A Daring Adventure

In Which My Husband Takes One for The Team (Also: Don't Read While Eating)

So it's, I don't know, about an hour after lunchtime here in Chengdu, and my home phone just rang.


It was my husband.


He was calling from the site of an all-day-long business meeting. He and a couple of coworkers are there today for some reason or another, and in the process of today's events, there was a working official luncheon.


And our phone conversation went like this:


                                               ~   ~   ~


ME:  So, how was the food at the luncheon?


JAMES:  It was a little spicier than what we're used to. And there were some... things... that I didn't recognize and hadn't... heard of before.


ME (thinking this sounded ominous, since we're in China and all):  Oh. Wow.


JAMES (less than enthused):  Yeah. 


ME:  Things you didn't recognize? Like... what?


JAMES (hesitantly):  Well, some sort of... of... worms. 


ME:  Worms. As in WORMS worms? As in from the GROUND worms?


JAMES:  Well, I don't think they came from the ground.


ME:  You don't think they came from the ground. Where the hell did they come from, then?


JAMES:  Um, they were actually Bamboo Worms.


ME (horrified):  Bamboo Worms?!? You actually ATE something called "Bamboo Worms?" Are you serious?


JAMES (miserably):  Well, they were deep fried. And I only ate one. Because I felt like I had to be polite. 


ME:  Wait, my laptop is right here. I have to Google this and see if there really is something called Bamboo Worms...


                                                ~   ~   ~


And I did.  


And there is.


And get this.


Bamboo Worms? Yeah, they're not really worms. THEY'RE **WORSE** THAN WORMS, YOU GUYS. 


Turns out, my husband actually ate MOTH LARVAE. As in, a mommy moth lays her eggs in a bamboo stalk. Then the eggs hatch into wiggling larvae. And the Chinese know exactly when this will happen during the year (of COURSE they do!). And they hack apart the bamboo in order to pull out the wiggling larvae, which they call "Bamboo Worms." THEN THEY COOK AND EAT THEM:





OH MY LORD, only in China. 


Ah, the super glam life of the U.S. Diplomat.


Dude, y'all. Hope no one ever tries to feed ME worms. That ain't happening, let me just say. My reaction would be a cross between:




and...





So I explained to James, who was still on the phone, what he had just eaten at the luncheon. He was super duper thrilled.


A dinner has also been planned for this evening.


Who wants to bet that James will be eating worms again tonight? 


YUM.
 

Friendship, Expat Chick Style

Here's what I've learned about FS friendships: if your friends there at post are with State, then there's always a wall.


You can't help it, right? You can't help that there's a wall. Because, really, now, you can only talk about real stuff up to a point. Are you REALLY going to complain about everything that's bugging you? No, you're not. Because, come on, that's tacky. Because maybe what's bugging you is something that your friend's spouse's other friend happens to oversee, or whatever. It's just... tacky. Because everyone knows everyone else and there's no such thing as anonymity in the fakey fakey Everything is wonderful! world that is the fishbowl of the Foreign Service. 


So you sort of stick to polite stuff in FS friendships and if you complain to each other, it's only sort of vague. You know? 


So then a girlfriend of mine who has been in the FS for time and all eternity shared her secret of overseas survival with me: In order to not lose your mind, you HAVE TO have friends who 1.) live there at your post, but 2.) who are outside of State. People you can actually, really talk to so you don't go insane with all the fake politeness and the Oh, yes, everything is fantastic! garbage that you have to say 99.9% of the time. 


My first year here, I didn't have one of those kinds of friends. It sucked.


But now I do.

It was sort of sad, really, how quickly one starved-for-friendship expat wife (moi) can make friends with another starved-for-friendship expat wife. Seriously. Because I met this other lady and we were all: 1.) Wait, you have kids my kids' ages?!, and, more importantly, 2.) OUR HUSBANDS DON'T WORK IN THE SAME PLACE?!?

And right then and there it was ON:






Ah, you guys, there is nothing so wonderful as being able to actually TALK to another human female who is ACTUALLY THERE RIGHT IN FRONT OF YOU (as in, not just on the phone) and who can therefore understand what you're saying about your city (because she lives as an expat there, too) but also is someone to whom you can say any darned thing you want, because you don't have to be fakey fake with her because she's not State.


HEAVENLY. 


Everyone should have at least one friend like this at post. It's a soothing balm to the soul.


So my soul-balm friend and I have been out and about, seeing Chengdu. We went to a Buddhist monastery recently and she took some pics with her iPhone and sent them to me.


Seeing as that I haven't taken any pictures of China for a long time, I wanted to put them up here.

Hello from a Buddhist monastery in Chengdu! And yes, I really do have hair in real life.

 

Seriously, sometimes living in China ROCKS. Isn't this place pretty?

 

I love this tree. It's like a bonsai tree or something, but it's probably about as tall as I am.

Outside of the monastery, there's always incense burning. It really smells wonderful, though I'm allergic to it most of the time.

Inside the monastery, there are places for one to sit during prayers/reflection/etc.

So there you have it.


Non-State girlfriends at post. I HIGHLY recommend them. In addition to the State ones, as well, of course. Those are good, too. Because, seriously - who the heck else will be able to understand bidding and bureaucratic red tape woes?!  :)

Now Why Didn't *I* Think of That?!?!

You guys, this is BRILLIANT. I wish I could take credit for it, but I cannot. 


If your R&R from your overseas post is back to the States anytime in September, October or around theres, this is the PERFECT way to go about getting cheap (almost free!) and easy Christmas photos of the family. Bonus: After you take the pictures, you can have them printed out there, too! Then it's just one-stop shopping at its best! 


Gotta love stuff that makes your life easier, you know?


                                             ~   ~   ~


As for us, people keep asking about how bidding is going.


Ha ha ha!


Look, folks, this is DS. Seriously. And if nothing else, DS bidding is fodder for some awesome gif usage, if I do say so myself.


Check it, mah peepz:

I would say that, if you want to go overseas, DS bidding is like the Hungry Hungry Hippos game, except the marble-to-hippo ratio is WAY too high here. Maybe if there was just, say, ONE marble (overseas post) to four hippos. That would be closer. Unless, of course, you're DS bidding on DC jobs. Then there are four hippos and eleventy zillion marbles.

 
So, you know. The whole trying to stay overseas thing. Wish us luck.


I actually have DS friends who were summer bidders in the past (like we are now) and who bid in September/October (just like we did) but then didn't get their assignments until that next March or April. OR MAY. It happens. I'm being realistic. I'm prepared for the wait.


