7 months and counting

Since China ushered in a new Premier a few months ago, the entire city and country had heightened security, both in person and virtually. In addition to the typical firewall (facebook, blogs, google docs) They fully blocked all of Google at times, and many VPN services including our own. After 2 wks stateside and many hours trying to troubleshoot the great firewall of China, my personal tech warrior T got my VPN going again! For a while I was wondering how long we could stay in China- with the internet being my gateway for work (product research, sharing images with clients, etc) I questioned how much longer I could go. There were days I couldn't send or received emails, except through Yahoo, my spam acct from some 15 years ago...

And here we are! Me and baby. 20 pounds more, trotting through the gray cold city, dodging dog poop and wondering when spring will arrive.

I can finally let out a sigh of relief! After many phone calls, emails with health insurance, hospitals, doctors, we can really focus and pray for our little one, knowing at least the medical service side of things will be ok. We had an ordeal going through 3 international clinic/hospitals talking to 4 doctors. 

baby!

Parents!

Now we spend our evenings going thru stacks of baby/parent/for dummies books learning all sort of interesting, semi-gross and amazing things about how God created bodies to birth. Wow! I have never been so in awe of the human body as a work of design, engineering and art all rolled into one!

the most amazing cake i've ever seen

On of my friend's had a big joint birthday with 3 other people (whom we didn't know) and they had this awesome cake made by the team at the Westin hotel.

It was huge- and had a little house for each person decorated with things they liked- basketballs! The Golden Gate bridge was depicted along with JW marriont (Shanghai), World financial center (Aka Handle building), and pearl tower. In the back are signs showing their favorite hangouts, and there was also a huge cookie of an iphone showing their wi-chat icons and birth dates. And yes- we did eat it!!!

me, birthday girl Mary, Coco, and Laurie

Our little one

This is our little one, growing in my belly. He's already been all over australia, shanghai, and soon will visit America.

We have been praying for our little one for the past 4 months. Its been an adventure - previous the pregnancy I had a mystery condition and was told we may not be able to have kids- ever. Or other not-so-nice possibilities. We are thankful for our healthy baby and look forward to his debut next spring!

So far, the morning sickness has dissipated (after a boat trip on the great barrier reef), road trips and airsickness. He is moving now- kicking and shifting- usully when I've been sedentary for much too long, or cooking at the stove...?

It took us a while to share our new for various reason, one of which was we didn't have a normal ultrasound to show... our doc kept giving us awkward or x-rated images! haha ha We're in an "international" hospital but most of the staff are local Chinese who speak english. Did you know that since its the year of the dragon that many Chinese families have been having their kids this year? Like twice as many? to be fair, our hospital quoted us their number of local patients doubled this year- not sure if its like that across the board, but it was near impossible to get into any other local hospital.

BMW masters cup

T: Guess what! I got us all free tickets to the Master's cup!
K: Awesome!
K: What sport is that?
T: ....


My dad likes golf. "Like" is probably an understatement judging from the multiple weekly tee times and $ he's invested into equipment and those funny golf jackets with elbow length sleeves. So when my parents came to visit us in SH, my mom naturally gravitates towards shopping, and we were thinking of an activity my father would enjoy. Golf. So T heard about BMW giving away free tickets to the Masters Tournament here in Shanghai, and reserved us 4 passes for the whole weekend!

The tourney was at Malaren Park (English name, not chinese for "Spicy people" as I supposed) out in Pudong at the very end of Line 7, Meilian lake. The event provided free shuttles direct from People's square,  and then we were on our way! It was party cloudy with a light drizzle. When we got there we had to walk about 15 minutes through a construction one to a magnificent resort-like place. Huge banners of the head lining competitors rippled every 10 meters. We would get to see the top 3 golfers in the European circuit! (Out of some 27 players, including Chinese, and other nationalities- it wasn't clear what made it "european")

There was a tented area where all the sponsors showed their wares, giving out free iphone4 cases, putting competitions, and even a mini go-kart track for kids to practice driving.

I'd never been to a Gold tourney before, but was surprised at the number of young families there- babies and toddlers being pushed around the greens (were which very far apart!) and the volunteers would wave their "quiet" signs at them when the Golfers tee'd off. The older kids enjoyed running in the big open spaces picking plants and touching the fresh cut grass!

