Happy Fireworks Day in the States... and China?

The 4th has always been special. I think it became even more special on a personal level when we moved overseas. America with all of it's positive and negative attributes is still the best country in the world. We've discovered that many of the people that live here don't really know how lucky they have it day in and day out. Maybe it's because it's so familiar, but I think it's easiest country in the world to live in. Your worries are different when you live overseas and it's a pleasure to "head home" for the summers to let those worries be at bay for a short time. I love America and I want Maddie to grow up loving it too inspite of her TCK (Third Culture Kid) status.



The 4th is about fireworks and BBQs. Even in the heat of Tucson, we had it all. Andy decided to give Maddie a "lesson" of sorts. Even though she looked at him like he had two heads it was quite funny! Maddie has seen fireworks in Arizona, Illinois, and Oregon I have to admit that as far as SPECTACULAR goes, nothing will beat the fireworks over Chinese New Year in Shanghai. Below is a video clip from the outskirts of "town" on the last day of the new year... it was a panoramic view from one end of the sky to the other... at midnight!

Wedding of the Century/Parent of the Year

We knew that today would be an adventure! Xiebin, our driver from school, gave us an invitation to his wedding about one week ago. All of the Chinese staff at school have been asking all week long, "Is Maddie coming to the wedding?" Maddie has slowly warmed up to Xiebin over the past year and will greet him when she is in a good mood. She put her party dress on and we headed out to The Pacific Hotel right across from People's Square in downtown Shanghai. The hotel was built in 1928 and was at one point the tallest building in Shanghai. The Chinese have been very busy getting married this year because it has been a "double happiness" year. Today marks the actual end of the Chinese Year so Xiebin and Wei Wei were just getting in under the wire!

This is Maddie's second Chinese wedding - the first one was much... calmer. Xiebin is kind of young, footloose and fancy free so we knew that it would be memorable! As soon as Maddie walked in the door she was the center of attention. There were about 350 people at the wedding and we were the only foreigners invited. Chinese weddings are banquet style where all of the guests sit around circular tables and the wedding "ceremony" occurs around everybody throughout the evening. We knew that we were "special" because we were guided to to the only table that had three place settings of knives and forks. It's tradition for all guests to have a picture taken with the bride and groom. Maddie was in about half of all those photos. People just swooped her up and she was center stage - she really was a great sport about it.

Maddie was so excited to be at a party with familiar Chinese faces around her. When Mr. Ma walked in the door, she literally jumped off my lap and ran across the room to him. He's the other driver for the school and is a dear, dear man. She LOVES him and will go to him even if she's cranky! She sat with Carol a lot of the night and of course, Ruby, Eva, Edith, Sam, and numerous strangers had to have their arms around her at some point. At one point, Carol warned me to keep my camera out because Maddie had just been appointed the resident flower girl. It was interesting how all of the "roles" were assigned right before the ceremony started. The ceremony was supposed to start at 5:18 (an auspicious time), but the role assignments took some time so it actually began around 6:30.

The last time Maddie was a flower girl was for Jess and Chad's wedding. She followed a few other flower girls and ended up stopping in the middle of the aisle to pick up their mess. I was amazed that she actually did it this time. She marched right down the aisle in front of the bride and groom, tossing rose petals along the way. The assigned " firecracker people" were popping off the fireworks, the assigned "confetti people" were throwing colored paper everywhere - and she kept on marching!

After the walk down the aisle, the hotel's MC introduced Xiebin's uncle and he gave his speech and then the MC introduced Andy. Earlier in the evening, Xiebin had personally asked Andy to give a speech and when Andy accepted, Xiebin was down right glowing! Andy spoke in English and Ruby translated. Makes sense to me - 350 people at your wedding and the two people you would want speaking would be your uncle and your employer! After the speeches, the meal began!