You'll never find ME with a bad attitude!! You'll never hear ME being all:

NOPE! I'm going to be A Good Foreign Service Wife. I'm going to be patient and I'm going to just sit back with my good attitude and be all gracious and stuff. 

Because that's how I roll.  


SHUT UP, IT IS TOO. 

 

In Which My Husband Gives Me AMPLE Grounds for Divorce

(Just kidding.)

(Sort of.)

Okay, so, last week James did the unthinkable - he went back to the United FREAKING States on a trip without me.


WITHOUT ME, people.


So it was for work. So what? WHATEVER. So it was something he needed to do for his job and his position and the world and national security or WHATEVER. I don't care. He went to Cali-FREAKING-fornia (Los Angeles, to be more precise) WITHOUT ME and stayed there for a WEEK at a nice hotel with a rental car and with lots of DS/other State guy friends. Living it up, American style. They saw movies, they ate American food, they went to shopping malls, etc. 


And I, of course, being A Good Wife and Mother, stayed here and took care of the children and home, etc. Stayed here. In China. While he was in Cali-FREAKING-fornia. Eating In & Out Burger and watching Ben Affleck in whatever that new movie is about the Iran hostage crisis. WHATEVER.


I'm sure you can JUST IMAGINE my reaction when he told me that he'd be going to the United FREAKING States for a work thing:

"No, really, James - go to the States without me. I'LL BE JUST FINE."

And I didn't kill him when he got back, just in case you were wondering. Though while he was gone there were plenty of home fires I had to put out all by myself (isn't that always the way it goes? The bottom falls out of the universe while the Dad is away on a business trip). Actually, not only was he not here, I pretty much never got to talk to him that whole entire week because of both the time/day difference and because he was always either at seminars or official visits somewhere or MOVIES or RESTAURANTS or MALLS.  


He will be offended if I don't publicly state that he DID bring me back some Trader Joe's bags of dried cherries - which I adore - when he returned. Except that I now have to point out (for the sake of balance) that if I had gone with him, I would have been able to buy the damn cherries my own self. And also watched Argo. And eaten American food. And stayed in a hotel. And talked to other grownups.  


Sometimes I hate being an EFM.


And as to the title of this blog post, he wouldn't BE that lucky. He's stuck being married to me FOR FOREVER, regardless of how ticked off I might be that he just got to go to LA and I didn't. 


So there. 

 

Stupid Freaking Moon Cakes, GOD

I know I keep saying over and over again that I'm going to write blog posts about how much I love China (which I do, seriously), but then in reality I always actually end up writing blog posts which sort of sound like I'm making fun of China even though I SWEAR I'M NOT.


This is another one of those blog posts, of course. And this is probably a great time to remind everyone that the United States does NOT write this blog and does NOT authorize this blog's content and would actually probably run screaming from this blog if given the opportunity.


We clear? Okay. Moving on.


So next week here in China is some sort of really long holiday, which is like YAY! because of course my husband is supposed to be off for it (operative phrase: "supposed to." In reality, we shall see.). This is because when you're serving overseas (theoretically) you get to take off both the major American holidays AND the local country's major holidays, so BONUS!


So, anyway, the major Chinese holiday around here next week is something about Autumn or Harvest or whatever and it's a super major big deal sort of like, I don't know, Christmas and Thanksgiving all wrapped up in one. It goes ALL WEEK LONG, which is not at all American, because in America we get an official day off every few months for random this or that, but never anything like a whole week off all at one time. I'm telling you - China knows how to party. 


The problem, of course, is that when they party they do all sorts of things that I don't understand because, of course, I'm a white bread American girl and we don't have stuff back in the United States like this:

Moon Cakes contain a paste made out of mashed beans. And, yes, that IS a whole, hardboiled egg yolk inside. YUM.

Which are called "Moon Cakes," and which are the major celebratory holiday fare of the region. So much so that the tiny little bakery where we buy our sandwich bread had a HUGE truck back up to their teensy little front door and unload so many boxes of professionally-made Moon Cakes that the boxes stacked up to their ceiling all over the store. Seriously.


To me, Moon Cakes taste pretty disgusting. I mean, no offense, Chinese people, I totally respect how even your sugary treats aren't sugary, which is why all of y'all are the opposite of obese Americana, but really now- desserts made out of smashed beans and whole hard boiled egg yolks just wouldn't go over well in the U.S. on major holidays. Or even minor ones.


And you, Dear Reader, would probably surmise that since China as a whole is obviously free to enjoy eating whatever its little heart desires on its own major holidays, that if Moon Cakes are such a big deal that they're basically like egg nog and Thanksgiving turkey and pumpkin pie and Christmas green bean casserole all all wrapped up in one, then China can just have at it and this wouldn't affect me. You'd think that it's Not My Problem, right?


But you'd be WRONG.

You're WRONG. Wrong, wrong, wrong...

Moon Cakes ARE my problem. THEY ARE **SO** MY PROBLEM. This is because I'm an employer, you guys. I employ an ayi. And employers are supposed to buy their employees Moon Cakes for the holiday.


Now, my ayi (pronounced like the letters i.e.) is the most wonderful creature on the entire earth. The sun rises and sets at her feet. I worship the ground she walks on. And here in China, like I said, employers are supposed to buy Moon Cakes for their employees. It's just What's Done. It's like back in the Charles Dickens days when Scrooge was supposed to buy the Christmas duck or turkey or goose or whatever for the Bob Cratchit family. IT'S WHAT'S DONE. 


Except my ayi won't let me buy her Moon Cakes. Every time I try to broach the topic, she wigs out. Sort of like when I tried to buy her daughter a store-made birthday cake for her birthday. Wigged out seven ways to Sunday. NO, she doesn't want Moon Cakes, NO, don't buy them for her, NO, her husband's employer already bought some for their family, NO, it's not up for discussion, NO NO NO NO NO.


And then, the next day, when I even brought a Moon Cake catalog home from the bakery, showing the zillions of different kinds of Moon Cake packages for sale and asking if she'd like to pick one out, she lept away from the catalog like it was a venemous snake trying to bite her, and continued with the NO NO NO NO NO NO NO! thing. 

And I would totally up and buy her Moon Cakes anyway, even though she freaks out at the thought of it and tells me NO NO NO NO NO, except for you don't really do stuff like that here in China because then people get offended. The "face" thing. It's big here. Does it include Moon Cakes purchases? I have no idea. I'M NOT CHINESE. I DON'T KNOW THESE THINGS.