Homes for sale- almost all were empty.

Dad and T got to talk to one of the golfers- who overheard them speculating the situation, about rules when the balls get stuck in awkward places.

Quiet!

I wish I had brought my raincoat. Fortunately T and my parent came prepared with umbrellas!

Dad and Timon

Even though a cloudy day, the clean air and smell of fresh cut grass was wonderful. I hadn't seen a sky that big in a long time!

Also noted, Malaren park's website advertises Shopping outlets, which are actually 15-20 minute drive away, 5 blocks from the Meilian metro stop. It didn't look very populated when we drove by, but apparently many were enjoying the lake/park, renting boats and walking perimeter of Meilian lake. 

Australia trip part 1

We flew out Thursday evening and arrived in melbourne just after lunch. It was freezing. Frigid! My luggage didn't make the plane, and we were exhausted and hungry. Unfortunately, the "central" airbnb we stayed at had nothing in the neighborhood- it was a 25 min walk from town, totally residential. And freezing. Did I mention it was freezing? I'm talking 50 or below. We were both underdressed, and furthermore, underpacked. I didn't even have luggage to pile on more layers, so I took to wearing Timon's. After sorting out where my luggage was going (we waited, it didn't show and we were eager to see the city) We headed off into the city!

We were told stores and cafes were 2 tram stops...but we didn't feel like waiting in the cold and we walked briskly and found ourselves in town relatively quickly. We found a Salvo's (salvation army) where I tried to find a coat or sweater- but alas nothing fit me.

RMIT

 We stopped by Vic's market- a huge covered wet market, where they were packing up. We shared a bowl of lentil soup then trotted on towards Swanson st, to see the bath house then detoured to RMIT college which had a really cool exterior and interior architecture and design. Bright colors, geometric shapes, a bit cave like, and we spent some 20 minutes charging phones and trying to figure out the bus system to get to fitzroy- a hip area of cafes and boutiques. Evenutally we found a bus, which required  a jaunt up swanston through the city center, past museum, China town, and alas a Target! We went in and bought sweaters. It never felt so good to be wearing 3 layers and no be able to bend your elbows. 

RMIT

We hopped the bus to Fitzroy (it began sprinkling!) and we evenutally met up with two of our friends, one who moved to Amsterdam 3 years ago so it was a jolly reunion (and she had a guide book!)

The bride and groom to be texted us to meet at Cookie, back on swanston, so we cabbed back, only find crowds of people! We ended up at the 10th (?) floor rooftop cinema/bar thing, which had a very cool view. They were showing snippets of music videos- basically the history of music videos accompanied by music. it was peculiar and interesting. and cold. 

around the city

 Adorable grade school marching band!

Yep. Strap a tree to your bike and the day begins.

4 more days until australia!

We found the key to our file cabinet this week. This is a huge highlight considering we couldn't open the file cabinet for the past 2.5 years, and weren't sure what was inside. It must ahve been important if it was locked, we reasoned.

Ok- this was actually T's file cabinet and so he knew, but I was really curious. He went through the contents with serendipity and boredom, tossing old files from former work, while finding his paperwork to get a driver's license in China! He had taken a test and had the proper stamps and certificates to obtain a license- all he has to do is turn it in! Finally.

With the new space, we organized every paper floating in our house. My random sketches, tax forms, medical receipts and letters from Gramma. Now everything has a home- it felt good to get things in order. Paper is our main form of clutter. Mail. Bills. Neglected RSVPs. (We received a wedding invite on Oct 6th, with a US post mark of Sept 10th?! Way past their rsvp date.... sorry!)

4 more days until australia!

We'll be heading to Melbourne, Yarra valley for a wedding, then cairns (great Barrier reef), and Sydney. Packing, packing...

Packing is a paint for both of us. We both forget stuff. We are list makers who lose lists.

We forget electric plug adapters A LOT (we found 6 HK ones, since we buy one everytime we go there) and then packing for opposing climates- if its summer in SH I'll forget socks, if winter I'll forget sunglasses.