Weird concert

On Saturday I went out with two Polish girls. We went to the concert of so-called jazz band from France. Concert was at the very nice place, Shanghai Oriental Art Center. The building is called also the Blooming Orchidea. Both exterior and interior are very modern and interesting.

We all were looking very much forward to listening to some jazz. But it all went wrong from the beginning.... Concert started with an Italian song, kind of from 40, 50 ties. Nothing wrong with the song as such, but it got me completely confused since I expected jazz, if not in English then at least in French.

Volume level of the band and front man was bad balanced making it almost impossible to here him. From the first song I did everything to ignore/avoid the front man who was so extremely annoying that I couldn't stand him. His way of acting on stage was weird and tiring. He danced in the way that you usually see your uncles at the wedding shortly before it is time to go home.

The energy of the front man and the rest of the band was like black and white (cloths they were actually wearing). Eight guys practically not moving and the front man being all over the stage. The band was playing very good, but you couldn't feel the passion and the front man... yes, passion of an uncle from the wedding....

They had a translator, a very attractive Chinese girl who spoke both English and French. Front man spoke mainly French which was translated by the girl to Chinese. That left us without any knowledge of what they were talking about :)

The best moment of the concert was when about 40 young Chinese came on the stage and started singing...

The whole concert was filled with Italian, Spanish and French songs, one or two English... No jazz at all (if you do not count few nice solos on piano or drums).

We did not get what we came for, but we definitely got to laugh quite much.

Chinese people have a special way of experiencing music, deep deep inside their souls, nothing is showed on the outside...

crrriss, crrross

Last Friday Vincent came from school and started talking German-like... I thought that maybe it was because he was playing a lot with his German friend... But it turned out that he simply started saying 'R' properly :) He makes up words with strong 'R' and says them out laud. He has a lot of fun doing that :)

He continued the whole weekend and when he woke up this morning crrriss... crrross were still on the top of the hit list :)

Polish and proud!

"He speaks Portuguese with his Brazilian father, Polish with his mother, he was born in Sweden and speaks Swedish, he speaks quite fluent English and now he's learning Mandarin. During my 14 years of work overseas I have never had a student like this. I would like to welcome on stage Vincent De Paula."

Vincent with his teacher and Amy

Before the parade

This is how Vincent's teacher introduced him before he gave him a Global and Community Appreciation award, during the assembly of UN International Day of Peace at school.

All children in their national clothes

OK, I know he speaks all these languages, I am used to it and at the same time amazed every time I think about it. But to hear Vincent's teacher saying that in front of all students, teachers and parents made me the proudest mother in the world. I stood there, with a smile around my face (literally), taking 100 photos per second and felt how proudness and happiness are filling every cell of my body. My boy, with his shy personality, started international school and found himself there in an amazingly great way.

"Dzien dobry"

But lets start from the beginning....

Today was a big day for kids at school, and for Vincent it was extra special. As a part of the celebration of the Day of Peace, he was carrying the Polish flag in the parade (as he is the only child in the school having anything to do with Poland), he went on the stage and said 'Good day' in Polish (all kids with the flags did that in their languages). Later he has performed with his classmates singing 'Hello world' and playing paper board guitar (they made them themselves in the school). And after that he received his award. His friend Amy also got one. She is born in Singapore and has Dutch parents. She speaks Dutch and English and is the true citizen of the world :)

Vincent was so relaxed and enjoyed himself so much that for a long time I couldn't get my eyes dry...

Racuchy z jablkami :)

After the assembly we had a food fair with food from all the countries represented in the school. All food was prepared or arranged by parents. You should have seen all the kids (and adults)  with their mouth full of all possible food :)

I shared a table with Slovakia and made 'racuchy z jablakami' :)

It was a great day! Now Vincent is sleeping peacefully :)

Vincent speaks Chinese

We are still fully enjoying Vincent's progress in speaking English and yesterday he has surprised me big. He started counting in Chinese, as it was the easiest thing in the world :)

yi, er, san, si, wu, liu, qi, ba :)

Whitening not anti-wrinkle

Chinese women are not worried about wrinkles... They worry so little about them that there is no market for anti-wrinkle cream... When you go to expensive cosmetics store or to the supermarket, you have to look very carefully to find any anti-wrinke cream... When I asked about it, pointing at my very own wrinkles the girl didn't know what I meant...