So now I'm all freaked out because I feel like no matter what I do I'm a horrible boss. Who knew that a dessert that isn't really dessert-y that tastes disgusting and contains hard boiled eggs and mashed up beans could be SO MUCH FREAKING TROUBLE?  


So, anyway, I'm not going to buy the Moon Cakes. And I'm going to feel like I've gotten lost somewhere between here and there (here being: "The employer is supposed to buy the Moon Cakes," and there being: "NO NO NO NO NO NO NO!!!"), and I'm sort of damned if I do and damned if I don't.


And lest you think I'm some sort of horrible person (which I am but not over this, at least not intentionally), I will tell you that if I thought that there was any way I could buy them without offending or horrifying her, I would do it in a heartbeat. And also, she actually said that Moon Cakes don't taste that great. Which maybe makes them more like, I don't know, the Chinese version of fruitcake except made out of beans and hard boiled eggs.


Which may actually improve fruitcake, come to think of it.

Me and My Idiot Moron Self

Sometimes I'm so incredibly stupid that I surprise even my own self. (Which you would think would be hard to do because, you know, I've lived with myself so long that by now I should already know the depths to which my idiocy can go.)


And since I like nothing more than to humiliate myself on the interwebz (and who doesn't?), I just have to tell you the dumb thing that I did.  


                                                 ~   ~   ~


Somewhere on my blog (I'm way too lazy to go and find it) I've talked before about how eggs in China are different than eggs in the United States. Which isn't surprising, because honestly bananas in China are also different than bananas in the United States, and the same thing with potatoes, ETCETERA. They all may look the same, but they don't necessarily taste the same or behave the same when cooking.


Eggs in China are different on the outside and on the inside. On the inside they're different because the eggs here won't fry like the eggs in the US. Don't know if it's my cooking or my pan or the eggs or what, but I can't make sunny-side-up eggs here with Chinese eggs. They, like, disintegrate during cooking or something frustrating and hard to describe like that.


But then there's the OUTSIDE of Chinese eggs.


Look, people, when my Dad was young he grew up on a farm in Indiana, so I'm technically the daughter of an Indiana farmer, so I know where eggs come from and it's not The Egg Fairy.


Eggs come from the backside of chickens, not to put too fine a point on it, and the backside of a chicken isn't always squeaky clean. I'm down with that and I understand the concept, but it is a bit - how to put this - of an "expat moment" when you go to use an egg you've bought from the store and it's all:






FEATHERIZED.


Which, really, the feathers don't bother me and I actually think they're cute. The problem actually is when the eggs have, um, how to put this... GOOKY BROWN STREAKS all over them, which we all know isn't really the way eggs are sold to us in the United States.


In the United States, grocery store eggs are perfectly sparkling clean. They are free of feathers and free of gooky brown streaks and free of anything that reminds you that said egg just recently slid out the back door of a live chicken. When you reach into the American egg carton to pull an American egg out for your pancake batter, you don't sort of STARE at the egg and wonder if you should don a rubber dish glove during the grabbing/cracking process in order to lessen your chances of contracting Megadeath Ebola Asian SARS Bird Flu IV or whatever is out there now that they cull chicken flocks for sometimes here in the Asia-ish region. 


I have no idea how eggs in the U.S. get so darned clean.


So one morning I was in the process of making something (probably pancakes) that required the use of eggs, and I was, as usual, sort of staring at the streaked eggs trying to figure out if I should be reaching for the dish gloves when James came into the kitchen, looked at the eggs, and said something that can be condensed down to the word "Ick."


And since James is always my reality test, I knew that I was then justified in thinking that my streaked eggs could use some spiffing up. If not for aesthetics, well then for health reasons. 


The next day I had bought some fruit from an outdoor market and was in the process of bleaching it (which entails filling up the sink, putting in the fruit, adding in bleach, and letting it all soak) when THE MOST BRILLIANT THOUGHT *EVER* IN THE HISTORY OF THE WORLD, YOU GUYS, popped into my mind. I was all Wait a minute... if I bleach all of my fruits and vegetables, then why don't I just bleach my chicken poo eggs?!


And I got all happy and I grabbed those gunky eggs and I put them in the bleach water along with the fruit and I bleached the ever-living hell out of those things, while simultaneously patting myself on the back over my sheer creativity and ingenuity and problem solving prowess, and I was all:






Except the overseas version, which is far more potent.


And those eggs floated in their bleach bath and then I pulled them out and rinsed them off and rubbed them with a dish towel and gosh darn did those bad boys SPARKLE. 


They looked like American eggs! All clean! And attractive! With a spic-and-span feeling!


And I hummed around the kitchen all Betty Crocker meets Julia Child meets Laura Ingalls Wilder and basically felt sorry for all expat wives who aren't as bright as I am and who were still using ugly, unsanitary eggs caked in chicken poo.


But as we all know, pride goeth before a fall.


So a few days later, when I was trying to make something for my children (brownies?) that required (remember the REQUIRED part) eggs, I pulled my gorgeous, clean eggs out of the fridge and cracked one into the mixing bowl. The mixing bowl that already held a box of precious brownie mix out of our consumables stash.


The egg plopped into the brownie mix.  And I stared down at it and was HORRIFIED.


It was, like, milky and greenish and brownish and nasty and congealed and smelled like bleach. And I was mildly perturbed because it couldn't be fished out, so I had to throw the whole contents of the mixing bowl into the trash and start over, which meant that I had just lost a precious box of brownie mix from our consumables over a gross, spoiled egg. DARNIT.


So then, I started over and broke open another egg and it was just the same: disgusting, spoiled, rotten, unusable. 


And when I sniffed the inside of the cracked egg shell, it REEKED of bleach.


And then I started thinking. Which I don't do very often. OBVIOUSLY.


And being as that at one point in college I was a Chemistry major, and being as that I have taken a lot of science classes, actually, I pondered the eggs. The eggs that would obviously have to be at least semi-permeable. Because in order for baby chicks to grow inside them, they would have to be semi-permeable in order to exchange gases (you know, oxygen and such) with the outside world. DUH, ME, DID MY COLLEGE TUITION BUY ME NOTHING??!?!


So then I was left with nothing in my kitchen but a bunch of ruined eggs that smelled like bleach when you cracked their rotten insides open. Which meant that I had to throw all of my (sparkly! clean!) eggs away. Which meant that I had no eggs.


