Wednesday, May 23

Did I mention that the Chinese, while obviously adoring their children, are amazingly blasé about a lot of safety issues?  I’ve spoken about the lack of car restraints.  The school’s soccer/playing field presents another example.  On this soccer field are a number of old tires, just lying around on the edges of the field.  When I followed a 3 year old child over to the edge of the field, I noticed broken tiles, small holes, piles of rubble—weird, inappropriate things on a field used exclusively by young kids.  And, all last week, workers scraped, stained, and then painted the fence around the field.  While kids were around at all times.  The scrapers were electric; the workers repeatedly tossed the worn sandpaper pads right onto the field, to be picked up by curious 3 year olds!  Not to mention the paint shards floating in the air from the scraping process! The field now has a shiny black wrought iron fence around it (I believe this was a city project; it was not a school sponsored project), but at what cost to the kids?! And, still with tires and broken pieces of wood, etc littering the edges here and there!   There is also a playground behind a second building on this property; we have taken the 3s and 4s there every day this week.  There is a road edging the playground space; it doesn’t occur to anyone to prevent cars from moving down this road!  There’s a big dirt and rubble pile at one side; no thought of clearing that away.   Kids today picked up a chunk of glass as part of their play.  The reaction of the lovely Chinese woman with me: don’t play with glass, kids.  Not, we’ve got to get this space scoured clean of dangerous elements!  This is the attitude with which they drive—I’m going through here, not so fast that I’ll kill you, but with clear intent to keep coming.  So watch out.  A fellow I know who’s been here 2 years shuddered at the thought of driving in China!

The black fence glistened this morning in the absolutely stunning morning sunshine.  The ocean was (truly) sparkling, the sailboats were out, the light sharp and bright.  It was agony to stay inside, particularly because of the morning quality of the sunlight.  Julia and I walked the Boardwalk up to May 4 Square at the end of the school day, and that was lovely. 

A view of the lighthouse on our afternoon walk

Julia scootering along the shore

But the morning vision was really special.  And again, I was stunned by the size and proximity of the tankers steaming (?) by.  It’s one way to envision the manufacturing enterprise of China—a steady stream of jumbo sized tankers. 

See how huge the tankers look in the photograph, taken from the school??

I could tell today, particularly, that a tide was in action in the Bay.  Contacted Captain Hoffman (Dad/Pa) for a tide chart to confirm that something was going on.  The tide doesn’t fall or rise very far, but enough for some rocks near the beach to appear at the lowest tide point.  I love a tide; I would be obsessed by the tide schedule if I lived regularly by the sea.

I planned a number activity for the kids today using foam pieces—you peel off the paper and they stick where you put them.  One child stuck them to his face.  The activity was pretty simple:  a number line across the top of a sheet of paper, with boxes for the number of foam pieces to match the number.  The kids were absolutely mesmerized by this activity!  They worked with intensity, they  expressed their personalities in sorting by color or shape, arranging in a particular pattern, and/or working in total random joy.  It was very satisfying. 

Satisfying foam piece work

Julia’s buddy Alex acquired two young bunnies on Sunday; he brought them to school for the last few weeks of the year.  They are tiny and adorable! As is Alex!  We will get to bring them home for a weekend; woo woo!  Julia transitioned from that to, “Can I have a real pet of my own when we get home? “  Let’s see what Dad says! 

Alex and the bunnies!

Julia had math homework last night—chart reading—and more tonight.  She’s done a lot of math this week; math is an area she is mostly confident.  Not so much reading! But she actually is a better reader than she thinks herself of being.  She has grown a lot academically this year (thank you, Mrs. Jones and Mrs. Caparell!).  I look forward to the day when she eagerly chooses to read.

We bargained for hair fixings today among the vendors who set up along the sidewalk from the bus stop to our community gate.  They are there every night, selling clothes, shoes, back packs, hats, and today wooden molds and utensils for cooking!  I want to know if these things are ‘new’ or ‘used’—everything is clean and neat, but where does it come from?  And who would buy a brassiere or underwear from a street vendor?  On the way to buy hair bows and some street food?  There are local cherries for sale everywhere, including this fellow with his three wonderful big old baskets selling cherries right downtown among the skyscrapers, and right next to the line of motorcycles parked on the supposed sidewalk. 

