Pregnant Woman Learns a Lesson

Yesterday was a busy day.  It was Juliana's third birthday, which was filled with balloons, Minnie Mouse cake, cards and packages in the mail, birthday pizza, party hats, and presents - all of which were greeted with immense excitement.  In China it was Mid-Autumn Festival, one of the major holidays of the year.  Almost as important in certain sectors of society, it was International Talk Like a Pirate Day.  And not so widely noted but certainly memorable to me - it was my due date.

I know, I know.  A due date truly has about as much meaning as an imaginary line on the horizon, and only about 5% of babies are born on their due date.  I wasn't expecting the baby to come on her due date; I was sure she would already be born.  Juliana was born four days early, so it seemed reasonable to believe this baby would come early too.  That's pretty much what I've been thinking the whole pregnancy, and most of the past month I really felt like she could come any day.  I don't know how many times I've thought, "She will SURELY come before ___!" (see lesson #3 below.)  It's been a long month.

And now I have passed over the imaginary invisible line into the land of "overdue."  I know, I know. A baby isn't truly overdue until a couple of weeks past the due date, and it's just as normal for a baby to be born a week "late" as a week "early."  But somehow it's hard to convince yourself of that, particularly in our induction-happy culture.

The uncertainty of these last few weeks have been especially difficult to handle.  I've had frequent, increasingly intense contractions for weeks (see lesson #4 below) and a couple of times when it seemed like labor was really starting.   Then there are all the normal annoyances and discomforts of being 9 months pregnant, summed up in the general feeling that your body is slowly self-destructing.

I could handle all those better if I could just sleep.  I usually wake up about a dozen times a night.  Not that I actually count, but I really don't think I'm exaggerating.  I doubt I ever sleep longer than an hour, sometimes much less.  If I don't wake up as many times it's usually because the fifth or sixth time I just stayed awake for hours.  In other words, I sleep like a baby.  So the idea of resting up before the baby comes sounds nice, but it's just not going to happen (see lesson #5 below).  I do remember the exhausting newborn (and not-so-newborn) days, and I know what I'm in for, but the possibility of 2hrs sleep in a row sounds kind of nice right now.

I may have mentioned once or forty times that I haven't had the most fun with this pregnancy.   Perhaps that's why I thought it would end early - it only seemed fair.  Besides, first babies are supposed to be late, not second babies, right?  And we all know that pregnancy and life operate on strict principles of fairness (see lesson #1 below).

I was reminded the other day that 40 is one of those significant numbers in the Bible.  40 days of rain on the ark.  40 years wandering in the wilderness.  40 days being tested in the desert.  All periods of trial and tribulation.  Some people apparently thrive on those 40 weeks of pregnancy, but trial and tribulation seems a more fitting description for me.  Everybody knows you're supposed to learn something from all that trial ("what doesn't kill you" and all...), and apparently I need some extra time to learn my lesson.

Here are a few of the lessons I have learned recently.
1. Your mom was right.  Life isn't fair.
2. The powers of my wishful thinking are shockingly ineffective.
3. Never make assumptions about anything because life rejoices in proving you wrong.
4. Whoever said Braxton-Hicks contractions are painless was either a man or a woman going through transition in labor.
5. Helpful advice like, "Enjoy this time of pregnancy!" and "Get rest while you can!" are about as helpful as racial slurs or bashing on a person with disabilities  and may get you a similar response.
6. Oh yeah, I'm not in control.
7. It's possible that I don't know everything like the best time for this baby to come.
8. I can either drive myself crazy with angst and impatience or let go and let it happen when it happens.
9. Apparently no one has been pregnant forever.

So I'm waiting and trying to breathe and be patient.  (No honestly, this is me trying.)  This baby will come sometime like tomorrow or next week and defintely not any later than 2 weeks (when they would induce).  (Which, by the way, would be October and completely unacceptable.)  This eternal pregnancy will actually end and I'll finally get to meet that baby I've been waiting for.  It's going to be great.

Monsters who throw up

Juliana has recently developed a fascination with monsters.  She's not really afraid of them; she's just obsessed.  There are monsters in the closet, in the bed, under the bed, under the table, outside, inside, and inside her tummy.  Mostly they are silly monsters, or friendly monsters, or monsters who eat people and then throw up.  Her newest imaginary friend monster is named Ju-Ji-Ja-Ja (also the name of her favorite made-up song).

I'm not sure where the monster thing started - perhaps from recent talks with friends.  This summer she watched the Veggie Tales episode where Junior is scared of monsters.  She learned the song, "God is bigger than the boogie man."  She also learned she ought to be scared of monsters.  A few weeks ago she watched Monsters Inc., and she loved those silly monsters.  We realized we have to be careful about what books we read at bedtime.  After reading "Froggy goes to Bed," Juliana wondered why she didn't get a snack before bed and insisted her door also be cracked open.  When we read "Bedtime for Francis" (Francis is an imaginative child who stays up wondering about the noise outside her open window, the crack in her ceiling, the monster in the chair, and the fact that she is inordinately hungry.),  Juliana was also concerned about the crack in the ceiling (there isn't one), the open window (it was closed), and naturally, the monsters.  When she woke up the first morning the first thing she said was, "Francis had a crack in her ceiling."  We hid the book; Juliana found it and wanted to read it again.  Who wouldn't?

While Juliana shows little actual fear toward monsters, she has developed a number of other phobias.  Dogs, for example, which is kind of a problem since my parents have a dog.  She is fascinated with the dog.  She likes to feed her scraps from the table and call inside and outside and get her fingers licked - all from the safety of the other side of a baby gate.  If she ever happens to end up in the same room as the dog, she starts screaming.  She has also developed a fear of spider webs, any type of bugs, and being alone in any place ever.

