough to hold it and old enough to know better. And shame on his parents or grandparents for allowing this. Even more shame for not going to clean it up. Let's just say for the sake of argument that Raelynn peed in the stairs. I would go and clean it up. I wouldn't just leave a big puddle of urine for everyone to step around.

Jeremy says he's going to try to talk to the mom or grandma of the boy again but I say he should wait until Raelynn makes another pee in her little potty and then quietly creep up the stairs and pour out her pee in front of their door. He made a horrified face, and I must admit that is really nasty but you gotta fight fire with fire. Or in this case, piss with piss. Hopefully the note brought out enough shame for this bullshit to stop.

I guess we should be grateful though...at least it's not poop.

Happy Year Of The Sheep!

Happy Chinese New Year! It's the year of the sheep, ram or goat, depending on who you ask. The Nanfang has a great article about that one, if you're interested in learning more. I'll just go with sheep since it's what my husband first told me and what he calls himself when asked about his birth year.

So how was our celebration? Well, to be honest, I think the food last year was much better. The food during last small CNY was also better.

But this year, we put out nuts, seeds and fruit as a snack. Which is very typically Chinese thing to do. Also, we began drinking before the real food came out. Scandalous! Jeremy's parents were not keen on drinking before the food. They think it's strange to drink without eating at the same time. Oh and I found one of our last beer mugs! I'd thought all of them were destroyed by the in-laws. One survived!

Slowly, MIL adds food to the table. We don't mind the slowness of it, since it's only about 4:30pm at this point. This is some cooked beef that they serve cold. It's cooked with Chinese spices that I don't even know how to explain but that other foreigners who've been here will go, "Oh yeah, THAT beef." It's not bad but I really can't stand to eat more than a few pieces of it. I also get annoyed with this dish. Because they serve it COLD. But if I try to drink a cold glass of water or milk, or eat a cold American dish, watchout! Because it will kill me, yo!

 Gah! It's that century egg with ginger on top. I do not eat this weird fermented egg thing. I can't. It makes me gag. Plenty of other people find it delicious though. If you're one of them then good for you. I skipped this.

 Meanwhile, my husband has forced me to turn the satellite channels off and put on the Chinese cable. Boo. But wait...this is interesting...some crazy lady with an ugly dress. Also, dig on the cutesy wootsy ram digital ram in the corner. That is SUCH an Asian thing to do. It makes me want to scream.

 Speaking of things that make me want to scream, see this dress. WTF?!? All I could think of was my friend Aaron Gordon and what he'd do if he saw it. Like always, he probably heard my laughter from here.

Ok, look, I don't mean to be a bitch or anything but if you're going to dress up in a gown that resembles an overfertilized flower market from hell, leave your glasses at home. Get contacts and put them in for this one event. Or just grope around blindly. It makes you look like Old Mother Hubbard bought herself a dress from the town dump.

 More ham. Because she probably bought a giant slab of it when she shopped for the stuff she made for small CNY.

 She made la pi at Jeremy's request this year. She made it so much better last year. Seriously. This was very blah. La pi is a potato noodle and vegetable dish. It's served cold with a garlicky, peanut sauce and also has bits of ham. She did a very half-assed job on this one.

 She slopped this on the table too. Garlic sauce for that ham. Sigh.

Cabbage and jellyfish salad. Very tasty!

Also, please notice Raelynn's little fingers snatching more ham. We moved it away from her because she gobbled up so many pieces. We wanted her to eat other food as well. But of course, FIL disobeyed our wishes causing her to disregard the things we say. Urgh...

 The table is filling up fast with food now! Here's a very ugly but tasty store-bought chicken. Also served cold. Also cooked with those odd Chinese spices. I miss American seasoning on things. I was happy the breast was there though. I like white meat. My in-laws think I'm strange for that. I think THEY are strange for many reasons of course, but because under that meat you see, there are chicken feet. Blah!

 Somebody took a nice long nap so Mommy could enjoy some food and many beers before doting on her. Thanks Seoul!

 Now we have some very jumbo jumbo shrimp. They were so good!

Seoul is trying to steal things off the table while Raelynn is making some sulky face. I'm not sure why...maybe because we took the ham away?

She made abalone but instead of making a soup like she did last year, she served them like this. I didn't find them very delicious this time.

 Raelynn busts out her busted demon bunny. This thing is so much worse than I thought. FIL put batteries in for her before the dinner. It squeaks but thankfully, not too loudly. And it hops around.

You can't tell from the photo but it has a broken leg. This is how he gave it to her, incidentally. she did not break its' leg! Oh and photobomb courtesy of Jeremy's foot.

This is a soup with scallops and cucumber slices on top of a steamed egg. It sounds and looks vile but it's incredibly tasty.