What they worry about is to have a lighter tone of the skin... so you can find a lot of whitening creams...

And there must be something about it since it is very difficult to tell age of Chinese women. They all look young until they become very old and their faces are covered with a lot of wrinkles. And by then there is nothing you can (want) to do about it....

One-child policy

City Weekend has published information that 45% of Shanghainese  couples would not like to have more than one child even if the one-child police was relaxed... Children are seen here as an expensive investment...

One moth was enough

Vincent has been exposed to English since his very first days as we always spoke  English at home. Since some time we were noticing that he understand a bit of what we were talking about. But now the English issue became much more serious as he started the international school.

From the first day at school we could see that he was picking up a lot of words and expressions. He was asking about the meaning of words he heard at school.

But this weekend there was a break through... Vincent started speaking English. For the first time we had a conversation (all three of us) in one language :) We are used to hearing Vincent speaking 'foreign' language, but we felt so proud of him :) One month was enough for him to get going. We have tested him on various topics and he has impressive vocabulary as for 5 year old boy. He can even do the simple math in English :)

It is so funny when he initiate a conversation in English :)

Now we, parents have two important tasks to take care of:
1. Secure Vincents knowledge of Polish, Portuguese and Swedish.
2. Learn new language Vincent doesn't speak since English is not our secret language any more...

Two very bad decisions

When you move to a very different country with small kids (especially few months old) there are some things that you want to work without any problems. Before we left Sweden I was promised that Marcel will get all the vaccines according to Swedish schedule and made in Europe or US.

You can imagine my surprise when I found out during our visit at the doctor that two months earlier (exactly when we came to China) Chinese government has banned import of vaccines in order to support sales of locally produced ones... As for China, fully understandable, but as for me, a mother... bad news... A doctor suggested with a smile on her face that I can get all the vaccines I want in Hong Kong or Singapore... No comments...

Second bad decision was made recently by IKEA. They are limiting assortment in their food stores to only IKEA branded ones... That means no Kalles, no pepparkakor, no blue berry saft and more... The only hope is that maybe they will get suppliers for these goods that will brand them IKEA... Will you IKEA?

Marcel meets Emilia

Emilia is the cute and happy little girl, in more or less Marcel's age. They have met for the first time one week ago and it was an interesting event. Already at this age they both were playing 'hard to get' if the other one showed interest :) Fortunately they gave each other few minutes of attention... Let't see how it will look like on their second date :)

Vincent loves his school

After three years in Swedish kindergarden, Vincent became more open to new things. He is a little-big curious guy who loves knowing everything about everything. He keeps asking questions and as it wasn't enough with asking questions he is following them with next question: "How do you know that?". He makes me reading a little bit more, just to keep up with his interests :)

But now Vincent has faced new challenge, an international school with English and Mandarin as main languages. Vincent was extremely excited about the school. After two months without his Swedish school and friends he needed a change.

We went to school

on Wednesday and we got a general presentation for new families we also had a chance to see his classroom and meet his teacher. During the presentation, a short movie about the school and brief presentation of key persons there he was clapping his hands with everybody and had this wonderful smile on his face. He definitely enjoyed it! But the best part was still ahead of us.

When we came to his classroom, there were no other kids, just the teacher. Perfect situation, my analyzing kid had a chance to meet his teacher properly and discover all the toys in the room in a very relaxed atmosphere. The teacher turned out to be a male! He seems to be a cool person, but at the same time quite strict on the rules he has. Very good combination :)

Vincent got interested in some things in the room and started playing. After a while when he already felt comfortable with surroundings, the other kids came. Kids are funny in this age :) They do not approach each other, just go around observing others behavior or simply ignoring each other... :) After en hour he still didn't want to leave and I had to use persuasion techniques to get him out of there. The promise of next day worked pretty well.

