Melanie Fischer

Volleyball season officially ended and Morton was asked to practice and play a friendly tournament on the highschool varsity ping-pong team. The competition was pretty tough, but Morton held his own – pretty good for an 8th grader playing mostly among seniors!

I was invited on a tour of the American Embassy art collection. The first tour they’ve given in over three years. The work was a beautiful collection of mostly contemporary art with some old photographs of foreign diplomates – some from well over a century ago.

Two weeks ago the kids had off from school Thursday and Friday. Trying to squeeze in as much traveling as possibly while Celia’s in China, I planned a trip. I warned the kids that we would have to carry our bags all day – so carry very little. Dan could bring other things the next day. Of course, at 5:30 in the morning, with departure in 30 minutes, I’m still talking Morton down from his three bags. In addition, to be consistent in the way I plan trips – I was still making reservations and decisions as we were heading to the airport. We flew off early Thursday morning (Celia had a party Wednesday evening) to Xiamen. Xiamen is a coastal town in the south east of China with about 3.5 million people. A lot of foreign ocean trade went through Xiamen. Downtown Xiamen is an island and another smaller island off of Xiamen, Gulangyu, is where the foreigners set up their headquarters. The kids and I flew in and jumped into a taxi to the old downtown area which has a walking street with the curvey hutong streets surrounding it. We wandered around, bought our obligatory refrigerator magnet, found a hole in the wall restaurant to buy a pretty good lunch, and then caught the ferry to Gulangyu.

Two blocks away from the ferry we lost the tours which were following their flag holding guides and found lovely quiet hutong streets and an ocean side promenade.

Large banyan trees grew along the roads and over old walls. Large old European estates in various states of repair and disrepair lined many of the interior streets.

After much wandering we found the large old estate we were staying at. Entering into the estate walls we walked into a blissfully calm environment, set up for tea service in front and a lovely garden in back. A small room next to where we checked in held the most beautiful traditional Chinese dresses I’d ever seen. There were no tags, and I assumed they were out of my price range, but I asked if they were for sale. They were for rent. Visitor rent the dresses and have themselves photographed in the gardens and in the beautiful old buildings of the estate. I have found this is a very common thing to do in China. Many of the famous sites (the Forbidden City, the Summer Palace, for example) are surrounded by stores that rent time period costumes and photographers who will photograph you as you tour the sites.

That evening we headed to lovely seafood restaurant and ordered all their vegetarian dishes ( and one delicious bing (pancake) dish that included a tiny bit of seafood – sorry Celia!).

Around five years ago we were sailing up the Spanish coast and one of the towns we stopped in had these places were tourists were putting their feet into water and tiny fish were nibbling on them. We thought it was very strange, but Celia and I have discussed it a number of times since then, so when we saw the same type of place across the street from the restaurant, we figured we had to try it – so after dinner we went in. No amount of coaxing could get Morton even in the door. First they gave a painful foot/lower leg massage. Then they cupped the souls of our feet – putting a flame in the rubber cup and then getting it to suction to our feet. For whatever reason the cups wouldn’t stick to Celia’s feet. Finally we put our feet into the fish filled water. We laughed hysterically. It was so strange. I’m not sure if it did anything for our feet – but it was definitely an experience.

Once our feet were lovely from being nibbled on, we went looking for desert. We got these cute treats that are basically batter poured into egg shapes and then cute faces burned onto them to look at us while we ate them.

The next morning we had a lovely Chinese breakfast at the hotel before wandering back to the ferry to meet Dan at the airport.

After picking Dan up at the airport, we headed to see some Tulous. Tulous are beautiful old family compounds that were built as fortresses out of clay- the most lovely were built as circles. Each family with in the extended family would have their kitchen on the ground flood, storage directly above and sleeping room above that. The middle of the compound is outdoor space and sometimes as the extended family grew an additional circle or two were built inside the original circular building. Traditionally the bathroom was outside the compound, but more recently families have been adding bathroom facilities. Pretty crazy and amazing! Unfortunately most of the younger generations are leaving their family tulous for more convenient locations and/or more modern facilities and they just return to see family for the Chinese New Year holiday. Apparently during, I believe the 1970s, the U.S satellites saw these buildings and thought they were Nuclear reactors!

