The Newfound Adjustment Right Before We Leave

Today I find we are adjusting fairly well to life here. The things that struck us or quite frankly horrified us just a couple of weeks ago has faded into "thats just life here in China." (See my next blog for some funny examples of this).

This morning we headed off to a newcomer's meet and greet at the clubhouse. This is the first one they have had since our arrival, so I was interested to see who we would run into. The only unfortunate part was that Dustin came with and was the only male there. (We will know next time for such an event and let him stay home). We did meet a nice group of people. For whatever reason, most of the women happened to be from Germany. There was one person from Sweden, one from Australia and one other women from the US. One nice aspect was I was able to connect with a women that I have run into while walking around our community. She is from Germany, and her daughter will be in Danny's class this fall.

We came home to a wonderful lunch made by our ayi. We had asked her to cook two lunches for us a week, so we can get the boys introduced to authentic chinese food. She made us chicken fried rice and it was fantastic. While I enjoy this dish in the US, it is just so much better here, it is amazing.

After the boys woke from their naps, we headed to the clubhouse to find out some information about fall sports and I thought I would let the kids play at the indoor playground for awhile before dinner. On our way out the door we ran into one of our neighbors and he invited our family over for dinner on Friday night. He is from Denmark and his wife is from Beijing. We had a very nice conversation, and then the boys and I continued on to the clubhouse.

I should have heeded my gut feeling based on the level of noise coming from the indoor playgroud that we should avoid it like the plague, but I felt like I promised Danny, so we headed there anyways. Boy was this a mistake. I think I have mentioned before that some parents choose to, well, not parent thier children here, or they don't parent as well as being physically absent, leaving an ayi in their place. This of course results in children that are bratty, spoiled, and terribly bad behaved (and this is me describing it in quite pleasant and nice terms). Unfortunately, it seems we chose to go to the indoor park when everyone of these children were present. What resulted I will describe to you, but lets just say I did not make any new friends, however, my children are safe and in one piece.

So, I only ventured in, because most of the children (ages rangeing from 4-6) were located in the small kids area (more Josh's age stuff for tumbling, etc.), so I felt it fairly safe entering the other area. Danny and Josh went to the toys that when you get on them they bounce backwards and forwards. There I met a nice mom from Canada, however our conversation was cut short by the children running through the area carrying large floor tiles, waving them into each other's faces. The mom I was talking with agreed with my shock and dismay that none of the childrens' mother's or ayis came to correct this bahavior. I decided though not to get involved as they were not at that moment invading our area, or threatening Danny with their bahavior.

However, when the children bagan making their tiles go airbourne, I quickly changed my mind. One child was actually already hurt by this action, but still no mother's came over to stop anything. So....I marched up to each child (Josh on my hip) and grabbed their tile out of their hands telling them they were through playing with them. I actually raised my voice at a child picking up a new one to "put it down." I am sure that if any of the mothers visiting in the sitting area (a section of large steps, sort of like theater seating, at the other end of the play area) actually were paying enough attention to see anything, I have not made any new friends by interferring with their children. However, when children are getting hurt and my children are in danager, my mama bear protecting her baby bears instincts just take over. After getting those children to stop throwing things around, I took Josh over to the slide. I do not know if it was the excitement, or the fact that the kids got really loud after that, but Josh burst into tears. (This of course was right as the new mom I had met was trying to tell me about a group of moms that get together in the community). We quickly had to leave, and I noticed the other mother did not hang around either (she was gone before we even had our shoes back on) and I was so furious at the lack of parenting and the children run amuck that I was muttering all the way out of the area.

Needless to say we will not be returning to that area anytime soon (the other moms are probably quite relieved about this), or at least we are going during the morning when the other kids are in school. Thankfully Dustin wanted to go out to dinner because I was still fuming and processing through things when we got home.

I guess I just do not understand why people believe children raising themselves is a good idea, and I am finding this is my greatest pet peeve in life or at least to life here in China.

So while it ended on a sour note concerning some people in our community, overall and even through it all, I met some very nice people and look forward to getting to know them better when we come back in August.