My wedding is about one week away. It will be a traditional Chinese wedding with a few Western traditions thrown it. At this point I don't really know what is going to happen. I know they basic outline but that's about it.
Many people keep asking me if I'm excited. Well, yes I am. But at the same time I mostly just want to get it over with. It has been months of questions and being completely in the dark at times. I can't speak with my future in-laws because of the language barrier. They are the ones planning the wedding. It's very frustrating. Right now I plan to just show up and do what I'm told until it's over. That probably sounds horrible but at this point I don't know what else I can do.
On another note... My parents will be here tomorrow night! I won't actually get to see them until Saturday morning but they will be in the same country as me in about 27 hours! I will meet them in Beijing and we'll spend a couple days there before heading to Howie's parents' house.
I have only two more days of work before I have more than a week off. I can't wait!
Thursday, September 24, 2009
Tuesday, September 22, 2009
Oink Oink
It feels like SARS all over again. Yet again I am in China during a worldwide outbreak of a potentially deadly illness. During SARS the entire country was shut down for a long time. We were not permitted to leave the campus I was living at. If we did leave (I was classified as a teacher and could usually get out and back in), it was iffy if a store or bar or whatever would be open. I was not allowed on a train to go home from Beijing because my skin was hot (duh! I had a horrible sunburn).
This time, however, it's N1H1. Or as it's referred to by my students "The Pig Ill". As senior teacher at my job I am required to keep the other foreign teachers up to date as well as receiving hundreds of pointless emails from my manager or the head office of the corporation. Last week I received another email filled with tons of information that does not necessarily pertain to me. This one was about N1H1 preparedness.
According to this email the school I'm working for is cracking down on health. Rooms, toys, doorknobs, and chairs must be sprayed down with sanitizer after each class. Parents are not allowed in the school. And antibacterial soap must be placed next to the sink in the bathroom.
It was nice not to have a ton of parents in the hallways during our classes. (The parents talk loudly in the hall, answer their phones, and peek in the classroom to make sure the teacher is asking every question to their kid.) As this school is a business, this rule lasted about one hour. Instead of being refused to enter, the school found an old thermometer (which isn't accurate BTW) to scan everyone's hands before they enter.
As I expected, there is no sanitation going on.
The best part of this is the antibacterial soap. Laughable! It's a bottle of soap, or used to be. It is 95% water with a tiny bit of soap.
I asked why so many new rules were made. My manager said that two schools in this city had been closed due to N1H1. You'd think if schools had been closed (especially in a country that didn't even admit to having N1H1 until recently) that these precautions would be carried out.
I guess I know who will pay my hospital bills if I get N1H1.
This time, however, it's N1H1. Or as it's referred to by my students "The Pig Ill". As senior teacher at my job I am required to keep the other foreign teachers up to date as well as receiving hundreds of pointless emails from my manager or the head office of the corporation. Last week I received another email filled with tons of information that does not necessarily pertain to me. This one was about N1H1 preparedness.
According to this email the school I'm working for is cracking down on health. Rooms, toys, doorknobs, and chairs must be sprayed down with sanitizer after each class. Parents are not allowed in the school. And antibacterial soap must be placed next to the sink in the bathroom.
It was nice not to have a ton of parents in the hallways during our classes. (The parents talk loudly in the hall, answer their phones, and peek in the classroom to make sure the teacher is asking every question to their kid.) As this school is a business, this rule lasted about one hour. Instead of being refused to enter, the school found an old thermometer (which isn't accurate BTW) to scan everyone's hands before they enter.
As I expected, there is no sanitation going on.
The best part of this is the antibacterial soap. Laughable! It's a bottle of soap, or used to be. It is 95% water with a tiny bit of soap.
I asked why so many new rules were made. My manager said that two schools in this city had been closed due to N1H1. You'd think if schools had been closed (especially in a country that didn't even admit to having N1H1 until recently) that these precautions would be carried out.
I guess I know who will pay my hospital bills if I get N1H1.
Thursday, September 17, 2009
Laziness and the Government
So, my last post was more than 8 months ago. Some of that is largely attributed to my laziness and/or work schedule. That last 4 or 5 months is due to a government ban on most blogs including this one.
Over the past 8 months a lot and only a little has happened.
I met Howie's family for the first time during Spring Festival (Chinese New Year). We traveled to his hometown, a very small village near Fushun, Liaoning, China. During the stay I was exhausted almost the entire time and very homesick. His family was so welcoming and felt like my own family so much that I wanted my family to be with me as well. Howie's parents are farmers. Not corporate farmers like the US is filled with but commune type farmers. His aunts, uncles, and cousins all help his parents farm their land and his parents help his aunts, uncles, and cousins farm theirs. His father is also a pig butcher.
Spending time with his family was great. They have a traditional countryside home. This means, no running water. All their water is from a well. The bathroom is a hole in the ground in an outhouse. They have the cleanest, best made outhouse I have ever seen. His uncle (who has a modern apartment in a town nearby) let me go there to take showers a couple times. There are only so many "baths" I can take by wiping my skin with a wet rag. Dinners were huge and long. One of the dinners we had lasted about 5 hours. I was about dieing by the end of it. All meals are eaten in his parents' bedroom which also doubles as a living room. A small table is placed on the bed (made of concrete) and we sit around and eat with everyone sitting on the bed.
