On the ground in Shanghai

We've been in Shanghai for 3 days now and, although I'm still a little fuzzy (jet lag/time zone issues), I'm starting to feel a little more like myself.

We arrived on Friday afternoon, more than an hour late, and were met by Chris's FHP driver and Peter's driver - we needed both vans because we had 14 suitcases between the 3 of us, plus a couple more that the FHP driver brought from Chris's office in Ningbo and we never would have fit all of us in one van.  We drove to Peter & Nickle's house in the Green Villas, arriving before Peter and the kids were even home from school, and were greeted by Annie, Peter & Nickle's Ayi (housekeeper/nanny).  We unloaded all of the luggage into the garage and pretty soon, Peter & the kids came home, walking and riding scooters.  Their home is large and lovely and part of a very Americanized subdivision of large expat family homes.  The neighborhood is going to especially great for the kids, as they can ride scooters in the cul-de-sac, walk to the playground with friends, and even go to their friends' homes, mostly by themselves, well, except for 5-year-old Cameron.

The kids seemed very excited to see us and show us their new home.  Although their furniture had finally arrived, along with curtains and drapes, their air shipment has not yet arrived, so they don't have much in the way of toys, clothes, books, dishes, or pots and pans.  They're doing well with the things they picked up at the local grocery store and IKEA, but are looking forward to the arrival of their shipment.

We had a great night at their house, including dinner out at a local spot called Big Bamboo.  Obviously, this is one of the official Friday night dinner spots for families in their neighborhood as we saw and/or met at least 3 or 4 other Concordia families - Concordia being the international school the kids attend.  By the time we got back to their house after dinner, we were fading fast, not having slept much on the flight over.

Saturday morning, we met with representatives of our management company to take possession of our apartment.  There were a lot of maintenance issues and items missing that were supposed to be here, but it was nonetheless good to get our luggage transferred into our new apartment and start unpacking. 

The living room/dining room area is large and open and has a lot of light, with glassed-in decks at each end.  The big leather couch is very comfortable, thank heavens, as I've been sleeping on it the past 2 nights.  Our bed is as hard as concrete and will require a trip to IKEA soon for a new mattress. 

The kitchen is very small and so the American-sized refrigerator is in the dining room.  We specifically requested an oven be added before we moved in, so I was envisioning a stand-alone range in the dining room, next to the refrigerator.  Instead, we got a counter-top "oven," which is really not much bigger than a toaster oven, although we haven't been able to get it to toast anything yet.  Peter & Nickle were the lucky recipients of the 13x9 cake pan I brought in my luggage, as it's too big for our oven.  Good thing, too, as they've been making us dinner every night and the cut of beef we picked up for our Saturday night dinner would have been too big to cook any other way. 

You'll notice there's no dishwasher in our kitchen either - I can't remember the last time I didn't have a dishwasher.  I have to buy a dish drainer this week and hopefully Chris will get good at washing the dishes, since he's not going to do much of the cooking.

Chris had engaged the FHP driver not only to pick us up at the airport on Friday but also for all day Saturday.  He kindly moved all of our luggage into our building while we were doing the move-in check with the management company and then took us to Metro for a big shopping trip.  He is very kind and was a lot of help with our packages.

Chris and I slept in the apartment on Saturday night, but Samantha opted to stay at Peter & Nickle's house, given that she'd finally gotten a good night's sleep there Friday night and she has really been looking forward to cousin time while she's here in Shanghai.  So, on Sunday morning, she and Cameron walked over to visit our apartment and then Cameron treated us to slushees at a little shop right next to our complex.

After we went back to Peter's and met up with their former Ayi, who had taken care of Kennedy 8-9 years ago, when Peter & Nickle first lived in Shanghai, we took off to do some shopping.  We went to Carrefour, a huge store similar in type to Wal-Mart, with food, electronics, household goods, etc.  It's in a very large shopping complex, complete with a food court and many, many American fast food outlets, including Subway and KFC.  As Samantha was hungry, we first stopped at a little Hong Kong restaurant and tried a few local dishes, including cold, cut cucumbers, a pork fried rice, and some cooked cabbage.  Samantha ordered a chicken baked rice that was terrible, although we weren't sure if it was just burned or if it was supposed to taste like that.  :)

We returned to Peter & Nickle's Sunday evening for dinner with some friends of theirs from Concordia.  They had received their shipment of goods from the U.S., so had spent the whole weekend unpacking and trying to get organized.  Peter made a great stir-fry, but couldn't use his new rice cooker because the directions are all in Chinese.  Fortunately, his Ayi can teach him to use it today - we may have to invite her over to teach us how to use our appliances, too.  :)

All-in-all, we are adjusting.  I'm still quite fuzzy-brained most of the time, but I'm sure it will take me a while longer to adjust to the time zone.  My body is not particularly flexible with my eating and sleeping schedules.  Peter is coming over soon with his driver so we can explore some of Shanghai and deliver Samantha to Nickle so she can spend the afternoon at the office with Nickle.  This should be great exposure for Samantha, who is taking some international HR classes in Vienna this semester.

Peter & I are going to the Community Center of Shanghai to sign up for some tours and classes.  I already registered for their Shanghai 1-2-3 seminar next weekend, after Samantha leaves, so Chris & I can learn more about the expat community, vendors, and local businesses.  Fortunately, Peter is a couple of weeks ahead of me in learning about the area, so he's teaching me a lot, and he has great contacts through the school.  The adjustment would be much more difficult if he and Nickle weren't here - we're going to so enjoy being a few blocks away from them for the next couple of years.

While we definitely miss our family and friends, I was able to FaceTime with both Elizabeth and Miranda today and briefly with two of my sisters.  Today, we got the computers hooked up and hope to hook up the Vonage router, so our U.S. phone number will be operational again.  I still have to buy a Chinese iPhone - while I have a small Chinese cell phone now, I have decided I need a smart phone with a translator app, GoogleMaps, and all of the resources that are available to me through my U.S. iPhone when I'm home.  But, in the meantime, both Peter & Chris have Chinese iPhones, so as long as I'm with one of them, I'm covered.