Tag Archives: chinese in germany

The Naming-Stage has begun

Ever since the article “Family 4.0 in progress “ we had multiple appointments with the doctor and ultrasound check-ups in order to determine that everything is fine and most importantly to see the gender. However each time the doctor could only say “the baby doesn’t want us to see it yet”. That would be fine but we heard this sentence six times! Yes six times the baby prefered to hide from the prying eyes of the doctor. Meanwhile a friend who is pregnant as well got to know the gender during the second check-up already. My wife was stressed, very stressed as she wished for a girl and also because she was annoyed of her mother telling every few days what gender the child might be.

After hearing “the baby doesn’t want us to see it yet” once again in the middle of the week we decided to have yet another check-up in a nearby city. We were at the doctor before at week 11 for some risk evaluation and they got a 3D-Ultrasound there through which you can see all kind of details. Back then the doctor knew already the gender but was not allowed to tell yet. This is because due to regulations stating that before the end of week 12 of the pregnancy the gender can not be told (here a little article regarding the reason for it) . So the only person knowing the gender was not allowed to tell us back then. This time however it was week 23 and we were ready. The primary goal for this check-up however was to make certain that everything is fine with the baby. The doctor was going on and on about the different development stages and that everything looks fine with a sudden”and its a girl”. I did not even realize him saying it as I was busy building some toy cars with Nathan and my wife also needed a few seconds to realize what just happened.

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Meimei I am waiting for you here with Totoro-san

So yes, we are expecting a baby girl and Nathan will get a Meimei 妹妹 and not a Didi 弟弟. As you might expect my wife is full of joy right now and checked out all kinds of girls clothing already. My wife told pretty much everyone she knows about it just seconds after leaving the doctor’s office. Of course she also told her mother about the gender and her reaction was “see I told you all the time it is a girl, I am always right!”. You might remember her calendar thing and what gender the child will be according to all kind of stupid nonsense, over the past months the gender she foretold changed every few days… Right now we are in process of thinking of some names which is really no easy task. Thankfully we still got till May to decide on it and I have no doubt at all that MIL will have some really stupid name suggestions once again.

What crazy names might MIL come up with?

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

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Strange Appearances in Photos

Do you know the feeling when you think you are going to take a great picture just to have someone pop into it? Or see someone “unwanted” in them when you go through them later? For me this phenomenon appears each time my Chinese mother-in-law is around.

No matter where we are she jumps at each opportunity to be in the photo as soon as she sees me using one of the cameras. It got sometimes so bad that I secretly tried to use my camera or only used it when she was occupied harassing other people. Of course this does not always work especially when I try to take pictures of Nathan as she is never far away from him. She got even that good in getting somehow into the photo that I only realize her “being in the shot” when going through the material weeks later.

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Last but not least: Do you spot her? Check above Nathan’s head!!!

Do you have somebody who wants to be in each picture as well?

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/

A Day at the Beach

Last week I announced that I would be getting more active with blogging again and I kind of regret it already. No not that I hate blogging but I discovered that I have too much material to work with. Yes, you can actually have too much. For one my dear beloved Chinese mother-in-law is giving nearly daily new material to write about. However she is just the tip of the iceberg as I have “postponed” so many other things over the past two years. Only the small trips and craziness in China is already overwhelming me! So this post is about one of our little tours from last summer when MIL was still with us in Germany.

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So much sand

What image do you have when you think about a beach? I’d say it is with clear blue water and white sand. All over the world the beaches are different as I especially noticed when we had our holiday in Rhodes where the beach was a stony hell with each step without shoes was pure torment. Last summer we went to a beach nearby my hometown, to Sankt Peter-Ording.  It is a very popular seaside spa (they have their own sulphur spring!) and is a municipality of the district Nordfriesland in my home state Schleswig-Holstein.  That beach is a bit different from any I have ever visited before as you can see in the pictures. This is because it is a Intertidal Zone, the entire North Sea coast of Germany is called Wadden Sea (including part of the Netherlands and Danmark). Twice a day the ocean decides that it fun to retreat and you can do some great mudflat hiking.

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Yep, you can swim there

Anyhow the beach at Sankt Peter-Ording is also easy to reach by car as it has Germany’s only beach parking lot. So you just drive there and park you car at the beach. When we were at the beach there was currently the low tide which meant that we had to walk still for 20 min till we reached the ocean.  MIL and my wife were amazed as they had never seen something like that nor imagined. Nathan was another story though as he was so afraid of getting his feet dirty in the mud (yes he is one picky little fellow). He also didn’t really trust the shallow waters which were filled with shrimps and crabs. The entire time he wanted to be carried except of course when we wanted to leave. Suddenly he wanted to play around and not leave anymore, what should I say – kids.

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A pile of…I don’t know

Though we were only there for one hour we had a great time. There is just so much fun you can have, especially with kids, as there are small animals everywhere. I still remember how I “hunted” down a crab the size of a golf ball and proudly presented it to my wife. It took a lot of effort and pain and in that moment a small boy passed by showing off his crabzilla. That beast was nearly as big as a dining plate! I wonder if he still has all his fingers…

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That all is usually covered by water

Besides hunting down crabs I also tried to catch some shrimps but that was a bit harder even though there were thousands of them in the shallow waters. In the end I decided against catching any more crabs or shrimps and set them all free because I was fearing that MIL was making some sudden dinner plans involving those poor little creatures. As you might remember from this blog post I was not too happy once we got home as MIL somehow had managed to drag in half the beach in the car. That was some serious vacuum cleaning the next day I tell you that.

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Some of the stilt houses

In case you ever have a trip to Germany and are for some weird reason in the North I recommend to check out the Wadden Sea. It is just incredible what Nature is doing and to see with you own eyes how the water retreats beyond eyesight. Where to witness that spectacle is all up to you as it is magical at any spot at the Wadden Sea.

What interesting beaches have you visited?

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/