Good Bye, Old Friend

Today we said good-by to my beloved dog, Inca.  It is, hands down, the hardest day I've had while living abroad. 

We came here as a family, all five of us.  No sooner than Eugene got his official marching orders for Asia, I was on the phone arranging travel for Inca.  And when he got word of our early return to the US, much of the same.  But as the clock ticked through this summer and fall, I began to notice oddities in Inca, things that were just not her norm.  So those thoughts began to creep into my mind, was Inca's time drawing near?  There were days when I was sure of it.  She wouldn't be able to see or smell the doggie treat on the floor, was fearful of taking the step down from our bathroom back into the bedroom, and woke in the morning just to sleep in a different room, in a different position.  It's easy though to sweep those thoughts away, blame old age.  For the love of pete, she was 14 years old already! Cut the old girl some slack.

But her behavior when the movers came from the air shipment last week caused me to take her to the vet immediately.  She was so lethargic, never once raising her voice, as she was known to do, to the commotion inside our house.  Never even getting up from the spot on the office rug she had planted herself on earlier that morning.  I was afraid she wouldn't get her health certificate to travel and if something could be done, let's nip it in the bud sooner rather than later.  So we talked, the vet and I, about Inca what her days and nights were like.  And when we were done, he gently suggested that perhaps the best thing for Inca was a well-deserved sleep.  Along with old age and having gone blind, Inca exhibited signs of kidney failure. 

Every night Inca slept on our bed, her furry body huddled against mine.  The past week, knowing that this day was coming, has been agony.  I found myself waking in the night, trying to capture the sensation of Inca sleeping at my feet, trying to memorize the little sounds she made while sleeping.  I'd reach down and scratch her head or rub her little belly and in the morning I'd tell Gene once again "I didn't sleep well last night". 

One particularly awful day, my daughter, the wise old soul she is said to me, "Mama, what if you were so tired and someone told you you couldn't sleep?"  And her sage advice has rung through my head all day long.

After we had our good byes with Inca this morning, Gene and I walked the quietest walk through Stanley Plaza together.  "Do you think you'll get another dog?," he asked me.  "No," I tell him blotting drippy tears from my eyes, "I won't get another dog, but maybe the kids will."  Because you see even though Inca became the family dog, she was in all honesty my dog first and foremost.  She joined us as newlyweds just six months into our marriage.  It was this little Yorkie that kept newlywed me company as Gene sequestered himself, studying to become a CPA.  It was her silky fur that caught my tears as we sped away from the shores of Lake Erie in 2001 to live in North Carolina.  She snoozed in slivers of sunlight in the dining room of our first home, walked the block with us as we chatted about the new life we discovered in the south.  When Mia was born, it was my little dog who paced the floors with me and my terminally ill child.  I will never forget the sight of her perched on the arm of our sofa, peering quizzically into the empty bassinet after Mia had passed.  She joyfully welcomed both baby Reagan and Tripp and endured countless hours of tail pulling, dragged about the house by chubby toddler arms, being thrown into doll strollers, wrapped up in blankets.  But after the adventurous or down right torturous day, she happily spent her nights asleep on my bed, cuddled together, me and my furry baby.

So maybe when all this raw hurt passes, and I know it will, the family will welcome another animal to live in our home.  But it won't be my dog.  It will be the kids who choose their pet.  It will be that dog who absorbs the tears of Reagan's first heartbreaks, comforts Tripp when his team doesn't get the big win.  That dog will play fetch with the kids and their friends, walk with them to the ice cream stand, lay at their feet while they study.  And of course I'll love that dog too but it won't be my dog, because after my Inca dog, nothing can compare.  Lots of people have dogs and lost dogs, but I assure you, really, nothing can compare.

Good-bye sweet girl.  You are so missed.

Last Friday Night

I always knew it would be about the people I met, the friends I made. And God sent the best of the best my way.  This is what I will miss most about Hong Kong.  My friends, my ex-pat family.