Late that afternoon we did a hike up the hills behind the tiny town of Zhangzhou. The air and the view were so lovely – and as a tea drinker – a little embarrassing how little I knew about how tea is grown. At least here, they are grown on bushes cut short into low rectangles.

That night we stayed in a beautiful smaller rectangular Tulou. As most of the family had moved out of the Tulou, one remaining couple, whose kids are grown, was running it as an inn.

The next day, Dan and I woke early to take a pathetic but also glorious (air and scenery were fantastic!) run up the hill the town was nestled in. The door to the Tulou was impressive and more of a feat to open than we are used to.

After a run and a quick shower we had a lovely simple breakfast and then headed out to see a few more Tulous and tiny towns. We saw what is apparently the largest Tulou (sadly I forget the number of people it houses).

Then we walked to a beautiful Tulou which sadly now only houses animals. I’m thinking it would be a fantastic artists’ retreat!

We stopped in the same town with the largest Tulou and the animal housing tulou at a tiny hotel and had a coffee.

Before leaving the Tulou area we visited a few more Tulous – including one that had two circles inside the outer circle. It was a shame to loose the yard in the middle, but it was a pretty amazing structure.

We then had our driver take us to a town an hour north up the coast from Xiamen called Quanzhou, home to around 7 million people. It is considered the start of the Sea Silk Road. Quanzhou is considered a third tier city – so foreign tourists don’t really go there but a friend, Dong, was taking her daughter, Autumn, there to check it out for the weekend and encouraged us to meet her there. Dong had heard that being a third tier city, Quanzhou was able to avoid having much of their old neighborhoods knocked down for high-rises that most of the big cities have experienced. I spent a lot of time trying to book ourselves into the hotel Dong and Autumn were staying at and was told that they don’t take foreigners but eventually I was able to get Dan’s assistant to get us two rooms. The hotel was in the old hutong area – so excessable only by foot – getting there through a maze of walking streets. It was lovely.

The main attraction in Quanzhou is Kaiyuan temple. After settling into the hotel we headed out to see it. Walking there we walked through what must be the most major tourist street. It was crazy crowded!

We stopped along the root to get a roof top view from a building that had a fancy bake shop inside.

Kaiyuan Temple has twin tours. They are are made out of stone and are incredibly beautiful (one can be seen behind the lady with her pastry). I had never seen one that looked like this.

We then ran back to the hotel and met up with Dong and Autumn to have dinner. Walking to dinner Celia and Dan stumbled upon this dog that was dyed to look like a panda. Pretty crazy!

The next day after breakfast at the hotel, we head out with Dong and Autumn to see some old beautiful temples.

The first temple was Confucian where we have been told people come to pray for good grades. Dong showed us how to do it, we lit incense and then made our wishes. I’m not sure my kids cared very much.

It was very interesting seeing how the walls of the temple were built, between the bricks were areas of mud based, or sand based cement. Any architects out there can explain why?

We then went to an old mosque. There were the old walls and then a newer mosque sitting next to it.

Outside the mosque we decided to try a cup of sugar cane juice that this woman was making. It was good – though a little too sweet to finish.

Then we headed to one last temple. I believe it was buddhist (I need Dong to confirm). The building was over the top ornate but it was so crazy crowded we couldn’t bear it.

After lunch we wandered the hutong streets some more and went back to see the towers again as the girls had missed it the first time around. The boys took a Morton detour and apparently found a place to shoot a bow and arrow.

Then we said, “Goodbye” to Dong and Autumn before heading to the airport back to Beijing.

When we got back to Beijing Celia was very excited to see Milo.

Since we got back:

I went on a lovely tour of this art area in Beijing that was designed and built by Aiweiwei and now houses very high end art businesses. A friend of a friend, Hugh, has a business making rugs. He gave a few friend and I a tour of his business, served us lovely tea and then showed us an art gallery and two incredibly upscale furniture businesses. It was pretty amazing.

In addition, Celia has started playing soccer on her highschool team – a gutsy thing to start senior year. We are proud of her – though I have not accomplished taking a decent picture of her playing.

