Hello Family!

Guess what? We're in China! I know I posted on our blog, but I thought I'd give you some more detail and other entertaining things.

Jaime did pretty well on the flight. She slept a lot, ate a lot, cried a little, and Justin walked her up and down the aisles for the rest. We got economy plus seats, and those were just fine with us. It was a long flight, and we were both exhausted by the end. We landed, got through customs just fine, and found a bus, train and taxi to get to our friends' apartment. When we went to get on the bus the driver lady saw we had a baby and refused to let us on the bus. She was concerned for us because there was standing room only on her bus, and she told us of another one to go to that would have more room. We found it, got on, and it took us at least 1 and 1/2 hours to get to Shanghai train station. We got there and found out they were fresh out of train tickets to Nanjing. We wandered the street for awhile not knowing what to do when someone approached us who had bought tons of extra tickets because they knew the tickets to Nanjing would be in high demand and sold them to us for about $20 extra which was fine by us! It was better than staying in a hotel for the night. We had a two hour train ride and then were met by our friends who took us the rest of the way.

They took us to the grocery store and showed us how to set up cellphones. Fyi, Justin's number is 1-385-148-0239 and mine is 1-385-192-6747. You can call us on those but we can't call you on them. We can call you via skype, but we aren't moved in to our place yet with our own internet so we'll have to wait on that for awhile. We looked at a couple apartments and think we found one. It's a very good price but the water heater is powered by solar panels. When there is sun the water heats up, when there isn't it doesn't. So there is no/very little hot water. The people who currently live there boil water, mix it with cold water and pour it over themselves to shower. We think we can get the landlord to fix the situation, so we're trying. We also went to a department store and were able to buy Jaime some clothes the next size up and then went to Wal-Mart. Wal-Mart is very expensive compared to other places here, so I don't think I'll be going often. We walk so much here! Even to get to a bus or the metro, it's a long walk. A day of errands ends up being a long day of walking. My feet have been hurting a lot, but from what other people have said, I'll get used to it. I love the food here so much! But, I'm also going through American food withdrawals. The stuff I miss most is pizza and anything with sugar. Justin says maybe we can get pizza for my birthday (they have it here, but it is very very expensive).

Justin has started classes and I think they've been going okay, you can ask him about it, or I'll ask him to blog about it. So far our biggest worries have to do with Jaime. I worry constantly about all of the germs. China is a VERY dirty place. Kids pee in the streets all the time, raw meat hangs outside every shop, no one washes their hands and everyone tries to touch her. People smoke everywhere and have no concept of not smoking around babies. It's also pretty cold for her without a carseat, so we've had to buy some marshmallow suits for her. And finally, the jet lag. Oh, the jet lag. Justin and I adjusted marvelously, but Jaime, not so much.

How is that for detail? Too much?