His first days went very very good. In the morning, before we left the house he said "I am so happy, I'm gonna cry"... This feeling must have been very strong, because he said that in Polish to me and a minute later in Portuguese to Rodrigo :)

In school he listened to the teacher, played a lot and read books. When I came to pick him up, he made a comment that he didn't meet any kids yet... I guess all kids are still a little bit confused and try to find themselves in the new situation... The second day he said: "Mommy, can you pick me up a little bit later?" :) That was such a relief... he likes his school a lot! After second day I asked him "Can you understand when your teacher talks to you?" and he answered "Yes, and I also understood the movie we watched today". Great!

Vincent has a weekly schedule, including visit to library (twice a week), Mandarin classes (every day), art, science and physical exercise. He is wearing the school uniform. He has 10 classmates from US, Germany, Holland, China, Sweden and Norway. Quite a mix.

This weekend he was thinking a lot about Monday and what he will do in school. I just hope that tomorrow after school he will be as happy as he was last week!

The Great Wall is great

Last day of our Beijing holiday, me, Vincent and my mom, we were planning on going to the Great Wall. Of course, to be in China and in Beijing, the Great Wall is a must to see place.

To make it easy we bought an one day bus tour. Unfortunately weather forecast wasn't the best, but we hope bestanyhow. In the morning we went to the bus and the first rain drops starting falling down. After 15 min it was raining cats and dogs...

We stopped at another hotel to pick up more tourists. We were 11 persons, us three, one Mexican girl and seven Chinese fellow travelers.

We made a first stop at Ming Tombs. Very quick visit and nothing extremely spectacular, but interesting. After that we had lunch and during this lunch we saw how great Chinese people we had a chance to meet. They spoke very little English but somehow we manage to have a nice conversation. They were group of doctors. They come from a city close to Shanghai and they do not like Beijing cosine, therefore they brought some of their own food - a bag of dried small fish and a soup, or rathe a little plastic bag with some powder which the put into the big bowl of hot water. We were offered both fish and soup, which we kindly accepted with a smile on our faces :)

They were making sure we ate and drunk enough :)

When we got to the wall it was still raining, but much less. The first thing we did was to buy rain jackets which turn out to be made of a foil like very bad garbage bags. But we didn't have a choice and we took what was there :) They were in very bright colours, light blue, yellow and purple :)

We started climbing. You can definitely say that millions people has done the same. Some steps were 'sampled' by human feet. Some steps were very low and some very high, which made the

whole thing less easy. But nobody promised it will be easy :)

Here our Chinese friends showed again extraordinary politeness. One of them was carrying an umbrella over Mexican girls head and the other was waiting for us to make sure that everybody will make it to the top. One man took Vincent's hand and helped him to take the steps. Vincent though it was a lot of fun and got very high tempo and our Chinese friend held up to it. We got a bad conscious for that, but he seemed to enjoy it :)

After one hour we reached the top! The view was marvelous. High mountains and many kilometers of the wall throughout them. It was definitely worth the effort.

And right then, when we started going down we understood that going up was a piece of cake compared to going down. But Vincent again took the lead and almost run 'downstairs' :) We came 15 min behind :)

After we came down we had a great cup of coffee and Vincent had ice cream with his little Chinese friend :)

I want definitely to go back there, to see different part of the wall. And since Rodrigo didn't go with us this time, probability of going back there with him is pretty high :)

Beijing ZOO - buuu

Day 1 in Beijing.

We decided to start with something extra important for Vincent to set up his spirit high up for next few days. Since we started talking about moving to Shanghai, he was very excited about Panda Bear and it became quite a motivation for him to come here. He wanted to see Panda Bear. We wanted to do it too, so we took of for Beijing ZOO.