Last weekend we celebrated Purim. Morton – by going away camping with the Boyscouts all weekend. Celia, Dan, and I went to Ted and Roberta, who are long time Beijing weiguaren (foreigners). Ted is a writer and rewrote the Purim story as a Western and then we read and acted out the story. It was a riot. Celia played the mayor of the town (who replaced the king in the original story). She was fantastic. I had my etch-a-sketch in case I needed a quick draw. (Anita and I made it years ago).

And one last picture special for Celia that she just came home and had me shoot:

We hope to hear from you all! Although we are having great adventures, we miss you!

Xo

Last week an ISB parent invited me to join her to see one of the locations of the Beijing Biennial Art Show (there are three). This location is in an old department store that opened around 1960 where only foreign currency could be spent – which regular Chinese people couldn’t get their hands on. Apparently regular Chinese people would go in and be astonished at all the colorful clothes, the appliances and other foreign conveniences they had never seen before. More recently the department store has been struggling, there was talk of plowing it down. There are still a couple floors selling some goods and they just opened a couple floors for the Biennial. A number of curators had areas they curated. The show was really nice to see – a lot of really interesting work. Sadly the show was very empty – hopefully that was because it was a week day. Unfortunately I didn’t take many pictures.

There was also a beautiful installation by Tan Jing where the tiles crack and break under the viewers feet, giving a sense of walking through dusty memories.

There were a couple pieces by Xin Yunpeng about pingpong. I especially liked a video piece with the sounds of the game and a break with the referee’s eyes.

Trying to out run the Chunjie (Spring Festival) travel rush, which should start tomorrow (Friday the 20th of January), we jumped on a plane to Harbin this past weekend. Harbin is a two and a quarter hour flight north of Beijing.

Harbin is by far the coldest place I have ever been – and as I went to college in Minnesota – that’s saying something. Harbin has a population of over 10 million people and before this past summer when Celia and I read the book People Love Dead Jews – which has a chapter on this city – I had never heard of Harbin. There are so many humungous cities in China that I have been completely ignorant of. Harbin is famous for it’s over the top Winter Ice and Snow Festival – and we had heard it was not to be missed. That, and our interest in the very large Jewish community that lived in and made the city the thriving metropolis that it is- made us very interested in going.

After checking into the hotel and bundling up (see picture above) we strolled along the main old street and found a dumpling shop to grab dinner and try Harbin beer (very light).

The next morning after the Chinese buffet breakfast at our hotel we bundled again and walked out to the river front. On the river were lots of activities – though not the many people we expected and feared. It was quite empty. There were ice sleds and carnival type rides spinning people on the ice, ice skating and ice bicycles. Four wheel vehicles were spinning people on a long line of inner tubes connected with ropes. I convinced the kids, and then the man driving the four wheel vehicle (in Mandarin!!), instead of driving us in crazy circles, to pull us to the other side of the river to where the Snow Sculpture Festival was taking place.

The snow sculptures were super impressive!

After the snow sculptures, we took a gondola ride back over the river. Morton headed back to the hotel and Morton, Dan and I found a delicious Chunbing restaurant (I have found out that’s the name of those delicious pancakes we ate at the Beijing Hutong restaurant) and ate a late lunch.

Late afternoon we headed out to see the Ice Sculptures – which are the most famous part of the Harbin Winter Festival. The handiwork was not as impressive as the snow sculptures, but the overall effect, with the massive size and amount and with the disco lights inside was a fantastic site.

Later that evening we took a taxi to another side of the city to meet with Dan Ben-Canaan – who is known as the only Jew who lives in Harbin. He worked on having some of the many important Jewish buildings preserved. He and his lovely wife Isha had us to their home, gave us many snacks and spoke of the history of the Jewish people who from around 1890-1950 were a powerful force in Harbin.

The next day we got up early and spent a good chunk of the day exploring the historical buildings of Harbin.

The interior of St Sophia was odd. It needed a major restoration but they had a pianist playing music and a show of traditional western inspired landscapes (plus The Last Supper).