Of course, Juliana has always had an aversion to being alone.  When she was a baby, her definition of being alone was anytime someone wasn't touching or holding her.  Seriously - she loved to be carried and hated to be put down anywhere.   Once she started getting around on her own she didn't want to be held all the time, but she used her new mobility to make sure she was never more than 3 feet away from another person.  The first time she played in another room, on her own, for more than 10 minutes I was shocked and a little worried about what's going on.  She's gotten much better about playing on her own, but if she actually asks me to leave the room, that probably means she's about to do something she shouldn't.  Her most used phrase is,"Will you play with me?" followed by, "I don't want to be lonely!"

At this point in time, if she goes to the bathroom by herself (even with the door open where she can still shout at you), she is lonely.  Besides, there is a monster in the shower.  This also applies if you go to the bathroom by yourself and she is not standing nearby inspecting the toilet paper.  If she has to walk into another room by herself or if you walk into another room without her she cries, "I don't want to be loooonely!" Her first response to bedtime is, "I don't want to sleep by myself!  I don't want to be lonely!"  She is finally sleeping on her own in her own room again, mostly without waking up during the night, but she will only go to sleep if the door is open and daddy is sitting outside where she can see him.    She certainly seems suited for a communal life.  Perhaps it's her reaction to not being in a country with 3 billion people.

Full Term

Tomorrow I will be full term, 37 weeks pregnant.  Finally, the end is in sight.  My body is gearing up and progressing well (4cm).  I'm glad to know all the contractions I've been having day and night, which have become increasingly more uncomfortable the past few weeks, have actually been doing something!  Unfortunately I know from last time that the progress doesn't necessarily mean much for either early delivery or fast labor.  37 weeks may only be the beginning of full term, but I'd still like to think I don't actually have three more weeks! And surely it couldn't be more.

Actually the end has been a little more tolerable this second time, I think because the whole rest of the pregnancy was more miserable.  But I wouldn't be at all sad if baby was a bit (weeks) early.  I may have mentioned before that I don't exactly love being pregnant.  Unfortunately, general intolerance with being pregnant doesn't seem to make baby in more of a hurry to come.  Just ask my cousin who has been miserably sick for the past 39 weeks.  I'm just super glad to not still be nauseous and throwing up all the time!  I'll take an awful lot of back aches, sleeplessness, heartburn, contractions, fatigue, and general aches and pains over being sick.  Still, there are times in life when three weeks seems like a very long time.

My cool belly henna

I have had a couple of wildly productive weeks in which I accomplished all five of the items I mentioned in my last post: got henna, borrowed baby items, bought cloth diapers, wrote newsletter, and ate more guacamole.  I even did a few other things as well, like made cloth wipes, packed a hospital bag, bought a big sister present for Juliana,  painted a big sister shirt and little sister onesie, and hung out with my very pregnant friend and very pregnant cousin, speculating how much longer pregnancy would really last.

In preparation for labor, I have been re-reading Ina May's Guide to Childbirth and contemplating how cool it would be to meet Ina May (a legendary midwife).  I also created a birth plan, which wasn't too hard since it was very similar to my last one.  The term "birth plan" still seems a little off, since the years in China have left me skeptical of plans in general - how often do things actually go like we expect?  I appreciate the idea though - an opportunity to contemplate and discuss your childbirth goals and ideals. 

Everything didn't go exactly as I imagined when Juliana was born (she was face-up so I had a lot of painful back labor, there was meconium in the fluid so they had to check her out and I didn't get to hold her immediately), but in general I was still able to have the kind of birth I desired.  Before having Juliana, I really hadn't thought much about childbirth until meeting with my midwives and taking a course geared toward natural childbirth.  Since then, childbirth has become a topic of particular fascination for me.  I love learning about the ways our bodies are created for birth and hearing positive birth stories.  I have come to view childbirth not just as something to get through with as little pain as possible but as an important, powerful experience in itself which results in a beautiful new baby.  Not to mention the end of being pregnant!

This time I already know one "hitch" in my plans beforehand.  I tested positive for group B strep (a bacteria up to 30% of women carry off and on, without actually being sick), which mainly means I will need to go to the hospital soon after labor starts to receive antibiotics.  I would have preferred to labor at home for a while before going to the hospital, but it shouldn't make a huge difference.  I should be able to create a comfortable laboring environment, and I feel confident in my midwife not pressing for unnecessary interventions.  I'm also not excited about being hooked up to an IV while receiving the antibiotics, since it will be harder to move around, but I'm glad it won't have to be the whole time.  Fortunately the baby's odds of receiving the infection are very small, 1 in 4000 when the mother receives antibiotics.

Aunt Becky's hand-sewn quilt with animal pictures she drew (she made a similar one for Juliana with pictures from children's books)

I still have a few more projects to keep me occupied as I wait for baby, but all of the vital things have been accomplished.  We have a car seat to take baby home from the hospital.  We have a baby sleeping basket in case baby actually sleeps on her own sometimes, and we have a bed rail for co-sleeping.  I have washed all our newborn clothes and blankets.  Baby also has a couple of really cute new blankets from Grandma Yaya and Aunt Becky.   I have a bunch of washed newborn diapers and some cloth wipes made.  I am working on a cloth book with pictures Juliana has drawn for baby, things like "babies with lots of tails" and "roads with tape."  It's supposed to be a present Juliana can give the baby, even though it will take a while for the baby to care.  We already have a big sister present for Juliana which is the important one.   So anytime baby wants to come she can just come right ahead.  Anytime baby, anytime.

Grandma Yaya crocheted this Noah's Ark afghan

Shī Shì shí shī shǐ ("Lion-Eating Poet in the Stone Den")

By Kevin

One of the frustrating things about learning Chinese for a foreigner is the number of homophones (or homonyms, if you prefer) -- words that sound either exactly the same or nearly the same. In English we have plenty of homonyms. I'm sure English learners struggle with "two," "too" and "to," but it's nothing compared with Chinese. 

