Thanksgiving

Our American day of thankfulness arrives in Asia about 12 hours ahead of North America. This Thursday differs very little from any other in China. In fact, we sent our kids out the door this morning to their British International School and Chinese Kindergarten like any other morning.

Are we more or less Thankful when we celebrate this day by not celebrating in the usual way?

While it is true that in a little under an hour I will retrieve Bei Bei from her kindie, and snatch Millie and Eliza from their mid-day Thursday routine in time to catch our flight to Shanghai, I wonder, are we thankful on the ordinary days, on the routine ones, the ones that involve scrambling for backpacks, lunch sacks and homework. The days when a kiss and a to-go mug of Joe @ the door is a rushed affair.

I savored a rare moment of alone time this morning @ Starbucks (where I nipped out to buy a last minute gift for our Thanksgiving dinner host in Shanghai.) As I sat enjoying my pumpkin scone and mocha in the relatively quite coffee shop atmosphere, I thought of all the collective moments of our China experience, and in our life in general, for which we can be thankful.

Almost on cue, I looked up to see huge white fluffy flakes of snow floating by outside. It was an unexpected event, beautiful and fresh. As I ventured out the back door of Starbucks, leaving the serene environment of mellow jazz and comfortable armchairs, I stepped into the crisp November air with wind gusts sending the snow swirling like autumn leaves. The atmosphere was not pristine, but unique, as techno music blared outside of a clothes shop and people scurried doing their Thursday things, but most smiling with the unexpected sighting of snow in the fall. Unexpected things on a Thursday morning. Smiling, happy people doing their routine.

I am thankful for this morning, for the warmth of the indoors, and the cool crispness of the outdoors. I am thankful for the moments we share together as a family, and those we share with our friends in this foreign land.

As you carve your turkey tomorrow, think of your thankful moments, both those that come to mind when the table is set with the best china and surrounded by those you love, AND life’s other moments: the rushed and scattered, the busy days and times. May your thankfulness be at hand in both kinds of moments. May my thankfulness be the same.

Happy Thanksgiving to all we know, love, treasure and miss! May your day be blessed, and our hearts truly thankful.

Sailing Sister's Journal

Sunday night at bedtime, after Eliza and Bea were tucked in, I crawled in with Millie, our resident sailor who had 30 minutes before lights out. I miss my big girl when she’s gone six days a week (Monday -Friday @ school, and either Saturday or Sunday sailing.)

Sunday night her cheeks were flushed with a windburn. The weather has changed since she started her sailing course nine weeks ago, and now we were hard pressed to find clothes that would keep her both warm and nimble in her one-girl boat.

“It still feels like I’m floating,” our Sailing Sister said as we cuddled under the down comforter in her canopy bed and she talked about her sailing experience.

With her permission I am sharing the following journal entries from her sailing lessons, logged in her Hannah Montana notebook.

Sailing Sister’s Sailing Journal

Sailing WEEK ONE
In the morning we had a lesson and assembled our boats for sailing. Then, we walked to McDonalds in Jusco. I got a Happy Meal- chicken nuggets. I got a little brown puppy in a pink bag.

Afternoon
We walked back to the sailing center. We brought our boats down to the dock. We tightened a rope to join our boats. We did not use the sail. (We used the small oar instead.) We played a game: Whichever team got the most balloons [that were floating in the water] wins! Gabriel and I won! Dad picked me up. We got sailing homework!

Sailing WEEK THREE
Dad dropped me off as usual. We had a lesson and assembeled our boats. I ate at McDonalds- Happy meal with chicken nuggets. I got a black and white puppy in a black and white bag. We walked back to the sailing center.

Oh NO!! There is too much wind! I could not/would not get going! One of our sailing teachers got in my boat and started sailing with me. She is a great sailor! After a few laps she tells me to try it. I do (but not ‘til she had convinced me to!) I get the hang of it. She helps me in my weak spots. Then she gets out and I do a few laps. When I get out my dad gives me a Starbucks hot chocolate. “YUM!” But, I am cold. We go to pick up some [takeaway] food then we went home.

by Millie Grace 9 and a half

(aka Sailing Sister)

My Cosmo Life

My Cosmo Life

My last week featured a fabulous blend of cosmopolitan living that reminded me again of how much I appreciate life in our present international environment. (And by cosmopolitan I mean worldly in an excitingly international and global way, and not a skanky Cosmo mag kind of way.)

