Bricks, Pork, & Split-Pantology

This post is really a conglomeration of randomness that we wanted to post. The first few items are just little things...and then we'll get to the "meat" of the post. hahahah ok sorry...that was cheesy.

On a recent trip to a nearby village we got the opportunity to see some stuff that we don't often see in our city. That's not to say that our city is that much more developed...trust us, it's not. But the area of the village we visited is still a good couple decades behind our city.

Here's the kitchen of an old home we visited. Though most kitchens here are nicer than this one, this one is still in use! Mr. Zhao eats every meal he cooks straight from this kitchen.
Amazing Race fans might recognize the round bricks of coal sitting on the floor...used for building a fire in the turquoise thingy

I'm not gonna complain about my "coleman stove" in my kitchen anymore.

Outside on the street there was the local butcher:
I'm sure we have this in our city too...but maybe we just don't visit that part of town.

Ok so the next one is something prevalent in all of China...even the big cities. So it wasn't special to this trip but we just realized it was about time to educate you all in Split-Pantology:

This is the most blog-appropriate picture we could find that had a good balance of not totally grossing you out but letting you see enough cheek to understand what we're talking about.
Split-pants are used almost exclusively in this country on children ranging from 1 day old to 4 years old...maybe older. They are basically just pants that aren't sewn up in the crotch area. Lovely thought eh? So the concept is that anytime the kiddo has to go to the bathroom, they just squat wherever they are and do their business. Of course this leads to puddles & what not on sidewalks, in parks, aisles of grocery stores...you name it. And who knows how many times a mother might get all nastified on while holding her baby.
But on the other hand we never mistakenly tell someone that their daughter is lovely when in fact it's a little boy! :) And on the same note, when all that business is on display you don't have to worry about dressing your child in gender appropriate colors so that people know what he/she is. And can you imagine the amount of diaper trash 1.3 billion people could produce?! So actually they are being quite environmentally friendly! ...minus the poop in the grocery store.
(Just as a side note we should clarify that we've actually never seen #2 in a grocery store...#1 is a whole different story)

Consequently though, it's been a complete nightmare to try to find clothing here that is actually sewn together in the crotch for Eden to wear. When we tell people that we don't want the split in the pants they look at us like we're all crazy! Luckily, we've got amazing family and friends back home who are shipping her hoards of cute pink clothes!

Strangely enough, diapers are in abundant supply here. Even pampers and huggies. I'm not sure who buys them...maybe just foreigners & mothers who are sick of being all nastied on.

So now you understand Split-Pantology...or at least know it exists even though you might not quite understand it. And maybe you are a little grossed out. sorry about that. maybe I'll wait till the next post to put a picture of Brandon eating a silk worm.

ok that's enough random thoughts for today...

We Have Fleas...

yeah. I know. Gross. Ewww. Yuck.
And I'm running a huge risk telling you this because I know now you've totally talked yourself out of visiting us. But with little going on these last few days, our flea infestation has consumed my thoughts.
Yesterday morning Brandon left for a quick trip to go pay our electricity bill.
I heard the door shut...and then about 2 minutes later, I heard the door open again and he was screeching: "Ahh...they are everywhere! They're biting! What do I do?!"
I ran in there only to see his ankles and feet covered by little black bugs. I ushered him into the bathroom (which remember is just one big room with a shower in the corner) and started spraying his legs down with water. Those stupid things wouldn't come off!
Finally after pelting them with water for quite a while we thought we got most of them down the drain...that is until we found one or two on our house shoes periodically through out the day. They even popped up in my dreams last night.
So for over 24 hours our apartment has been infested with fleas.
Ok, maybe infested is a strong word. But still...finding a couple here and there is no fun.

But this is when our strong disliking for indoor pets is paying off big time. "They" say that without anything to "feed" on, fleas will die within 2 weeks time. So with no dogs or cats to prey on, those little suckers should be goners (sp?) soon. Perfect timing for our trip out of town next week...get out of here while our house fleas die off.

So as long as you weren't planning a trip to visit us in the next two weeks, I think you'll have a flea-free couch to sleep on in no time!

