A recent note from an old blogging site about my posts from China in 2005 has prompted me to repost them. The blog was a convenient way to give updates to many. This was my first of six, sent shortly after we moved for what turned out to be about one year in Beijing, leaving before the Olympics in 2008. Our raw, naive reactions are fun to read after all this time. The other five will follow shortly.
17th July, 2005. Beijing.
Dear friends and family,
Many of you have asked to let you know what China is like, and here is our first “blog”, to use the new techie term. We’ll send updates every now and then – or even start a web page.
For phonecalls, we plan to use “www.skype.com” when we get our high speed connection, which is free computer-to-computer and is as good as any phoneline. For more conventional means, our address will be c/o Peter’s work at:
Peter Ireland
Schlumberger Technologies (Beijing) Ltd.,
8th Floor, ChuangXin Building, Tsinghua Science Park,
Beijing 100084, People’s Republic of China
Home telephone = 5135 7480 (from USA, prefix with 011 86 10, from UK prefix with 00 86 10)
Cell/mobile = 134 3907 3331 (from USA, prefix with 011 86, from UK prefix with 00 86)
[Don’t forget the time zone differences!]
Our physical address is the Hairun apartments, in the Chaoyang district of Beijing to the North East of the city, by the 4th ring road and the airport expressway, very close to the Holiday Inn Lido.
Nothing prepares you for the complete life transformation when one moves from Texas to Beijing – and any change is amplified several times due to having 2 small children.
Our biggest challenge, quite simply, has been nothing to do with China – it’s the 13 hour time change. The kids have just not been sleeping through the night, and the tiredness just makes everything more difficult. The tiredness causes the temptation just to sit in the apartment for ever, while thinking “why did we ever do this”.
Venturing out really is quite simple though. Beijing is a dirty city – the pathways are muddy, all surfaces are dusty, and the air quality is highly variable! Crossing the streets is difficult enough by oneself, but pushing a stroller, or holding the hand of a reluctant, independent 2-year old, makes it quite an adventure. Just remember to look both ways for bicycles! The heartwarming experience though is seeing almost every person you meet smiling from ear-to-ear at your children. We’re still not sure why – it’s as if they have never seen a child before. I think it’s a combination of the fact the child looks different, and that western kids might be a bit more active than Chinese ones.
However much they smile at you, most locals speak very little, if any, English. We have guards to our building who are always so friendly – but the most we can exchange right now is a simple “ni hao” (hello). Need to bake them some cookies – brings back memories of baking cookies for the guard outside our apartment in Angola – though this seems like a different planet! There are shops that have imported goods, and they speak English – but you certainly pay for the privilege. Going into local shops, and pointing at what you might like, is always fun and can be surprising! Prices for local stuff is very cheap, though it is much more of a cash-based society, with about 8Yuan worth a dollar, so spending 100 Yuan feels like an awful lot, when it is in fact $12.
Basic living in the apartment is quite different. Water out of the tap is not drinkable. You need to buy or recharge cards for gas, electricity, international phone calls, cell phone calls – which also means you need to work out where to do this, and how! Where does the trash go? There’s a bin that looks like it’s used for recycling, but does anyone know that? As one gets used to a new environment, it seems many things don’t work. It’s more difficult when the instructions to everything are in Chinese – both on the appliances, and the instruction manuals. However, by some trial and error, and asking the landlady’s rep to translate, and by trying to do some comparisons with a dictionary, one works out most things. One trouble is, the locals don’t even know how to use a dishwasher or oven, as they don’t use them! Still, things seem to mysteriously stop (gas, internet) and then start again. At least I’ve been assured that the electricity to the building has never gone out – would be interesting carrying the kids up 23 floors!
The view from the 23rd floor is spectacular. There’s nothing special about what we can see – just the Beijing skyline. What’s spectacular is that it is always the backdrop – our living room has big windows, so any time I look up, I look across the Beijing skyline. That is on the clearer days – today is very foggy (perhaps smog?) and I can hardly see the building next door.
Getting into the city is very easy with Taxis. Of course, they don’t speak English, but you just need to show them the address in Chinese characters, and 99% of the time they’ll know it. We have a taxi book with lots of addresses in Chinese to start off with which is great – and then you start gathering receipts or business cards of places that you like. The rides are a bit worrying with the kids though. Most taxis don’t have seatbelts, and the driving is rather aggressive. We haven’t tried car seats for them yet – it would be difficult trying to find the taxi with the seatbelt, and then the carseat needs to travel with you on the other end. Makes us a bit nervous though. Need to make sure that Bailey is always between us – she likes to try opening the door while speeding down the highway – without a seatbelt to hold her in!