In general, idea of zoo isn't really the best by it self, but you get your hopes high when you finally decided to go there.You want to get amazed by the nature, take few interesting photos and in a way relax...

But in Beijing ZOO you get three times NO...

1. You do not get amazed by nature, because the animals do not live a fancy life there...

There was not a single animal that had a normal living conditions.

You could watch pandas from behind the glass window. One of them was sitting at the gate as it wanted to escape. The other one looked like she was a very old or very sick... The biggest pleasure from Panda area was to look at the souvenirs...

Wolves were the saddest view... Four of them were 'exposed' in sort of glass cage in size of 5x5m with ONLY sand. Not a single leaf or bush. They were digging holes in the ground trying to hide. Their fur was dirty and matt. Some of them were injured. When I saw them I immediately thought about Nordens Ark in Sweden and the wolves living there on the big forrest areal representing truly wonderful species.

A tiger was sleeping in the shadow as it was around noon and very hot and steamy. People were throwing water plastic bottles to force him to move...

Bats were constantly photographed with a flash as people tried to see them. They also tried spitting on the glass counting on their reaction...

2. I didn't take many photos, because it turned out to be the least inspirational place I have been to.

Well, it was very dirty, a lot of garbage on the ground and almost not a single one garbage bin... There are some works being done (I hope improving anything) so we could hear a lot of noises coming from saws and drills...

And as if it wasn't enough there is a huge highway going just above...

3. Relax - forget about it!

So many people... Everywhere... Shouting (their way of being)...

If you plan on coming to Beijing, I recommend you to focus on historical places and skip the zoo...

Beijing is big

After unpacking and arranging our house, it was time to do something nice. Why not to go to Beijing for couple of days?

Weather forecast didn't look very promising, but since it hardly ever turns out to be true, we hoped for the best.

We took the bullet train, the (very) fast train between Shanghai and Beijing. It took me some time to get used to average speed of 306 km/h that was displayed in the wagon. But after two hours I stopped thinking about it:)

It is a very convenient way of traveling since it takes only 5,5h and it is 1318km distance. And it is definitely part of Chinese charm and a way of meeting Chinese people.

Our wagon was almost empty, so it felt very comfortable, also with our 4 months old baby. I got very surprised when on the way to the restaurant I passed few wagons fully packed. They were very crowded (obviously), laud and smelled with all kinds of food. In the aisle of every wagon you can find a tap with cold and hot drinking water. The hot water is used by passengers very often to make an instant soup. One soup - ok, but 100 of them give a really heavy mixture in the air. I said to Rodrigo that I am very happy with our places. Of course on the way back from Beijing our wagon looked exactly as I described it above - crowded, laud and filled with smell of all kinds of all kinds of food...

Beijing is huge. It is enormous. Its main avenue is 40 km long and 50 m wide. 8 lanes each way...

One day, me and my mom decided to walk back to the hotel with Marcel in the carriage. He was sleeping and we like walking... On the map it didn't look too far away. And since we like walking...

After three hours walking we haven't even made 1/3 of the distance... We tried to catch a cab, but for some reason any of the empty ones (they were only 5 by the way) didn't want to stop...

We took a bus and two subway lines and after one more hour we got back to the hotel. A very happy moment for our feet :)

Typhoon Muifa spared us...

It didn't feel good when media started warning for the worst since many years typhoon approaching East coast of China. At first it was classified as 'super typhoon' (strongest in 4 steps scale), but then it was still almost 1000 km away from the coast. Later it was 'just' a strong one. They were saying that the waves will reach 12 m and winds will be 160-170 km/h...

The feeling got even worse when they said that about 300.000 people has been evacuated from the most 'risky' places along the cost.

Then we found a letter from management of the compound that we should prepare for the typhoon, close all the windows properly, hide any loose items and stay at home during the whole weekend.

The whole Saturday we were checking the weather forecast and latest news on the Muifa. It felt really good when it turned out that typhoon had changed its path and went more into the sea.

