china « Random Thoughts Today and Tomorrow

{December 7, 2009} Update from China – Notes to Self for Future Trips

I made it to Shenzhen, yet again with my two little kids. I think everybody including myself were expecting this to be the worst flight so far. It’s been extremely tiring on all of us in the past. I was expecting it to be hard on me because of my son, who is now 14 months and just such a boy.

Instead, surprise, surprise! It was such a refreshing flight. They both slept remarkably well. My son didn’t want to wonder the hallways too much. He did a little bit in our first-class cabin, but didn’t have to chase after him into business class or economy or anything. And he took a 2 hour nap after wards. And fell asleep as we landed. I got breaks to eat. I got breaks to watch a little bit of TV. It was amazing.

My daughter slept well too, and had a long nap all the way until the landing.

Adjusting the two kids jet lag is an art that I like to think that I have mastered. This time it is going well beyond my expectations. My son usually sleeps at 9 pm Pacific time and wakes up around 8 am. That is 1 pm and midnight China time. So that is what we are working with. The week prior to leaving, we started trying to let the kids sleep later and later. It was a bit tricky since no matter how late I slept with my son, I would still have to wake up early the next day and I had interviews.

In China, they usually would go to bed around 2 pm and wake up a little after midnight.

This time it was just amazing. First day they both slept around 5 pm. We were in aww. Even more in aww that they both woke up 3/4 am. Second day they slept around 6/7 pm. Both still woke up around 4/4:30 am. But it does look like this time it will only take a couple of days to adjust.

Now tips to myself for the future. We always mail clothes and we mail summer clothes. Just in case it is soo hot and we can’t buy any summer clothes locally. And we bring little winter clothes thinking we can easily buy all the winter clothes we want.

This plan has been fairly backfiring. We end up with loads of summer clothes, fell rushed to go buy winter clothes.

I think in the future it is to mail winter clothes. What they ultimately need is long-sleeve t-shirts and medium thickness sweat pants. Don’t need that much shorts, or tanks, or dresses, or skirts.

Looking at the weather pattern is will be in the mid 60s to 70s for this week in ShenZhen. Very comfortable.

We did mail summer clothes in the case we go to Sanya – which is in the mid 80s. So it might work out this time in that sense.

I also brought one thick set of winter clothes for the possibility of going to Nanjing – which is unlikely as it is raining all week and it is in the mid 40s to low 50s.

For myself – the main thing is to have two pants that I love, two shirts I can easily interchange. And one comfy cardigan. I think I did well this time packing. Just not as much long-sleeves shirts for daughter (only two) and socks for son.

I’d just like to see it go easier next time. Mail more clothes that we need, and less that we don’t. And we can always adjust as the weather gets colder.

All this might be moot, since I don’t know when is the next time we will do such a trip. And in April we will be going to Nanjing and the weather will be completely different.

Addendum: For the past few days here in Shenzhen, it has been a lot warmer. It gets to 85 in my room. The t-shirts and shorts have come in handy. Can’t go outside in shorts, yes in T-shirts. I think it would still be best to mail some t-shirts, not as much, and just of couple of shorts for son, none for daughter. A good thing to remember is that the clothes dry a lot faster when it’s warm, so we don’t need to worry as much about laundry backing up.

{March 5, 2009} Panoramic Pictures

I’ve been playing with a panoramic program called AutoStitch, this is what I have:

Another view of the ocean with the sun setting from our main windows.

View from the other side of our building; the city of ShenZhen.

{March 3, 2009} View From ShenZhen

View from ShenZhen to Hong Kong.

This is the view from the balcony of where I stayed in ShenZhen. It’s hard to tell, but across the way is Hong Kong.

{February 10, 2009} Sam’s Club / Walmart in China

I’ve never been to a Sam’s Club in US, but I assume it’s huge like a Costco. I’ve been to Walmart. I think people can agree with me when I say it’s where we go for the cheap stuff. Not so good quality, but cheap.

So there’s a lot of things that we’re used to having in the US, that’s kind of hard to buy in China. Not impossible, just not usually at the local farmer’s market. So we go to a nearby Sam’s Club/Walmart. It’s just simple things like butter and cheese.

First of all the parking lot is truly kickass. There’s a little light and sensor above each parking space. It’s red of there’s a car and green if it’s empty. Instead of driving slowly around looking carefully for a space, you can go straight to the green. I love it. There are always things like this that I wonder why isn’t really incorporated in US. But then, it’s never quite as crowded in the US as it is in China.

The other thing I noticed is that everything at Sam’s Club/Walmart is really high-end and expensive compared to the local stores. I’m not very good with brands and such, but I do know Clarks just because I have a pair for work. Sam’s Club/Walmart had a little stand for Clarks.

