Planes, trains and automobiles... and boats, bikes and lots and lots of walking

Alternatively titled: Why we never seem to have fun in Hong Kong. (beware this is a long post)

Hong Kong is a wonderful place.  A beautiful city on the water, wonderful food, great places to visit, English spoken everywhere, etc.   However, I have been there at least 5 times and I never seem to have much fun. The first 3 trips were medical trips...accompanying a friend to the hospital in 2000, pacemaker checks and surgery/miscarriage trips.  Not fun.  Last year we came for our visa, but had the train disaster where our train broke down on the way, making everything late and had to rearrange all our travel plans.  That trip suddenly seems almost fun now.

I really cannot complain. My life is so much easier than most people in the world and I have the privilege of traveling and staying in many comfortable and exciting places.  But my patience was severely tried this trip and I often found myself wondering...how would I react if there was a really serious crisis?  This trip was in no way a crisis and had some fun moments in between, but certainly shows how inconveniences and "mafan" (trouble, but really there is no english word to convey all that this word can mean) can bring out the not so nice side of me.

We spent a lot of this week running around filling out paperwork, lots of waiting in lines, lots of time on various modes of transportation, time in doctor's office and more waiting.  However, I am so thankful that we now are back home with visas in hand and I got an "all clear" from my cardiologist about my palpitations.  But it was not easily obtained, that is for sure.  It seemed at every step there was some sort of set back, confusion, wrong information given etc.  Our flight there was much later than we thought we had booked.  Still not sure what happened there.  WE got in about midnight to our hotel and we had already planned to do one day at Disneyland the next day so we went ahead despite having tired children.  That was a fun day, though we ended early since no one had had much sleep.

I will do another whole Disney post sometime, but everyone had a good time...I mean, it is Disney.

Monday we transferred to our guest house via taxi, ferry boat and walking about 30 minutes straight up hill with one suitcase, 3 children and lots of little backpacks.  Chris immediately took off to the visa office (which required a walk down hill, return ferry boat ride, walk to subway, subway ride and walk some more to visa office) to be told we needed a health report, but no help given as to where we could get that done.  In the end, we had to go to Shenzhen (mainland) to get it done. Tuesday was the most brutal day, in which I first saw the doctor and was told I might have a problem that was substantial.  Chris kept walking around the building the doctor's office was in because the kids were causing a huge scene in the tiny office just being normal kids.  Finally I was done and we took off for SZ, requiring two subway changes, a train ride to the border, immigration on both the HK and China sides, a taxi to a hospital.  We did the "VIP" health check, meaning you got the results in 2 days instead of 5 and skipped the lines at each station.  That was for sure the best 400 rmb we ever spent!  Remember our children are still with us and Lucy screamed every time I had to ... get a stomach ultrasound, chest x-ray, eye check (they listed both Chris and I as color blind..was the weirdest color test I have ever seen), ECG and blood work.  These checks seem very random but are standard for anytime you get a new visa. At least everyone thought she was cute, even when screaming.  After that, we found a Pizza Hut and treated the kids to dinner since they had done a pretty good job (there were a few meltdowns that day, including my own but we all did ok) and then do the return trip.  We ended up climbing the steep hill from the pier to the house at 11 pm.  Wednesday there was nothing we could do so we had a nice day at the beach, again a steep climb downhill but it was relaxing.

Despite the walk, the beach was nice and quiet.  There was a little stand with hot dogs and snacks.  Perfect for simple playing and fun at the beach.

Perhaps the most exciting part of the beach was the helicopter landing pad right next to it.  The kids got to see 3 helicopter landings and it can't get much more exciting than that if you are 4 or 6 or even 1.

The house was in a more jungle-like area on an island, so we saw lots of frogs and lizards and this giant praying mantis.  Also lots of fun if you are a little boy.

Thursday Chris left at 4:30 am to return to SZ to get our health check (which was fine other than our color blind diagnosis...we can't be professional drivers)  and then go to the visa office.  There the visa office told him that everyone needed this supplemental form that Monday he was told only Chris needed.  So he rushed back to the guest house for me to sign and fill out and then back to the visa office.  Finally he could submit our application.  Friday I left after 8 am to go to the doctor...had bloodwork, an echocardiogram and treadmill test.  Doctor determined my palpitations are not the dangerous kind and adjusted a few settings on my pacemaker to try and help it.  Once released I rushed to the visa office and succesfully picked up our passports.  We were free to go!

