laundry, needs

Hi everyone,
there is laundry onsite. You can buy detergent here for pretty cheap.

Don't buy normal diapers, but preemie. Those are the only ones that they want, b/c there's an apartment, literally, full of diapers.

Don't buy endosporin, I bought too much of that already :)

Infant Tylenol is always great, so is hydralife oral rehydration powder.

Fer-In-Sol and Poly-vi-sol are vitamins that they use when they have it available to them, but they don't use it all the time.

I bought a bunch of hydrocortisone. But I didn't buy any balmex, so that'd be good.

They need shoes for babies, hit up some garage sales, lots there :)

Yeah, hope that helps.

see you soon!

Joan

Thanks for offering to wait up for me at the airport, I realize I land almost an hour after Callie, but if it's not too much trouble for us to get the same ride that'd be great. : )

Don't worry Ysabelle, I haven't started packing yet either! When I went to Beijing last summer for 3 months I brought enough clothing to last me about a week and a half to 2 before I had to do laundry. Speaking of which, another for you Joan: are there laundry facilities nearby and should we bring our own detergent?

Another thing I was wondering was if everyone plans on bringing items from the needs list. Room in my backpack may be sparing but I can always pack my carry on nice and tightly! Some good family friends of ours work closely with the Johnson & Johnson company so I'll try to get in touch with them to see if I can get baby diapers en masse or anything else that may be needed. Said family friend is very excited about my trip to China and super interested in the work we'll be doing, so I'm sure she'd be willing to help out. Any thoughts? I'll also see if there are any old movies I have lying around.

One more thing! I met a friend of my brother's last night who's been living in Shanghai for about 10 months working for an advertising company. He's from Montreal like myself and speaks fluent Chinese so it was great getting a bit of a refresher (and talking in code in front of everyone else... heh heh). It made me really really excited to practice my Chinese when I arrive!

Take care everyone and see you all soon! : )
-lb.

Towels, souvenirs from home, ARRIVAL details

Hi Everyone,
I found towels, not sure if you want to use them or not, they seem ok :)

________

Also, souvenirs from home... I visited some friends here in BJ and I brought macademia nuts... Other things that my family appreciates in Taiwan is coffee, though not everyone drinks it here. Someone at Tufts said that the Ai-ee's appreciate American candy (checkout aisle candy), I think they found that nice, and were quite surprised. But I don't think that's what I would have brought myself.

Keep in mind it is getting warmer, so if you go all out and get fancy chocolate, just be careful :)

Any gift is a surprise, and I wish I had prepared more gifts than what I had brought. Sorry I'm not much help in this area.

________

Also, I will be going with the driver to pick each of you up. I'm average height (in Asia) and until my friend brings my contacts, I also wear really thick glasses. I'll be either with a driver or by myself, we'll have a sign with the CC logo and hopefully smiles on our faces if your flight is delayer ^_~

There are ATMs in the airport that take VISA and one with MASTERCARD, but the instructions are in Chinese. Otherwise, there are banks that you can exchange currency with, but you need a Chinese person with you to do so. Lastly, there is an ATM nearby here, so you can walk over and use your VISA. Hope that helps.

________

Here is the order of arrival.

Tim - June 20 - 2:50

John - June 21 - 3:00

Anna - June 21 - 1:50

Callie - June 23 - 3:00

Lauren - June 23 - 3:55

** Callie, you are in terminal 3. Lauren, you're in 3 also, we'll wait for you :).

Ysabelle - June 23 - 6:00

Ok, I believe that's everything I have to share right now.
Ladies, need to tell you I have two cats that I'm babysitting for a neighbor. Looks like they'll be with us for a day or two but hopefully I'll get them back to her asap.

Okee dokee... SEE YOU ALL SOON!!! Soon you won't be able to check your emails and the blog!

reply to Ysabelle - driver, exchanging currency

Hi Ysabelle,
you DO NOT need to pay the driver who picks you up. Sorry if that was a confusion. A ChinaCare driver will pick you up.

As for exchanging money, my dad mentioned yesterday that Chinese currency is not open-market. I thought you could exchange money in America, but I'm not totally sure. Give it a shot, if that doesn't work, then bring American currency to the airport and exchange money there. DO NOT exchange money from any one except banks and the airport, otherwise, getting fake bills is a possibility.

For the last 2 weeks, I think I've lived on ~200-250 RNB at most, and that was including some gifts for home.

Hope this all helps!

Joan

"Souvenirs from your home town"

anyone have ideas about what might be appreciated? I'm puzzled.

by the way, Joan, I like your email away-notification :)

movie nights! how fun! i'll try to see if i have any kids movies, but i think all my dvd's are in my apartment in austin (which is 3 hours away from where i live). but that's exciting!

i just got the e-mail from diana which had all our arrival days/times on it. i'm the last one to get there! sad. haha. i haven't even packed yet! how do you even pack for 2 months? i've never had to pack for such a long amount. i don't think i even have enough clothes for that amount of time.

oh! question: joan, you were saying something about giving money to the driver that picks you up? is that right? how much do i need to bring? and where can i get some money exchanged to RMB over here (the bank)?

take care everyone! and have a safe flight!!!

ysabelle

Movie Nights!

So some interesting things have happened in the last hour.

I spoke with the British English teaching woman and this is what I found worthy to share:

1) we're all invited to a (very shortened) version of "Sound of Music" performed by the older fostercare kids, June 26th.

2) Kid's movie nights are in the works! So if you have any Disney/Pixar, awesome kids movies/shows; that'd be great if you could bring those. I've asked my dad to send over VeggieTales but other stuff from you would be cool :) Maybe one movie night a week, either Saturday or Sunday.

3) Adult English class is over because the teacher is leaving. So I offered to do some of that, and I hope you're all interested also. Basically, it's "English Corner", which means that it's a time for people to practice English with a native speaker, colloquial kind of stuff or topics, w/e :)

Movie night for staff was also an idea brought up, but I think that American movies here are so cheap that bringing it over isn't totally necessary...but if you've got favorites, by all means :) Otherwise, slidereel.com (which I haven't visited) has American movies with Chinese subtitles, which would be good for them.

So yeah...some ideas to toss around.
If any one is very generous with sharing and happens to have a mini projector, that'd be kind of cool to have...but very luxurious :)

:D I'm just excited right now, :)

see you all soon!