Going straight to the butter/cheese. It’s interesting, because here at a local supermarket you can find like a dozen different brand of cheese and butter. There probably isn’t a huge difference between them, but the point is that the market is really saturated.

There at China Sam’s Club/Walmart, there was only one brand of cheese and butter. Not the brand that I buy in the US. I’m sure this brand had to cut a deal with Walmart.

I can’t help but think that the US brands that haven’t made it into China are probably missing out on some profits.

Another brand I love and was able to still get in China – Dreyer’s ice cream. A lot of brands, even though it’s technically the same brand, the product is extremely different. I don’t really understand it. Well I understand that the “American” brand bought in China, is really made in China. But isn’t the “American” brand bought in America also made in China?

I’ve written before about how Mead Johnson’s Enfamil’s formula is really disgustingly sweet and completely different in the two countries. One label – two different products.

Now I’m writing – the Dreyer’s ice-cream is even better in China.

{February 9, 2009} Adjusting Your Babies Jet Lag

My first born is under 2 years of age and she has already been back to China three times. Dealing with jet lag is always a pain, especially when coming back to the US. However, I believe my husband and I are really getting better at it.

This last time was different, because now we have two babies. We’ve looked up the internet on this jetlag issue before and the advice is always to adjust them early, even before you get on the flight. But most of the advice is assuming people are traveling between states, not halfway around the world.

This time, we followed the advice. We let the babies sleep later and later everyday so that they were going to be around 11:30 to midnight. We did this because our flight to China was leaving at 12:30 am. So we figured it’s better that they can stay awake until the plane takes off.

Going to China is 15 hours, coming back is 12 to 13 hours.

Going to China – our bedtime is their afternoon (around 2 to 3 pm). So it’s not that bad. We just go to sleep around 2/3pm and wake up around 2/3 am. And we move that back by 1 to 2 hours everyday. It’s actually kind of nice to finally be an early bird for once.

Coming back is always the hard part. Because now, our bedtime is like 8 am in the morning. It really doesn’t help to go to sleep at 8 am in the morning and then wake up 8 pm at night and just be awake all night. In the past, we’ve also tried to adjust backwards where we made our daughter sleep an hour later each day. That really took a long time to adjust – almost 3 weeks. And it was painful. This time, we adjusted forwards. We would wake our daughter up and hour early each day. This worked so much better. She adjusted pretty much in a week.

We really couldn’t apply the same strategy to our son – the younger one. So that was the tough part. As my daughter got adjusted and he didn’t – I found myself being up all the time. As soon as she fell asleep, he would wake up.

Either way, it hasn’t even been two full weeks and they are both adjusted now and I’m just happy I can get 6 hours of sleep per night.

I think this experience is preparing me for residency.

{September 7, 2008} Boom of Chinese Immersion Schools

My husband and I have given a lot of thought as to how to encourage our children to still be Chinese language savvy while growing up in the US. We’ve even thought about the possibility of moving back to China and sending them to international schools. Basically we care about them being excellent in both Chinese and English.

Since my husband and I both came to US when we were little (7 and 4 respectively), we know how hard it is to force kids to learn Chinese. He and I both fought our parents hard against going to Chinese school. In the long run, most of our Chinese was greatly improved after high school, when we both realized how important it is.

We have looked into many, many options. Some of these has not happened yet; play dates in Chinese, starting a Chinese Cultural Center in Davis, etc. Some things has happened; we bought a bunch of DVDs in Chinese only from China (Shrek 1-2-3 in Chinese, Baby Einstein in Chinese, Teletubbies in Chinese), we try to speak only Chinese in front of our little girl. This is all because starting this week, she’s enrolled in city classes Monday through Friday, which will all be in English anyway. We’re not as worried about her English development, especially with a mother who as in honors English and a father who took AP English.

However, at the end of the day, we really don’t want to be constantly worried about sending her to great afterschool programs and camps just because they are in English. We don’t want to worry about “not if”, but “when” she’ll start fighting us about learning Chinese.

So I’ve been doing some research on Chinese Immersion Schools. The information I’ve found has been amazing. Just public schools alone, there’s two in San Francisco, another on in Hayward, one in Cupertino, and one being discussed in Palo Alto. These are all happening in the past 2-3 years. Then there’s the private schools, one of them is opening in Berkeley this year and another in SF. There’s a ton more: http://www.fccncalif.org/schools.htm.

And we just found out that there might be an immersion school in Sacramento and Woodland – both very close to us in Davis.