 

I will never find the words.  I just know I am a better person, my life is better, for knowing you. And don't you ever forget, if there is ever a time when you feel lonely or lost, when you really need a friend, you just never know who is going to get out of the taxi in front of you.  She could turn into your HK bestie.

 

So, to my Hong Kong crew, to my beloved Southside Girls, this one's for you to commemorate our last Friday night.  Saying thank you feels so inadequate, but thank you!

 

(And because I am an IT idiot, if this video keeps cutting out on you, put your cursor in the corner of the video screen and keep moving it around.  Weird, right? But it works)

 

 

Making It Count

Scribbled on a page of my notebook is my Hong Kong bucket list.  A list of stuff that I jotted down this past July of all the things I wanted to experience before December's departure.  My catalog of stuff I had heard about, stuff I wanted to do again, stuff I want to do bigger and better the second time around.  The list isn't that long really and it has stuff that's big and stuff that's not so big. So, I started to check off those things I've accomplished and when I was done, only five items remain. 

Call it vanity or whatever, but I'm proud of myself. So very proud! Because so many people come here and do nothing, nothing at all. They are turned off by the unfamiliar, afraid of the adventure, so it's just easier to slip on a pair of yoga pants and complain. But I tried to do everything, everything I could so that when I went home I would never look back at this time as wasted time. Now, that doesn't mean that I don't have my days where I've just had it. I'm pissed about waiting for a taxi in the rain, annoyed at the Chinese mainlanders touching my children's faces, disgusted when somebody spits on the sidewalk in front of me, and throwing the mother of all hissy fits when I find out my shipping allowance is way over. But when those moments pass, and they are just moments, I do look around acknowledge an experience that has been a blessing. An opportunity not everybody gets. You get handed a situation and you can either let it get the best of you or you can make the best of it. It's all about making it count, right, Jack Daswson?

Check out my bucket list, some with photos, some without.

1.  Great Wall of China

 

 

2. Big Buddha



 

 

 

3.  Horse Races

 

4.  Thai Cooking Class

 

5.  Run a 10k Race

 

 

 

6.  LKF on Halloween

 

 

7.  Macau

 

8.  High Tea at the Peninsula

 

 

 

9.  Rent a Junk Boat

 

 

10.  Shenzen Again

 

11.  Girls Weekend in Singapore

 

 

 

 

 12.  Ziplining

 

 

 

 

 13.  Smoke a Hooka Pipe

 

 

 

 

14.  Fish Foot Spa

 

 

15.  Karaoke

 

 

 

 

And what didn't I get to?

 

1.  Jumbo Floating Restaurant

2.  Hike the Twins

3.  Ocean Kayaking

4.  Dim Sum with a Cart

5.  Hagan Daas Ice Cream Fondue

 

It's not entirely impossible that I won't knock a few more of these off the list in the next two weeks.  Who's up for ice cream? 

 

 



5 Mondays

I countdown events by the number of Mondays until the date.  I guess it's because Mondays are the hardest day of the week, lazy weekends over and the rush of a new school/work week beginning.  Once the week starts, it's like racehorses out of the gate, off and running.  But it's Mondays that you need to get to and get through before the week can fly by. 

And so looking at the calendar today I see that we have 5 more Mondays here.  That's it, that's all.  Five.  I can count them on one hand now.  One, two, three, four, five.

There is a growing list of things that need down before I walk out of The Lily for the last time on December 15.  Some days I shoot out of sleep in the morning with the realization that there are things I've forgotten or things I can accomplish sooner rather than later. "We can apply for drivers licenses with our new addresses now,"  I gushed to sleepy-eyed Eugene early one morning.  On another morning I accost him while shaving, "The cable!  I'll have it hooked up while you are in the US next week.  We'll have phone, internet, TV as soon as we arrive!"  I remember when we've moved in the past, the realtor handing me a check list of to-dos before we close one door and open another.  I wish we had a check list now, but this move is so very different.  I don't think anyone could easily and comprehensively catalog it.