 You can see the egg better in this photo. What annoyed me though was when MIL brought this out, FIL took his chopstick, stuck it into the broth and put it in Seoul's mouth. I shouted at him about it and my husband said it wasn't nice to yell at people on the holiday. Look, I let a lot of things slide from those 2 morons but sorry, he needs to wear his ass as a hat for this. He could have made her very sick! She's only 7 months old. She can't have eggs yet. Or seafood! What an idiot! Even MIL yelled at him. I did not apologize. And I won't. I can't wait to move my children away from that dangerously stupid man. MIL is incompetent too but she frightens me much less than he does.

 Just some meh-dish with pork, that weird black mushroom thing and some leafy green that's like spinach but is not actually spinach. This was like what she'd make us any other day of the week.

 Here's the head troll holding the baby. She's wearing her green vest she wore the other day. This time, she's paired it with a pink shirt. Which pisses me right off. Not because it's pink but because Chinese people constantly refer to pink as red. It. Makes. Me. INSANE. Red is the color for CNY and to wear it is lucky. When people get married, red is a lucky color too. And then they cover sewer grates and ugly things by the newlyweds' home in PINK paper. Because. They. Think. Red. And. Pink. Are. The. Same. WTF China?!? Augh! Stop it, please. I lectured my husband about the difference between pink and red. He's got 2 daughters. He NEEDS to know there is a difference between these colors.

At this point in the meal, I felt the beer was making me very full. I wanted to maximize my drunk and salute my folks who were unable to come visit us this year. So I switched to baijiu, a very strong Chinese alcohol.

Cheers, Mom & Dad! It was like they were right there at the table with us. Sort of, anyway.

 Big steamed fish time! Meal is almost over now. Fish was fabulous as always. She has never messed this one up.

 Dumplings had come out at some point while I was in our bedroom putting Seoul to sleep. Despite all the loud pops and bangs that night, she slept very well. How were the dumplings? Not bad, but not her best either.

And now, I leave you with a couple photos from bad Chinese cable TV specials. May this CNY be prosperous and wonderful for you all!

Give Me A Break!

Yesterday, I saw this article on the Shanghaiist. In case you're too lazy to click, it's about a bunch of dancing aunties (sometimes known as dancing grannies) who refused to dance somewhere else and are annoying the animals and patrons of the Shanghai Zoo. Dancing aunties have become somewhat of an issue here in China. My friend over at Crazy Chinese Family has written about his own Chinese MIL and her dancing. It's a thing, one I wish my MIL would get into and dance far away from here. For now, she just sings annoying ancient Chinese songs out of tune.

Anyway, the article pissed me off enough for me to bitch briefly about it on my Facebook (both my personal page as well as my blog page) and so I knew I had to devote a blog post to it.

First, here's a photo of a typical dancing auntie ensemble, from The Australian:

Dancing aunties aren't really that old. Look at these women in this photo. And look at the women in the Shanghaiist link I provided at the beginning of this article. Do these women look frail and decrepit to you? No? Yeah, not to me either. So why then are police afraid to tell them that they should find another place to dance?

Here's the end of the article:
The women, who've chosen the amphibian and reptile area as their disco arena, have been told repeatedly by staff to obey the rules, as their noisy music disturbs the animals.“Other visitors have also complained about the loud music. It affects the animals and disturbs their reproduction activity," a zoo official surnamed Ye said in a Shanghai Daily report. One of the ladies, however, reasoned that “the animals enjoy the music and watch us dance.” Ye said the zoo had reached an agreement with the dancers a while back to stay 10 meters away from the reptiles, but that's all gone out the window.
He said that because of their age and because "some of them have high blood pressure and other diseases," all they can do is try to persuade.

Yes, really. Check out that Shanghai Daily link too. No offense to Shanghaiist but the Shanghai Daily article is better written and additionally provides more details. I discussed this with Jeremy who of course defended these "old" people. He said they pay taxes and there's not many places to find where they can dance. He says America is a larger country with less people. That may be so, but what does that have to do with following rules? That is China's problem, I tell him. That no one here obeys the rules that are set up.

In America, if there were groups of dancing grannies, if they happened to congregate in an area that they weren't supposed to, someone in authority would likely come along and tell them politely that they were violating an ordinance and would need to find another place to go. The grannies would likely obey that and find another place to do their dancing. If anyone got surly, they'd likely be hit with fines. And if they took it to an extreme level, they'd likely be ushered off to jail. But I don't see that happening. But here? Oh, but I'm old and frail! You'll make me die by talking to me like an adult and telling me, even kindly, that I cannot dance here.