It was an eventful week socially.

MONDAY
It started off with a bang with the celebration of another CAT wife’s 40th birthday. We pulled out all the stops (or at least as many as can be pulled out on a Monday morning working around our husbands' travel plans and kids school schedules.) Pedicures, waxed eyebrows, paraffin feet and champagne to lessen the blow of the big 4-0. We followed it with lunch at another friend’s apartment where we shared a big pot of chili—an American fall favorite. We chatted in American accented English and covered the gamut from holiday plans to the new scene in American politics. It was largely an American affair, but in China, not the heartland where most of us hail from.

TUESDAY found Bea and I off to playgroup in the morning hosted by my Turkish friend and with representation at the international playgroup of families from Denmark, Germany, China, the UK, France, the US, and Holland. While most families in our playgroup operate in English fluently, it’s also often a place of language potpourri where mamas scold and console their offspring in their mother tongue. Tuesday afternoon I volunteered in Eliza’s classroom, and listened as children from all corners of the globe honed their oral English and reading skills by reading aloud.
With all my flitting about between playgroup and school I didn’t prepare dinner, which meant at our usual dinner hour, the Johnson’s in China were dining on fabulous satay, steaming bowls of noodles with delicate strips of beef, spring rolls and spicy minced chicken wraps at a new Vietnamese place just 10 minutes from where we live.

Most WEDNESDAY mornings find me seeking to increase my global mindedness by studying Mandarin: a process that both excites and overwhelms me. Wednesday night I joined several other playgroup moms (or is it mums?) for our monthly dinner. We have found that often the conversations our Tuesday meetings are lacking. We created our Wednesday dinners to facilitate conversations that include complete sentences and exclude wiping sticky fingers and diaper changes. Of course our conversations inevitably turn to our kids, life in China and it seems the parenting challenges we face in the United States are no different in other parts of the planet. When to start kindies, how to successfully potty train, and more specific to our China experience how to live in a world different from the one we know.

Wednesday we dined at the interestingly named Boiling Fish Township, a restaurant in QD’s Central Business District specializing in Sichuan cuisine. When it was time to select our fish, I bravely joined my Chinese friend (who fluently speaks Mandarin, German and English and picked me up in her cool Jeep Cherokee which she daringly drives herself) for the selection process. Live tank… fresh flailing fish… the place isn’t called Boiling Fish for nothing.

“Too big,” my friend complained, prompting the fish guy to scoop up the flailing scales and tail and lob it back into the tank. With his net he deftly trawled for a slightly smaller one. He threw the slippery, thrashing fish on the scale where it flipped off only to be caught by the tail and whacked hard against a crate. Literally minutes later it arrived at our table in a big vat of spicy oil and laden with the lip numbing pepper corns Sichuan food is famous for. And for the record, the fish at Boiling Fish Township was delicious. (My Chinese/German friend ate the venerable fish head!)

THURSDAY afternoon found me rug shopping with an American friend seeking to spruce up her living room space. Like Monday, it was American event, but took place in China. Because it was in China, the selections where more varied, vibrant, and not within the more muted color scheme she sought. We went to Haibo the huge furniture mart, which features, what I call rug pits where every possible floor covering can be found (except possibly something tasteful and demur.) We searched Home Depot (yes… we actually have a Home Depot) and B & Q (its British twin) but to no avail. (Although she did find a couple of fabulous rugs for her kids' rooms.)

FRIDAY morning found me off to Starbucks to share a coffee and a chat with a new friend from Australia, with whom we shared notes on life in China and raising kids here. Friday afternoon I had a late lunch with my sweet and soft-spoken Korean friend who introduced me to a new restaurant in the leafy old section of Qingdao. We dined Korean style: seated on a heated floor, on comfy silk pillows around a tiny table and later sipped cappuccinos together while continuing to sit “like pretzels” as my kids would say.

SATURDAY afternoon we joined other CAT families for an early Thanksgiving feast. Our newest CAT family, a Lebanese American couple and their three children who just arrived this autumn after spending years working and living in France, hosted. Their French neighbors joined us. 50+ people dined on a traditional American meal complemented by the unique additions of jiao zi (Chinese dumplings), Asian noodles, and “international wines”, as our French friend Olivier (as in Sir Laurence Olivier not Oliver as in Oliver Twist) calls non-French wines. He considers all the “international” ones to all taste the same. His father, who was visiting from the south of France, also joined us. Even though he didn’t speak any English, except for “I don’t speak English,” Obama still came through pretty clearly! Despite differences in language, culture and cuisine, the time we shared together proved particularly poignant.

