I was up at 3:30 this morning (Monday). It is 4am and all the kids are up now. I thought I would send a quick post telling you we arrived safe and sound. John will leave for work at 7am (taking the laptop). The kids and I will play some board games that we packed in our suitcases and swim.
We landed in Shanghai Saturday night at 6pm. Our driver (Mr. Zhou - pronounced "Joe") picked us up in a van. We had arranged for another car to come as well for our 12 suitcases. The 14 hour flight was uneventful until the last two hours when James and Emma started throwing up. Eliza and Tessa slept most of the flight, and we all enjoyed at least two movies each. We are staying in the Marriott serviced apartments for a week. It is a nice big apartment with three bedrooms.
Our landlord is out of town until August 8th, so next Monday we will move into our townhouse. Yesterday we attended the branch. It was pretty empty with most of the ex-pats still vacationing in their home country. After sharing time the kids split up in two classes for primary. The YW and RS meet together in the summer. The Olsen's invited us over for dinner. He is the 1st counselor in the branch and we met him in May on our pretrip. His wife tragically passed away earlier this year (heart issues). They have four kids under the age of 8, the wife's sister is living with them right now to help with the kids. It was nice to spend a few hours in their home. James and Emma liked playing on their piano and Eliza and Tessa liked playing in their toy room.
Then we braved a grocery store (Metro -- we had one in Chongqing) to get some basic food for the week. Couldn't find much of anything for James to eat. I'll plan on feeding him fried eggs and bananas for breakfast and lunch the next few days. I had a pit in my stomach all night worrying about what we will eat. That may be one of my biggest challenges here.
We are excited to finally be here, but anxious to move into our house so we can unpack and start to feel settled.