The number of homonyms make it easy to misunderstand Chinese when hearing a word or phrase taken out of context.

I was reminded of this when going through my Chinese flashcards the other day. On my phone, I often use a flashcard program called Memrise to help me remember vocabulary. I have it set up to sometimes play the audio for a word, then ask me to provide the definition. When you don't know the context of how a word is being used (like, say, in a flash card program), sometimes it's hard to guess its meaning. A simple word like shī could mean "teacher" (师), "wet" 湿 "poem" 诗,  "lion" 狮 or "corpse" 尸. And  if you aren't careful to listen for the intonation of each word, it might be impossible. Change tones and you could wind up with "time" "ten" "true" "stone" "food" or "to know." And that's just with the second tone - there are four (plus a neutral tone). There's even a famous Chinese poem concocted to show the limitations of pinyin (courtesy of wikipedia) that only uses the sound "shi":

Shī Shì shí shī shǐ

Shíshì shīshì Shī Shì, shì shī, shì shí shí shī.

Shì shíshí shì shì shì shī.

Shí shí, shì shí shī shì shì.Shì shí, shì Shī Shì shì shì.Shì shì shì shí shī, shì shǐ shì, shǐ shì shí shī shìshì.Shì shí shì shí shī shī, shì shíshì.Shíshì shī, Shì shǐ shì shì shíshì.Shíshì shì, Shì shǐ shì shí shì shí shī.Shí shí, shǐ shí shì shí shī shī, shí shí shí shī shī.Shì shì shì shì.

In characters, it looks like this:

石室詩士施氏，嗜獅，誓食十獅。氏時時適市視獅。十時，適十獅適市。是時，適施氏適市。氏視是十獅，恃矢勢，使是十獅逝世。氏拾是十獅屍，適石室。石室濕，氏使侍拭石室。石室拭，氏始試食是十獅。食時，始識是十獅屍，實十石獅屍。試釋是事。

Translated, it means: 

"Lion-Eating Poet in the Stone Den" 

In a stone den was a poet called Shi,

who was a lion addict,

had resolved to eat ten lions.

He often went to the market to look for lions.

At ten o'clock,

ten lions had just arrived at the market.

At that time,

Shi had just arrived at the market.

He saw those ten lions,

and using his trusty arrows,

caused the ten lions to die.

He brought the corpses of the ten lions to the stone den.

The stone den was damp.

He asked his servants to wipe it.

After the stone den was wiped,

he tried to eat those ten lions.

When he ate,

he realized that these ten lions

were in fact ten stone lion corpses.

Try to explain this matter.

Even compound words made up of two or more characters can sometimes be difficult to guess without context. When the audio for shí jiè appeared in my context, I had to think carefully. After all, there were four different words I'd learned with similar pronunciation. With this exact pronunciation, it can mean "season" (时节) or "the 10 commandments" (十诫). With different intonation, " shì jiè" can mean "the world" (世界 shì jiè) or "field of vision (视界). And shījié (失节) means disloyal, whereas shǐjié ( 失节) is a diplomatic envoy. My dictionary lists at least 13 different meanings for "shi jie."

Often this is one of my biggest difficulties when conversing with a Chinese friends. I might think I understood what somebody was talking about, but then find myself suddenly confused. I'd look up a word that I thought I understood and discover that it has a homonym that has a completely different meaning, which I was unsure of. It's one of the reasons one of our teachers, when we came to China assured us that "the first ten years (of studying Chinese) are the hardest." 

Chinese people often ask me why I don't listen to more Chinese radio or watch more Chinese television (I really should, but my listening level is closer to Juliana's than that of an adult, so her cartoons are somewhat suitable for me). The puns are one reason. It's just harder to catch those things when someone's speaking fast and I can't interrupt them to ask a question to clarify meaning. Hoping that we'd have enough Chinese to understand a Chinese cross-talk program (a popular category of skit) after two years of study is clearly a stretch. Chinese humor is all about puns and wordplay. And more and more, the internet is filled with it. 

Last semester, my tutor pointed me to an assortment of relatively obsolete characters, which are gaining new life on the internet. One example is the character 囧, pronounced jiong. On the internet, it's basically transformed into an emoticon to express embarrassment. Look at it -- it's a bit . But even more, people have been using words that sound the same as a word that has been put on a blacklist by the government, trying to convey an entirely different meaning. 

This article gives some perspective: 

According to Moser, the Internet has become a place for people to play with the Chinese language. Puns and wordplay have a long history in Chinese culture. Chinese is the perfect language for punning because nearly every Chinese word has multiple homophones. Homophones are two words that sound similar but have different meanings like hare that rabbit-like creature and the hair on your head. In Chinese there are endless homophones.

“Because there are so many homophones there’s sort of a fetish about them,” says Moser. “As far as the culture goes back you have cases of homophone usage and homophone humor.” Many times forbidden or taboo words in Chinese are taboo precisely because they sound like another word.

A good example of this is the number four, which in Chinese sounds like the word for death and the number eight, which sounds like the word for prosperity. Moser has a Chinese aunt who used to work for the phone company and she could make money selling phone numbers. People would beg her for a phone number with a lot of eights. “People would actually give her gifts or bribes for an auspicious phone number,” says Moser.

Today, wordplay online has less to do with getting auspicious numbers and more to do with getting around censorship. Moser cites an example of a recent phrase he saw online mentioning the Tiananmen Square incident – only the netizen didn’t use the words “Tiananmen Square” or even 6/4, which refers to the date the incident took place. Tiananmen Square and 6/4 are both censored online. Instead the netizen referred to the “eight times eight incident.” Moser was confused when he first saw the reference. “And then I figured out, eight times eight is 64,” says Moser.