After our walking tour, and failing to find a restaurant I had read about, we went into a random restaurant that looked nice. While we tried to figure out the menu, a young man sitting at the table next to us came to our rescue. He was studying in Australia and was home for the holiday having lunch with his mom. He told us what to order and told us we’d done well falling into this restaurant – it had been in Harbin at least since he was a child.

After lunch we went and packed up our hotel room and headed to the airport and back to Beijing.

Highlights of this week: Celia celebrated her big “Halfway Lunch” – half way through senior year. The parents go over the top with it – spending hours decorating. The seniors are applauded on their way in, then special food and fantastic deserts, a slide show and a photo area.

Dan had a big meeting with a higher up in the government and was given the opportunity to spend a few extra days being quarantined in a hotel – locked in his room, eating lovely food that is left at his door in plastic containers.

I was invited to a hot pot restaurant with a really interesting group of women. We all wore red in honor of the new year.

Dan finally was released to his meeting and then was able to make the New Years Celebration at school.

This evening marks the beginning of ChunJie (the Spring Festival). Everyone in China goes to their home town to celebrate the New Year with their families. At the moment we plan to stay put, having some quiet time. Possibly we’ll do some exploring – once we recover from this last trip. I’ll let you know!

So we did sneak in a Thanksgiving dinner between all the lockdowns. The Sunday after Thanksgiving we were cleared to have a small Thanksgiving dinner. We had a few families over. We missed our families in the States, but it was super nice to get together and the food was all delicious – especially Celia’s tart!

After my last entry things continued to get a little crazy here. During that initial locking of our neighborhood they had everyone in the neighborhood line up and get tested. The delivery people and the Ayis (“Aunties” – women who clean the homes and do childcare) were caught also locked in to our neighborhood. Even delivery people who were just delivering a package at the wrong moment got locked in. They were held for maybe 12 hours in our complex. We were freed after around 24 hours as no one had Covid. 

The kids school planned to open the following week, but the one school that got permission to open had a case of Covid on the first day opened, so it was shut back down and all other opening of schools were denied. Covid was spreading in  Beijing and it seemed the government couldn’t keep up with their routine of picking up possible near contacts of near contacts and quarantining them. Fewer and fewer people were getting picked up as the system appeared to be overloaded. People started protesting. Many neighborhoods where people lived more tightly than in ours had been locked down apparently for months. We were on an emotional rollercoaster – so depressed to be shut in by Covid again. To have travelled so far to end up not being able to experience China – why are we here? And then for a half a day we’d get hopeful that things would improve – that the kids could go to school – and then things would look worse.

Back to our story: Someone in our neighborhood caught Covid and many in the neighborhood gathered to block entry to her house – so she couldn’t get picked up. The government never showed up for her. The government made a statement about this variant being weaker, then restrictions quickly started to get dropped. All happened very quickly. Schools were still closed, people were getting sick. People were panicked as they had heard for three years how dangerous Covid is. The city was a ghost town. Things were shut – no longer due to regulations but because there was no one to work places – everyone was sick. Dan got Covid. For five days he would sleep between his online meetings. Travel restrictions in China were finally lifted and vacation was a few days away. Saturday morning the 17th, Dan woke feeling better and I booked flights to Xi’an for the next day.

Despite getting terrible a cold this week, I had some pretty amazing experiences.

Tuesday two of my tennis buddies, Coco and Rose, took me Stand Up Paddle boarding.  We loaded their inflatable SUP boards into our minivan and drove to the Qinghe River next to the Summer Palace. Although when the Palace was built it was in the country, today it very much in the city. Rose told me the water wasn’t clean – but we wouldn’t get wet – but when we got to our put in location, there were tons of Chinese swimming in the river. Apparently they swim there all year round. She then corrected herself and said it actually wasn’t so unclean. I am not sure how clean the water actually is. We inflated our boards in the parking lot and then dropped them off the wall embankment – three feet down to the water – keeping on the ankle leash so as not to loose the boards. We then slowly lowered ourselves down on to the boards so as not to fall into the water. Rose does competitive SUP racing so the board she loaned me was narrow for speed – hard for me to balance on. I didn’t fall into the water, but by the end of our paddling my feet were pretty tired from keeping me stable on that thin board. Although the river ran between busy roads, it felt really peaceful. We paddled for a couple hours and found ourselves in an area of the river where the embankments were being renovated so between the roads and the river ran a make-shift wall – keeping visitors to this part of the river out – but also – keeping us in. We kept paddling and looking for openings to get out. Rose and Coco would ask workers when the fencing would end. The workers either didn’t know or said not too much further – but the end never came. We finally saw a temporary hole that some workers made to get themselves and their materials in. We climbed out of the river there and dragged ourselves and our boards over the rubble and out the hole in the fence. It was a fun adventure. Dan is now fantasizing our spending a summer sometime kayaking the entire 1000 miles of the River. Sounds fun. We’ll see.