Another awesome thing we just found in Davis is a Chinese-English bilingual daycare. There’s a long waiting list and they accept kids starting at 3 years of age. There are tons of these places throughout the Bay Area. I used to do after-school tutoring at a place like this when I was in high school. As to the quality of this place? – It’s hard to say. We went to meet with the director, who is very nice and does all the Chinese teaching herself. However, there was not a single poster in Chinese on her walls except for a poster about “bo-po-mo-fo”. Either way it’s better than nothing.

In the long run, I think the best thing would still be doing frequent trips back to China. This way my kids will have a motivation for maintaining their Chinese.

{August 29, 2008} Packing for a Baby to China

So now that I’ve traveled to China, again, with my baby, I’m much wiser about what to pack for her. And basically, don’t bother packing lots of things.

Pack: clothes, blankie, favorite toys, bottles (you can easily buy bottles there, but you need them on the way there anyway), just enough diapers for being on the road, and formula (see last blog for reasons why)

What you can buy in China: basically almost everything, besides good formula

- Diapers: just as good and maybe even better. We bought ultra thin ones (I don’t think that option even exists in US, but I’m not sure, I don’t usually buy pampers). It was great, we just changed more often, used a bit of butt paste and my daughter never got a diaper rash, even in the extreme Beijing heat!

- Bottle sterilizer: can be easily purchased for several hundred RMB. These were great. You place the already cleaned bottles in these plastic pots. Put in the required amount of water and press the button and the bottles become sterilized. Convenient for hotel living.

- Baby wipes: comes in big packs and easy for travel packs. And there were types where it was safe for cleaning hands, not just the butts.

- Baby lotion, shampoo, soap: There are so much more baby lotion options. Like milk lotion. I personally like the one that comes with spf 15, bought that for my daughter to be used in US. Lots of baby toiletries for purchase.

- Baby butt paste: I saw a bunch of types, didn’t get to try it out since I had brought my own.

The bottom line: Basically there was so much more that could have just been easily bought there than I realized. The only thing is to definitely bring your own formula. Other foods, like rice formula is readily available as well. Really would have saved me a lot of packing both ways.

{August 29, 2008} Mead Johnson Baby Formula: Exploiting the Chinese?

Perhaps this title should pertain to ALL BABY FORMULAS in China. I was quite disappointed by what’s on the market over there.

So from the beginning: my 17 month old daughter drinks Mead Johnson Enfamil’s Next Step formula. And they should be darn happy for this too, because she goes through a large can a week. Most babies in US switch to cow’s milk by 1 year of age. That’s what my preceptor/baby’s pediatrician recommends. The main reason why we kept her on formula is because of my mother. She runs a daycare and she really believes that babies who stay on formula until age 2 gets sick less. It’s not really a big deal. But we figure we can afford it and we do travel so much, it would be more convenient with a baby that’s healthy all the time.

My baby’s pediatrician, who was also my preceptor, gets all these formula samples from all sorts of companies of course. He gives them all out as soon as he can. However, the Next Step is the one that he never gives out. He thinks it’s a scam and it’s just concentrated milk. So while I was on his rotation, he gave them all to me. My baby loved it. She loved it more than the first Enfamil. I’ve tasted both, Next Step does taste a lot better.

So we went to China for 3 weeks, I was almost adamant that we would not need to bring any formula. I’ve seen Enfamil brands on the shelves in China – shouldn’t it be the same thing? I’m so happy I listened to my mother in-law. We brought three 32 oz cans and two smaller sample size cans and that was almost not enough!

As we started to run low, we went to the local supermarkets. First we brought Enfagrow for 1 to 2 years of age. She hated it. She would take a sip and not drink the rest. No matter how hungry she was, she would not drink it. It was incredibly sweet. I don’t know what this company is thinking! It was like drinking corn syrup. How can China not have problems with baby diabetes with formula as sweet as this? As sweet as this – it’s also more dehydrating and dangerous for the baby than replenishing.

I can’t put all the blame on Mead Johnson. I also bought other brands while I was there just to compare, all of them were incredibly sweet. It’s obvious the main goal is to hook the babies. It’s disgusting.

Finally I bought a step down from Enfagrow, which is Enfapro for 6 to 12 months. It’s also very sweet and my daughter wouldn’t drink it as well unless I mixed it half with Next Step. This is how we made it through our last week and barely made it back to US with enough formula for my daughter.

While in China, I was getting so desperate, I emailed Mead Johnson just in case I was missing something. Maybe I was buying the wrong one. Maybe this isn’t their formula? It’s a knock-off?

They forward my email to a rep in China and this is the response I get – “Mead Johnson products which supplied at China market are made in China with import raw materials and under very strictly control and meet both China relative standard and Mead Johnson standard.”