Despite the rather inconvenient location of the guest house (on an island requiring a 30-60 minute ferry ride to go anywhere), it was otherwise perfect for our stay.  They provided 2 meals a day, had 2 playgrounds, lots of bikes and cars and toys and free laundry, which I did twice since our stay was twice as long as we planned. Lucy loved this car and her brothers liked pushing her around in it.

Austin spent a lot of time on this little bike and was so free to ride around the fenced in patio area.

Unfortunately, Saturday was the last day to use the return leg of our tickets but the flight was full.  So we lost that portion of our tickets and had to buy new ones.  First few we tried ended up being sold out.    We thought we succesfully booked tickets for 5 pm out of Hong Kong.  As we were riding the ferry to the airport, Chris saw in an email in fine print that the 5 pm was sold out so they booked us on the 8 pm flight.  Sigh.  At this point it wasn't really a surprise.  So we spent 5 hours in the airport instead of 2 but had a smooth flight home.

Lucy loved watching planes take off at the airport...entertained all 3 for some of those 5 hours.

Lucy actually slept almost the whole way in the bassinet!  I could write a whole other post on Lucy's lack of sleep this trip, but she did not do well in the same room as all of us.  And we were on the go a lot...I was pretty tired.

Flight home...all tired out.  Austin did not sleep at all and Bennett slept the last hour.

 But upon returning, we realized our new flight landed at terminal 3 but we had left our rental car in the lot at terminal 2.  What would have been almost the cost of 2 taxi's to park for a few days was a bit more when parking for 7 days.  Anyway, we rode the bus to terminal 2, loaded everyone and everything in the car at one am...only to discover the car would not start.  At this point all 3 kids, who had been really very good travelers, lost it completely in sobs.  Not our finest moment.  We ended up getting a taxi back at the terminal and arrived home in one piece last night.  Everyone slept till at least 8 this morning (Bennett slept till 11 am!) and we are so glad to be home.

If you asked the kids what we did, it might sound almost like a vacation to them.  It definitely was not to us parents, but we did do a day at Disney and the kids actually went to the beach 3 days in a row with at least one parent.

Despite the obstacles, I think the relief that my health is all good and just a constant reminder for Chris and I of what some have had to do in the past just to be here helped us keep thankful hearts overall.  We definitely had some ugly, sin-rearing moments.  Definitely felt frustrated at times.  But are reminded that so many truly suffer and we mostly just had a bit of mafan. However, I think we will not make any trips to Hong Kong for awhile.

adventures in HK

This will be a brief post but wanted to update about our trip to Hong Kong. We should have flown home last night but are still here. After three trips to the visa office, we finally successfully submitted our application today. We were given wrong information about new requirements, one being a health exam now required before submitting the visa application. Long story short, we took everyone for a long day to Shen Zhen...across the border into china, Tuesday to get Chris and I the exam. Chrisent back today to pick up the results and made two trips to the visa office today needing even more paperwork but finally it is all in. On top of all that, I had a routine check of my pacemaker with the cardiologist I really like here. While the pacemaker checked out ok, he wants to do some tests to determine the cause of some tachycardia...palpitations, I have been having. So tomorrow I will return to do an echocardiogram and a stress test. So we would appreciate prayers that I would get a good health report and that there would be no more snags in getting our visor tomorrow and we can hopefully head home on Saturday. We have had some fun aLong the way too but I will save that for another spots. Thank you!

Making the best of it

So, in the end we all will need to travel to Hong Kong this weekend to change our visas.  It was the combination of many different things that timed perfectly to make this a longer-than imagined trip.  Chris' new university where he teaches had their 100th anniversary this week, so on the tail end of a national, 8 day holiday the school additionally was closed Monday-Wednesday of this week.  So Chris cannot pick up the invitation letter he needs until Friday and our visas require us to leave the country on Saturday.  But then once in Hong Kong, we will have to wait until Monday to begin processing Chris' visa and are booked on a flight leaving Wednesday.  WE gave ourselves an extra day to have fiascos, after last summer's eventful trip to Hong Kong.  Technically, only Chris has to go to Hong Kong.  The kids and I just have to leave the country.  We very briefly considered that Chris would go to Hong Kong by himself and I would take the 3 kids by myself to Korea for a long day of travel and then come home and wait for Chris to return 5 days later. Very briefly.  The amount of money saved was not significant enough to be worth all that travel by myself and time apart. We also considered the train option again.  I must say I was quite relieved when all the trains to any city near Hong Kong were fully booked, except for hard seats.  Hard seats are...well, what it sounds like...hard benches on a train that would pretty much be torture to ride on with our family for 24 hours.  Many people in this country do often ride that way.  Which reminds me how very thankful I am that we have the means to fly there instead.

