How We're Spending Our Days

A giant garage sale, the sound of packing tape becoming like nails on a chalkboard, the kids running off almost daily to continuing filming a movie with their friends, checking the weather in Minnesota for September, midnight phone calls to the loan company in the States, one more order from Tao Bao, catching up with a friend I haven't seen in a year over a foot massage, a long, actually cold, walk in the morning around the park, homeschool curriculum purchases, dinner with old friends, taking breaks with episodes of Suits, rethinking what we really need in those 6 suitcases we can take back, disassembling thousands of Lego pieces, negotiating one last Build a Bear party with friends, using up the oatmeal, caramel and chocolate chips in a stellar dessert, finding time for a family photo, the more frequent flow of tears . . .

This is how we've been spending our last days here.

Feelings about The Move

When we ask our kids, "How are you feeling about the move?" their most common response these days is an exasperated, "Stop ASKING me that!"

We might be asking too often.

It's all part of trying to keep our finger on the heartbeat of this transition. While our kids don't necessarily like to produce a response to this question when we ask, there are plenty of other times when they volunteer the information. It comes in random comments like Megan saying, "Mom, this is the first move I've done where I'm going to be sad." (the others she either doesn't remember or we were moving to places where we already had lots of close friends and weren't leaving any behind), or Ethan telling me, "In the morning when I wake up, I'm excited to move to America, but in the afternoon when I play with my friends, I'm sad."

So how is mama feeling about the move? (it's ok - I'm not tired of the question yet!)

Most days I'm ready. It feels like the right timing for us to go. We've been doing a lot of "last time to this place" trips around town and while I thought I'd be sad, instead I'm just filled with happy memories of them. It's a sense of "we came for such a time as this" but that time is done and it's time for new memories in new places.

I'm finding great satisfaction in sorting through and purging our stuff. I like knowing that we are stripping down to what we really need and use, and are able to bless others by giving them the rest. I'm thrilled that it only costs a little more to have people pack for us so I don't have to spend my last two weeks doing that.

I'm excited for things like family, libraries, Minnesota in the fall, water from the tap, letting the dog run in the yard, our future home, shopping in English (no more wasting time trying to read labels in another language!).

I'm a little fearful about leaving the role of expatriate. It's one I've had for 13 years and through several moves it's stayed with me. I'm afraid people in the U.S. will think I'm "home" and all is well, and not be able to understand the reverse culture shock that is inevitable. 

And I'm sad to leave. I hate that I will have to say goodbye to my friends here because they are great friends who love me well. I could try to placate myself with the knowledge that we can stay in touch so easily by many means, but the truth is that they have part of my heart. I am deeply blessed which makes it devastating to leave them.

So that's a whole salad bar of emotions for you. Feel free to ask me in another week or two - there will probably be even more.

Just don't ask the kids. :)

House!

This is the sign our neighbors across the way posted last Saturday after hearing that the bank in Orlando accepted our offer on a house there. It's been a long and at times frustrating process, but we're nearly there (pending all those details with the loan and what not).

If you're curious, the address is 14419 Nell Dr, Orlando, Florida, 32832. We hope to get everything settled before Erik goes radio silent out in the Wild West of China this Thursday.

Rejoice with us and pray that all goes well with the details!

House Hunting

We have never owned a house. That's one of the by-products of living overseas for 13 years in a state of flux. The most expensive thing we have ever purchased was our car in Singapore. That actually felt much more daunting than this, maybe because buying a car in Singapore meant swallowing the fact that we were paying probably twice what the car was worth, while most of the houses in Orlando are selling for about half of their previous price. It is, indeed, a good time to be a buyer in Orlando.

Yesterday, we saw 11 houses. A few of them were easy to write off the list. One of them, as we drove through the neighborhood to get there, I realized I didn't even need to view (we did anyway. It had a nice kitchen). Of the 11, four of them have potential, but none of them are a no-brainer.

One of the last houses, nicely situated 7 minutes from Erik's new job in a beautiful, "Was this built by Disney? Do they colorize stuff down here or is it actually this green?" kind of neighborhood, seemed ideal. Bank-owned, which normally could mean, "Be prepared to witness something akin to a prison riot scene," it was beautiful, huge, well-kept. There were only 2 downsides-no "nature view" for my outdoor needing husband, and no downstairs full bath.