Which meant that I couldn't make brownies.

That was a little while ago. And so now the (new) eggs in my kitchen are all fashionably sporting dark brown streaks and feathers. And evidently that's the way it's gonna be.


THE END.

Mo Chit Just for You (Our Trip to Thailand, Part the Second)

As tacky as it might sound (and it does, indeed, sound tacky), from the perspective of an English speaker, Thailand definitely has some words that really lend themselves to being initially mistaken for being... how to politely put this... slang (or worse).


For example, you already know that we visited Bangkok a week or two ago. However, while we were in Thailand, we did NOT have enough time to get to go visit 

It's not MY fault my brain automatically wants to change this into a bad word. Blame Hooked on Phonics and the way it worked for me.

another city with a name that just BEGS to have English speakers abuse it, though I've heard that it's supposed to be pronounced "foo-kett" or some such, but please. I'm the sort who tries really hard to be polite, but when I see "Bangkok" and "Phucket," well, my brain immediately and automatically discards them to the sidelines as being impolite, and I have to consciously tell my brain, No, they're fine, you may use them in polite conversation, for there's no other way to discuss your trip!


Not that it really matters, though, because as everyone knows we were actually in Thailand for some

Water WITH ICE IN IT. Served at a real restaurant. OH THANK GOD.

ICE.


This, my friends, is ice. Ice is wonderful and amazing and worth traveling a gazillion miles for. Ice graces our drinks and makes us happy on warm days and darned if China DOESN'T HAVE ANY ICE ANYWHERE AT ALL, EVER.  How Chinese people live without ice I cannot begin to fathom, and if I stop and reflect upon the fact that on hot days Chinese people purposefully drink plain *hot* water (why? Why? WHY???) in their homes for normal hydration purposes my brain will explode at the sheer wrongness of it all. 


Know why else you go to Bangkok?


Mexican food.

A chimichanga, which is the sort of food one cannot get in Chengdu no matter how hard one tries.

This is the part where my father, a foodie of nearly psycho proportions, will freak out and go into apoplectic seizures because we ate MEXICAN rather than THAI food in Thailand. 


And while eating Mexican food while you're in Thailand may make no sense at all whatsoever to an American who can eat whatever sort of food he so chooses any random day in America, this makes PERFECT sense to an American visiting Thailand who gets basically only one meal during his visit and who has been looking forward to eating REAL, HONEST-TO-GOODNESS MEXICAN for as long as he's had his plane tickets because he can't eat Mexican in Chengdu and, besides, Thai is Asian and all he ever eats in Chengdu is Asian food.  AND HIS NAME IS JAMES.


Deal with it, Dad.


One thing we did not know before visiting Bangkok was that Bangkok has a king. And a queen. And that both the king and queen are memorialized on every street corner, building, sign, window, shelf, etc. (or at least it feels that way) to the point where all of the banners on the side of the road leading up to the airport and all of the decorations across the airport's facilities were in honor of the king because of his birthday.

Evidently the king's birthday was eight months ago. Yep, I'd leave the decorations up at this point, too. Saves on having to rehang them in just a couple of months...

These were separate from the images, paintings, shrines, etc. that featured the queen, which were basically on every street corner and beside every building.


You probably can't read what is written on the king's blurb at the airport (sorry, my picture sucks, an iTouch can only do so much), but it's something like, "The Great King, whose every action is to benefit all Thai people in all respects," or something super positive like that.  


The whole king and queen thing is such a big deal in Thailand that when you go to see a movie in a (clean!!!) movie theater, while drinking a drink with ice in it (!!!!), you must stand before the movie starts in honor of the two to three minute advertisement that comes on before every movie that is basically a propaganda piece about the king and how wonderful he is and Look! Here are pictures of him feeding the homeless and walking around with normal Thai people and spending every minute of every day doing wonderful things for Thailand.


James and I stood as expected, though it felt sort of strange to be doing so, and then we had a long conversation later about how, um, THAT WOULD NEVER HAPPEN IN AMERICA.


                                                     ~   ~   ~


Me (incredulous):  Can you IMAGINE if, in America, before any movie started playing in a movie theater, every single person in the theater had to stand up and be silent in respect for a three minute short film about the current President of the United States and how wonderful he/she is and how every minute of every day all he/she does is stuff to benefit all Americans?  Complete with pictures of him/her from childhood on up and then feeding the homeless, etc?


James:  HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAhahahahaha!! No matter who the President is, half the movie theater would stand, the other half would stay seated and start yelling and screaming, and fights would break out all over the place!


Me (nostalgically):  I know! We're the greatest country on earth!


                                                     ~   ~   ~


James and I pretty much only had one day in Thailand before we had to turn around and start the travel process back to Chengdu because, hello, our children were home alone and we wanted them to be alive when we got back. (Which they were.)

We flew out of Thailand and landed in Guangzhou in order to change planes to get to Chengdu.


Ah, being back in China:

Anyone need to make a pit stop before getting on the plane?

So CHINA-EY.


We had a bit of a layover in Guangzhou and decided to try to get something to eat. GONE were the restaurants that we had just seen a few hours before in Bangkok... restaurants that sold sushi or gourmet ice cream or sub sandwiches or anything even remotely familiar to an American.


We tried to choose between:

Yum!

Spiced Small Intestine *or* Belly Juice Tripe...

Yummier!

...Edible Tree Fungus with Mature Vinegar *or* Hot and Sour Kelp...

Holy cow, I don't know how to choose between them all!

...or some nice Belly Juice Radish.


It was so hard to choose. Everything sounded so totally delish.  In a CHINA-EY sort of way.


Forget what we ended up ordering. Something with noodles?


Glad we ate during our layover in Guangzhou on our way back to Chengdu, though, because LITTLE DID WE KNOW AT THE TIME, but while we were in the air flying from Guangzhou back to Chengdu, it rained a tiny bit in Chengdu (for all of a half and hour), and China began diverting planes away from Chengdu because evidently no one can land a plane somewhere where it has rained in the last three hours.


Or something.


So we got diverted to Chongqing and sat in the plane on the tarmac for four hours. Interestingly enough, James and I were sitting in the exit row seat lane and at one point, the Chinese stewardess (who had been physically guarding the exit row's emergency exit door that leads out of the plane) had to leave her post and turned and told James very seriously that she needed HIM to guard the plane's emergency door.  One can only presume that she was worried that someone was going to come along and try to pop that door open and plunge to the concrete below the airplane just to get away from being crammed in a plane with no air conditioning or food or water for hours.