I was very disappointed. I don’t understand why they can’t supply a product in China that’s the same as what they supply in US. I’m assuming that US has better standards, why can’t they meet that in China? I was so excited with the idea that I had picked a global brand, just to find that it’s completely different in China. Really can’t rely on just a brand name I guess.

I’m also very disappointed in all these formulas that are just way too sweet. Juvenile obesity and diabetes is a growing problem in China, and these companies are not helping. I’m glad drinking formula is not as commonplace in China for this reason, but it is a trend that is growing. The common thinking in China is that formula is getting better and better. But as a future doctor, if someone asked me, I would still recommend breast-feeding for sure, especially in China. And don’t trust Mead Johnson just because it’s label is on a can in China.

{August 7, 2008} One Beijing Taxi Driver

Today we decided to take the new bullet train from Beijing to TianJin, max speed 350 km/hr, total transit time 30 minutes. It’s been open for 6 days. It was a pretty awesome trip, had a great meal eating famous TianJin BaoZi (meat dumplings?). However, the best part about today so far was when we got back and got into our taxi and met our taxi driver; Yang Shifu (master).

This taxi driver was the most talkative driver we’ve met so far. He asked me where we were from. He thought at first we were people that lived and worked in Beijing. But I guess after a while, he changed his mind. He said the more the thought about it, the more it seemed like we weren’t natives. I said I was from Taiwan and that everyone else with me is from JiangSu.

Me being from Taiwan – really got this guy talking. He is actually heading to Taiwan soon for a vacation with his wife next month. He’s going for about a week. He talked about how he’s been to Macau, Hong Kong, and Tibet, but not yet Taiwan. “Since Taiwan is part of China,” he says, ”I have to go see it.”

We’re all pretty amazed. How does this taxi driver get to travel so much? First thing we asked though – was how was Tibet? We’re all interested in going, but worried about getting altitude sickness. So he goes on to say – well he was in the military in the 70s, so he keeps himself in great shape and had no problems. It’s about a 2 day train travel to Tibet, and maybe a couple of people did get sick, but not in a need to be hospitalized kind of sick.

Once he mentioned the military, air force to be precise in GangSu Province, he had to direct his attention to me. He talked about how he really wanted to attack Taiwan back in those days. “But now, there is no need,” he says, “I can go to Taiwan and see how it is for myself.” He said he wanted to meet the taxi drivers there, see how sanitary Taiwan is, and see if there is anything he can learn from them.

Since this driver was so talkative and friendly, we asked him about great places to eat in Beijing. This is where he told us that he wouldn’t know because he’s Muslim and he only eats at restaurants that he trusts. But he did mention quite a few great Muslim restaurants we can visit.

So we had to redirect the conversation back to his lifestyle – you can just tell this is one guy that knows how to enjoy life. His wife is a “Model-Worker” – I believe a big deal in Beijing. She’s in sales. His son is 23 and works for Bank of China. Him, he makes about 5-6000 RMB per month just being a taxi driver in Beijing. That’s after paying his company for the car, gas, and other expenses.

We asked him about where he lives, and he said he loves his house and it’s huge. (About 1100 square feet it sounds like, maybe small to most people in US, but not to this guy). He said he got to (zhan au yun guan) or “basked in the glory of Olympics”. He was part of the communities that were torn down for Olympics construction. He used to live in a traditional Chinese styled villa (si he yuan). The government tore it down and gave people like him reassignment to brand new homes. He states he loves it. He was so proud of it, he had to point it out when we drove by.

He boasted in a prideful kind of way about how the money he makes just goes to enjoying life, his house is paid off and he figures he doesn’t want to go to his grave regretting about this he never got to enjoy.

I loved this guy, I think we all enjoyed our time with him. It was a long trip back to our hotel, but I don’t believe anybody noticed the time. It was a refreshing point of view to meet someone like him after so many negative articles from the western media. We even told him that too. We said all we ever hear about is how there is no religious freedom, minorities are repressed (he’s part of a minority group that is traditionally Muslim), and how Beijing locals like him can’t possibly enjoy Olympics with his house taken away from him etc, etc. We said all this, and he was quick to refute all that. He said he loves how the government treats him and his family. He’s obviously an open Muslim all his life and he got to serve in the Air Force. He was so proud of being Chinese and living in Beijing. He boasted that Beijing was the best city in China and in the world. He talked about how plenty of his foreign customers says Beijing is even better than Paris, France.

Yang ShiFu – thank you for being such a joyful taxi driver. It really made our day. We all came back to the hotel hot and tired, but with a smile on our faces. He gave us a wonderful, refreshing view of Beijing people.

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