Thursday Celia submitted her Early Action and Early Decision applications! First one in her grade. And she did an amazing job! I am very proud of her.

Last night we had another crazy adventure! Morton arrived back at school yesterday, Friday, afternoon from an eighth grade sleep over camping trip. He then participated in his after-school volleyball class and then was heading back out for a weekend Boy Scouts camping trip. I ran to school to say, “Hello” and “Good bye” to him and most importantly to give him a bag of snacks. 

Dan and I then headed out for dinner.  Someone had invited us to what we thought was dinner at a Japanese restaurant. Our driver drove us downtown to the fancy hutong that we had walked around with the kids. We got off, scanned to go into the hutong (- our every move scan that shows our recent covid test – and also keeps track of where we go) and looked for the restaurant. When we didn’t see it, Dan pulled out his phone to look at the directions he had been sent. There were pictures with arrows. We back tracked out of the hutong and went around the corner. We walked past the KFC into the dark parking lot next door. People quickly asked us where we were going – they must have been some kind of security – and then quickly led us half way back into the parking lot. They touched something hidden there that slid a panel open to expose an opening. It opened to reveal an elegant room with a sunken sitting area with a gas fireplace going. Our host, who we had never met before, was there to greet us, along with another friend who has set up the dinner. A fourth guest arrived shortly after us. The fourth guest was an American who has lived in Beijing for twenty years and is the owner and curator of a museum here – and he grew up not too far from where I did. Our host explained that she owned a good chunk of the real estate of the hutong and had recently built this private area to have guests where they wouldn’t have to scan to get in and she was trying to figure out how to utilize the space. She gave us a tour. I am sorry I didn’t take photos but that felt like that might be tacky. Aside from the room we were sitting in, she showed us a large living room type area, then an open central area where beautiful bamboo grew in a large glass shaft that ran from a flight down to above the ground floor where we stood to get exposure from the skylight above. There were two bedrooms around this area – she said in case guests were too tipsy to drive home. Then there was a narrow outdoor area. Inside this outdoor area she had a crane bring in a couple trees and a large stone to make a tiny but magnificent Japanese garden. She then took us downstairs. There was a lovely staircase but we took the elevator with glass walls, passing leaf papered wall paper on our way down. Downstairs looked like a good sized Chelsea art gallery, with a large beautiful bar and a glassed in wine/liquor cellar. In the middle was the glass shaft with the bamboo growing up to the skylight above. It was all magnificent. She asked for our ideas what to do with the space and said she was not interested in it being a money making venture. That was not the purpose. 

Afterwards, we went upstairs to the dining room (also lovely) where we sat around a round table with the loveliest lazy susan I have ever seen. There was a back door out of the dining room which abutted to a Japanese restaurant’s back door which is one of her tenants. From this door the most elegant Japanese food I have ever seen slipped quietly into the room and was placed onto the lazy susan. 

At first we weren’t really sure how the company would be as we felt a little thrown together, but it ended up being really interesting conversation – hearing about the museum owner’s trials and tribulations getting Matisse artwork into the country when suddenly countries were boycotting China – concerned China was going to support Russia against Ukraine. And hearing about our host’s different business ventures and traveling and quarantining with her thirteen year old son. The only bad part of the meal was when the museum owner started talking Philly sports and I shamed my brothers by having no clue. 