Just the sort of task James has ALWAYS wanted to do.  NOT.


No one got past James (and, mercifully, no one tried, though they all would have failed), and after four hours we were let off the plane and herded to the Chongqing airport terminal where we waited another four hours. Meanwhile, an American man on the plane kept us posted on the weather back at the Chengdu airport ("My girlfriend has literally been standing at the Chengdu airport these last eight hours and not only has it not rained once, but planes have been taking off and landing the whole time!") until we were put back on a plane and sent to Chengdu eight hours later, thank the LORD.


We were supposed to have arrived home at 8 pm on a Saturday night, but we actually got home at 5:30 am Sunday morning.  OH. HOW. FUN.


But I won't complain. Know why?  Because another lady from the Consulate trying to get home to Chengdu that same night was traveling with her three children all under the age of six, BY HERSELF, while one of her children was vomiting, and SHE got waylaid in Chongqing at the same time as James and I did, but SHE wasn't let off the plane for the whole eight hours.  She and her children all sat on the plane on the tarmac in Chongqing while the plane ran out of food, ran out of water, had no air conditioning, etc., and while her sick child vomited. 


And THAT, my friends, is the glam life of the Foreign Service sometimes.

 

The Pros and Cons of Chengdu, China: A Bidlist Primer

My dearest darling bestie, Jill, has asked Foreign Serivce bloggers to list the good, the bad, and the ugly about their current posts so that people who either are or will be bidding might have a glimpse of what life is like there before pushing that FSBid button.


This is because bidding can seriously suck.


This is because bidding can be something like this:



 

Because it's basically like the whole entire earth comes hurtling in your direction and, as a result, you end up comatose on the ground.  


So in order to help you current/future Chengdu, China bidders, I present to you:



                    ~    ~   THE PROS OF LIVING IN CHENGDU   ~   ~



1.)  The Food:  Because the food is so awesome that descriptive words fail me. Plates and plates of yumminess just waiting to be brought to your table. Yes, a lot of it is spicy, but trust me - you'll quickly adapt. And then you'll be addicted. Because Chinese food in China is NOTHING like Chinese food in America... it's totally different and it's WAY WAY BETTER. And I believe that the food in Chengdu is much better than the food at any other post in China, because Chengdu has Sichuanese food and goshdarnit, people, it's seriously wicked awesome yummy.


2.)  It's Cheap to Live Here:  Not only is the Chinese food that I was just talking about cheap, but it's also cheap to live here.  You can definitely save money, and that's a huge plus for us.  Of course, whatever money we saved the first year we were here we just spent during our recent R&R, but that's not Chengdu's fault.  


3.)  Our School is Awesome:  The school that my boys attend is incredible, and we are so, so blessed that it is here. Great teachers, great students - in fact, my boys literally don't have a single complaint about any other student at the school - such a wonderful atmosphere. 


4.)  It's Safe Here:  Which I sort of took for granted until James and I started bidding for our next post and I started reading the Real Post Reports of other places and then it really sank in... how blessed we are that we are so safe in Chengdu.  We can walk anywhere at any time, day or night, and be completely safe.  No one is going to kidnap us or carjack us or try to hold us for ransom or bomb us or, or, or... you get it.


5.)  The Post has Perks:  Like TWO R&Rs (again, didn't realize how rare that is until we started bidding!), getting a consumables shipment, the fact that we have both APO and pouch here - we're grateful for those things, and we know that not all posts have them, or have then when you're bidding and then take them away, later etc. 


6.)  No Freaky Weird Diseases:  Like Dengue Fever or malaria here, thank goodness. 


7.)  Household Help:  Because it's relatively cheap here to live, we can afford a part-time ayi (pronounced like the two vowels i.e.), and thank the dear heavens above that we can.  You'll read more about this in the Con section, below, but in addition to what I say there, it doesn't hurt that I don't have to clean my bathrooms or my floors.  Now, mind you, it's much, much dirtier here than in the U.S., so things have to be cleaned super often... but I do love having an ayi, and the ayis here are good workers and are dependable.


8.)  Local Doctors:  Thank GOD we have some local U.S. doctors at private practices in the Chengdu area.  Some posts don't, I'm finding out, and that would just be horrible.  But when my kids have been sick or injured, our family has been able to go and get care on the local market, and that has been a huge lifesaver for our family.  Also, we're really glad that we elected to have the Foreign Service Benefit Plan as our health insurance, for it's made filing health care claims overseas much easier than it would have been if we'd stuck with Blue Cross.  (Actually, I can't even fathom the pain and suffering if we'd kept Blue Cross while we were overseas.)


9.)  The Climate:  Is very moderate, in my book. While it gets a bit cold, like not even as cold as Washington DC, it doesn't snow. And while it gets warm/hot, like maybe in Florida I guess, it's not like the hot you get at posts that are FREAKING SUPER HOT, and the hot doesn't last for months and months on end or anything. It has a nice mix, with nothing too extreme at either end.  Because a bid for here is a bid for pandas, not ice.


10.)  I Really Like and am Fascinated by the Chinese People and Culture:  I love that, when we walk down the street, we see a completely different world than the one we grew up in back in America. I love that the Chinese people see things differently, do things differently, and live in different ways. I am completely convinced that the Chinese culture does a much better job with many things than the U.S. culture does, and I'll write about those hopefully soon.  I love walking down the street and seeing Chinese people look at us, also, with curiosity and interest... because I know that some FS friends in other places aren't looked at that way, but rather with anger or hatred.  China is a good place to be and it's really broadened the scope of our lives and souls.  I am very grateful that we have gotten to be here.


That said, here are...



                    ~   ~   THE CONS TO LIVING IN CHENGDU   ~   ~


1.)  The Air Pollution:  Tops the list, by far, before anything else can come close.  That and its resulting health problems.  I've said it a zillion times on my blog, but in case you're new here, my family was pretty much permanently sick the first year we were here at post, and I'm not exaggerating.  Ear infections/ lung infections/ coughs that wouldn't go away... it was bad. All of our issues went away during our R&R back to the States, and I'm hoping against hope that this second year at post will be better for us. But the air pollution is just... horrible.  There's no merciful thing to do for bidders but to say it aloud.  