So, we will just have to make the best of it.  We are considering a day at HK Disneyworld.  We have not told the kids, but it is near the airport, we have several days with time to kill.  If we can make it work we will.  Half of our stay will be at a guest house we discovered through friends that sounds great...play area for kids, near the beach, two meals a day provided and so on.

So, tomorrow will be a very busy day with Chris teaching his first day, homeschool co-op teaching for me and a trip on the horizon.  If the blog is silent for the next week, you will know why! But please think about us as we travel Saturday through Wednesday.

Reunion

Chris and Austin made it back safely today.  After only 26 hours on the bus. Yes, they were braver than me. I would do 26 hours on a train and it feels like that long on our plane ride across the ocean, but a bus with no bathroom? Not sure I would have a good attitude about that.  But they did and are home...they walked in the door around noon today.  We were all excited to see each other.  Bennett was very happy to have his big brother back and Mei Mei was excited too and even joined in the wrestle melee that followed our very early dinner.  Chris went to bed this afternoon (he slept a total of 5 minutes on the bus) but was up for dinner and is back in bed now. Austin did get some sleep on the bus but was awake by 4 am and was asleep within minutes of his head hitting the pillow tonight.

 Happy to be together (not to delude you, there was arguing today but also lots of happiness together).

Lucy wanted to join in on wrestle-fest tonight.  If she is on the bed, couch or anything soft lately, she loves to throw herself back and laughs.  You have to watch her, since she has no sense of the edge of the bed.  But she was having a great time and is a tough girl...wants to be right in on the action.

 Where's Mei Mei? I promise she was not being smothered to death in this picture...they would blow raspberries and kiss and tickle her and she just laughed and laughed.

Boo!

A little extra motivation

Tonight I have been hanging wet laundry.  This is one of my least favorite tasks, one I usually leave to my helper,who is of course on vacation this week.  I usually start the clothes in the washer, she hangs them, she usually folds and I put them away... team work right? We do have a dryer, but usually "I" (aka my helper) hang our laundry unless I am in a hurry for something to be dry. I do have to dry my towels though...there is such a big difference between soft, dried towels and hard, crinkly line-dried towels.  But I digress.  So usually when my helper has been gone awhile I cheat and dry more clothes in the dryer, because I am lazy.  But I now have a little extra motivation to hang that laundry myself.

We found out recently through our friends' unfortunate experience that our city now has a new electricity-saving motivation.  What is usually the biggest motivator for most people?  Money of course.  So, everyone is now allotted a certain amount of electricity for a calendar year, starting in January (I have no idea what that amount is however).  If you go over it before December 31, you are bumped from paying 5 mao (or half of one yuan)/unit (also have never figured out exactly what this unit or "dun" is) to paying a whole yuan/unit.  The price doubles.  You are then allotted a small amount of electricity at this double price.  If you go over that, then you have to go to the office of electricity and have them add additional electricity at some exorbitant price for you and receive some sharp criticism of going this far over your limit.  To clarify, the way our electricity "bill" works is a pre-paid system.  So you take your electricity card and your bank card to a machine (at a bank or for us there is one in the management office) and put money on your electricity card. Then you stick your card in your electricity meter in your apartment and it adds the units to your meter.  If you run out before you pay again, your electricity just cuts off until you pay.  Clever but annoying system to make sure you pay your bill.