With all I've tried to get accomplished, there are also those things that are screaming for attention and I have no patience for.  Instead, I'd rather watch the last season of Desperate Housewives that I picked up for a few bucks over in Shenzen, China.  (I know Mike dies during the last season, but I'm not there yet.) Numero uno on the detestable to-do list?  Sorting through what stays and what goes. 

We went through the same process when we came here.  Walked through the rooms of Lake Edge and scrutinized what we really "need" to live for a few years and what could go into storage to be retrieved at a later date.  I think I did an ok job but I didn't get it totally right.

"Remember that story, mommy?  The one with the snake and the mongoose?"  "Rikki Tikki Tavi,"  I say.  "Yeah, can you read it to me?"  And looking at those huge saucers of brown eyes, I have to say "Sorry, baby, it's in storage."  Every time I make soup, I long for my soup cups with the Campbells soup kids on the sides.  And when Tripp comes home from school with a teacher's request for baby pictures, I just feel like a bad mom. 

The good thing is, all that stuff still exists.  In fact, this Saturday it will be yanked from the confinement of storage lockers and, under the watchful eye of my husband, will placed inside the rooms of our new house, our Bella Casa. The bad news is, the same cannot be said of our stuff here.  Turns out, we are more than a little over our shipping allowance to go back so now I have to go through our apartment, room by room, and make some hard decisions.  I need to decide what is important enough to load on a cargo ship and send back. Need to decided what parts of my Hong Kong life I want to keep.  Need to decide what to leave behind, throw away, give away.  And though it's only stuff, it bugs me, bugs me big time.  It's kind of like throwing pieces of your life away and who wants to do that?  I reason with myself and tell myself the only things I absolutely need to take home are my family.  I know this.  But it still sucks.  Sucks, sucks, sucks!  So that is why instead of making list for the packers, I'm watching Bree Van de Camp become not only an alcoholic but a bit of a tramp of a housewife.

What it all comes down to is this: time is going to keep on passing and whether I am ready or not, December 15 will arrive.  Five Mondays will become four, then three, then two and one.  My kids will run down the ramp into Hong Kong International one last time, watch our luggage chug away on the conveyor belts.  I will have my traditional mimosa before take off, look at Gene across the aisle and ask "What movie are you watching?"  And it won't matter what is crated and on its way to Apex and what is in a donation pile for the needy Chinese of Hong Kong.

There are so very many things I look forward to when I resume my real life in North Carolina. Having my foot on a gas pedal, the red trimmed doors of Target sliding open to welcome me, the cashier at Harris Teeter telling me "y'all have a good day".  The happiness of surfing through channels and finding a re-run of Happy Days on TV, sipping on Gnarly Head cabernet from my favorite flowered wine glass, sitting on our screened porch at night, listening to the crickets chirp.  Praying during Sunday mass at St. Mary Magdalene and sub sandwiches from Jersey Mikes on the way home.  My phone ringing and hearing my best friends southern drawl saying "Hey, you got a minute." The sound of the garage door opener rattling to life as Gene comes home from work, sitting down to eat a meal I made with my own two hands and listening to Brian Williams re-cap a day of world events.  And flipping through Tripp baby albums, my empty soup cup on the table in front of me, while Reagan tugs on my arm, "Please, read me Rikki Tikki Tavi again. Please, just one more time!"

After 5 more Mondays.

A Drop in the Bucket List

It was a Sunday while we were in the US this summer for home leave.  The four of us were speeding down Route 5 towards my brother's house.  The roads were lined on both sides with grapevines, the sky was crystal, the sun, I swear had a big smiley face on it like in Reagan's drawings.  The kids were strapped in car booster seats in the back and Carly Rae Jepsen was blaring from the radio "Hey I just met you...".  It was a perfect moment that I wanted to freeze, capture in a photo frame and tuck into my pocket so I could pull it out and relive it every now and then.  Especially those times in Hong Kong when I'm missing the US.