On SUNDAY morning we attended our International Christian Fellowship where again we were a less than homogenous mix.

Seven days of international, global living. This is my Cosmo Life. This is our cosmopolitan experience in CHINA.

ELIZA'S Number Poem

Year go faster, I want to grow more
Yes I am three, but I want to be four

When I am six, I want to be seven
And then eleven . . . All the way up to heaven

Eliza wrote this poem in school yesterday. Her class is doing a unit in literacy about poetry.
She helped with this post by formating her poem's fonts and colors.

THIS IS CHINA

When you’ve entered a bathroom stall, used the toilet (either Western or squat) and then realized (too late) that there is no toilet paper provided. This is China.

When people approach you and tell you your children are too cold (in the winter) or too hot (in the summer), while their own child, regardless of the season, sports trousers that completely lack a crotch. This is China.

When (unsolicited) advice is offered, telling you should cut your three-year-old daughter’s shoulder length hair while you are unable to distinguish if their six-year old is a boy or girl given their buzz cut. This is China.

This is China. Or TIC for short. It’s the phrase we reach for when an adult man in a Speedo crouches beside our beach blanket with a cig and chats with our three-year-old (or maybe just in his wet undies, if he has come to the beach on a whim.) We’ve come to say that the only thing worse than a Speedo is a baggy Speedo, or perhaps baggy, soggy undies! This too is China.

TIC… the words we utter when we’re frustrated, irritated, puzzled or ticked (or is it TICed?)

But there is another side we often fail to consider:

When ... the heating element goes out in the dryer.... An hour later a repairman arrives on a beat up 125 cc motorbike and one hour and ten minutes later your clothes are tumbling again. You’re only out 6 bucks. This is China.

When you hop in the back of a taxi and the driver tells you are: lucky, pretty or young (or some combination of the three.) This is China.

(It could also be cheap therapy… hop in the back of the cab and cruise around the city for a half hour while he tells you your hair and kids are great and you come from the best country on earth. America… very goodah… usually followed by a thumbs-up.) This is China.

When you can buy GAP socks out of a carry-on size roller case or picture frames from Target or IKEA on the street, for a fraction of the U.S. retail price. This is China.

I think you get the idea.

This is China.

And, this, is our China experience.

Saturday Morning Pancakes

enhance your viewing experience of this blog entry by
switching the playlist song at the bottom of the page

to J J Cale and E Clapton's Three Little Girls

Its a great way to watch our three little girlies!

Lions and Tigers and Bears, Oh My!

(don't forget that you can click on any picture to see a full view!)

Just a little over a month ago
we spent the better part of a day
@ the fabulous Singapore Zoo.
We saw the rare white tigers
that yesterday gained global attention
after mauling to death a disturbed zoo employee.

Follow this link to see the news report.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/asia-pacific/7727100.stm

The Grass is Always Greener...

Growing up in the Lutheran tradition, Thou shall not covet thy neighbor's (fill in the blank... ) was covered by both the 9th and 10th commandments. In the small catechism written several centuries ago by the thesis and hammer toting Luther, the act of coveting is condemned not once but twice, suggesting the importance of being sated with one’s own lot.

I must admit, in China they are usually two of the easiest commandments to keep (in my mind they’re a two-fer anyway!). There is little in the way of my neighbors' possessions I covet, except perhaps my neighbor Mrs. Yang's new ride (a post-baby gift from her richy pants husband.)

But, even that momentary desire fades when I consider actually driving that German luxury automobile (with the top down of course) through the unruly streets of Qingdao.

In the same vein as coveting is the “keeping up with the Jones’” philosophy so prevalent in the West - for China it is perhaps instead, “keeping up with the Zhangs’” Again…. I am largely reluctant to desire the opulent light fixtures, mammoth pieces of furniture and other over-sized, over-done items of Chinese luxury.

But… I would love nice grass in our back garden!

This is the present state of our yard:

When we moved in our landlord assured us we had kind of grass that did not need to be cut (because it didn't grow!). We have tried, in vain, each year to prompt a more lush lawn. The soil is poor, and our complex is built on the remnant of a limestone mountain.