The Internet is ripe with clever examples of how people evade the censors. However, censorship is just one reason netizens play with words online. Another is the very technology that enables people today to input Chinese characters onto their cell phones and computers.

Jack Wang explains how he types Chinese characters with his phone. He uses an English keyboard and uses the pinyin system. Pinyin is the method for converting Chinese characters into our alphabet. For example, the Chinese word for “today” is 今天, which is rendered into pinyin as “jintian.”

Wang types the English letters “jintian” on his phone. As he types the first three letters, “jin” a list of Chinese characters pops up on the screen. Each different character sounds just like the word for today, “jin” but means something completely different. Wang points to each possible character and explains its different meaning: gold, clothes, only, and finally 今, the character for “today.”

Everyday, people are typing in a word like “today” and seeing all of the potential homophones for that word. This says David Moser has fueled wordplay like never before.

“I think that’s given rise to a lot more puns then would normally have been uttered in the earlier days when you had to just pull everything out of your head,” says Moser.

People have gotten even more creative playing with this input system to intentionally create new Chinese slang, translating English phrases into pinyin and then into Chinese characters. The meaning of these new words can seem random but they’re not. For example the Chinese character for glass, 玻璃, pronounced “boli” has come to mean “gay man.” Turns out, the slang term actually comes from an English phrase, “boy love.” But netizens have abbreviated the phrase into the English letters “B L” and then they looked for a similar abbreviation in Chinese, typing “B-L” into their computers and out popped the character for glass. “Suddenly the word glass was being used for male homosexuals,” says Moser.

Beating censors sounds like a great idea for proponents of free speech. But I think it probably only works for native speakers. For us foreigners trying to learn Chinese, it's a recipe for disaster. If Chinese people start using Chinese characters to convey meanings that are completely separate from their literal meaning, the likelihood of me catching it is next to nothing. Unless I have someone "in the know" to explain that someone is describing that man as a "bottle" means he's homosexual, the meaning will completely fly over my head. I'd probably guess they mean the man is weak, or easily breakable. 

If you enjoy Chinese and seeing the difficulties of translating these many different homophones into English, be sure to check out my Chinglish book "Chinese + English = Chinglish" on Blurb and Amazon.

In the Land of Biscuits

Let me begin with a shocking confession: it has been days - days - since I last ate guacamole.  As I think about it, it seems a little sad but I haven't actually missed it too much.  We can in fact buy guacamole in Georgia, but one of the real benefits of California is knowing people with avacado trees in their backyards.  It's probably the reason so many people live there despite the crazy gas prices.  That and something about the good weather.

I have been surprisingly lax in my avacado consumption, but I have had some really good biscuits and cornbread so it probably makes up the lack.  Somehow biscuits just taste better in the South; it must be the humidity.  I've actually been enjoying this thick, Southern air, even though I've grown accustomed to drier climates (after 24 years of humidity, can you believe I've lived in semi-desert areas for the past 6 years?).

After two weeks of relative health we all succumbed to colds once again.  Juliana bounced back pretty quickly (she has an enviable immune system), but after more than a week Kevin and I still show no signs of improvement.  My last cold/sinus infection lasted 4 weeks, but Kevin usually gets over colds pretty quickly.  Apparently our sinuses are experiencing some severe reverse culture shock.  So while August in Georgia is usually a bit oppressive, right now walking around in a giant humidifier is pretty soothing.

The day after we got to Georgia I got to see my midwife and was reminded of how much I love her.  She chatted with us about my cousin (whose baby she delivered 4 years ago), her husband and son's recent trip to China and how she has somehow ended up with a large Chinese clientel - both graduate students at UGA and people from Shanghai coming to have their babies in the US.  She answered our questions and talked about how much she likes second births.  She joked about only accepting second time moms because the labors are usually so much faster and you already know what to expect.  The practice now has three midwives on rotation including a new one we'll meet next visit.

Other than the doctor's visit, we really haven't been anywhere or seen anyone except my family since coming back.  One day we'll get over these colds, hopefully in time to see my cousin and good friend before they have their babies the beginning of next month.  Two of my sisters are at home, though, and Juliana is having a wonderful time bossing everyone around.  She would definitely enjoy communal living.

In between resting and blowing my nose (I'm really enjoying tissues with lotion - good job America), I also unpacked our suitcases, something I never quite got around to in CA.  All our clothes are nicely organized on closet shelves like we actually live somewhere!  I also made several to-do lists, including things we should probably do before the baby is born.  By the time I made the lists I was too tired to actually do anything on them, but at least now I feel organized.  Top on my list of things to do, once I actually get feeling better:
-Get henna (priorities, right?)
-Borrow baby stuff (she may end up in our bed for the first months anyway, but it would probably be good to get the carseat before she comes)
-Buy baby diapers (we bought some super cute one-size cloth diapers in China, but since they'll probably be too big the first month or two, we're planning to buy some newborn prefolds as well - still cheaper than a couple of months of disposable diapers)
-Write a newsletter (It hasn't been the greatest year for newsletters, but we should probably write one in between the last "guess what we are having a baby" and the next "guess what she's here".  What can I say...there's been maybe one month out of the last eight that I haven't been sick.)
-Eat more guacamole. (That wasn't actually on my to-do list, but maybe I should put it there.  I have really been slacking off.)

Next update: Why I love Midwives, The Benefits of Tissues with Lotion, or A Social Commentary on the Giant Size of American Shopping Carts.  Or perhaps I will just write a newsletter.

Our American Summer

I've planned to write several blog posts in the past few weeks but somehow it's never happened.  It's funny how you can not be doing anything specific and still stay busy.  I guess we are experiencing the typical American summer.