And then, plop, we landed smack dab back in Asia a few weeks later and it was an all together different experience then when we had first arrived the summer before.  Where last year was dedicated to establishing a life in Hong Kong, this year, or should I say, these months, are all about making it count.  Doing it all before we pack it all up and go back.  The goal is to leave here with no regrets.  Not a one.  Thus, the bucket list.

You know what a bucket list is, right?  Those things that you want to experience, want to accomplish before you kick it.  I sat down in early August and literally jotted down my Hong Kong bucket list.  At the top of my list, rent a junk.

So, what's a junk?  This is a junk

 

 It's not the exact junk we rented, but it's pretty darn close.  I had never been on a junk before, but people that have told me you just rent the boat, sail around, eat, drink, swim, whatever.  The company we used had an awesome package: 7 hours on the boat, heaps of food, open bar for practically pocket change.  Some companies have add-ons like speed boats for wake boarding, Thai masseuses, and mahjong tables.  But we chose the basic package, rounded up some friends and some friends of friends and even some friends of friends of friends, 25 in all, and on an overcast but warm Saturday morning, jumped aboard a junk. 

 

As I sit and write about it now, it's like big deal, you went on a boat.  And no matter what words I conjure up to try and make you understand, you won't.  But there was something magical and special about being out on the water for the whole afternoon with your friends.

Sitting on comfy cushions as the boat powers out to sea, you really do feel like Kate Winslet, arms outstretched on the bow of the Titanic.  You can't help but lay back on your elbows, tilt your head back and let the wind tangle through your hair.  It's an amazingly carefree feeling.

And when you see just how vast the sea is, you realize just how small you really are in this great big world. How all that crap you are stressing over and worried about just really doesn't matter in the big scheme of things.

 

 We dropped anchor just off a small island and were told to have at it, but beware of the many sea urchins populating these waters.  And in the blink of an eye, people were in the water, climbing down the ladder, floating on foam noodles.  The junk crew went to work filling empty water bottles with their own special cruise blend called Sea Breeze and throwing out bottles to swimmers below.  Some of us swam to the beach, hunted down a few shells and some beach glass and then headed back to the boat. 

 

I'm not sure who took the first jump off the top deck of the junk, but it was a blast watching people jump.  Some went straight down like the straightest pencil, some flailed wildly, others splashed down in cannonball form. After watching everyone else, I decided to give my fears a smirk of a smile, and then closed my eyes and jumped.  But just once....

 

 

 

 I don't know how those hours on the water passed so quickly.  One minute we were drinking beer

 

And dancing on the top deck

 

 

And the next we were back on the pier again

 

 

And once again I was wishing that I could freeze that feeling, capture it in a photo frame and tuck it into my pocket so I could pull it out and relive it every now and then.  Especially when I'm back in the US missing Hong Kong.

 

Renting a junk.  Just a drop in the bucket list.  

 

Week of Good-Byes

It's been a week of good-byes here in Hong Kong.  Good bye to school, to the bus mother, to after school activities and routines.  Bye to speech class and uniforms to packed lunches and repeat play dates.  But it's also been good bye to people.  Some for the summer, some for, well, ever.

Ex-pats generally don't stay in Hong Kong for the summer.  They go home, to the mother land, to the places they came from to begin with.  Husbands go too and sometimes they are lucky enough to stay the whole season, but more often then not, they fly back themselves after a few weeks and wives and kids follow later. School ended yesterday so today began the mass exodus.  Tomorrow it will continue and we will be among the families that follow. 