I don't know about other parts of the US, but in Florida, when I worked mall jobs I always noticed that as soon as the mall was opened up by the security guards, swarms of old people would come in to get their exercise. They would walk all over together to get their exercise in the chillingly refreshing air-conditioned mall. Not once do I ever remember these people making too much noise, impeding the walkways or causing any other problems. They did their thing and were usually gone before the stores opened and the shoppers came. And these people - now these people were old! Definitely older than 50 and 60. 

And guess what? I pay my taxes back in the US. If I were breaking some sort of public rule and someone confronted me about it, I would stop immediately. I would go dance elsewhere. There are plenty of other places to go. Here, it's all about making laws and no one obeys them. Jeremy tried to tell me that wasn't true but then I brought up something that disgusts him - smoking. They made a law about smoking in certain places. Go anywhere in any city in China and you will see "No Smoking" signs posted in many places. And right by them, you'll see some loser puffing away. I can't even begin to tell you how many times we've gone into a restaurant with "No Smoking" signs posted on every wall and then someone will light up right there. Jeremy will usually smile politely and point at our children and ask them to please not smoke. Everyone cooperates then, thankfully, but my point to him about all this was that no one follows the laws here and THAT is the problem with China. Things will always be behind here because people think that the rules don't apply to them. How very sad.

I hope those dancing aunties realize that not everyone wants to hear or see their dancing, there are plenty of other places to dance and that no, the animals do not want very loud, bad music and stomping near their habitats. And I wish everyone else would realize that older people here are not going to just drop dead when you ask them to obey the rules - whether you are polite about it or you call them all sea hags and chase them away with a broom. Additionally, I wish the alligators would come out of the habitat and enjoy the slow-footed ones for lunch. I'm always rooting for the animals.

The Postman Never Rings Once

My mom is the queen of sending the most rockin' care packages ever. Seriously, give this woman a crown. She deserves it. She's sent us many a'package while we've been here. Like this one here. But I think you might remember this package best. It's the one that should have arrived for my birthday, but alas, China Post is just sloth-like when it comes to delivering things.

At the beginning of December, my mom had told me she had just dropped 2 packages to us and was hoping they would be delivered by Christmas. She's a dreamer, but hell, so am I. She sent them in plenty of time too, but of course we wouldn't get them by the 25th. I should be thankful they arrived before 2015 though.

In them, my folks had sent wonderfully thoughtful gifts for the girls and some of my favorite food items...powdered donuts, swiss cake rolls, sinful candybars...oh yes. Delightful stuff, all of it.

The packages were both the same size and roughly the same weight. Not exceedingly heavy but not light as a feather either. For 2 weeks, my husband had called every day to find out if the packages were at the post office closest to us yet. Nope. Nope. Nope. And then finally, Jeremy called me from work to tell me the packages were here! I jumped for joy getting ready to fling open the door for the delivery guy but my husband told me not so fast.

See, they delivered them. To the store downstairs. Where they deliver packages when no one is home so they don't have to try to come back and deliver them. So when you get home, you go to the store and sign for your package and carry it away.

"But I'm home!" I wail into the phone! No one had called or knocked or anything. And that's when my husband tells me they told him they couldn't find anywhere to park so they just delivered them to the store.

Yes. Because they didn't need to stop the fucking van to get out and take out 2 fucking packages and go into the store with them. No, they drove right into the store and tossed those packages out the window at the clerk. *facepalm* The real story here is that some dolt just didn't feel like carrying 2 packages up 6 flights of stairs to a woman who was home alone with a baby and one small child and couldn't possibly come get them herself. Thank you, asshat!

Anyway, at least I have more chocolate to comfort me in those moments of homesickness. I swear, it's getting worse. I was just sitting at the table yesterday and I burst into tears. Maybe I'm still just out of it from being sick. Maybe I'm getting sick of MIL being here to help me. Maybe I realize that vacation fucking sucks ass when you live on this side of town and your husband is busy at work all day, leaving you with 2 small children. Or maybe I just feel like that because I was too sick to enjoy it for the last week.

Whatever the case, here's some photos of the girls enjoying the gifts they got from their Papa and Mimi. Thanks again Mom and Dad! I love you guys so much!

Finally, a toy that is all mine mine MINE! Bwahahahahahahaha! Seoul is thrilled she has something that is not a hand-me-down. She loves this doll!

Raelynn models one of her new outfits and snuggles her Palace Pet. She especially loves this pink shirt with the dogs and hearts on it. She wants to wear it every day.

Just Stop.

I still can't even since the other day, and now, there is this funness...

 You can still see the first hole they dug on the sidewalk further in the background behind this giant pit they've dug that I surmise can only lead straight to hell. If you are a regular reader of my posts, then you have probably already guessed that this is not the first time they've excavated a huge hole here. But! It is the first time that they have made one THIS big. At least since we've been living here. Oooooh.