2.)  No Bilateral Work Agreement:  Which means that spouses can only work at the Consulate.  Because if spouses were to work outside of the Consulate, that would be illegal.  It would be breaking the law. Because we spouses come in on our diplomatic passports, which don't grant us a work visa, and individuals need a work visa in order to legally work in China, and we don't have one.  And since the Consulate is very small, there are only a teensy few jobs at the Consulate for EFMs and, come on now, none of them are very sexy.  This is very important for folks to know before bidding anywhere in China, because EFMs need to understand that their only choice for working is at the Consulate or Embassy.  


[In fact, I feel very strongly that if an EFM would like to work, then during the bidding process the family needs to determine which countries on their bid lists have (and don't have) bilateral work agreements, and then only bid on the ones that have them, because China isn't the only one who doesn't have one.  I have heard stories of EFMs trying to work outside of the Consulate/Embassy even when there isn't a bilateral work agreement, flagrantly (not innocently, but knowingly and flagrantly) breaking the law, and this literally disgusts me. I have no patience for it whatsoever. Don't knowingly bid on and go to a country that doesn't have a bilateral work agreement and then feel like you're somehow so special that the laws of your host country don't apply to you. THEY DO. You bid on that country, you follow its rules when you get there. If it's illegal for you to work on the local market, then DON'T WORK ON THE LOCAL MARKET. How completely gross is it to think that, since you're the spouse of a Diplomat, you can get away with visa fraud?  The same kind of visa fraud that my husband investigates back in the U.S. when it's done on our soil?  GET OVER YOURSELF and behave with ethics and morals! And trust me, the EFMs who are obeying the law and not working illegally are loathing the EFMs who break the law because it suits them.]

 
3.)   This is a Super Small Post:  Which means that everyone knows what everyone else is doing (of course). Before coming here, I thought that I would be able to navigate the whole fishbowl thing okay, but I found out my first year here that I could not.  Our family made some strategic changes over our R&R and, thus far into our second year, things are wayyyy better.  

 

Also, the extremely small size of the post could be either a good or a bad thing because, sure, everyone could be fantastic and life could be grand, *or* there could be even just one or two people who are malignant... and then the whole entire thing could be a net negative, because there's no real way to dilute malignancy at a super small post.  And when you're bidding, you have no way of knowing which way that cookie is gonna crumble.  


4.)   The Food:  Wait a minute, didn't I just list the food here as the #1 positive?!?! Why, yes, I did. But the downside here in Chengdu (not so much in Beijing or in some other Chinese posts) is that you pretty much can ONLY find Chinese food here.  There's not really any variety.  AT ALL.  So when you're going out to eat, you pretty much can pick Chinese, Chinese or... Chinese. And unfortunately, my children don't like the food here, though James and I think they're insane.


5.)  The Internet:  The good news is that we have it and that it isn't as bad as, say, dial up.  The bad news is that it isn't good enough to do a whole lot with.  Can't really stream Netflix movies.  Can't use for Skype or Facetime without getting kicked off a lot.  Can't make internet-based phone calls with it, which means that it's realllllly hard to talk to our parents or friends back home.  It's a pain.     


6.)  What the HELL am I Going to Make for Dinner?!?!:  Since Chinese food is all that's eaten here, Chinese food (Chinese produce, etc., which is totally different than U.S. produce) is pretty much all that's available here when you're shopping. Well, as I've said, my kids pretty much hate and won't eat the local Sichuanese food, and they're not alone...all the other Consulate kids I know refuse to eat it, also.  Which brings us to the problem of... what to feed our families?!? I sure as heck don't recognize and can't cook Chinese produce.  Nor does meat come pre-packaged like in the U.S.  So a lot of Consulate moms, when chatting or whatever, will throw their hands up and wail about how it's nearly impossible here to cook food that our Chinese-food-hating families will eat.  Which is why I'm so grateful that we have an ayi - she can make Chinese produce into food that my kids will eat.  Sometimes.  But "sometimes" is better than "never," which is what the kids would get with me.


7.)  Not Really Western Clean:  Okay, I'm being kind.  Restaurant tables are wiped with dirty cloths that also wipe the floors.  Sometimes there are roaches in the restaurants, climbing down the walls next to us while we're eating, and this is normal.  I've actually gotten used to it.  People hock up loogies and spit them all over the sidewalks.  Again - we're used to it now.  And, of course, we've already talked about the squatty potties and the split pants.  It's all just part of... normal life here.  


                                                 ~   ~   ~


And that's it!  


TEN positives and SEVEN negatives, my friends.  Because there's a whole lot to like about Chengdu! 


And be sure to head on over to Jill's blog this Friday to read about all the different posts worldwide and their respective pros and cons!

 

Slashing the Bidlist into Teensy Tiny Shreds

This is the first time James will actually bid, like, for real.  Because before this, when he was first hired, it was all just about which Field Office he was going to go for (there were just a few choices...we got Houston), and then it was us bidding off just the NOW list, which was very short (to get Chengdu), which means that this is the first time we've faced The Bidlist in all its unadulterated glory.


UGH.


A couple of months ago, when the AIP (Afghanistan/Iraq/Pakistan) bidlist presented itself (because it comes out in advance of the normal overseas/domestic bidlist), James actually was just a millimeter away from bidding on it.  He was gonna be all:




(But, of course, James is MUCH awesomer than that guy. Just sayin'.)  


But after literally weeks (WEEKS, I tell you!) of stressing Every. Single. Day. (and emailing everyone we could think of - Thank you, Everyone!) over which AIP position to bid on (they all had their respective pluses and minuses for James/our family), James was sitting at work and found that he just wasn't ready to push the bid button on AIP.  Not when he would miss a whole high school year of our youngest and last child.  Not when I couldn't go with him this time, but *could* go with him a few years from now, when our nest is empty.  So James decided to wait on the whole AIP thing and say: Not right now, maybe later.


So we went on R&R.


And got back to Chengdu.


And then The Bidlist came out.  With domestic posts and overseas posts and LORD HAVE MERCY, HOW DO YOU EXPERIENCED FS PEOPLE *DO THIS* OVER AND OVER AND OVER AGAIN IN PERPETUITY?!?!  


Bidding?!  Every one, two, or three years until you retire?!?!  Talk about





Anyway, James printed The Bidlist out and we stared at the pages and pages AND PAGES.  And then we decided that we had to something more than stare at it - we had to interact with it somehow. 


So James grabbed a black pen and he went to town.


SLASHED were all the overseas jobs that were exactly the same position as what he's doing now.  Because it's the sort of job that's awesome to do once, but it's not really supposed to be done more than once, or at least not more than once in rapid succession. Or whatever.  See: Job variety, the goodness thereof.  That reduced the overseas bidlist by easily half.