I would pause here to make some cultural observations but they are all still too muddled.  After living away from your "home country" for long enough, you stop looking at it through insider eyes.  It makes more sense to take on a mindset more similar to when you first moved to another country.  It's not as confusing, because you still understand most of the rules, but some of the rules and some of the players have changed and nobody can tell you exactly which ones.  And sometimes it's just you that have changed - your inner rhythm is different from before, so you feel one step off from the world around.  Which isn't much different from how you feel in your "borrowed" country, except that nobody expects you to fit in there.  The nice thing is, after a while you just don't care as much.

Other than making vague cultural realizations, the past few weeks have been busy with seeing people.  Almost all of Kevin's friends and family are still in the general LA area (novel, huh?), so there are lots of people to try to catch up with every summer.  It's not quite as urgent this time since we will be back by the end of the year.  It's not long time compared to normal, but I guess, "If we don't catch you this time we'll try to work it out in 4 or 5 months" does seem kind of long.

Juliana has been having a great time playing with friends, with Nana and Gramps, and with her new toys.  She has been doing lots of drawing and made my sister a beautiful card full of spiders for her birthday.  She has done well during all our driving all over.  It helps that she can amuse herself by talking and singing for hours.  She likes to make up new songs.  Her latest hit, "I'm Lying on my Knees," reaches previously unmatched intensity and decibles.  She has already acquired a play house and car, so obviously she is adjusting well to American life.

I am busy being pregnant.  Overall I have been feeling better now that we're done with all that packing and moving and traveling craziness, but sometimes pregnancy catches up with you.  You might forget that your body is still working hard to grow this ever demanding (or at least ever active) baby...until you do too much and your body decides to not-so-politely let you know what it thinks about that.  The good thing about pregnancy is that you get to know that some day this madness will end and your body will get along with you again.  Apparently some people really love being pregnant.  But then some people love Nascar, asparagus, and Chinese opera, so there's a lot I don't understand in the world.

And I am now less than two months from my due date!  Juliana was 4 days early, so I'm holding out hope this one will be early too.  I sure wouldn't mind, and the kiddos probably wouldn't mind having their own birthdays afterall.  Of course I would like for baby to wait until she's actually ready to come out.  And definitely until after we make it to Georgia two weeks from now.

Last week we found out we are having another girl!  I didn't have a strong feeling or preference either way, I was just eager to find out.  Kevin had kind of been hoping for another girl, although he was thinking maybe it was a boy because I was much sicker this time.  We are excited for Juliana to have a sister, and we do have lots of cute girl clothes already!  When we bought a little outfit for the baby, Juliana was excited and tried to claim it for herself.  Which is pretty much how I expect the future to be.

Now we just need to decide on a name.  We aren't planning on revealing the name until the baby comes anyway, but it would be nice for us to know before then!  We asked Juliana what she thinks her little sister should be called, but since she calls her dolls "dolly" and "new dolly," and her stuffed cat "kitty," I don't think she quite gets the naming concept yet.

I promise to update again sometime in the next two months before baby arrives. In the meantime, we'll continue to enjoy our daily guacamole, try to see a few more family and friends, and ask baby to please be nice to mama.

Back to America

It hasn't been the easiest transition back to America.  The actual travel went quite smoothly.  At just under 24 hours total, it was probably about as short as our trips have ever been.  It was 9pm by the time we left Beijing, so Juliana actually fell asleep right away and slept for most of the next eight hours.  Kevin and I both slept more than we expected.  I was uncomfortable but I moved around a lot and the back pain wasn't as bad as I feared.  While awake, Juliana was mostly content to watch Chinese cartoons.  We didn't even have a long customs line at LAX, and our bags all arrived.

Since then, of course, we had to deal with lots of jetlag.  Juliana was waking up for several hours during the night, or waking up excitedly at 4am, done for the night.  Kevin has been sleeping in with Juliana since she was disturbed by sleeping in an unfamiliar room.  He has been trying to put on videos for Juliana and get some more sleep, but he still hasn't gotten a decent night yet.  I was waking up at 3 or 4am, not actually too different from before we left China, but it really wasn't cutting it.

I've had a cold for over three weeks and it was just starting to get better before we traveled, but since getting back I've felt worse and worse.  I was pretty sure it had turned into a sinus infection, so I finally went to the urgent care and got some antibiotics which will hopefully help quickly.

While urgent care isn't exactly the height of American healthcare, I was pleasantly surprised with this facility.  I was the only person waiting, the staff were all quite friendly and seemed competent.  Still I was a little surprised to find myself missing China.  I don't exactly relish going to the hospital in China, but I've gotten quite used to it.  I paid $50 to see the doctor thinking, "In China it would be closer to a dollar!" and $30 for antibiotics which I could have bought from a Chinese pharmacy for $2-3. American prices can be a rude awakening.

Juliana has also had two days of throwing up this week.  She has thrown up all over me and Kevin and her grandparents' new couches, which seemed to withstand the test pretty well.  I'm not sure what was causing the throwing up - a virus or just difficulty adjusting to America, but she finally seems to have recovered.  Of course, the days she spent sleeping and watching cartoons almost all day didn't help with jetlag.  We've been back for a week, but last night she was still awake from 1am until amost 6am, which is really not okay.

Other than all the sickness and not sleeping, I suppose the transition is going okay, though.  Aided by plenty of fun new toys and grandparent attention, Juliana seems pretty happy with America.  She has even adjusted quite quickly to flushing toilet paper and gets upset if I even blow my nose and then put tissue in the trashcan.  "NO!  Not in the trash!  In America tissue goes in the potty!!"  If only the rest of potty training was transferring so easily.  I feel like about 75% of the progress made was left in China.

In the past Juliana has always called me, "mama," which is also what Chinese children call their mothers.  I was thinking that after hearing her American friends using "mommy" she might make the change, but I didn't expect her to change quite so quickly!  About two days after we got here she started calling me "mommy" and now that's all she will use.  It reminds me of the time my sisters decided we were too old to use "mommy" any more and we should all switch to "mom."  From that day forward there was no going back.  Fortunately we're not to that transition yet!