Happy Birthday America

We're finally posting pictures of our 4th of July!

On our way to our friend's home with groceries & other necessities for the day in tow.


After consuming a good number of hard to get Hot Dogs, we had a water gun fight!

Since running around and dodging water didn't sound all that feasible for me at the moment...I just posed for the camera:


After a good hour or so of Texas Hold 'Em (which we proud Texans did quite well at) it was Guesstures time!!

I don't remember what we were trying to act out...but the guys killed us 4 games to 1!

To end the day with true American Style we blew up some firecrackers! Being the birth place of fire works we were confident we'd be able to find hoards of neat ones...but they were a little harder to locate than we thought. Luckily our friends did find some things similar to black cats! And as everything else goes here, they were incredibly cheap! 300 for 3 kuai (40 cents!)

Had we found some cool Roman Candles here we would have gone crazy buying some because they'd be so cheap. (sorry dad!) But...I guess it's good that we never found any. We lit all 300 black cats & covered our ears as we let em pop! It was no huge fire works show...but at least the neighbors knew that the whities were celebrating something!

Finding out a little late how to correctly say Independence Day in Chinese, we resorted to telling our friends and neighbors that it was America's birthday! They understood still! They have such patience with us!

So Happy Birthday America!

on vocalizing observations...

I had a reminder on wednesday morning of just how different Chinese culture and American culture are. I mean sure, I can look around here and tell things are really different, but occasionally things happen that are so blatantly different that they still throw me for a loop.

In America if you make an observation about someone's appearance you only vocalize that to them if it could be taken as a compliment. You'd never vocalize it if it would offend them.
That's not the case in China. Regardless of if something might be taken offensively, they vocalize these simple "observations" because that's just what they are...observations. Not compliments, not cut downs...just observations.

So, back to wednesday morning. I was leaving our apartment when our upstairs neighbor, a really nice woman, said to me, "Oh April, you look a little fat!"
I smiled, refrained from slapping her as I reminded myself of this odd cultural difference, and politely responded, "Well, yes. But that's because I'm pregnant." She of course smiled and said, "oh that's wonderful!"

Then I drove myself crazy trying to remember if we had already told her I am pregnant and she thinks that not only am I pregnant but just fat as well...or is that the Chinese way to approach the subject of someone being pregnant when you aren't sure if they are or not?!?
You know, in America we'd rather be safe than sorry and not say anything at all to a woman who might or might not be pregnant. But maybe in China when they aren't sure they just say, "hey, you look fat." And then the person either says, "Yes, I am." or "No. I'm just 6 months pregnant."

Anyhow, I could have gotten really offended, but in this country where you just aren't sure what might come out of their mouths as simple observations not meant as cut downs...you just gotta take things in stride.

A Tale of Thai Visas

This story is a little belated...but none the less blog worthy.

While in Beijing we set aside a specific day for acquiring our Thai visas that we'll need for our two month stay in Thailand this September. So bright and early that Thursday morning we made our way to the Thai Embassy. After our taxi driver finally figured out exactly where it was we pulled up in front only to be greeted by a guard with a paper in hand titled "We've Moved!" ... or something to that effect.
So we got back in our taxi cab and took off to the destination listed on the paper. This place is some sort of international building with all sorts of offices inside. When we arrived & headed towards the door decorated in all things Thai we were quite disappointed to see the doors chained shut and all the lights off inside. Completely bewildered, we looked to the ladies standing behind a counter near the doors. Their reply? "Buddha Day!" Apparently it was some sort of Buddhist holiday and they failed to mention they'd be closed on the day we said we'd be there.
Oh well...shrug it off...we'll come back tomorrow.

