Saturday trip to the book street

East Asian people hate to be ripped off. For that reason many similar speciality stores are placed near eachother. Customers therefore know that prices will be the lowest where competition is fiercest.

So yesterday we traveled across town to the book street. It is the one place to get English books. I (Dave) picked up:

-a book on how to speak the local dialect. (It is about as different to the main langauge as Italian is to Spanish)
-"The Good Earth", a 75 year old tale of pre-revolutionary East Asia by Buck's county's own Pearl Buck.

On the way back we stopped by a new welcome addition to our city, Dunkin Doughnuts.

A very thoughtful gift

I have heard that Asian culture's are gift giving, but I was more than a bit surprised by the phone call I got last night. I student I hang out with at school called me up and said he would like to give me a dog! A puppy no less. I know Lilia would go crazy, but I had to turn it down.
From the archive, Aunt Julie and Lilia from Summer '08.

I have a great wife

After watching Die Hard tonight, Katie says "That movie was very Christmasee".

Um...Really.

So Saturday we were in the mall. Malls here are nice. Really nice. You are paying top dollar for clothing or accessories. There are nice restaurants. Two Starbucks, Haagendaz, Pizza Hut (remember it's a fine restaurant here.) Anyway, the mall are nice. So we were walking towards the escalator as a family when I saw an Asian mom holding an empty water bottle up to her child's _____ so he could pee into it. Mind you, there was a public toilet at most 20 feet to their left!!! The child was under 3 years old, but really. Really???

Dave's ultimate league

How do you buy furniture?

This image was not shot by us, but a cart just like this parks outside our complex selling wicker furniture.

Cultural Ways Asia Is Different From America

1. We use forks, they use chopsticks.
2. They use a squatty, we use a toilet. (you can google this if you are unfamiliar)
3. Main mode of transportation in Asia is a bike, ours is a car.
4. Main food staple here is rice, ours is bread.
5. In the winter Asians don't generally drink cold beverages. They drink them at room temp or warm. We on the other hand love a cold beverage all year long!
6. Asians wear lots and lots of layers everyday from October to April (including long underwear). We only wear a lot of layers when we are going skiing or watching the Christmas parade.
7. Generally in Asia the parents work full-time while the grandparents take care of the grandchild. Mind you they all live together. In America we value a stay-at-home mom or day care.

House of Sickness

I'm happy to say that Lilia is much better. Even when she's sick you can't tell. Even taking her medicine was pleasant! She had eye drops, which she gladly took, a nose spray was the same reaction! What kind of kid is this. We are more than blessed.
I on the other hand am awful. I have been fighting a cold now for 10 days. My sinus' are so congested that my teeth hurt and I have a headache from the pressure. It's unbelievable. I wish I had a large needle to shove up my nose and pop something to make the pressure go away. Oh, and if that isn't bad, I woke up today with pink eye!!! What in the world!
So I went to the doctor's today and he gave me medicine. Hopefully I can get some relief!

Just down the street from Best Buy

I (Dave this time) was returning back from buying blank DVDs from Best Buy when I noticed an antique store. They are not that plentiful here since so many antiques were destroyed as "decadent" during the 60's.

I stopped in to realize that they sold not only antiques but old English books as well. I have never seen used English books here before. Most of the titles were old literary classics. When I saw this book, my heart dropped. It is titled "The Unoccupied M----- Fields of Africa and Asia" from 1911. It was written by the Student Volunteer Movement, who sent over 20,000 young men and women around the turn of last century.

It was amazing to hear of what life like was here back then. I also got to thinking, what life this book's original owner led. He or she must of brought this book with them over the Pacific Ocean. They could of wanted to read it since they were headed inland. Now the book has survived multiple revolutions and it ended up down the street from Best Buy.

It is nice to know that you are part of continuing something much older than yourself.

A cold, ear infection and pink eye!

Lilia's had a cold for about a week now. I got lucky and now I'm sick. It's hitting me pretty hard. Today she started to develop pink eye so we went to the doctor's office. He checked in her ears and saw that she has an ear infection. There was one night that she woke up crying and it seemed painful for her to lay down. We gave her tylenol and she was able to go to sleep. She was totally fine the next morning.
The doctor we saw was amazing. He let her listen to his heart with the stethoscope. He also let her put the cap on the ear thingy. He gave her a tongue depressor and she loved it. It was a great experience. So we have 3 medications and hopefully everything will clear up!
All in all she's in good spirits. We are so blessed!

Valentine's Day

Dave and I had a really nice Valentine's Day date. He got me beautiful orchids and one of our friends babysat Lilia. We went out for dinner then we went to a place for Swiss chocolate fondue. The restaurant is run by a young Asian couple from our city that met in Switzerland while studying abroad. They brought the chocolaty goodness from the Swiss to our city. (Dave read about their story on the internet.)

The Weather

I'm so sorry again for the winter you all have had. But here in our city, today...it's in the 60's!!! Dave is wearing short sleeves. Yesterday was nice too.
Don't be too jealous because it will get chilly again by the weekend.

Make a mountain out of a molehill

I can be so crazy! I was so fearful of starting up with learning the language again. I really was upset about and was very object to the idea of it. Towards the end, just before family came my brain was getting overwhelmed and over-worked! Over the break I really didn't study. I turned off every part of my brain. Plus I was never a studier in the first place. I'm a crammer.
Then Tuesday came around and I thought I was going to disappoint my teacher, but he was totally ok with it! Then things went well and I remembered more than I thought I would. It really wasn't so bad. So I am continuing on with my studies. Slow and study.
Oh, did I tell you that Dave is so smart, plus he is good at learning the language AND he WANTS TO study! Crazy! So that works against me. (Again this is all in my crazy mind...)

I'm going insane!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

IT"S THE 15th NIGHT OF FIREWORKS!!! Lord, Please Help Us!!!
Granted we weren't here for the 5 major nights, but every night since there has been some fire works. We now have a nightly routine of barricading Lilia's window with all of our couch cushions to sound proof her room. But seriously, I don't know how much more I can take. Last night was "supposed" to be the last night since it was Lantern Night. Now tonight they are bigger, louder and going on longer. It's looks like Fourth Of July and sounds like a war zone! Tonight is supposedly now the last night; Dave just heard. It just gets to you after a while, and it's only been going on an hour so far tonight! Hopefully this will be it...but then again, you never know!

Lilia and Ryan were playing last night

We are settling in...

It's beginning to feel like home again. We had a few days now of normalcy. Hu Ayi (our paid help) came yesterday and Lilia went right to her. It was good to see her again. She had bought us gifts for the New Year. She got me green tea because I love tea and she got Dave some kind of meat in a package. He hasn't tried it yet.
Today we went for a nice family walk to park close by. We had friends over for dinner last night and again tonight. We want to get the quality time in before life gets to busy.

Lilia & Sydney in Malaysia