SLASHED were all the overseas jobs at posts that don't have high schools.  Because, you know, we love our kid and all, and our kid loves being in school.  That reduced the bidlist down a lot more.  Which SUCKED. Because we were all: Look at this awesome post!  We SO have to go there!  OH CRAP, IT HAS NO HIGH SCHOOL!  DAMMIT! DAMMIT! DAMMIT!


SLASHED were all the overseas jobs at posts that require anti-malarials. Now, if you are a family that can take them with no problem, like lots of folks I know, I'm seriously jealous of you, because your bid list will be much wider and deeper than ours. But we know for a fact (from past experience) that a certain member of our family cannot tolerate anti-malarials, and so those posts are off our list.  Which seriously sucks, actually, but it cannot be helped. This reduced our bid list by a huge amount, sadly. 


SLASHED are the overseas posts that will literally leave Zachary, our future high schooler, departing one post and going to another one in the summer before his 12th grade year.  Because what could suck bigger than starting a new school in 12th grade?!  Some private schools don't even accept kids who are coming in in 12th grade, and some public schools can't even figure out how to get incoming 12th graders graduated, especially with weirdo transcripts from a thousand overseas schools, or at least that's what I've heard. Yes, bidding will be easier when we don't have to worry with schools and timing a high school graduation. MERCY.

SLASHED (preemptively) are the posts that will quite obviously go to AIP bidders, who have preference. Hello, London-y, Frankfurt-y, Paris-y posts... I'm looking at you.  Because there's no reason whatsoever to be researching what the high schools are like in Brussels because, HELLO, ain't gonna happen. Which pared The Bidlist down even further, by quite a lot. Depressingly so, because it had already been reduced by a huge amount (see above).




(Except we don't really drink.)


With our shredded overseas bid list in hand, it was time to hit Real Post Reports and take a look at the posts that were left. 


UM?


I'm not gonna name any names, but if the Post Report for a certain city reads something like this:


Carjackings at gunpoint are extremely common. If you resist, you will be shot. In fact, several Americans with the [Embassy/Consulate] were killed here in [the last few years]. Some carjacked Americans are held for ransom. People often purchase/drive armored vehicles.  


Then we're probably not going to bid it.  JUST SAYING.  BUT THANK YOU ANYWAY.


Also, if the Post Report for another certain city says something like:


Dengue Fever is extremely common, as are many other diseases that cannot be vaccinated/guarded against, such as antibiotic-resistant Tuberculosis.  Also, do not eat any of the local food whatsoever, for you WILL contract Hepatitis.  Furthermore, the schools are okay, but they are roughly an hour and a half away from the housing, and the one road that connects them with the housing floods frequently and easily, making the road impassable and stranding the U.S. Government children on the other side of the flooding.  


Then NO. I mean, sorry, but NO. 


And on and on, lather, rinse, repeat.


James was wicked busy with his pet black slashy pen, y'all, so we'll see what happens.  The domestic bidlist got slash-yed up pretty nicely, also. After I surveyed the slashy pen damage, James and I then had the following very short conversation:


Me:  Huh.  I wonder where we will end up?


James (pensively):  Wherever The Drunken Monkey chooses.


Indeed.
 

[I'm assuming that everyone has heard the bidding lore of The Drunken Monkey, but just in case you haven't, it basically is a story within which a big, huge list of posts (or, alternatively, a map of the world) is stuck on a wall in front of a drunk monkey, and the drunk monkey throws darts at the list and that is how posts are chosen. All that to say: BE KIND TO US, DRUNKEN MONKEY.]

 

Dipping into the (e)Mailbag

Hello from China!


Yes, Matthew and I are back in Chengdu safe and sound, so that's good.  There were some United Airlines mishaps (cancelled flights, etc.) along the way, but NOTHING like what happened to my sweet friend Heather (not once, but TWICE), so I will chalk our journey back to Chengdu up as a success.  Because everything that isn't as hideous as Heather's experiences is a travel successes in my book!

Now that our first R&R is over, I am coming face to face with my unanswered email, and goodness almighty there are tons of them.  Sorry!!  This is probably because I seem to have freaked out the entire universe with this blog post of mine in which I basically said that our first year in Chengdu was... a challenge.


DS applicants, scared they might be making a mistake if they go forward in the hiring process, emailed me. Employees headed to China, scared of what may be ahead for them, emailed me.  Great questions were asked, and you know what?  I firmly believe that if one person emails me questions, that means that others would be interested in the answers, as well.  So here you go, world.  More blather from me.  You're welcome. If it's not great, I'll refund all your money back, LOL!  :)


                                               ~   ~   ~


                                DS APPLICANT QUESTIONS 


1.)  You mentioned how different the DS bidding process is from other FS positions. What does this mean?


Well, basically, if you're the type of DS family that would love to be posted overseas, it's difficult to not be jealous of other FS positions. This is because there are many more DS folks that would like to be overseas than there are open positions for them at any given time. The upshot is that many DS folks who want to be overseas often take jobs at unaccompanied posts in order to have preference during the next bidding cycle to go overseas.  If you want to be domestic, then life is great and all is well because there are domestic positions in abundance, especially in the DC area.  But if you want to be overseas, it's just really hard to "get out," as we often put it.  


It seems flipped for pretty much everyone else in the FS.  Everyone else in the FS has jobs in abundance overseas and (comparatively) very few jobs domestically. Therefore, it seems way way easier for everyone but DS to "get out" or "stay out" overseas.  It's just... life.  


2.)  From your perspective, was it a good move for your family to pursue a FS career?


Oh, absolutely. AB-SO-LOOT-LEE. 


Look, I write what I write on this blog because I feel like it's important for applicants (and other folks) to know that everyday life in the FS isn't all unicorns and rainbows and glitter and perfection. There are some unicorns and some rainbows and for those we are grateful. But life in the FS is just like life everywhere else... there can be problems sometimes. Not every assignment is going to be phenomenally amazing and even better than the assignment before.  That's just LIFE. That's just REALITY. It's reality for everyone who isn't FS, so why wouldn't it be reality for everyone who IS?


Would we do it again?  Oh HELLS to the yeah. I actually wish we'd done it sooner, because my boys are so old (ages 18 and 13) that they haven't gotten to be overseas a lot (this post is their first chance), and I would love for them to have had more of it. 