And when we return things will be different for us.  Just a few months ago I expected that we would return from summer home leave refreshed, proud and somewhat glad to have our first year behind us.  When this adventure began Eugene told me that it would be a year of figuring it out, a year of living, and a year of preparing to return home to the US.  But as we discussed last time, butterflies flapped their wings and BAM!, back in the US earlier than we anticipated.  So that year of just living was annihilated, and we've moved straight on to prep work.

When we come back in July, we will be (fingers crossed) home owners again.  When our feet hit Asian soil the countdown will begin.  Time will be limited. And though I am excited to have a home of my very own again, in a place where speaking English is the norm and Target just a short drive away, I am oh so very sad to see the clock tick away to final months, weeks, days, hours of our time here in Hong Kong. We were prepared for three years.  We were not prepared for 18 months.

I have a tendency to look way too far ahead in all situations, with all things, so I can't let myself do that now.  What matters now is that tomorrow morning my family will board a plane in Hong Kong and when our feet touch ground again, we will be on American soil, glorious, familiar American soil.  And we will see family that has been so far from us and we will eat cheap pizza and chicken wings, indulge on Denny's ice cream and run together at Presque Isle.  We will pick strawberries with the kids, swim in the pool and watch fireflies dance in the evening. Great times will be ours and wonderful memories will be created.

 And when we get back, we'll have six months to do it all right. To tick off all the items in that Hong Kong bucket list.  To enjoy it, really enjoy it.  The goal: no regrets.

To my family and friends and my BFF in Holly Springs, NC, can't wait to see you all!! And to my Southside family here on the island, safe travels, rest up.  We're gonna do it up right when we all get back.  No regrets.  Not a one.

The Butterfly Effect

As much as I love order and control, planning and organization, there is always one factor fluttering through my brain that I am consciously aware of -- the butterfly effect.  Are you familiar with it?  It's a theory that states that a butterfly flapping its wings in one part of the world will result in a tornado in another part of the world.  Similar to the ripple effect or maybe the domino effect, it's just another one of those reasonings that every little action causes a big chain reaction.

 Like maybe that grocery receipt that unknowingly falls out of your pocket.  Maybe it becomes the scrap paper that a young woman writes her email address on to give to the man she met in line at the store.  Maybe they start dating, maybe they fall in love, they get married, they become parents to the kid that will eventually discover a cure for cancer. 

Or how about when you're cleaning your garage and discover a deflated old basketball stuffed in the corner.  You think about just tossing it, but instead put it into the pile for Goodwill.  That ball ends up in the hands of a youngster who now, with a basketball of his own, can practice his jump shot at the park whenever he wants.  And he practices so much he makes the high school team, and then gets recruited for college ball.  That old roughed up ball from your garage paves the way for a kid who once could only dream of becoming a doctor or a teacher or an engineer.

I've got one more.  A guy sitting on the sand in Myrtle Beach watches his young grandchildren playing in the surf and he's thinking, 'This is a good life. No meetings, no reports, no deadlines'.  So after some thought, he goes back into the office and announces he's retiring early.  This leads to lots of meeting, lots of brainstorming, lots of shifting of staff and talent.  The CFO calls one of her staff members, he's in India at the time, and talks with him about the recent turn of events, which leads to a text message to his wife.  "Spending more time in the US", her phone screen reads.  She is at British trivia night with friends, and doing terribly to boot.  "Oh hell!," she exclaims showing her friends the message. "More trips to the US for him."  They order another round and manage to come in dead last at trivia.  A few days later he arrives home from India, plops down on their bed, stretches and proclaims, "It's so good to be home."  She smiles at him, thrilled he's back safe, but leans against the bedroom door to brace herself for the updated travel schedule.  "So, what is this about you spending more time in the US?".   "I didn't say I was spending more time in the US," he says with emphasis. "We're spending more time in the US."  She cocks her head at him, wanting clarification.  "We're going home, Laura.  I've been promoted.  I'm the new Corporate Controller". 

The butterfly effect in full effect.

We've been detoured again.  But this path will take us back home.  To North Carolina.  In December.