The Spring Festival holiday was a week long this time. The entire week was spent having large dinners, going to other people's homes, learning how to make dumplings, and eating every part of the pig that can be eaten.
Here are pictures from Spring Festival. And here are pictures of his home and the village.
Howie officially proposed to me in April. I came home from work under the impression that Howie was sick. When I walked in the door the living room was filled with roses hanging from the ceiling and candles everywhere. We had planned on having Pizza Hut that evening so he had ordered pizza so we didn't have to go out. He sang a song for me that he had written and had even made a little shirt for our cat to wear that said "Alicia, marry me." I knew it was coming but I was still very surprised. He planned everything and had been planning for a long time.
Here are the pictures from that.
One thing that is done here that is very different from the West is wedding pictures. Though we still aren't married, we already have our wedding pictures. We had these taken in May. It took two days and was extremely tiring.
Here are the untouched photos.
Howie and I got our marriage license on June 18th. We had to go to Shenyang for that since I am a foreigner. I first had to go to the US Consulate there and receive a letter that said I am not married and I am old enough to be married by US law. That took forever. The next day we had to go to the registration office. When we got there we learned that Howie's Household book was missing a stamp. We could not get married without that. We had to hastily go to Howie's hometown about 2 hours away and get that stupid little stamp. I was so frustrated that I was crying. Nothing was going right. On our third day in Shenyang we finally got our license after shelling out about 900 RMB (it cost about 50 RMB for native Chinese to get married). After that we headed back to Howie's family's house and relaxed for a day or two before heading back home.
Here are pictures from Howie's house in the summer.
Since then most of our time has been spent working and planning for the wedding. (Which is in about 2 weeks!) Luckily, Howie's father is taking care of most of the planning as is tradition here.
Howie is busy at work getting ready for a sales fair in Guangzhou and I'm busy with my new position as Senior Teacher at the same school.
I will try to get on and do updates more often from now on now that I have a proxy that allows me to access the site.
Over the past 8 months a lot and only a little has happened.
I met Howie's family for the first time during Spring Festival (Chinese New Year). We traveled to his hometown, a very small village near Fushun, Liaoning, China. During the stay I was exhausted almost the entire time and very homesick. His family was so welcoming and felt like my own family so much that I wanted my family to be with me as well. Howie's parents are farmers. Not corporate farmers like the US is filled with but commune type farmers. His aunts, uncles, and cousins all help his parents farm their land and his parents help his aunts, uncles, and cousins farm theirs. His father is also a pig butcher.
Spending time with his family was great. They have a traditional countryside home. This means, no running water. All their water is from a well. The bathroom is a hole in the ground in an outhouse. They have the cleanest, best made outhouse I have ever seen. His uncle (who has a modern apartment in a town nearby) let me go there to take showers a couple times. There are only so many "baths" I can take by wiping my skin with a wet rag. Dinners were huge and long. One of the dinners we had lasted about 5 hours. I was about dieing by the end of it. All meals are eaten in his parents' bedroom which also doubles as a living room. A small table is placed on the bed (made of concrete) and we sit around and eat with everyone sitting on the bed.
The Spring Festival holiday was a week long this time. The entire week was spent having large dinners, going to other people's homes, learning how to make dumplings, and eating every part of the pig that can be eaten.
Here are pictures from Spring Festival. And here are pictures of his home and the village.
Howie officially proposed to me in April. I came home from work under the impression that Howie was sick. When I walked in the door the living room was filled with roses hanging from the ceiling and candles everywhere. We had planned on having Pizza Hut that evening so he had ordered pizza so we didn't have to go out. He sang a song for me that he had written and had even made a little shirt for our cat to wear that said "Alicia, marry me." I knew it was coming but I was still very surprised. He planned everything and had been planning for a long time.
Here are the pictures from that.
One thing that is done here that is very different from the West is wedding pictures. Though we still aren't married, we already have our wedding pictures. We had these taken in May. It took two days and was extremely tiring.
Here are the untouched photos.
Howie and I got our marriage license on June 18th. We had to go to Shenyang for that since I am a foreigner. I first had to go to the US Consulate there and receive a letter that said I am not married and I am old enough to be married by US law. That took forever. The next day we had to go to the registration office. When we got there we learned that Howie's Household book was missing a stamp. We could not get married without that. We had to hastily go to Howie's hometown about 2 hours away and get that stupid little stamp. I was so frustrated that I was crying. Nothing was going right. On our third day in Shenyang we finally got our license after shelling out about 900 RMB (it cost about 50 RMB for native Chinese to get married). After that we headed back to Howie's family's house and relaxed for a day or two before heading back home.
Here are pictures from Howie's house in the summer.
Since then most of our time has been spent working and planning for the wedding. (Which is in about 2 weeks!) Luckily, Howie's father is taking care of most of the planning as is tradition here.
Howie is busy at work getting ready for a sales fair in Guangzhou and I'm busy with my new position as Senior Teacher at the same school.
I will try to get on and do updates more often from now on now that I have a proxy that allows me to access the site.
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