Maddie is a shrimp addict, but the entire table looked at her strange when she peeled the shell off the shrimp - it is a good source of calcium ya know! She had her second stare down with a chicken head and all in all, tried almost everything. Wei Wei changed her outfit three times during the wedding. During the second fashion outing, Xiebin and Wei Wei walked around to all of the tables and lit the candle and sparkler in the middle of each table. Our candle didn't have a wick so she took a match and pushed it into the candle to act as a wick. All of the men at the table blew out her lighting candle a few times for a few laughs! During the third fashion show, things got a little wild. Sam had taken an empty plastic bottle of soda that had 6 sides and had convinced Stevie to smoke enough cigarettes to burn 6 holes in it. Sam then put a cigarettes in each hole. When Xiebin and Wei Wei came around to the table for a toast, they made Xiebin light and smoke the 6 cigarettes by breathing through the top of the plastic bottle. Maddie and I were stuck and had a bird's eye view of the whole thing!

So, in the end, it was the most interesting Wedding of the Century and I'm pretty sure that we got Parents of the Year for letting Maddie see some of the things she saw! What an experience!

A Sunday Brunch minus the Funnies!

Sometimes you just want a newspaper.... a big, thick newspaper full of ads, coupons, stories, weather, and of course the Sunday funnies. We all sat around the Sunday Brunch table today on the 38th floor of the JW Marriott Hotel realizing that Maddie will probably never yearn for that particular comfort. She's a digital native and can get all of the good stuff online, including the funnies and the ads!


It was a very cloudy day in Shanghai today, but you could still see forever. When you sit in a boat on the ocean, you see ocean forever. Well, when you sit on the 38th floor of the JW Marriott, you see Shanghai forever! We had a great picture of People's Square!


Maddie is such a delight to be around these days that you can take her to posh places that serve champagne brunches complete with lobster, king crab legs, beef wellington, Beijing duck, and Maddie's favorite... the chocolate fountain. After she chowed on fresh shrimp, she dove into the chocolate. Who knew chocolate could look so pretty?! She giggled and laughed and giggled and laugh so I suppose we really did have a Sunday Brunch WITH the Funnies!

The Special Child Syndrome

Maddie is a blond.... Maddie is a blond with curly hair.... Maddie is a blond with curly hair AND blue eyes. What's the big deal we say? Maddie is growing up with Special Child Syndrome as her Grandma Barbara calls it. She's a STAR and people stop us on the sidewalk to take her picture. So then I take pictures of them taking pictures everywhere we go! Part of me is actually amazed that she doesn't get the same treatment when we go home for the summers, but I'm supposed to think that - I'm her mom!!

This morning we woke up to a beautiful Suzhou day and Maddie decided to walk around the city with us on a photography tour. We took a picture of the pagoda at the Ruiguang Ta right behind the Sheraton hotel. The pagoda of the auspicious light is what China is supposed to look like! When we are in Shanghai, you have to look far and wide to catch of glimpse of the non-capitalist, non-cosmopolitan China. Suzhou is close enough to us that we can head there for the weekend and see the history unfold right before your eyes. The Ruiguang Ta is over 2000 years old... now that's impressive! We took pictures of children playing in neighborhoods. We took pictures of the canals around Suzhou. We took pictures of the bicycle taxis. Maddie walked and walked and walked.... and rode on her father's shoulders for a really LONG time!

We made our way to the Garden of the Master of the Nets. The garden was originally laid out if the 12th century and was restored in the 18th century. We were there early enough so that it was quiet and we could get good photos. Maddie is into acoustic experiences though and has to stomp on all of the wood walkways and squeal a bit as she turns corners, pretending to see monsters. We kept trying to convince her that it was like a hotel, but we had very little luck! She's a Special Child and it is her job to be a peanut at any cost!

Adventures in Suzhou!

I’ve mentioned how Maddie really knows how to travel. She’s getting quite flexible in her old age! Today she managed a two hour car ride to Suzhou which is a canal town northwest of Shanghai. Maddie checked us into the Sheraton (hey, it’s all about the airline miles!) which is a gorgeous hotel that is built with pagodas and authentic Chinese architecture. We then traveled via taxi to the Yang Yang Shui Jiao Guan restaurant which serves the cheapest and best dumplings ever… well, next to Ms. Zhou’s of course! Maddie chowed on dumplings filled with beef/coriander, shrimp, and other mystery meats. The only struggle up to this point was the lack of a sit down toilet! She used to be really go at going anywhere, but she’s getting very opinionated in her old age and refuses to go in a squat toilet no matter how clean it is. Thank goodness you can distract her from almost anything if you just ask her to write her name. She wrote her name by herself for the first time a few weeks ago and now she just loves to show it off!

