So far the visit to Kaohsiung to see my parents have consisted mainly of:
Morning - get woken up by the kids, yell at the kids to settle down as they start destroying things, get dumplings for breakfast from vendors downstairs, dress the kids in swimsuits and head to the apartment complex's swimming pool
Afternoon - naps, sometimes by the kids too, then walk to a mall and let the kids play at the arcade because it's too hot outside; usually joined by my mom at this point
Night - dinner, see my dad during his brief break from work (although not at all tonight), fight with the kids about proper bedtime for one or two hours, then I stay up waaaay too late relishing alone time (such as not sleeping until 2:30am last night and wanting to kill myself this morning as the kids jumped around me)
Today followed the above template, with a slight, ever-so-exciting variation of dental check up for Declan and shopping for kindergarten supplies at Carrefour. Growing up, I've noticed with bemusement the huge "back to school" sale catalogues for the local shopping centers in Oregon. Since I did my own school supplies shopping in the US, and most of the time at garage sales, going to Carrefour to pick out lunch set, water bottle, etc school supplies for Declan today was my first ever participation of this autumn ritual. I felt like such a MOM, and it made me strangely giddy.
I also stopped by Eslite to see if they carried the Divergent trilogy by Veronica Roth in the original English. Astonishingly, they did not. This lack was not what astonished me--it was the fact that Eslite did however carry the Fifty Shades series in both English *and* Chinese. How is such a stupidly written* porn-in-words "literature" ubiquitously found in every country I've visited since the series' conception, while a beautifully-themed post-apocalyptic dystopian fiction series like the one by Roth is...not. Is this me being a literary snob? No, I think I just actually have standards.
*based upon 15 minutes of skimming through the first book in the series at the bookstore in Horev Center. The first clue was the email exchange format in huge chunks of the book (yuck!) and the last clue was how it feels like reading the diary of a drunk 12-year-old.
In the end, I bought the Chinese version of Four. (They didn't have it in the original English.) It's been on my ebook hold list at the Vancouver Public Library. Sadly, Joyce's generously shared library account recently expired and so kaput goes the hold list too. I figured reading Four in Chinese will help me improve my language even if it turns out to be a dud.
Five more days left in Kaohsiung before we ride the high-speed rail back to Hsinchu (and Daniel solo onwards to Taipei for a conference). I hope we don't get stuck in this particular routine.
Just watched Divergent last night. I liked it! Theo James (swoon!)-sorry, my feeble human side. I can now read the book but not sure if I should read the remaining two or just read as each movie comes out (such a LONG time) since the book is almost invariably better than the movie and I hate feeling disappointed.
ReplyDeleteHope you can get more rest and that Declan likes preschool and finds new friends soon!
Yay that you watched Divergent! Seriously, Theo James... I was at the movie theater with several other moms and only one of them was unmoved and slightly bemused by the rest of our...interest in him. The books *are* better, but this movie was surprisingly satisfying in its own way unlike The Hunger Games adaptation. I recommend reading the books now so that by the time more of the movies come out, the details are vague enough to appreciate the movies as their independent storylines. Comparing always disappoints.
DeleteThis routine sounds all too familiar, Amy.
ReplyDeleteIt's reminiscent of our vacation schedules, where everyone's time clock is totally out of whack so naps are skipped and meltdowns are regular. Pat and I wake up in the mornings just wiped from the ordeal of the night before: trying to get the kids to sleep (cos they're always wired at night), and then staying up wayyy too late trying to get some "me" time. :P
Ahaha, well, I'm glad I'm in good company. :)
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