It all ended up in just slightly stronger winds (60-70 km/h), few broken tree branches and some rain.

Thank God, this time, the fact that nature is unpredictable played in our favor...

Let's go to China and buy some milk

When we leave our compound, just outside the gate, 'real' China starts. Hundreds of mopeds, bicycles, small shops and workshops and an everyday life of Chinese people. It makes quite a contrast to the compound. After few walks out there now we say that we go to China to buy some milk. Instead of going to the big grocery stores for small shopping, we simply run to local supermarket, where all the products are local and what naturally follows, everything in the store is in Chinese, so we really need to know what we want to buy :)

Tonight I went with my mom for a walk and after walking inside the compound we got bored very quick, so we decided to go to China. After half an hour we were passing by a square at the quite big cinema and theater building (I guess it is a cultural center of the district, I think I also saw there a library and since it is a huge building there must be much more). I heard a music and after having a closer look I also saw that people were dancing. I had to get even closer...

It was dark at the square, no additional lights beside these from the road. The music sounded like the laud speaker was covered with loads of cotton pads and the Chinese hits were played.

There were about 10 couples on the 'dance floor', ladies dancing with each other, men dancing with women as well as women dancing solo. You have to know that it was not a joke! I wish I had my camera with me (I did my best with phone camera) to be able to capture seriousness on their faces and in every move.

I noticed that few couples were dancing similar routine, so it must have been some kind of 'folk dance'. Some of them were very gracious, some did their best to be gracious.

So, basically you could take five minute for dancing, just after you bought some milk or just on your way home from work...

What was most surprising to me was how natural it seemed to be for them to dance on the street. Specially, that I see Chinese people usually wrapped up in their politeness, rules and defined ways of acting, covering their faces when laughing, like it was something wrong to laugh. And here, out of nowhere this... Loved it :)

(pls, note that I wrote 'speaker' - one speaker... as it turned out later the speaker was placed in something that looked like a part of a bookshelf, with a door covering partly the speaker, so that you can not take it out, without a key to a big locker... The bookshelf was on wheels. It was rolled out from the square, back to the building by the lady responsible for it when the time was over).

I will have to check next Saturday, if this is a regular Saturday event in 'my' China :) Who knows, maybe one Saturday I will get to dance :)

What will I do with my life...

A moment of reflection over his own life... I guess...

From Manhattan to Wisteria Lane

No sky scrapers, no heavy traffic, no business men and women running to their meetings any more… no great view from the window, no TV tower blinking to me every evening, no Chanel or Gucci boutiques…

Instead, a quiet compound (from the traffic), filled with sound of billion of cicadas…

After a month in the temporary apartment in a city center, we have finally moved to the house that we are supposed to live in for the rest of our time here in Shanghai.

I feel like I had exchanged Sex and the City to Desperate Housewives… But the desperate housewives seem to be missing… Right now most of the houses are empty… All families left for holiday to their home countries.

Do you know the feeling when you drive a car and you are the only one driving your direction while on the other side there’s a plenty of cars…? You start wondering if you’re the last one to know about a complete disaster while everybody else run away from it…

This is how it felt to come here. There was nobody, except people working on the gate J

More and more people are appearing and the streets start to become more lively.

I am sure that I (we) will enjoy living here. I haven’t tested yet how complicated it is to get to the city center, but in worse case scenario I can always take a taxi J

Why did I do it to myself?

When you come to a new city with a 4,5 years old son, and

the kid does not have same routines as at home, you need to find many ways to entertain him and make it interesting. So, I looked for most popular attractions in Shanghai... One of them turned out to be an exhibition of wild-life insects...

You can do a lot for your kids out of love :) So, we went there with my mom, Marcel and Vincent...

First surreal thing was a big group of Chinese kids that came directly after us. Kids were divided in few groups, each one with two-three adults with headphones and microphones.

They were talking (shouting) to kids, desperately trying to keep them in some kind of order. They were so loud that Marcel started crying. We waited for them to pass...