Remember, here is what it looked like the other day:

Why they keep doing this, I will never know. Because, were it me with this project, I would have fiddled with the shit underneath the concrete and bricks BEFORE laying down the new bricks but what the fuck do I know about construction? Not much but I will tell you this...I have never seen so much fuckery in my whole life and I come from South Florida where they are constantly building new condos and kicking the shit out of the natural habitat. I've seen all kinds of weird shit back in my native Florida, but not anything quite like this. What, did they do all this work and then some chode comes in and goes, "Oh yeah! Oopsie Daisy! We forgot to put pipes down there. Tear it up again, boys!"

I know I'm often apologizing for my half-assed photos on here and this one is no exception. Sorry. Seriously. I suck. But I'm not a completely inept photographer. I was just trying to snap this quickly as Raelynn and I ran to Hao Shufu's awaiting taxi. We were already running late because someone *coughcoughRaelynncough* eats slower than a turtle. Unfortunately, because I was moving as I was taking this photo, you can't see what made this even more amusing...someone had thrown a whole cabbage down there. No idea if it was accidental or intentional but it made me wonder.

When will this shit end?!? At least it's not interfering with my sleep but damn! Just stop already!

Keeping Up With The Konstruction

Remember the other day when I said this? Well, that didn't take long for them to destroy it again, now did it?

This is right in front of my building, which Raelynn and I are walking away from as we head off to school. OF COURSE they are already digging up the sidewalk they just rebuilt. OF COURSE!

Here is a close-up of the hole they've dug into the sidewalk. Lord knows what the reasoning behind this is. Perhaps people here like to dig holes. Whatever the case, there are several more of them down the street. I bet it's for some wiring or plumbing or something like that. Which begs the question: why not do that BEFORE laying down the new sidewalk so you don't have to, you know, dig it up and redo it again?!? That's what always bugs me here - common sense does not exist. At all.

And On It Goes

It absolutely amazes me the way they conduct construction projects around here. I swear these people do the same things over and over and over again in the same places to ensure everyone has a job. That is the only logical explanation for their piecemeal, haphazard way of constructing anything. Like our street, which I posted about recently.

And on and on and on it goes, though I think it has finally come to an end. Here are the latest photos of our third world street:

They had done this overnight and my husband had forgotten about it when he'd parked elsewhere. When Raelynn and I came downstairs to find our driver, this is what we saw. We had to walk all the way to the end of the street and try to find Hao Shufu there. Jeremy (who, incidentally, took these photos before he went to work) called him to help me explain where we'd be but of all days Hao Shufu forgot his phone, it was of course on this day. His wife had answered and she was standing outside the gas station near our home, waiting for her husband so she could give him his phone. Jeremy told me to walk to the gas station and that's where we found her. Several moments later, Hao Shufu found us. He had apparently gone to the other side of the barricades you see in that last photo and was trying to yell to us. I never thought he would be on that side of the barricades because a couple days prior, there was a gigantic hole the size of a crater in the center of the street. Lord only knows what they were doing with that one. It rendered the street impossible to drive on and damn near made it impossible for pedestrians to pass through as well.

Anyway, they smoothed the road out from what you see above and it looks normal once more, or as normal as things look around here at least. The cars are parked on the sides again and now we wait and wonder when they will tear this shit up for another round of bullshit construction. Hopefully, they will wait until after we move away.

The Crazy Construction Continues!

I'm so behind on my blog posts. Sorry guys! But here's one to tide you over, chock full of more insane construction photos from my street.

A giant hole. What's most surprising to me about this is they actually put something up around it so no one would fall in. Times, they are a'changin'.

Sorry for the crappiness of these photos, but we were in the car when I took them. Here's another make-shift gate to prevent people from falling into the holes. Or pooping into them. Not sure which.

 As we're driving down the street, a steamroller is passing us.

I will just caption this with my husband's favorite exclamation:
JEJUS!

It's what Koreans call Jesus. Because in Korean language, there is no "z." It's one of those Korean language things that has stuck with him ever since moving away from there.

 I wish this photo had come out better. They've already laid the new sidewalk but for some reason, are jackhammering this part. There's a guy with a wheelbarrow pushing the debris and he's gone and ruined my photo by pushing it in front of the guy with the jackhammer.

 We park and of course I notice that someone (or something) has already ruined the new sidewalk with poo. It looks like it probably came from one of those yippy small dogs though. Still, that's just wrong. I think the sidewalk maybe stayed feces and urine free for about 1 hour, tops. That's my official ruling anyway.

And for Lord knows what reason, they tore this part up after putting it down. If I were the owner of that car there, I'd be piiiiiiiiiiiiiissed.

For now, that concludes my construction craziness photo series. If there's more wackiness to document, you'll find it first here.