The cherry vendor

I loved this parking job—this fellow (and some others too!) decided to park perpendicular to the rest of the line of cars, for a fast escape when ready to go!

Another street scene I captured this morning was a sidewalk ‘café’ which pops up every day.  The vendor is cooking food on a hot plate, and people come to the simple tables and sit in the low stools to have breakfast.  These ‘pop up’ spots are all over the city, and families might be there, old people, workers on their way to the office, a whole range of clients.  Is it just a variation of McDonald’s for a sausage mcmuffin? 

The simple, pop-up breakfast cafe

There were a number of great looking kites in the sky at the Kite Flying Park.  Lots of fish shapes and a great two-string kite that was diving and soaring, trailing a great blue and red tail.  The seller was doing a good job of promoting his wares!  I spotted a young Caucasian couple flying a ‘cheap’ kite and decided to approach them for information.  We plan to fly kites on Julia’s birthday, and I have been worrying that we might fail to get the kites up; the kites we see here are being flown by pros—maybe there’s a trick to the thing!  So I asked them—girl from Texas, boy from California—if it had been hard to get that little kite up; we were reassured to hear that it went right up, on cue.  Good news; thanks!

Many kites flying along the water - they add such a contrast to what otherwise looks like the skyline of any American city

A beautiful kite

Isn't that stunning?

Farther along, at the Music park (complete with huge bust of Beethoven!), we saw a triple kite vastly high in the sky.  This was three kites connected, ultimately, to one string being managed by one old master kite flyer.  He came right over to us when we stopped to gawk at the spectacle; he insisted that I ‘fly’ the kite for a bit—it’s not hard to hold the string of a kite someone has already launched!  Julia refused to touch it; she feared letting go by accident!  He totally understood and laughed!  What a great way to spend a retirement afternoon, flying a kite impossibly high in the sky on a picture perfect sunny spring afternoon!

The ever-so-high triple kite

While I was watching Julia negotiate a ramp perfect for the juvenile scooter, I noticed that the large red bus behind her was actually a mobile restaurant.  It is plastered with posters advertising its wares, including ice cream and all that fried and sauced kebab snack food that the Chinese love.  And it was Julia who realized that on the upper level, there were people sitting, eating.  Part of the food truck rage that we read about in the US!

The red bus food truck

We made our (nearly) daily stop in Carrefoure, for bananas, granola bars, M & Ms for mama, and some instant food for Julia; this turned out to be yoghurt.  We waited to eat it until we were securely on the bus; I have figured out that if we get on a rush hour bus before 5:15, we beat the crush of the rush, and might even get a seat at some point on the way home.  Julia showed her street cred by eating the yoghurt while clinging to a pole; practically the fulfillment of a life dream for her!

Riding the escalator (although one without steps!) on our way to the store

An accomplishment!

Aide Mia and I talked some more about the meaning of life today—am I giving off some vibe to her?!  She is really great; kind, hardworking, friendly, cheerful, good to and with the kids.  I like her a lot.  We talked about religion in China, and her own investigation of the idea of religion.  She has made a connection to the Baha’i faith.  I asked her how her parents had responded; she said they are open minded and accepting; her sister, on the other hand, told her she was crazy!  She has spoken about her childhood several times; she lived in a multi-generational house, where her paternal grandfather was, frankly, a cold, hard, mean man who berated her regularly for not being a boy (she was the second girl; later a son came too).  Her father’s work kept him away from home for long periods of time; she would say she grew up without him.   She counts herself lucky to have had the chance to get a university degree; other young women in her community were discouraged from education.  Her experience working for a while in a public Kindergarten (equivalent to a day care center in the US) taught her that that is not the route she wants to take.  The class will be 30 kids with two teachers.  She felt she learned that these conditions cannot be meliorated even by the well intended.  Even when the director offered her a raise, she chose to leave that job.  I can’t say for sure that it would be that different in the US; what are the ratios at a typical day care center? And is it a thankless, underpaid job?

Aide Subrina shared with me that her mother is a fabulous knitter (she only wore the most elaborate handknit sweaters as a child, of course wanting a store bought one all the time!); she is going to get a recommendation for shopping for me-woo woo!  Finding a local knitting shop is a favorite way to travel for me.  The aides suggested that the main fabric/yarn shopping area is always super crowded and noisy—sounds like an adventure we will have to undertake!