Even after these guys dumped two truckloads of fertile soil in our backyard space, the grass failed to flourish.

Is the grass greener on the other side of the fence?

Not on this side… where Mr. Li gave up entirely. After thrice re-planting, he opted to tile his back yard!

But... is there Greener Grass on the other side of the other fence?

Yes... and in the verbage of Mr. Luther ... This is most certainly true!

Just because you can, doesn’t always mean you should.

I’ve been searching for a more Asian look for The Johnson’s in China. In my probe for a cool Asian/Modern style, I stumbled on this, and hope that this new canned format satisfies that need without being construed as too pre-packaged and/or prematurely Christmassy.

In my search to more succinctly define our site as Asian influenced, I also created a play list.

Which haunts me with the above. Just because you can, doesn’t always mean you should.

Does the music add or detract? How about the counter? Or the little world map? Are three gadgets too much? It’s a slippery slope… I could also add world clocks, news feeds, a stock ticker, and a money tip of the day. When is “more” better, and when does the “less is more” idea apply?

And it’s more than just a format issue, I’ve been thinking about blogging, having a blog and being a blogger. I came across a disturbingly accurate quote recently, while following a comment thread on someone’s facebook page. It said, “Typically, blogs (and blogs on blogs) satisfy the writer's need for self expression over the audience's need for unbiased information.”

What in life is blog worthy? and does anyone really read it anyway?

A Sparkling Sea

Saturday in Qingdao dawned bright and sunny. The smoggy, foggy air we endured Tuesday to Friday had been banished. The air was crisp and cold. It was a see-your-breath kind of morning that foreshadowed a glorious fall day. And it was clear. It was a “horizon day” as Sean calls them (days you can actually see to the horizon.) Adding to the appeal, the Yellow Sea out our second story window and across the four-lane street, was sparkling in an on-the-front-of-a-postcard, can’t-really-be-real kind of way.


It was the kind of day that, were I still living in Illinois, I would feel compelled to mix up a pot of chili. I would bundle up and head out to enjoy a cup of hot mulled cider on the front porch. In fact, it was on such a day, three years ago this weekend, that we hosted our grand Moving to China Yard Sale in the front yard. It was the kind of day I would envy a cat lazing about in a sunny sill. The kind of day I could spend literally drinking in the autumnal sunshine.

Of course our fully scheduled Saturday didn’t allow for lazing. Millie to sailing, Sean and Jen to parent teacher interviews @ school (the British term for what American’s usually call Teacher Conferences.) Then on to pick Eliza’s pal for a play date, and on again to the opening of a new English bookshop.

No time today to bask in the sun, or quietly enjoy the fall weather outside. But, still time to enjoy the visual splendor… the bright red sumac glowing on the rocky mountainous outcrops that trace the coastline, the fan shaped leaves of the gingko trees that dot Donghai Lu gradually turning yellow, the sparkling water of the sea and the bright warm sunshine on this cold autumn day.

Christmas in our Hearts

A weekend ago we came home from a night out and found this piece of artwork hung in The Johnson Art Gallery (aka the small white fridge in our yellow kitchen.) The girls had watched Christmas with the Cranks, which had inspired Eliza to draw a winter themed picture even though we had been able to wear flip flops with our jeans and sweatshirts to the beach that week.

Indeed that week did feel Christmas-like, in our hearts, though not our climate, as a huge box of wonderful fall goodies had arrived from our friends the Bowlers in the United States. It was chock full of the can’t-get-it-in-China kind of things that made it all the more special. Special stuff from special people (who incidentally will add another special person to their family early next summer… yeah for #3!)

The girls have been honing their Christmas list for Grandma in the U.S. and for Mom and Dad (although unbeknownst to them their gifts from a certain shop with big red bags that hails from Michigan Ave and specializes in historical fiction and characters made the grand global journey back with us from Illinois in August!)

Once a week at bedtime we’ve been working our way through a thoughtful kids devotional book, which is careful outlining our need for a saviour. The book, full of realistically rendered oil paintings and worthy of coffee table status, was a Christmas-in-August gift from Great Grandma Lil who wanted to see the girls open her gift to them. At the end of each rather long chapter is a list of questions. After the first chapter about how God gave us the Bible as a special gift, we asked Bea the first of 15 questions about the chapter.

“Bea, who is the bible a special gift from?”

“Lilly Lew,” she answered!