We’ve made 2 trips to big stores. The first was to Carrefour – easily the largest store we have ever been in. Think of the largest Walmart (US) or Asda (UK) you’ve been in, and then this Carrefour is the same area – but on 3 floors! As you navigate the store, the eye locks onto either English words, or brands that we recognize, but it is very draining. Buying Kleenex tissues (a good brand in China) was easy, but trying to find out whether the baby formula we were buying was for lactose intolerant babies or not was near impossible. We were proud when we worked out the different milks – skimmed, full fat etc – by comparing the contents labels, where the numbers are in English, and seeing what is different! Happily found Nutella, and had mixed feeling about finding neither Marmite nor Vegemite. When looking at eggs, a worker came over, illustrated how they weren’t broken, and pointed out some text in English! In the end, we quit shopping before we were finished because we were just overwhelmed. The second trip was to an IKEA – clearly a very popular store. Easily, the busiest store I have ever been in except on exceptional sale days. The surprise was an excellent cafeteria – with a good chicken curry for $1. Carrying the kids around was exhausting (no shopping carts). I’m getting used to walking through crowds of people with a screaming child on my shoulders (Bailey) and everyone looking at her and ooing and ahing – and oh how she laps it up! At least in the eyes of the locals, children can’t do anything wrong, so we can let her play on all the beds at IKEA to keep her occupied!
What is remarkable when out and about at these “western” stores is the lack of Westerners! We really saw very few westerners whatsoever – so felt that we stood out very much. However, when we are in areas where there are mostly westerners, I also feel out of place, like I am not really in China. I’m sure we’ll get used to both! Lots of Westerners in our building – it looks like our next door neighbours are from Sweden, and we have a family from Louisiana in the same building.
In general, most things can be bought here – either from the big stores and pay local prices, or from the convenient import stores near our apartment. Some things you can’t find – ranging from swim diapers (not surprising) to digital alarm clock (why??).
The tiredness and jetlag make us do the craziest things. We brought an envelope of cash, and I kept it in my computer bag. I went looking for it one night, and searched through my bag 3 times, and could not find it. Janet tried, could not find it. Following morning, Janet found it immediately… Then 2 nights later, we forget to put a diaper on Bailey for sleeping – which she kindly let us know at about 2am when climbing into our bed – though Janet was already up since 1am tending to Samuel who has just refused to sleep more than 2 hours at a time.
This morning, we made our first visit to church. We had to show our passports on the way into the theater where they meet, as it is only for foreigners. There was a very nice nursery for Bailey and Samuel (about 10 kids in each of their classes). At the beginning of the service, it was pointed out that the Chinese Religious affairs graciously permit us to worship, as long as we have a foreign passport. In the message, the DVD of “The Passion” was referred to, followed by the comment “don’t ask me how I got it”. It was a surprisingly funny remark – but not sure why! Probably a combination of whether it could actually be bought legally in China, and also if it was counterfeit, should the preacher be discussing buying counterfeit DVDs… Even now I smile, and I’m not sure why. There were tons of different nationalities – about ½ the church is Asian, but there were lots of visitors (large crowd by us who were in Beijing adopting children). It was very cool to sing the “I love you Lord” praise song in Chinese!
For Sunday lunch, we tried a restaurant we’d been recommended, but it was mysteriously closed. We’d spotted what looked like quite a nice restaurant just below our apartment, so went there instead. Discovered it was actually a “hot pot” restaurant – which is probably best described as a Chinese Fondue (not the best choice with a 2 infants…). Also discovered it was their first day of business, so they gave us a VIP card as we were the first foreigners to dine there! Note that they spoke very little English whatsoever… Interesting challenge to ask for the toilet, but then it was just a hole in the ground and Bailey could not get herself to go!
The first 5 days really have been a series of ups and downs – lots and lots of little ups, and a few large downs. The ups are really anything that we successfully achieve – whether it is getting a worker to change out 18 blown lightbulbs in our apartment, or finding BBC world on the TV, or buying a loaf of bread from someone who does not speak a word of English, or finding an ATM that can give us money from our US bank account, to finding a restaurant that delivers – including a real dish or plate, to feeling very pleased with our lovely apartment, which is not only very well furnished, but also has excellent air conditioning! The downs are more associated with the kids – will they ever sleep through the night again? Will bringing them up with all of this attention from strangers turn them into spoiled monsters?
Not too many photos yet – but I need to start carrying the digital camera everywhere – to capture the unusual, whether it is a man towing a cart with his bicycle – that is loaded with a houseful of furniture, to a sign which proudly announces that they are building the subway “with good oder”.
The Adventures of the Cajunlimeys 