We've Arrived!!

Ok, so we've been here a month already and we haven't just arrived. But, I am finally learning how to blog, so in that sense, I've arrived. We arrived here in Shanghai on July 7, 2008 bleary eyed and dizzy from lack of sleep. After a full 24 hours of traveling we got to our serviced apartment and crashed hard. We are in a temporary apartment right now which is a cross between an apartment and a hotel. We have maid service that comes twice a week to change our sheets, mop floors and clean bathrooms. There is a service desk as well as a swimming pool and gym that we can use. I kind of feel like we are camping because we don't have our shipment of household goods yet. All we have is whatever we brought over in our suitcases! I have bought a few things just to tide us over until our shipment comes in August. The kids felt like we were having Christmas in July because we took them to Toys R Us and let them each spend $40. You would think toys would be cheap here, but they aren't.

Everyone wants to know what China is like, so here goes... We live on the east side of the river in an area called Pudong. Pu means river, dong means east. The other side of the river is Puxi (pronounced pu shee). Pudong is newer and much nicer. Most of the expatriates (foreigners) live here in Pudong. The streets are nice and wide and almost every street has a separate bike lane for bikes, scooters and mopeds. The area is very nice with lots of nice landscaping and greenery. There are also lots and lots of high rise apartment buildings. We live on the 17th floor right now.

We have been able to find most of the kinds of food that we like, but it is rather expensive. We are trying our best to try local brands and food so that we can experiment and find foods that we like and that aren't so expensive. I am pleased with the produce, yogurt, bread and inexpensive snacks. I just need to learn how to cook Chinese food!

Lee is very happy with his job. He works at a shipyard Wei Gao Cao (I am sure I didn't spell that right!) It's pronounced why gow chow. He has a van that picks him up each morning at the apartment and drops him off each evening. Because he has door to door transportation, we don't have a driver here. Most expatriates have drivers to take them everywhere. We walk a lot and take a lot of taxi and subway rides. We actually enjoy getting into the culture as much as possible.

Well, that's enough for now. I will try and post some pictures that we have taken from our apartment balcony so everyone can see what our everyday view is like.