Friday rolls around and we wake up bright and early again, hoping Buddha day only lasted one day, to head downtown to the Embassy. Making sure we had all necessary requirements for applying for the visa, we head out the door...thus making our first mistake. Online they posted the specific photo requirements (that we all know can be quite picky) and we just assumed that any place doing Visa & Passport paperwork would have a camera & printer on hand for fulfilling those specifications. I mean, that's the way we do it in America...so logic told us that's the way they'd do it here as well.
Seriously, after living overseas for 10 months you'd think we'd know better by now. Our motto from now on: Never Assume. Because most often the things that make total sense to us are usually exactly opposite in China. (and apparently Thailand as well)

So, after we filled out all the paper work they gave us directions to a little Kodak shop across the highway where we could have pictures taken and developed (because apparently they've been in this situation before of people making assumptions). So we cross the highway and walk in to the closest Kodak place that we see. We show the guy behind the counter what we're needing and he literally starts yelling at us. I'm not talking about a raised voice...this was all out yelling...in unintelligible Chinese...for no apparent reason. Shocked and a little frightened, we both just gave him the "wow that was really strange and unnecessary" look and scurried off.
We rounded the corner outside hoping that wasn't the Kodak store we were supposed to go to, and sure enough a big yellow Kodak sign appeared up ahead.

As we neared this store we could both tell something was awry. The lights were all off inside. Not having a good feeling about what we were about to hear we ventured in and told them what we needed.
"Sorry, no electricity. Come back in one hour."

Not having an hour to spare we began to frantically search for another photo store. We crossed streets, asked passers-by, & I'm sure looked like lost little tourists.
Then suddenly, like a beautiful ray of sunlight shining through the darkness, we both noticed a sign with a huge arrow marked: USA VISA. We were so happy we could have stopped and sang the National Anthem right then.
Still a little unsure if this was evil big-city-Beijing trickery, we followed the arrows cautiously and lo and behold! they led us straight to the strategically placed American Embassy. Hoping all American logic would not be cast aside at this embassy, we prayed they'd have a camera, white back drop, and printer on hand. Sure enough...12,000 miles from home, American Logic is still at work in the American Embassy in Beijing!
We paid our hefty dues for the small 2x2 inch Visa photos & made our way back to the Thai Embassy completely satisfied for being scrappy and so Amazing Race-like.

Three days later we picked up our passports with our newly stamped Thai Visas inside!

And three days after arriving back in our city Brandon's passport was stolen! booooooooooo

So, today my friends, he is in Beijing picking up his new emergency passport at the strategically placed American Embassy with the working camera, white back-drop, and printer. And after that he'll head to the Thai Embassy where he'll attempt to replay the story I have just told you...only without Buddha day (hopefully) and having 2x2 photos already in hand.

26 Weeks

I thought you all would enjoy seeing April's growing belly. Eden Grace continues to get bigger and bigger. She is now 14 inches long and weighs approximately 2 pounds.

Frito Pie

After Brandon's passport got ganked (woops I think we forgot to write a blog about that...anyhow, you get the picture), we realized we could easily take advantage of the situation of him having to go to a nearby larger city to turn in his papers for a new passport. This city has an incredible import store of all sorts of American food items. So when he left yesterday at 3:30 a.m. to travel by train to said nearby city, he took with him a large empty duffel bag so he could bring back all sorts of goodies.

So this evening we indulged in a Texan delicacy. Frito Pie.
He bought a large can of Hormel Chili and one big sack of Fritos. This evening as I was heating up the chili, the smell brought back a flood of memories.

Memories of 4th of July Hot Dogs.
Cold, overcast days where mom made chili for dinner.
5th Quarters for our youth group after cold football games where we'd indulge in Frito Pies and Mexican Pile On.
Chili cookoffs as a good excuse to raise money for our youth group.

....visions of smokey chimneys, snow covered backyards, & corn bread began to fill my Chili-focused brain.

And as we indulged in this delicacy, we couldn't help but mutter through our frito filled mouths, "Oh my gosh...this is so good!"

Actually, we recalled that neither of us has ever been a huge fan of Frito Pie. Brandon commented that the last time he might have eaten frito pie was when he was 13 on a camping trip...that might or might not have left him digestively challenged. (sure we may be feeling those same effects later tonight or tomorrow morning, but that's to be expected after not eating chili for over 11 months...)

But none the less, it was a great evening recalling back to wintry times when we were younger & reminding our taste buds that though we may be thousands of miles from Texas, we are in fact still very much Texan at heart.