So, most of our American friends who were here all summer have already passed the second tier and are making trips to the office to beg for electricity mercy to make it to the end of the year.  I suppose it really is a good way to help people conserve and I think we fellow Americans could certainly use a little financial motivation to not waste, myself included.  However, the allotment given here is probably plenty for a family of three who don't own an oven, a dryer and who mostly believe air conditioning might make you sick from the wind blowing on you.  For a family of 5 or 6 or 7 who do use those appliances, well, good luck.  We still have 1400 units left in the first tier, we found out a couple weeks ago when we added money to our card.  I am sure the only reason we have not gone over is that we were gone for 3 months this summer. We use an average of 20 units a day (30 when we run A/C but won't be doing that anymore) which gives us about 70 days.  As it is October 6, we won't make it to Christmas without at least going into the second tier.  Unless we do a bit more conserving.

Thus, I spent tonight hanging our laundry.  Something I really don't mind that much I suppose.  At least not as much as running around town begging electricity mercy.

Just two

It is amazing how one less child makes such a difference in the atmosphere of our home!  Every one is special and unique and adds a lot to our family...it has been strange to be away from Austin for so long.  But it also feels easy in many ways "only" having two kids at home this week.  It has been good to get some special time with Bennett, since the middle child doesn't always get enough of that.  And it is quiet...much quieter.  The dynamics of the two boys often bring ...noise.  Lots of noise. Happy noises and arguing noises, but definitely noise.  Bennett misses Austin terribly and asks when he is coming home often.  I laid down with him in his bed last night after tucking him in...he was lonely in the room by himself.

Other than being sick (which is occupying a lot of time, especially night time for Lucy- she is having a hard time sleeping), we have been across the street to the new park twice, Bennett went with friends to a playplace Tuesday while I stayed home with Lucy and today we had a quiet day at home.  I think today might have been my homebody's favorite day. Here is what we have done so far:

 Playing lots of trains.  Bennett used to always ask for "mei mei" to play trains with him. However, now that she can walk around the train table and break up the tracks, he wants her to play upstairs.

 Taking good naps...at least Bennett is. This cold has worn him out.  I love his hand on his cheek here.  Lucy on the other hand is napping terribly.  I also think she is about done with a morning nap...oh sad day.  I really need that nap when we are homeschooling, but will have to get creative.

 Opening presents...with birthdays around we have enjoyed lots of great presents from Grandpa and Nai Nai, Great Grandma Haney and Nana and Bop. Lucy is pretty good at opening them if you get her started.

 And more trains...thanks to Great Grandma's book and train figurine set, Bennett can now play trains upstairs and on the go too.  We finally have out the winter pajamas...it is still quite warm in the day but getting chilly at night.

 Bennett and I made cookies today ...and often quoted Little Richard, the book Nana read to him over and over this summer, who always wanted to help and like Little Richard, Bennett was "very very good at tasting cookies".

 Lucy's new favorite spot in the house...looking out the window on our glassed in porch.  Usually looking for people or doggies.

This boy and his mom (or nanny or grandma, really hard to tell) kept waving at her outside.

And I hear her crying...nap time is done.  Better run.

October is upon us

October usually starts with a bang around here...and it definitely did today.  Today is National Day (think, Fourth of July for China, but a bigger deal here I think) and yesterday was Mid-Autumn Festival (or Mooncake Festival).  This year the two happened to fall together this year, making an 8 day holiday for many folks.  So no school this week.  A quick update...Chris and Austin did leave at 5 am this morning, plane bound two days late for their trip.  After almost missing their flight due to holiday craziness, they did make it there safely.  However, Austin is still in the middle of a bad cold and Chris said he fell asleep before 7 pm tonight.  Lucy woke up sniffling and coughing and Bennett, on day 8 of the cold, is still coughing and snotty.  I have that telltale tickle in my throat tonight...so it looks like even mama is going down.  Needless to say with travel changes and sickness, we did not do much celebrating here. I did notice the beautiful and bright moon at 2 am last night when Lucy woke up crying...and heard fireworks (maybe firecrackers is more accurate) this morning.

We did join some neighbors at the new park across the street from our complex this morning and it was a beautiful day.  Would appreciate your thoughts for us, that we would heal quickly as our family is scattered and especially for coughs to heal. I hate coughing, especially in little ones.

Here is a just a recent shot of the kids playing together.  We turned in our rental car and currently are without one, but brought the car seats inside.  Somehow the seats that are a requirement in the car seem much more fun as an option in the house...they took turns pushing each other back and forth across the living room.  It provided lots of entertainment!