When we could focus on exhibition, we realized that the name is quite misleading as there was a seal, small monkeys, alligators, turtles and other animals definitely not being insects... But OK...

I do not like insects, how I don't like them...! But since we came there and Vincent was asking 60 questions per minute I had no other choice but look very carefully at every single bug.

I was just looking at a shining green bugs trying to find an answer to one of Vincent's questions when my mom came closer to me with Marcel and he gently touched my arm. I jumped up like all these green bugs just escaped their 'cage' and landed on my arm... This is how much I don't like them...

Even if I do not like insects, I am still a curious person and like to get to know the unknown

:) But having a closer look, not always is a good idea... Because then you can see what you maybe wouldn't like to see. In general, I must sadly say that the conditions the animals are living there are not the best ones you

would wish for living creatures... It was not a pretty picture... I will save you the details, but I am very concerned before out visit at the zoo here...

On the pictures few examples of what animals you could see there (except the one with Ch

inese kids) :) ...

I am also saving you the most ugly ones...

The heat has hit...

After rainy, cloudy and foggy June, sunny and hot July has come. As Shanghai Daily has reported today, temperature today and yesterday has hit the record level this summer; 38 C. The air stands still and the heat embraces you so tight that it feels like there is no escape... Having a walk outside is far from being pleasant and the only thing you can do is to run into as many stores on your way as possible. They usually has a well functioning AC... But at some point you have to go out and face the heat...

In the evening it doesn't get better... Temperature goes down to... 35 C... The only relief then is that the sun isn't burning your skin...

So, what you do is shower, shower and once again shower...

On the photo Marcel enjoying his shower/bath after spending some time out in the Chinese summer...

My ability to speak Chinese...

Today I had my first Chinese class, or Mandarin, if I should be more correct :)

First of all i decided to go to school by metro, just to get to know the city better. This trip proved me again how huge this city is. On the map it didn't seem to be dangerous, but I needed 50 min to go from door to door... And it was only three subway stops... :) Anyhow, it went almost perfect, beside one moment... I used the map to find the school and I was on a good way until I started thinking about how hungry I was and at this moment I lost focus... This resulted in taking a wrong street... I had to call school to get some help and after 10 minutes I was there.

I rang the door and a little Chinese girl opened it with a wide smile on her face. This little girl turned out to be my teacher, a grown up women :)

Next moment shows how misleading perception can be... After first talk she says that I look Chinese...!!! And when she opened the door she was surprised that a Chinese girl (me) comes to learn the language... :)

I do not have to mention, that first half an hour was completely shocking for me as my teacher was speaking a lot Chinese and expected me to repeat whole sentences...

But now I can proudly say that I can count to ten and write every figure in Chinese and pinyin J

一, 二, 三, 四, 五, 六, 七, 八, 九, 十

Different, strange and interesting things about Shanghai, part 1

After almost two weeks in Shanghai I had a chance to observe and conclude :) There are many things very different from what I am used to, some are very strange to me and almost everything is interesting.

What is interesting is a huge interest of Chinese people in non-Chinese kinds and babies. What is starange about it is how strong they react…

During our first days, we were walking close to the TV Tower (Oriental Pearl Tower). There were of course many Chinese people enjoying the day. Many people were pointing at us and especially at Marcel and Vincent. And so far nothing strange about it… Suddenly a small group of people came closer to Marcel and started taking photos of him. One girl grabbed Vincent and asked her friend to take a photo of them… That has created a crazy spin of new people coming to us and taking photos of our kids. We were so surprized by this behavior that we didn’t react in any way… Until we ’woke-up’ and started walking through the crowd.

The other day, my mom was walking with Marcel in his carriage in the shopping mall and again, suddenly, some people came and took the cover we were using to protect him from the spot lights away and started looking at our little boy, talking very loud and pointing at him to other people passing by.