I know, I know, we're spoiled right? There's a bedroom downstairs, but no full bathroom. So what this says to the many guests we anticipate is, "Sorry, friends, no shower for you, unless you don't mind walking through our house to the upstairs bathroom you get to share with our kids who will soon be teenagers and I've heard teenagers spend a lot of time in there."

But such seems to be the case with each of these houses. There's just one thing about them (wrong location, no yard, odd layout, etc) that keeps us from jumping on them.

It's possible that the bathroom could be converted into a full bath, if we take out the closet and put in a rather small shower stall. But we're sitting here wondering, "Should we just go for it? Or do we wait for something better to come along?"

Looking Forward

Now that we've said our goodbyes and are picking up the pieces of our broken hearts, it's time to look forward at the next step. In two weeks we will move up north, closer to our office. While packing box after box and dongxi bag after dongxi bag (these are plastic like bags that zip shut. Dongxi means "stuff"), I have started thinking about our new apartment and what I'm excited to experience in it, like:

1. A double sink in the kitchen
2. Dishwasher
3. An island with stools next to it - breakfast is served!
4. A guest room, maybe two!
5. That beautiful duvet I bought at Hola for the guest room
6. Using the shower curtain and towels in the guest bathroom that I never could part with but haven't needed for the past 3 years (and the new bathmat that matches them that I got for my birthday!)
7. Bright, bright rooms
8. A five minute commute to the office, door to door
9. An office in our home
10. Beautiful new paint colors
11. Stairs! I haven't had stairs in my house since right after college
12. Leaving behind the leprous walls of this apartment (from the water damage)
13. A giant homeschool/playroom
14. A closet! Chinese apartments rarely have closets. They just use wardrobes
15. That huge built in shoe/coat cabinet in our main room
16. Friends across the street and down the street in more than one direction - so many people we know who will be close!

That last one is probably the best (and I'm not just saying that to counter the material emphasis of the previous 15 thoughts). I'm not thrilled about the packing and unpacking, but I'm excited to think about how much fun it will be to live in!

Changes

I just sat down and thought through the number of families we know who are shifting houses this summer - some across town, some to other countries. It's at least 10. This mass shift should happen between the beginning of June and the middle of August. I hope someone out there is willing to make a lot of casseroles for unsettled people. I also hope our city has a good supply of cardboard boxes.

Erik meets with the landlord today to talk about all the things that need to happen in our new apartment. Can you imagine what it takes to outfit a house that is currently 260 sqm of concrete? Thankfully we have water and electrical supplies to the right places already. Erik made this amazing excel document with expanding tabs that outlines everything that needs to be done in every room. He asked for my help last night. I'm not sure how much I was able to contribute, as my help consisted of looking through my Pottery Barn books and putting tabs on pages of things I want to do that have nothing to do with construction.

By this fall we'll have made a lot of decisions and a lot of changes, as will many others. Will be interesting to see how it all looks once the dust settles.

Moving On

Our lives as expats are filled with change. The most difficult of that, of course, is when the change in our relationships. Over the years we've said goodbye to more friends than we care to number.

This summer we'll say goodbye to our closest friends here, the family who came through training with us in 1999. Our experience with them has been the true definition of community - doing life together. We're so thankful we've been blessed to be next door to them this year! It will be devastating to say goodbye to them, but their move will also facilitate one of our own.

We've decided that with them, and another family we love, leaving, combined with high rents and cost of living in this part of town, and our current distance from the office, it makes sense for us to move to the north part of town. There, we will be close to Erik's office (instead of an hour away!), and will be within walking distance of people we work with. The rents are significantly cheaper and the houses are bigger.

We think we've already found one of these cheaper and bigger apartments, so we're excited! The landlord is fantastic and seems to not be in great need of money, which means he's not asking much from us. The apartment is on the 12th floor across from our office. We're thinking of installing a zip line down to it. The main downside is that the new area of town is not exactly a beautiful place to live, and our apartment in particular is devoid of surroundings where kids could play. This will be particularly difficult for Erik the Outdoor Man, but will not have much impact on Gina the Girl Who Could Live Happily in a Bunker. I will miss running along our canal though!

We plan to move in August, after our friends have left. Between now and then we will be working with the landlord to "zhuang xiu" the apartment as it is currently an empty concrete shell. Pictures and stories of the crazy process sure to follow.