Family Day

Although it might sound like we are home and together a lot, which we are, a very few moments in our day could ever be considered quality time together. Therefore, we have instituted what we call "family day." It is a day, usually Sunday, that we spent time doing fun things together that involves us leaving our apartment. It also usually includes a trip over to PJ's (a.k.a. Papa John's). It is a good day.

Today we went to the city park. Until this week we did not know it existed. LB saw it when riding in a taxi this week and asked around for the name of it. Although we looked forward to spending time together we dreaded going. It has been our experience that public places which do not have an admission fee are crawling with people so much that it ruins the enjoyment and it is exponentially even worse on Sundays - everyone else's family day. However we were very pleasantly surprised. This park was not crowded. It was clean and well groomed, even for this Texas girl's standards, and most amazingly we picked a day to go that was not blazing hot and the pollution was low, so low I could even see the mountains in the distance and the blue sky. We only spent about 45 minutes there since DB's lunchtime feeding was quickly approaching and AB was wearing big girl panties (this park was clean but we were not about to venture into the restrooms) but we hope to make a return trip soon.

Although you can find them in some locations, parks here tend to be a bit sparse when it comes to children's play areas. Most of the equipment is more tailored to adults...which is kind of strange to us but not to the locals. Fortunately AB is pretty happy to swing on a bar for a few minutes. Maybe one day we will find a slide or a swing somewhere.

The ladies of this country, and most of Asia for that matter, want lily white skin. They often ask me what I do to keep my skin so white. They are shocked to find out I did not like my milky white skin as a youth and did bad things to it in order to make it tan - well as tan as this very white girl can get. I would still really like to have more of a tan, ya know - cause it helps hide cellulite and spider veins, but I am not willing to damage it in the sun and I have NEVER seen self tanning sprays or lotions in this country. If I did I am sure they would be too expensive or untrustworthy. So, pale it is! Anyways, the ladies often carry umbrellas lined with a solar coating to prevent the sun from penetrating the umbrella and darkening their skin. I carry one but today AB preferred to use it. She smacked a lot of people with it, but they all thought she was such a cute foreign kid they almost seemed happy to have her do it.


KB is carrying the stroller and baby bag. Good daddy, but we have got to get you some new sunglasses. The bridge of these are taped with red duct tape.

DB slept most of the time but woke as we were about to leave. He was hungry.

They found a caterpillar.

OK. I know what this looks like. Yes a woman is straddling a man, and no this is not the first time I have seen this sort of inappropriate display in public here. However what you may not be able to see is that she is not trying to be close to her guy because she likes him, she is cleaning out his ears and needed to get a closer look at what she was doing. Kind of romantic, huh?