At some point Dan and I got frantic texts and calls from Morton. The BoyScouts had driven the couple hours to their camp sight and then were forbidden entry. We believe there was a case of Covid in the region and so they were not allowed to enter. It sounded like there was an hour or two of going back and fourth discussion- could they stay or not -and then they got back into the bus and were driving back to school. Not an unusual story in China. Around 8:45 we had to say, “Goodbye” to go meet Morton’s bus – ending another amazing, eye opening evening. Not the China I thought I was coming to experience, but definitely amazing.

The next morning Celia woke early and said she needed to see a doctor. Her throat was killing and she was achy all over. Dan called the local clinic and they directed us to the hospital downtown. The doctors there put Celia on more antibiotics and sent her home. She went directly to bed. 

Three days later, no improvement – possibly worse – so I took her back to the ENT at the hospital. He wanted her to stay at the hospital for three days and get intravenous antibiotics. I suggested we go home at night and return for the treatments. Celia got up to go to the bathroom, then turned around, went pale as a ghost, eyes rolled back and passed out. Luckily the doctor saw it coming and got her to an examination chair to land on. A couple doctors and nurses ran around her speaking in mandarin – a bit scary to watch having no idea what was being said. This gave me more pause about taking Celia home but after a half hour or so Celia’s color came back and we decided to stick to the plan: three days of coming to the hospital for intravenous antibiotics, steroids, and glucose and go home at night and then see where we were.

Again, no real improvement and her throat looked worse. The doctor then wanted to keep her in the hospital for five days giving her some completely different antibiotics through IV. I again pushed for going home at night. The doctor spent a while on the phone with another doctor and a pharmacist and then decided there was a different strong antibiotic that Celia could take at home – five large pills to be taken every six hours. Almost immediately after starting the pills, Celia started feeling better and making tons of plans – making up for lost time. 

Two nights later was Friday night and Celia was up for going to Roberta and Ted’s house: American’s who have lived in Beijing for many decades and have become the gathering spot for the Jewish community here. They host Shabbat dinner for anyone who wants to attend every Friday night and made Dan feel very welcome during his solo year here. The community was also very welcoming to us and were so happy for Dan that he was no longer separated from us. It was a lovely gathering.

A few days later, Celia felt up for going to The Great Wall. We went to a section of the wall about an hour’s drive from our home where one can take a gondola up to the wall, walk for an hour or so, and then take a toboggan ride down. It reminded my of going on a similar ride I believe in the Pocconos where my possibly four year old brother, who was riding with my mother, told her not to be scared, to let go of the brake and hold onto him. On the way home we stopped at the local town and got lunch. It was an assortment of inedible (by us), odd, and tasty dishes. One of the dishes was spicier than anything any of us had eaten before.

It was a super fun day!

Other highlights from last couple weeks:

A couple days later Morton and I went to the Temple of Heaven.

On Friday we all went to the kids new school before heading to the visa office to apply for our permanent residence visa. The school facilities are AMAZING! – like nothing we have ever seen before. I have been enjoying the indoor tennis courts. The rock climbing wall looks fantastic. Dan brags about the choices at the cafeteria and all the playgrounds are unbelievable!

Friday night Dan and I went out on our first real date in about a year and a half! We went to Stanliton – a very hip neighborhood – which preCovid was full of weiguaren (foreigners) – but is now mostly full of locals. We went to a lovely restaurant and wandered around. The buildings lit up in crazy lights in alternating patterns and the stores were top notch designers. Dan has his eye on a flying car that was on display – an actual full scale flying car!

Saturday I biked out to a local ”wet market”. Apparently they’re called that due to the live fish splashing around. It was fun to check out all the local foods and other merchandise for sale. Unfortunately I have found that when I speak to local people I can’t keep hitting “Replay” to hear and then decipher each word as I can when I am studying Mandarin. I look forward to bringing the family back there to sample more of the foods.

And Today (yeah! I’m just about caught up!) Dan, Morton, and I biked out to a local neighborhood where I had been told I could do some shopping and there would be no other waiguaren. It made us feel a little sorry we aren’t living – at least for a little while- in this area. The conditions are a lot less posh than where we are living – but it felt like the real cultural experience we came here for. Again, we struggled a bit conversing, but we enjoyed ourselves exploring a bit and tasting a few different snack.