I know he is very cute (J), but this way of acting gets quite scary…

The umbrella industry in Shanghai

Coming here from Sweden I am definitely used to the rain and wind. And I am used to rain and windproof jackets. It is almost a fashion in Sweden :)

Here in Shanghai you do not have it... What you have here instead is umbrellas... When it rains everybody have one... If you are in a shopping mall and it starts raining, do not worry, there are many people selling umbrellas just outside the mall...

If you already have one and you enter any shop with a really wet umbrella... again, do not worry that you will make a floor wet or shopping will get uncomfortable because of water dropping from your umbrella... at the entrance of every shop, bank or other institution you will meet people handing out plastic bags for your wet umbrella or you simply place it in a wrapping machine... There is no way you can be found guilty for making any place dirty or wet :)

When it gets sunny, everybody takes out umbrellas again to hide from the sun :)

Now I have to get one as well, maybe I will fit in a little bit better :)

First 9 hours!

Last night Marcel slept 9 hours in a row :) Not bad as for a 3 months old baby :) He definitely belongs to our tribe of 'Celebrating the sleep' :)

After such a good sleep he was in a very good mood.

On the photo, Marcel talking to grandmother :)

...new in Shanghai...

The first week has passed... a lot of first impressions and thoughts... I noticed that my way of experiencing this place is different from as it would have been, if we came here only for holiday... I always think about ways of dealing with everything that is different in the future... since we will stay here for a while :)

Living in the very central part of Shanghai has a good side... it is very good start point for visiting city. I cannot say that everything is very close, because nothing is close here :) But it is definitely easier to reach various places. If it only wasn't raining almost every day... But as I have heard today, only couple of weeks more and the weather will change :) to very hot and steamy one... :)

Interesting thing in my perception of this place is that it doesn't feel so strange as I expected it. I find my way around and enjoy it :)

But there is one thing that 'worries' me - language... It is difficult without knowing mandarin... and English doesn't help much... It is the biggest motivation for me to learn basics of mandarin... Let's see how it will go :) So far I recognize two words - exit and entrance, as well as 1, 2 and 3. Not bad, isn't it? :D

Shanghai is a huge city, but for some reasons not so overwhelming and there is something strangely calm about it (I know it may sound ridiculous, but it is true :)). This city, simply make sense :)

Until mid July we will live in the apartment on 21st floor with a very nice view to the sky scrapers on one side and the river on the other one. Then we will move to a calm area a little bit outside city center. So, I hope that until then we will manage to visit most of the places here in the center :)

And the boys:

Vincent - what a great big brother he is :) Marcel adores him as well. Vincent is very excited about China, he absorbs everything and feels very confident and self going. It feels good for me and Ro.

Marcel - today we made him laugh :) There are many wonderful things in the world, but baby's laughter makes its own category, not comparable with anything... Just lovely :)

10th of June it is...

After many weeks without any news, suddenly a lot got fixed and arranged.... and the most important thing - tickets... they are booked for 10th of June and there is no way back... Finally we will all be together as we used to, before the whole China story started...

The moving company is booked and will come soon to pack our things and get ready for the shipment.

Temporary apartment is also booked, so now we also know that we have a place to stay before 'our' house will be available. This is of course a big relief... :)

In so called meantime, M is aiming for 10th week of his life :) And for me it feels like he has been with us since 10 months... His smile that I got to see a lot is something really wonderful, you never get enough :) see yourself :) Great, isn't it? :)

new chapter... new circumstances...

...yes... things can turn pretty different from what you have expected... and of course it depends quite much on what and much you do expect... the biggest fun is when something you did not think of has happened... :)

...after many years in Sweden it started to feel like home... nothing strange actually since I got my own family and home... my own place with my own people... and time for change has come...

...to try new things is healthy so why not do that... being on maternity leave and not working can be done anywhere in the world... so why not in Shanghai...?

...in one month I will put my feet on the new ground together with my three guys, husband R and sons V and M... I am pretty sure that it will be exciting time in my life when everything gets settled... but before that... all packing and preparing to make this all work... heaven help us... :)