One week down and 7+ months to go.  Hopefully America will be kinder to us from here on out!  At least we'll only have two cross-country trips and 3 hour jetlags, plus a minor new-baby transition to deal with, so from here on out it should be pretty easy going, right?

Moving Day

Moving day finally arrived. There were several times in these weeks leading up to it when I thought I might die, if it's possible to keel over dead from exhaustion. I finally got over my super long cold but am entering the third trimester with plenty of exhaustion and back pain, even without dealing with the move. Lately I am far too tired and uncomfortable to sleep. Apparently my body is gearing up for jet-lag because I've been waking up at 3:30 or 4am unable to sleep for hours.

A few weeks ago Kevin hurt his hand, which has been a bit of a problem in the packing and moving process. It is still sore but now he can at least pick up things again. Juliana is very familiar with packing suitcases for a trip but is completely thrown off by packing up everything we own. She has been pretty stressed and confused lately. Even though we've tried to explain what is going on, she doesn't quite understand that she will in fact see her toys again (like “8 months later” really means much to a preschooler), we're not just taking them all way. She also has been a little freaked out to leave our sight; I think she's afraid we will leave her behind.

Despite the challenges (Did I mention the heat? And the A/C unit in our bedroom just stopped working...), all of our belongings are packed and no one died in the process. Even if we wanted to move all our things down from the 6^th floor, down the road, and back up to the 3^rd floor on our own (which we didn't), I can't carry anything heavy and Kevin can't carry much with his hurt hand. So we hired a moving company for about $70. Originally we scheduled the moving guys to arrive at 9am this morning, but they called the night before to say it would be noon instead. Shortly before noon, they called back to say 2-3pm, and they finally arrived just after 4pm. I guess we should have expected it.

Three normal-sized Chinese guys pulled up downstairs in a large truck. We were their third move of the day, and they were happy that almost all the furniture belonged to the landlord. Still, we had 40 boxes and a dozen trashbags, plus two cabinets and a crib. I'm pretty sure we moved here with about 30 boxes total (larger ones, granted), so the accumulation mystery continues. Where did all this stuff come from?? It's not like our apartment is that big.

The three men sized up the load and then started hauling. They looked like average sized guys, no bulging muscles or anything, but looks can be deceiving. I watched the first guy tie together half a dozen boxes, strap it to his back, and head off down the stairs with a load twice as big as himself. One man was obviously the main mover. Even though he had already moved two households today, he was still smiling, joking with the other guys, and chatting with me as he energetically gathered boxes. He rather seemed to relish his job.

He strapped eight boxes together and hoisted them onto his companion's back. When the other guy wavered and decided it was too much, the main mover said something to the effect of, “Really? You can't handle these eight boxes? Come on!” Then he strapped them to his own back and headed downstairs with no problem. A couple of trips later, he hoisted our large 3-door wardrobe onto his back. It was too big to fit down the stairs frontwards, so he backed his way down 5 flights of stairs - with the giant wardrobe on his back. It was all highly impressive and a little nerve-wracking. I was a little concerned for our belongings and a bit more concerned that this would be the part where someone keeled over dead. If this were the States, they could probably put on a show and charge admission.

Kevin stayed downstairs to watch the belongings being loaded into the truck, and I stayed upstairs telling the movers which items to take. I would have felt a little bad about sitting and watching them work so hard if not for my big pregnant belly. At one point I moved a very light box out of the way and they said, “Oh no, don't pick that up. We'll move it.”

Halfway through, the men paused downstairs for a smoke-break and when they came back up they had stripped their shirts off. It was mid-90's after all. One guy paused appreciatively in front of our fan but the other guy explained that he was avoiding the fan because after sweating so much he was afraid of getting too cool. Uh huh. Two of the guys were starting to look winded, but the main mover was still energetic.  He showed his moving buddy how to balance a chair on his back and still have his hands free for a couple more items.  Finally he strapped four large boxes of books on his back and trotted off downstairs.

In just under 1.5 hours, everything was moved downstairs. Now all that was left was carrying it up 3 flights of stairs to our new apartment. Piece of cake. They were finished by 7pm.

I'd say those movers were definitely worth it.

Chinese phone conversations

By Kevin

I have a confession to make. I hate making phone calls, particularly to strangers.

It was one of my least favorite parts about being a journalist. I hated being the interruption to somebody's day. I hated the impersonal nature of it. But it was a necessary evil. If I wanted the story, I had to make dozens of calls a day. So I sucked it up and did it. For an introvert like me, it was always a task. It wasn't something I did on the spur of the moment. It took deliberation. It was a means to an end. I even got to the point where I didn't mind it so much because I can type much more quickly (and legibly) than I can take notes by hand.

If I hated making phone calls in America, imagine my hesitation in China. For my first year in China, I didn't even have a cell phone. I enjoyed the freedom of being able to go for a hike in the hills behind campus and not have to worry about it ringing with some pressing need. My students and superiors all had my home number. That was good enough.

I only broke down and bought one because Ruth and I were dating and I wanted another way to talk to her on the days when our Internet in Tonghua cut off at 11 p.m., making Skype useless. I also decided I'd need something I case I needed help getting out of inevitable travel difficulties on my first solo domestic China trip to see her in Yangzhou. But I only spoke English. Only to friends. In fact, the only people I gave my number to were friends -- and if they were my friend, at that time, they could speak English. If someone on an unrecognized number spoke Chinese to me, I apologized, told them I was a foreigner and my Chinese was bad, and hung up. If it was important, they'd find an English speaker to help them call again.