3.)  Has this career been good for your husband?


It's what he always wanted.  He always, always wanted to make it into federal law enforcement, and now he is.  He worked SO hard to be able to get here, and I am proud of him.  I'm allowed to be proud of him - he passed the BEX on the very first try, got through his pre-employment stuff within just a couple of months, never stepped foot on the Register (even though there was one at the time) because he scored so high during his assessment, etc. 


I've said this before, and I'll say it again... there isn't a single agency that could even begin to tempt him to leave DS.  NOT. ONE.  You name the initials, it doesn't matter, he would laugh at the idea of leaving DS for whoever it is.  I'm dead serious.  Not a single one in his mind (or mine, for that matter) can hold a candle to DS.  


Why is that?  Because of the dizzying array of possibilities that DS has to offer.  I mean, we just got our bid list (for what he will try to do after Chengdu) yesterday.  Pages and pages and pages AND PAGES of different jobs.  Sure, the juciest will go to folks bidding out of AIP, and we agree with that wholeheartedly.  But even once those folks have their choices, there will still be so many fantastic opportunities left (of course, it will still be hard to "get out" or "stay out" overseas, as I've said before).  But think of it - my husband will never have to sit behind the exact same desk in the exact same place with the exact same boss doing the exact same thing staring at the exact same coworkers every single day for the rest of his life like many folks.  I can't tell you how awesome it is to have so many choices. And for the choices to be is so many places.  And with such a variety of job types. Truly phenomenal.


4.) Is being overseas/being in the FS hard on a marriage? 


Uh, yeah. YEAH. There are divorces in the FS. There are affairs in the FS.  There is suicide, spousal abuse, child abuse, alcoholism, etc. in the FS.  Why wouldn't there be?  People are people wherever you go, whatever you do.  Problems like divorces, etc. are part of normal life anywhere.  I've heard that there are more divorces in DS than the national average, and I would surmise that that is correct.  This life can be seriously stressful.  EFMs can feel totally sidelined and isolated.  There can be boredom, loneliness, sadness, depression... you name it.  If it's part of the life outside of the FS, it's part of life inside the FS.  Again, why wouldn't it be? 


My dear friend Jill told James and me many moons ago (before we left for Chengdu) that the prevailing wisdom regarding marriage overseas is that, and I quote, "If there are cracks in the foundation of your marriage, then those cracks will be magnified overseas."  This is super duper true.  I'll go even further and say this about marriages overseas:


**Any issues you've struggled with in your marriage will be magnified times at least ten and thrown in your faces more often than you can imagine, just for good measure.**


So yes, there can be challenges to your marriage while overseas. But rest assured - James and I have been married since basically birth, and we will be married for many, many more decades to come. So you can be happy overseas, as well.  


5.)  Is FS life hard on your kids?


It can be.  My kids have been sick more often than I can even describe this past year.  They are lonely for their friends and neighborhoods and family back in the U.S., especially at holidays, and not just the big ones.  Absolutely - Christmas and Thanksgiving is hard. But Halloween was also hard last year, because they missed their old neighborhood and friends. They hate the food here (James and I think that's crazy, but my children are entitled to their opinions). They hate not having a real, solid, steady home. 


FS life can also be FANTASTIC for kids.  Mine love their school, and their friends at the school. It's great that they're getting a chance to be exposed to so much more than they would in the U.S., and that they get to travel around to so many different places.  I'm confident that being overseas is giving their lives a depth and richness that they would not have otherwise had.  So, you know: tradeoffs.  Just like real life anywhere.  Right?


6.)  Do you wish your husband had a career in the States?


Well, if I did, he can have it with DS.  We could park our little selves in the Washington DC area and never leave if we wanted to.  People do it all the time.  I mean, sure, every however many years he would end up going on a year-long unaccompanied tour, but trust me when I say that if we ever decided to park it in the U.S., we could park it in DC (and/or hop around to other states, actually, if we wanted) and never leave.  That's one difference I think between DS and the rest of the FS - I don't know if the rest of the FS would be able to pull that one off (don't think so?), but DS folks do it all the time for various reasons. 


7.)  What is life like for tandem couples when one spouse is DS?

 
Um?  James and I aren't tandem, so since I've never done it, I don't really know first hand what it's like.  I would imagine (and have heard) that staying together (you know - the whole bidding thing) is hard.  This is because, again, it's really difficult for DS to get/stay overseas. I mean, when you link a person whose jobs are mainly domestic (DS) with a person whose jobs are mainly overseas (everyone else in the FS), and you bear in mind that each overseas post has, whatever, a tiny tiny amount of DS people at it, comparatively, then I think you can see that there may be challenges there, especially as the DS person climbs the career ladder (the higher you go in DS, the less jobs there are overseas).  


I would imagine that it's far easier for both of you to end up in DC a lot.  But, really now - what do I know? I've never done it.  But I've heard stories of the difficulty of bidding and how the person who isn't DS can feel like their career is being held back by the person who *is* DS, etc.  But honestly, what is your alternative?  For one of you to be a career EFM?  That ultimately may suck bigger than trying to navigate the tandem thing.  


                                           ~   ~   ~


                      PEOPLE ASSIGNED TO CHINA QUESTIONS


1.)   I've been assigned to (insert anywhere in China) and I'm in (insert any kind of pre-going-to-China training at FSI) and HOLY COW, you're scaring me!  Culture issues/pollution/illness?! The heck?!?! HELP!!!


Okay, look.  In my desire to be a well-rounded (humorous?) writer, I seem to have given the impression that we all hate being here or something, and that is NOT what I've been trying to say!  I am actually very fond of China... I like China quite a lot. There are many, many things that are better here than in the U.S.!  I guess I need to do a blog post about that sometime, because I seem to have come across very negatively lop-sided and that's not been my intention.  


Your tour in (insert Chinese post here) will NOT be exactly like ours.  How could it be?  You are completely different people than we are!  You will be in a different city. Or, if not, you will have a totally different job, and/or you will have different experiences, and/or you will react to them differently. And - take heart! - I don't think there's any family at post that's been anywhere as sick as mine as often.  Nor are you, not to put too fine a point on it, MARRIED TO ME.  Lucky you!  Nor are you doing the exact same things we are, nor do you have a blog, nor are my children your children, nor...nor...nor, etc.  So please, don't worry, it will be fine, don't be upset! Forgive me for freaking you out, it was not my intention. There are a ton of great things about China, I'm sure your tour will be wonderful!