Tag Archives: Xi’an

I do whatever I want to do

February 9, 2020 CrazyChineseFamily 12 Comments

Some of you may have heard about some certain coronavirus going around. No, I won’t be writing now all about the how it is spreading and what will happen in the near future but all about my dear Chinese mother-in-law, once again. Over the past years I had so many blog posts about her and her “special” behavior, especially regarding her doing whatever she feels like to. Now it is once again not any different. In Xi’an the situation is currently not that extreme as in Wuhan but everyday life is certainly limited now. For example each household can only send one person out every second day or so to buy groceries and whatever else is needed. This is strictly monitored as most apartment blocks have their own entrance(s) which are locked and the security guard (or something very similar to that position) is taking note who is leaving and coming back. Upon coming back they will also check the temperature of the person to make sure that they have no fever.

As you can see it is really restricted about going out currently and you shouldn’t waste any of those “outings”, as a household always needs some certain supplies. Now we have MIL entering the combat zone with her own unique ideas what to do when going out. Just few days ago father-in-law called my wife that MIL had left the apartment to go feed the stray dogs in the area. My wife immediately tried to reach her mother but she didn’t answer her phone. Few hours later then she was able to reach her and asked where she had gone. My wife had to make it appear as her father didn’t sell out his wife about her outing as that woman can be really difficult towards him. So the conversation between my wife and MIL went along these lines:

Wife: “I tried to reach you, because the kids want to talk to you, where were you?”

MIL: “I am busy preparing dinner now and before I was bringing boxes (for our business) away with your father, nothing special.”

Wife: “But there are no boxes currently which need to be sent away.”

MIL: “oh, just some boxes…”

Wife: “And you never go out with dad to bring them away, he is always doing it alone!”

MIL: “I ate to much and wanted to take a walk..”

Wife: “So you go out to take a walk because you ate too much, but didn’t you tell me just that you are preparing dinner?”

MIL: “I was still full from lunch, way too much food”

Wife: “So you go out for a walk even with the virus around. You would never do that except you go dancing in the park with your group or feed the stray dogs!”

MIL: “Don’t be silly, there is no dancing currently because people are not allowed to have meetings like that right now”

Wife: “So you went to feed the dogs!”

MIL: “No no, just taking a walk”

Wife: “The dogs…”

MIL: “Just a little bit, I did not even touch them”

Wife: “You know that you are not allowed to feed them anymore!”

Yeah, MIL wouldn’t admit it really that she just went to feed the dogs. The reason why she is not allowed to feed them anymore by wife has two reasons. For one she has no vaccinations and the second reason she kind of kills the dogs with the food as she feeds the leftover super spicy food either from the restaurants or currently from what they cook at home.

Poor dogs locked up in cage they can’t even lie down

Even though MIL means to help the animals she does the exact opposite. Here in Germany she went out to feed the ducks in the city center with spoiled meat during her first summer here and magically after the very same summer 90% of the duck population had died/ vanished here replace by seagulls. