Category Archives: Mom in Law

Crazy Chinese People, Mom in Law, Our cute son

Survival Guide: Chinese mother-in-law

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During the past years of blogging I read often comments like “You must be a very patient man”, “I could never live that long with my mother-in-law” or “You are a role model of being able to cope with MIL”. I don’t really think that I am a role model or even that patient. It is a mix of all kind of things which help me to endure every year my crazy Chinese mother-in-law for three months at our home. Of course there is also no real “guide” on how to deal with Chinese mother-in-laws as every person is unique and my MIL, even though very crazy, she is not the worst kind of person you can imagine. To get some view on other bloggers Chinese mother-in-laws you should try for example the blogs of Betty, Lina and Jennifer. They all got hilarious stories about their dealings with their MILs.

 

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Nathans instincts are telling him to run!

One thing you might notice after seeing those three blog recommendations is that they are all women. Yes, I actually don’t know any male blogger writing about his dealings with Chinese in-laws (in case you know some, please do tell me).  Seems that I am touching a subject that is not too common for men to write about! It is also not a bad thing as you will notice that there are certain differences between how I as a guy am able to endure my Chinese mother-in-law and how women from other blogs manage it. I’ve been told that there are some women who could never ever manage to live for more than a few days with their in-laws. Of course I am no expert when it comes to women but my wife explained it in a way that even I get some tiny idea on what might go on. Mind you this is just how things were explained to me and will most certainly not mean that it can be applied on everyone. It goes somewhat along these lines: The mother-in-law always looks out what is best for their son, nothing and I mean really nothing what the daughter-in-law is doing will be ever good enough in the eyes of a MIL. Did I get it more or less right? Feel free to give feedback. This seems to be the key factor which could lead to certain problems between MIL and their daughter-in-law.

 

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Rest in peace poor kitchen rag

How is it for a guy? I don’t want to generalize again as it is just from my view as I have zero ideas how other men are doing it. I am somehow able to endure three months without too many problems because of one big thing: I don’t care too much! Really, I know MIL’s insanities for several years now and even though it leaves me speechless I don’t really make any drama. Sure I try to set up certain standards which all of us should follow (especially MIL). Sometimes this works, sometimes not. For example it has not worked thus far when it comes to kitchen rags or leaving oily handprints everywhere. I respect that my mother-in-law has her own view on how things should be done but there are some limits. This is where my dear wife comes into play. She has actually much less patience when it comes to her own mother. Most of the times she goes tell her mother how things are being done in this household before I can even open my mouth to comment on something weird MIL has done again.

As you can see it is not only my attitude of not caring too much about all the crazy stuff MIL is doing but also how my wife reacts to her own mother and makes certain that it our home doesn’t turn entirely into a monkey-house. Besides that I also kind of switch off most of my brain activities during every three-month visit (not that there is much brain activity anyways but I reduce it to a bare minimum).  So things which would drive me at normal times insane such as the need to clean the apartment at least ten times a day due to the mess MIL leaves behind just don’t receive any reaction anymore in my head. I see the mess but my brain does not react accordingly and thus much stress is avoided. The constant background noise which is my wife and her mother talking/ arguing doesn’t even bother me anymore, in fact I don’t hear it. There are many occasion where I sit in the living room watching my favorite TV show indifferent to the fact that I am placed right between those two women “talking” a bit loud…

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My wife in the arms of crazy MIL, in the background you might notice an elephant with a long neck

Is it just me who switches of the brain when dear mother-in-law is staying for three months? I think not. I actually know some other guys who are married with Chinese women and do the very same thing as me when their MIL decided to stop by for three months. Whenever my wife would ask them how it is with their mother-in-law staying for such long time they just shrug their shoulders. However I must say that these other guys are all Finnish just as me. I have heard stories about other men from around the world having big time troubles with their MIL. I guess it is this Finnish mentality of not giving a damn which helps me to survive all the insanities around me.

P.S. The featured image on top is one from back in the days when I was in the army, who can find me? (Also Nathan’s godfather is in that picture!)

How do you deal with your mother-in-law?

Be sure to follow me also on Facebook and on Twitter as I will post there occasionally pictures which do not find their way into my blog posts. Furthermore I also have a YouTube Channel in which some videos might pop up from time to time

https://www.facebook.com/CrazyChineseFamily

https://twitter.com/CraChineseFam

https://www.youtube.com/

Crazy Euopean People, Crazy Family, Mom in Law, Travels

Going around Helsinki

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I just recently realized that I have no blog post about Helsinki and what you can visit there at all! I mean I got  Xi’an covered, Stockholm, Tallinn and also several North German cities but nothing about Helsinki, the city I lived for so many years. Thankfully I did not forget yet everything so I will give you a small impression on what you can visit there within a day. All pictures were shot few days before our wedding going around the city with my in-laws and also few days after the wedding taking some friends around.

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Helsinki Cathedral

First of all some info about the city. Helsinki is the capital city of Finland with a population of about 625 thousand. That might seem pretty small but you have to think that the entire nation only got a bit over 5 million inhabitants so it ain’t that bad suddenly anymore. Finland has been for many years under the rule of Sweden and later under the rule of the Russian Empire. Only after 1917 Finland got its independency. It was under the Russian rule that Helsinki became the capital city of Finland and in the city center are many neoclassical buildings. In fact it happens often that tv shows or movies are using the city center of Helsinki not in order to have Helsinki itself as the setting but St. Petersburg! But more about that you shall see in some pictures.

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Aleksanterinkatu

One main thing to visit in the city is the Helsinki Cathedral. It has been built from 1830-1852 and was known until the Finnish independency as St. Nicholas Church (Grand Duke of Finland, Tsar Nicholas the First of Russia).  it is not an incredible big cathedral but it has a very interesting design and interior decorations. Standing in front of the cathedral you have a wonderful view towards the Senate Square and can even see a bit of the  South harbour. Passing by the Senate Square is the street Aleksanterinkatu which is a shopping street where you can find pretty much everything, there is also Stockmann located, a big department store. The street is also very interesting as it is heated during winter time and thus there is no snow. A short distance away is Temppeliaukio Church which is famous for its design. It was built 1969 into solid rock and is known due to this fact also as the Rock Church. Due to its design and the rock walls it has excellent acoustics and is often used for small performances.

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Temppeliaukio / Rock Church

From the Helsinki harbour you can take a ferry to Suomenlinna, an old sea fortress which is also a UNESCO World heritage site. The island is inhabited by some 900 people and all around are the old remains of the fortress including huge cannons. It is also a very popular place to go for Finnish people to enjoy the rare summer days to have some BBQ and go swimming in the ocean. At Suomenlinna is also the last surviving Finnish submarine Vesikko. From the Helsinki harbour you can take also another ferry to the Helsinki Zoo Korkeasaari. The ferry used to be the only means of getting there however these days there is also a bridge leading to the zoo (only by walking though!). It is a small but nice zoo with animals from around the world. There is also an Africa and a South America House with small animals running partly freely around there.

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Cannon at Suomenlinna

All these places you can pretty much visit within a day. Of course there are also many other places you should visit as well. The best way to get a good look around is to take one of the sightseeing buses or taking Tram Line 2 and 3 as they go pretty much around all major sightseeing spots. As you might have seen I did not include much of the city center here such as the museums, the famous Railway Station, the city hall or the Parliament House. These are all places you can easily visit by walking around the city center as they are just minutes away from each other by walking. To my shame I must admit I do not have any pictures of them and thus didn’t include them now in this short tour.

Have you visited Helsinki already or plan to go there one day?

Be sure to follow me also on Facebook and on Twitter as I will post there occasionally pictures which do not find their way into my blog posts. Furthermore I also have a YouTube Channel in which some videos might pop up from time to time

https://www.facebook.com/CrazyChineseFamily

https://twitter.com/CraChineseFam

https://www.youtube.com/

Crazy Chinese People, Crazy Family, Dad in Law, Mom in Law, Our cute son, Uncategorized

The Silent One

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Last week I wrote about the often unpredictable behavior of my crazy Chinese mother-in-law. In the comments I was also asked how her husband is dealing with it all and I have here something like an answer.

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First time carrying his grandson #Nathancuty

All the general info about him I wrote already down in two other posts About Father-in-law and The Love for Table Tennis. For the ones who don’t want to read it all I give you some short summary. He is in his mid fifties, loves to play table tennis, eats tons of sweets, as an OCD when it comes to cleaning and is able to eat about double the amount of food for lunch and dinner than the rest of the family combined. In the post About Father-in-law I wrote that he is working as a driver in one of the city’s bureaus. This is no longer true as the whole department has been shut down by the government to safe some money. Now he is unemployed and bored as hell every day at home. For him it is not about being unemployed and not earning money but that he has too much time on his hands out of nowhere. Worst of all for him is that he is whole day home and so is his wife!

 

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Watching over Nathan

Wheras MIL is a very strong person he is more the weak one. He easily gives in when his wife has something to complain about and most of the times I think he is doing so in order to escape the endless annoyance of MIL by making her think she won once again and shuts up. I know this might sound mean but once you heard one of her charades you will understand. Come to think of, his wife always has something to complain about him but usually it is actually something she did wrong herself. She pushes down by accident some vase? His fault because he placed it there and so on. So how can he partially escape the madness called his wife? He plays with his phone some weird farming games or does so on the computer whenever he is not cleaning the apartment or watching sports on TV. The good thing for him is that MIL loves shopping and goes dancing and thus is often gone for many peaceful hours. I think he is always looking forward when MIL stays with us for three months…

Though he is very invisible when going around as his wife wants to be the center of everything he still shows his presence when needed. When we need something he goes off and gets it for us in an instant. When we want to cross the street he will go ahead and wave to the cars to let us through. When he sees my wife looking at something in the shop window he will immediately gives her money (though my wife always takes the money she returns it before flying back to Europe without anything spent). He is very caring but sometimes way too much as he gets afraid that something is not good enough. Everytime before buying something he will carefully check the item he wants to buy to make sure that everything is 100% fine. When going out to eat he will clean each cup, bowl and the chopsticks. At home he is cleaning the apartment twice a day, each time done three times. Because he is so worried all the time that everything works fine he has high blood pressure and from is former afro hairstyle nothing is left.

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Meet Afroman

Of course we want to give him sometimes some nice presents but that is a futile effort. Not only does he not want anything but when he actually gets something from us he will store it safely away because he wants to wear/ use the old things first until they are broken. During MIL’s days as a model she often got some nice clothes and also gave him some. These days are over twenty years ago and still the clothes he received are originally packed and stored in his closet. Few years ago we bought him a new shaving machine, it took over a year until he used it and only because MIL threw away his old one as even threatening him that she will give the shaver to me would make him use it. In the end all I can say about FIL is that he is a very reliable person who prefers to stick to the background and is thus the exact opposite of MIL.

Do you also have a more quiet person in the family who is always there when you need her/him?

Be sure to follow me also on Facebook and on Twitter as I will post there occasionally pictures which do not find their way into my blog posts. Furthermore I also have a YouTube Channel in which some videos might pop up from time to time

https://www.facebook.com/CrazyChineseFamily

https://twitter.com/CraChineseFam

https://www.youtube.com/