Wednesday, July 25, 2007

An Old Post... Reposted

I wrote this the day after we moved into our apartment, which is nearly two weeks ago now. I was unable to post it because we didn't have internet access yet, and Scott attempted to post it from work, but with all the Chinese symbols in place of English, it didn't happen correctly. Tonight he is in Hong Kong, and low and behold, he can view blogs there! He looked back through old posts and realized this one hadn't made it. The day I wrote it was sort of a pivitol day for me, as you will see, so I am trying again with the post!



THURSDAY'S GIFT

I've been wanting to post for several days now, but have been without internet access since we left our hotel. Now I am trying to quickly write something that Scott can post for me from work tomorrow. Hopefully our internet access will be up and running by the weekend.

We moved from the hotel into our apartment yesterday afternoon, even though we don't have our air shipment yet. We decided to try to "rough it" without kitchen stuff, toys, etc. We did get some plastic silverware and one cheap cooking pot to use until our things arrived. Also picked up an inexpensive set of dishes from IKEA the other day. It's great to be here, lots more space than the hotel and the kids are enjoying arranging the few things they do have here in their rooms.

The big news is that we found some friends today! We ventured to the outdoor beach/pool this afternoon, and within 10 minutes Seth and another boy were chatting. Caleb joined them in the sand a bit later. Finally my curiousity got the best of me, and I went over to say hi myself.

"Mom, this is Brandon. He lives in building 2, and he's going into 5th grade at Concordia."

I could hardly believe my ears! A fifth grade boy, living a couple of buildings over from us, attending the school our boys will attend this fall.... has made friends with my fifth grader.... 24 hours after we moved into building 6? God is amazing.

But it gets better. A little later I figured out who Brandon's mom is, and I went and thanked her for Brandon's friendliness. She started a conversation with me right away, and we ended up talking for quite a while. Her name is Paulina, and their family moved to Shanghai from Oregon a year ago. She also has a seven year old daughter... like us. She had a rough start when they first moved here, but loves it now, and was full of stories and encouragement for me. When we parted ways to head home for dinner, she gave me her number and said she'd love to have the kids over to play, and would love to get together, and that I can call her for anything.

I clutched the scrap of paper all the way back to our building and up the 48 floors to our home. Paulina may not end up being my best friend, or even a close friend... but she reached out, smiled, spoke English, and offered her phone number.

It's a huge gift, and I am so very thankful.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Lynne,

I asked my coworker Rachel (who I mentioned in a previous comment) about whether all blogs were blocked in China, and she said that unless there was political content, they shouldn't be, and that your problem is most likely a technical one. She suggested talking to someone in tech support, either from your ISP or maybe someone from Scott's company, but she was surprised you're having this problem. Hope you can find some way to make it work...