Year three, when we moved to Weinan, I was forced to pick up the phone and call my first Chinese stranger: the water delivery company. In China, you can't drink the tap water, so you must purify your own water with a boiler or filter or buy bottles of purified water (a bit like those 5-gallon Sparkletts bottles you can sign up for in the States). The first words out of my mouth (in Chinese) were: "I am a foreigner." Then, reading from a script, I informed them that we needed them to deliver a bottle of purified water to my door. I crossed my fingers and hoped that they'd understood. Thankfully, the water company had gotten the routine down from the previous foreigners who lived there, so as soon as they saw our telephone number on their caller ID, they knew the drill. Before long, I just had to tell them I was the foreigner on the third floor. An hour later, water would magically appear. Success. I could speak Chinese. As long as it was written out in script form. If they varied from the script, I was utterly lost. I usually just went back to the top and repeated myself. In Tonghua, this wasn't an issue mainly because I had a water purifier in my apartment, so I never had to order water delivery. This continued for years three through five. My Chinese improved incrementally in that span of time, but not enough to branch out beyond the now memorize script, plus a few variations.

Year six in Yinchuan was the start of language school. Day one, we repeated the water ordering routine we'd established in Weinan, first informing them I was a foreigner, then explaining our need for water and where we lived.

A month later, one of our homework assignments was to call information and ask for a particular phone number. I was so spooked when the operator asked me to repeat my request (the name of a park) that I had to call back a second time to get the number right. I continued to avoid phone calls.

Halfway through the year, I signed up for a Taobao account (kinda like an Amazon.com of China, though China also has Amazon.com). I figured it would be easy, I'd use Google translate to sort out any problems I had with ordering, then the items would arrive. The delivery guy would either call or send a message upon arrival (most domestic deliveries in China don't arrive via the standard postal service), but it wouldn't be too difficult, even with beginner Chinese. Then one of the orders was bad. Apparently sometimes Taobao merchants continue to list items that are out of stock. So one day, after ordering something, the merchant called to explain to me that they didn't have the item. It took me awhile to figure out that she was asking if I wanted another similar item or if they should return the money. Eventually I figured out to just ask for a refund. It didn't make me enjoy talking on the phone any more.

An aversion to talking on the phone isn't exactly a great trait to have as a language student. Some students might relish the challenge of a phone conversation. They might be excited to see how well they can communicate. They may be excited to see if the other speaker is able to guess that they aren't Chinese. Generally that isn't me. I just want utility. Usually talking on the phone is nothing more than a necessary evil.

The one highlight to my phone experience in China was when one day, I had to order more propane. Our apartment has a small 10 gallon propane tank underneath the counter to run our stove burner. It needs a refil every 8 months or so. Anyway, when the delivery guy arrived, he was shocked that I was a foreigner. It was the ultimate compliment: I hadn't made enough pronunciation or grammar mistakes in my short phone conversation to reveal myself as a non-native speaker. I was ecstatic.

I should probably put today's phone calls in the "language win" column. After all, in the end I was successful at completing my task. I think. But after a rash of miscommunication, it feels like it belongs in the "loss column."

Let me explain. We will be moving next week. Ruth is 6 months pregnant and I fell down while jogging two weeks ago. Nothing was broken, but I scraped the knuckles of my left pinke badly enough that I still can't bend it and sprained my wrist badly enough that twisting bottles and lifting heavy boxes is out of the question. Not ideal timing for us to move. Since we live on the sixth floor and will be moving to the third, we need to hire movers to do the heavy lifting. Thankfully hiring movers plus a van here costs less than renting a moving van in the States.

So I called up some movers recommended by my Korean classmate (who ironically taught at the same college in Tonghua as I did the year after I left -- but that's a different story). My classmate said they charged them 200 RMB for the move, which is half of what some American friends paid for their move. The caveat -- their new building has an elevator. So the operator answered and cut quickly to the chase: where were we moving from and to, how much stuff and what floors. She didn't recognize the new apartment complex, so I explained that it's just across the street from our campus gate. I explained that we have very little furniture, just a wardrobe and a crib and 40 or so boxes of various sizes. Then the floor - sixth to third. It took her a few seconds and she gave me a quote: 350 RMB. Reasonable, but I figured I'd try another mover.

Yesterday, my classmate Kevin -- whose apartment we will be moving into -- had arranged to move some other furniture and boxes belonging to our friend Kaylene into his apartment at Cai Xiao (the name of the complex). Kaylene had to leave early last year for medical reasons and plans to return to a different city in China after she recovers. So we packed up her stuff, bought some of her furniture (since our new apartment is mostly unfurnished) and decided to store it all in our apartment while we are in the States awaiting the birth of baby #2.

Kevin had also bought some of her stuff, so he called the movers and got a quote that he could move the stuff -- from floor 2 to floor 3 of Cai Xiao -- for 260 RMB per truckload. Plus, the movers would charge a little extra for big stuff like refrigerators and giant wardrobes. He set it up for Tuesday morning. Kevin said the guy's Chinese was a bit hard to understand, but he'd worked things out fine. Granted, of everyone in our class, Kevin's Chinese is the best. Every semester he gets the award for being the best student in class.

So, since I also needed movers, today, I sent the same mover a text message with the details of our move and asking for a quote, hoping to avoid a phone conversation that would immediately reveal me as a foreigner. But when he hadn't replied after an hour, I decided to give him a call.

I asked if he'd received my text message and told him I wanted to move from Ning Da to Cai Xiao (our new complex). Immediately, he seemed confused. "You called earlier about moving on Tuesday, right?" he asked. I feigned ignorance."No. That must be someone else." I didn't want to admit that I was a foreigner. Often the price quoted to a foreigner is significantly higher than that offered to a Chinese. I didn't want to be a target for being cheated. I just told him that I wanted to move on Friday. I didn't mention that my friend had spoken with him yesterday. He said that he'd already said that it would be 260 because He charges by the truckload.

