Tuesday, February 28, 2012
"Did you put mushrooms in the stirfry?"
A couple weeks back I made a delicious honey garlic chicken stir fry with organic vegetables for dinner. I like buying the organic vegetables as much as possible for obvious reasons...they're organic but also because they are conveniently preweighed and prepackaged. At the larger chain grocery stores here in Chengdu you have to have your produce weighed and tagged at a weigh station. Quite often this means standing in a line up with 20 other people waiting for your turn to have your produce tagged meanwhile fighting off those sneaky people who try to budge in front of you. Didn't their kindergarten teacher teach them to line up properly? Anyway back to the stir fry...we sat down to dinner and it was delicious! Yummy honey garlic sauce from scratch, chicken and veg over hot rice...mmmm. Then my husband K says, "did you put mushrooms in the stir fry?" I look over as he's pushing a little grey slimy thing to the side of his plate. Ew. No, I didn't put mushrooms in the stir fry. It was a slug. One downside to organic I guess.
Sunday, February 26, 2012
From The Grocery Store...
Just like my 'Lost in Translation' post, I think I will regularly post about things 'From The Grocery Store.'
Today the kids and I walked to our local grocery store to grab some hamburger for spaghetti. We grabbed a pack of hamburger and F was asking if we could go see if they had pig brains today when I saw this. I asked the kids what they thought they were and F suggested maybe it was a tongue. I shook my head and she looked at it again. "Cow penis?" she suggested warily. "Yup and testicles," I told her. EWWW was their response!
Thursday, February 23, 2012
How to install a heater/air conditioning unit in China
Step 1: Tie on your harness and get a rope around the fan unit then climb out the window.
Step 2: Get the fan unit on the window ledge.
Step 3: Climb out the window with the fan unit. Oops looks like someone forgot his rope!
Step 4: Maneuver fan unit into place. Yup, that's 11 floors up.
Step 5: Mount unit with bolts and carefully climb back inside!
Please make sure to hire professionals to install your heating units! I think they know what they're doing.
Lost in Translation
Oh Hi!
As of last Sunday, we have officially been in China for one month! Wow! Some days I am surprised at how much we have actually packed into that month and other days I wonder why the calendar still says February...shouldn't it say June by now?
It has been a pretty big transition, for me especially. The kids take it all in stride. Less than three months ago I packed up our entire life into a 10x20 storage unit, said goodbye to our dogs, cows and few remaining chickens. Drove to the coast and spent some time with family and friends and tried to prepare mentally for this trip.
The flight from Vancouver to Shanghai was excruciatingly long. I gave the kids gravol twice but somehow they didn't fall asleep until two hours before we landed. S was so deep asleep that as the plane was unloading I was still trying to shake him awake. I guess the two doses of gravol hit him 10 hours later? I couldn't wait to see my husband K when we arrived and imagine my surprise when he wasn't there to greet us. Here I am with two kids, a chihuahua and nine(yes nine!) suitcases in the Shanghai airport with no husband to retrieve us. Add to that the fact that I didn't have a cell phone to call him! I paid a porter to take our luggage, got the dog sent to quarantine and finally found K who it turned out wasn't allowed into that part of the airport hence the fact that he wasn't there to pick us up. We headed for our flight to Chengdu which ended up being delayed an hour and a half on the runway. I was so agitated and anxious that I thought I would need to get off the plane! We finally arrived in Chengdu and got to our hotel at 2:30am local time! What a day!
Since then we have been doing as much sightseeing as possible. We stayed in the hotel for several nights before moving into our apartment. We slept there for five nights without any heat. When you think of China perhaps you think of warm. Well let me tell you that a cement apartment is not warm in January! After shivering my way through my first night, K surprised me with an electric blanket. It was like heaven crawling into heated sheets!
We are getting very familiar with the Chengdu Metro and we do a lot of walking. People stare at us constantly but I'm learning to ignore it. People are fascinated with the kids and their white skin and are constantly wanting to touch them...which is really gross considering most people here have their fingers constantly up their noses. But we're managing! We've learned to walk really fast! *chuckle*
Here's a few pictures from our first weeks here
Jinli Street the day after we arrived
First meal in our apartment!
Wuhou Temple
The Bamboo Park
A chilly panda at the Chengdu Zoo
Until next time!
It has been a pretty big transition, for me especially. The kids take it all in stride. Less than three months ago I packed up our entire life into a 10x20 storage unit, said goodbye to our dogs, cows and few remaining chickens. Drove to the coast and spent some time with family and friends and tried to prepare mentally for this trip.
The flight from Vancouver to Shanghai was excruciatingly long. I gave the kids gravol twice but somehow they didn't fall asleep until two hours before we landed. S was so deep asleep that as the plane was unloading I was still trying to shake him awake. I guess the two doses of gravol hit him 10 hours later? I couldn't wait to see my husband K when we arrived and imagine my surprise when he wasn't there to greet us. Here I am with two kids, a chihuahua and nine(yes nine!) suitcases in the Shanghai airport with no husband to retrieve us. Add to that the fact that I didn't have a cell phone to call him! I paid a porter to take our luggage, got the dog sent to quarantine and finally found K who it turned out wasn't allowed into that part of the airport hence the fact that he wasn't there to pick us up. We headed for our flight to Chengdu which ended up being delayed an hour and a half on the runway. I was so agitated and anxious that I thought I would need to get off the plane! We finally arrived in Chengdu and got to our hotel at 2:30am local time! What a day!
Since then we have been doing as much sightseeing as possible. We stayed in the hotel for several nights before moving into our apartment. We slept there for five nights without any heat. When you think of China perhaps you think of warm. Well let me tell you that a cement apartment is not warm in January! After shivering my way through my first night, K surprised me with an electric blanket. It was like heaven crawling into heated sheets!
We are getting very familiar with the Chengdu Metro and we do a lot of walking. People stare at us constantly but I'm learning to ignore it. People are fascinated with the kids and their white skin and are constantly wanting to touch them...which is really gross considering most people here have their fingers constantly up their noses. But we're managing! We've learned to walk really fast! *chuckle*
Here's a few pictures from our first weeks here
Until next time!
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