After a trip to the DVD shop to purchase a new movie, Maddie took us to the Suzhou No. 1 Silk Factory. She was able to pick up silk worm cocoons and shake them to hear the worms inside. The coolest part for Maddie was watching the women work the machine that pulled the silk off of the cocoons to make reels of silk thread. Somewhere between 8-10 cocoons had their threads started and then were pulled through a single hole in the machine up the spinning reels. What’s funny is that we went there to watch the workers, but the workers spent much of their time watching Maddie! In another part of the factory, Maddie watched women soak the cocoons in water and then tear them open to take the worms out. The women then stretched the single cocoon into a 8” x 11” sheet. The sheets were dried and then were made several layers thick. Four other women then took the dried sheets and pulled them out so that they were as big as a king size bed. The pulled several sheets to make duvets of varying thickness. It was amazing to watch! To top it off, we could walk out of the factory with a silk filled king size duvet for about 600 RMB… that’s less than $100!

After a short rest back at the hotel, we ventured out again to the Quanjude Roast Duck Restaurant. You know you’ve found a good place when you walk in and you are the only foreigners there! The meal started off with a man filling our team pots with what looked like an oil can with a very, very, very long spout. The tea mugs had dried flowers in them so he added hot water to make a very earthy tasting tea. Maddie has recently become a tea addict and she couldn’t get enough of it! Barbara and I ordered for the table so we ordered the traditional Beijing duck. Beijing duck is made my filled the ducks with air so that the skin detaches from the meat. Then the air is sucked out of the duck to bring the skin back in. The whole duck is then roasted and brought to the table so that it can be carved right in front of you. You then take the carved duck and place it into a rice tortilla, put thinly sliced radishes inside, and top it off with a sweet Hoisin sauce. WOW!!! Maddie had one but ate mostly the baby bok choy greens!! She made it back to the hotel and had an “after dinner drink” of apple juice before heading off to bed. She’s out cold after her day of adventures in Suzhou!

The Circus in Shanghai!

I have to laugh because when Maddie travels, she knows what she is doing and she tells us exactly what to do. When we were in the Shangri-La last week, she reminded us to be quiet in the hallways because people could be sleeping. Today she insisted on having her own ticket for the subway and insisted on standing by herself. She's brave because when she is on her own, she knows that people will always enter her personal space by playing with her hair. She stands out and people stare, point, smile, touch, whisper, yell, take pictures with cameras/cell phones... all of which make her very uncomfortable. She survived the subway ride quite well though and we arrived at our destination an hour later. We had made it to the very authentic Shanghainese restaurant across from the Shanghai Circus World. She tries everything that we try on the menu with no fear. Her favorites today were the chicken (because it was served with the very cute head) and the tofu with clams.

Maddie was anxious to get to the ERA - Intersection of Time show where we sat in the third row from the stage. She sat there for two straight hours, clapping on cue and telling me all about the wonderful things that were happening in front of her. She turned to me at the end of the show and said, "Mommy, I can do that!" So, she can toss four bowls at a time from her foot to the top of her head while teetering on a piece of wood sitting on a big pipe. She can toss 40lb. Ming vases into the air and catch them on the back of her neck. She can do acrobats through moving hoops. She can fly through the air with only a piece of silk wrapped around her wrist holding her up. She can ride motorcycles at top speed in a big (not THAT big) metal sphere. She CAN entertain us for hours and hours on end!

Happy Year of the Golden Pig!

As I sat in the audience at the elementary assembly last week, I was completely amazed at how confident Maddie was up on stage. She IS the minority here yet she doesn't even notice... unless of course we're walking around Shanghai! She had spent the entire week preparing for her very first on stage performance. Lessons were filled with the meaning of Chinese New Year and she made lanterns and scrolls filled with Chinese characters. I very simply asked her what they said and she very simply told me, "Shin nien quai le." "Of course it did," I thought as I searched the files in my brain to recall that little tidbit I had forgotten! We had a Chinese dress made for her at the fabric market in the fall and she just managed to squeeze into one last time for the New Year celebration at school. After a big meal full of homemade dumplings and visits from Grandpa Earl and Grandma Barbara, she was off to perform her two songs on stage with her peers! It was a perfect start to a perfect holiday!