A couple hours later, he called me back. "I just saw your text message," he said. "If it's not the second floor to the third floor, but the sixth to the third, it is more agonizing (Sometimes Chinese is a bit melodramatic -- word used to explain difficulty -- 痛苦 -- literally means pain and bitterness). "The price will be 350 RMB." So, a bit more than 20 RMB extra per extra floor.

Then he asked, "Aren't you the international friend I spoke with yesterday?" I told him I wasn't. I'd been foiled. So had Kevin. How he figured it out I'll never know. Was it my limited vocabulary or my repeated requests for him to repeat himself. Who was I kidding? I'd mostly hoped he would think I was someone from a different province, whose Mandarin was poor. "But you are moving to Cai Xiao also, right?" "Yes." I gave in. "Yes, my friend spoke with you before. He is moving from another apartment to Cai Xiao on Tuesday. I am moving from Ning Da to Cai Xiao on Friday."

We'd thoroughly confused the poor guy. I was afraid that might happen. Now I'm hoping he still shows up on Tuesday. Maybe I'll wait till then to decide if it goes in the "language win" or "language loss" column.

Moving On (Again)

In just over three weeks we will be finished and heading back to America!  In some ways I feel like it couldn't get here soon enough.  Maybe it's the pregnancy or the heat or the fact that we do practically the same thing every lesson, but I am so ready to be done with class.   I realized I have been a student for 24 of the past 25 years, and at this point I'm pretty sure I'm losing brain cells at a faster rate than I am gaining knowledge.  Just seven more days of class!

There are also things I'm looking forward to in America.  The way you go to the sink to wash your hands and water actually comes out.  The abundant use of A/C.   Doing something different than going to class every day.  Eating guacamole and real sour cream and Tums.  The Tums aren't necessarily related, but I am looking forward to them...breathing pretty much gives me heartburn these days.

Three weeks really couldn't get here soon enough...except for one little thing.  A couple of weeks ago we found out we have to move.  Not exactly great news.  Fortunately another apartment option presented itself pretty quickly - we are going to move into the apartment our teammates will be vacating.  It is just across the street from the school and less than a 10 minute walk from where we live now.

Just before we found out we'd have to move, Juliana packed her toys - and herself - into a box in what is commonly called foreshadowing.

Unfortunately while our apartment was fully furnished, theirs was not.  Fortunately someone has a bed and desk we can borrow, another teammate gave us a good deal on the couch she was selling, and Juliana has a giant stuffed bear which can take the place of furniture in her room...so we're almost good to go.  We are buying all the main appliances (in China unfurnished really means unfurnished) from our teammates - fridge, washer, stove (two burners!), hot water heater.  While we're able to buy all these things for less than we'd probably spend on one appliance in the States, it still irks me to have to buy them when we managed to avoid having to buy them two years ago.  But there's not much we can do about it, and hopefully we can re-sell them whenever we move back into teacher housing. We can do without a lot of things, but I'm not quite ready to try life without a fridge and washer.

Another unfortunate is that the rent is a good deal more than on our apartment.  $50 more dollars a month might not seem like a huge deal until you consider we were only paying $125/month for rent the past couple of years.  It's a pretty sizeable increase, but our apartment was a really good deal and I don't think we'd find something else like it.  With the more expensive rent we will get some pleasant perks like an actual eating area instead of a folding table in the living room, only climbing to the 3rd floor, a kitchen that won't freeze over in the winter, and best of all - water that actually stays on all Spring!  With two small, messy children and cloth diapering, I think having water every day will be a big asset.

While less stairs will be nice, I will miss our view of the mountains

So now that we have a place to live next year when we return from our time in the States, the next step is packing up everything.   Why do I feel like we just did this?  We haven't accumulated much in the past two years with one notable exception: when we came to Yinchuan Juliana had about 6 toys.  Now she has, well, a whole lot more.

There is nothing like packing and moving to make you realize just how much stuff you have.  It makes me a little squeamish to think about.  In the last move we did a pretty good job of eliminating things we didn't actually use, so our "give away" stash is pretty small this time.  But still - how do we possibly need so much?

Take the kitchen, which I have yet to tackle at all.  We have a square baking pan, 2 round pans, 2 bread pans, a 9x13 pan, a muffin tin, and 2 cookie sheets.  I use them all, but is it really necessary to do baking in that many shapes?

I do like the organizing and purging aspect of packing but not much else about it.  Especially frustrating is looking around seeing all the things we will need to pack but knowing we'll still need to use them for the next few weeks. 

The biggest impediment for me has been exhaustion.  The temperature has recently been hanging out in the upper 90's.  Heat doesn't usually bother me so much, but in pregnancy I feel the last remaining shreds of energy draining away.  We just started using our A/C since I decided I won't be able to get anything done without it.  Even so, the A/C is only able to cool some of the rooms in the house, and of course very few other places (like the classroom) are air conditioned.

The past couple of days we have been enjoying some wonderfully cool days though.  Thank you, Chinese government.  This weekend is the all-important 高考 (college entrance exam) for students across the country, and apparently every year they seed the clouds at this time to make cooler weather for students taking the exam.  We are trying to take advantage of the coolness - as well as our 3 day holiday this week - to get some more packing done.

Juliana has been doing her part in aiding the packing process.  When I finally packed up the first box of books last week she promptly unpacked it for me, no doubt for quality inspection.  As the pile of boxes slowly grows,  she's starting to get the idea.  The other day as Kevin and I worked on packing, Juliana rushed into her room, "I'm bringing bunny!  We need to pack bunny!  I'm going to wear my backpack!"  She understands packing for a trip a little better than packing for a move, and her concept of any future more distant than "right now" is still a bit fuzzy.  What will be even more confusing is when she moves into her best friends’ house next year and they aren’t there!