“No, Bea, its from God,” Millie quickly corrected her.
“Oh, God,” said Bea, and then added, “and Lilly Lew!”

Halloween in November and other Calendar Challenged Holidays

I love seeing new Christmas decorations come out here in December, and the bright red and gold banners that arrive in stores in January to welcome in the new Chinese year. I cringe, though, when we see the same tired and sun faded decorations still up the following July or October. (It’s considered bad luck to take down the Chinese New Year LUCK banners… which are extra lucky if hung upside down.) But surely the exhausted Santa Clauses could be eighty-sixed by spring!

Halloween décor is a relatively new in QD at least, and probably still bought up mainly by the foreigners who can also be seen rushing about the tailors in the Tai Dong area having custom costumes made and scouring about the shops that sell brooms and plastic basins and other household cleaning and maintenance materials (I once bought a flimsy fly spank for 1 yuan… 12 cents… at such a shop) looking for the infamous witch’s broom. Handmade straw brooms are still used regularly used in Chinese homes, on the streets, and even in grassy areas in lieu of rakes. They do make great costume accessories in that Wizard of Oz - Wicked Witch of the West way.

Our family’s Monster Mash party was just the tip of the Halloween iceberg… as Halloween continued on November 1 @ the Expat Halloween party where international children from all corners of the globe convened @ the Best Western for games, crafts and snacks, followed by good-old-fashioned trick-or-treating in the adjacent housing complex inhabited predominately by Westerners.

Eliza wore her new red silk and heavily beaded East Indian suit that we picked up in Kuala Lumpur’s Little India. She had a sticky jewel for the center of her forehead, one for the side of her nose and elaborate design that traced up her arm.

Beatrice sported the “bottom-of-the-dress-up-bin” look, reviving the tired bride costume and headband veil she has been wearing daily since we arrived home from Uncle Ryan’s wedding.

Millie spent another windy Saturday @ the Olympic Marina, facing for the first time really strong wind gusts and a white-knuckle sailing adventure. Sean spent the afternoon with her, and they came home to warm showers and a little down time before the costumed little sisters on a sugar high returned with Mom.

Saturday night was date-night, and Saint Ayi Lucy arrived for her five-hour stint with The Johnson girls. (Our date nights could probably be a blog entry of their own… stayed tuned… )

This week we had 7:00 reservations at our favorite restaurant in Qingdao, Tratoria Verde: a tiny, six-table Italian Restaurant in the heart of Hong Kong Garden. We enjoyed a leisurely dinner and decided, after our Italian coffees and melt-in-your-mouth tiramisu to try to catch the first set @ Club New York. (When we toured Qingdao in 2005 on our house hunting trip, our real estate agent pointed out Club New York and boasted that being inside was the equivalent to being in Manhattan. The reality… not so… not even close.)

CNY is on the second floor of the Chinese Overseas Hotel, where a huge bunting on the banister reads… Welcome to Friends From Domestic and Abroad. The toilets are the nasty variety you can smell long before reaching them. The lobby is outdated marble and the carpeted stairs are worn. The draw for us though is the talented six member Filipino band (half of which also lead worship @ our Sunday fellowship.)

Saturday night was Halloween night… with huge fuzzy spiders hanging from the ceiling, together with orange and black bunting. (Hopefully this autumnal décor does not go the way of other misunderstood Western holidays in China.) The bouncers, who usually wear U.S. army fatigues, instead had on jackets that could either belong on a drum major or the cover of Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts club band. The waitresses donned flowing antebellum dresses with matching hats. Our server, curiously also sported cat whiskers. The talented band did not disappoint, and like good sports where also decked out for the night, one wore a scary wolf head and a sleeveless furry top (white jeans and go-go boots rounded out her look), superman, a hillbilly and cat-woman joined her.

If you ignore the creepy middle-aged white guys trawling for women half their age, the rest of the mix at Club New York is rather fun and eclectic. Young Chinese crazy for 80s English music rocked out to I’m your Venus. The multi-talented band crooned a Japanese love ballad for the businessmen at the table next to us who smiled and politely bobbed their heads in appreciation. Later, one of the Japanese guys joined the band on stage for a rendition of Sweet Home Chicago where he played the bass and two of the regular guys from the band blew dueling trombones with their guitars still strapped to their necks. The band threw in a Chinese pop song, and closed out the set with an amalgamation of Gloria Estefan hits.

Halloween in November, China style!