Days are passing/events happening and I am not writing things down. 

We have now been in Beijing for two and a half weeks. Definitely the most challenging part of being here is getting the WeChat app to work so we can function. Everything is done through WeChat. Anytime you walk into a neighborhood, a store, or chew some food – you need to scan a code and show that you have a green health code which indicates that you have tested negative for Covid in the last 72 hours – and as we learned at the Shanghai airport – things don’t always run flawlessly. 

On our first day here we put new Sim cards in our phones, got our new Chinese telephone numbers, and then Dan and I went to a local branch of Chinese Construction Bank to get my WeChat hooked up to pay for things. Ends up joint accounts are not legal in China. We spent a couple hours setting up an account for me – we needed to use my phone to do this and it wasn’t getting reception in the bank – made it difficult – but we eventually walked out my having a bank account and what looked like a linked WeChat pay.

Maybe the next day Celia wanted to go meet a cat. She had been cat shopping online while in quarantine. Ended up the cat owner lived about an hour drive from us so I thought we should do something else on the trip so we weren’t just driving an hour, meeting a cat and then turning around. The famous Beijing art neighborhood 798 was some what on the route, so we went there. We planned to wander the area for two hours then go meet the cat. We were so excited. The neighborhood looked like it would be fun to wander around and Celia quickly had me photograph her to show her friends how cool it was there. Then from that high moment, it all went down hill.

We spent the next two hours struggling with our phones. We wanted to go into a store and our GreenCode wasn’t working.We had to call Dan to send pictures of our passports to try to reset the app. That worked and it seemed like we were back in business. We went into a couple stores with no problem – other than the annoying delay of having to open our phones, get to the correct program within Wechat and then scan the stores’ sign and bring up our Green Code – AT EVERY STORE – and often at the entrance to an area too – anyway…. Celia found an awesome pare of sunglasses at a hip second hand store and we were feeling good – and then I went to pay. My WeChat wouldn’t work. We stepped back out of the store, called Dan, and the three of us struggled to get the WeChat to work – no luck. At this point Celia and I were running out of time at 798 so decided we should stop fighting with the app and see a little of the neighborhood before we would get picked up. The weather was super hot and we really wanted something to cool us down – Celia saw a sign for ice cream. I figured I had emergency cash in my purse and this felt like an emergency. We went in to the ice cream shop probably five times being sent out of the store as our scans weren’t working. When we finally got our apps working correctly we went to order and they said they didn’t accept cash – only WeChat. We were out of luck. We were hot and incredibly discouraged. We listlessly wandered around the neighborhood, popping into a few galleries until it was time to go see the cat. Unfortunately, by this time the traffic had gotten terrible and getting to the cat was going to be an hour – and then another hour to get home. Celia decided to postpone. 

The next day, a new plan. We’d go out as a family, have dinner and meet the cat. This plan worked out better. We were given a restaurant recommendation. It ended up being a fancy vegan restaurant. We were brought to a curtained off table with silk flowers covering the ceiling, and although we weren’t exactly sure what some of the things were we were eating – it was all really good. 

Afterwards we went to meet the cat. It took us a while to figure out how to get into the neighborhood. The map brought us to a permanently locked gate. Texting back and forth with the cat’s owner, Celia found out we needed to go to a different side of the neighborhood. The owner met us there and walked us through a maze of her neighborhood and up to her sixth floor walk up apartment. The lights were out on the first few floors of the stairwell. We got into her apartment where she, her husband, their cat, at least one roommate and her dog lived. To say we filled the apartment was an understatement. It was nice to talk with the owner of the cat who was lovely and to see how she lived – much tighter than we are used to even in New York. Unfortunately the cat was freaked out by our arrival and wouldn’t let Celia anywhere near it. We waited for an hour and then told the woman Celia would come back over the weekend. Unfortunately Celia woke the next morning quite sick and wasn’t able to get back. 

Celia’s still in the market for a cat.

More to follow in next couple days!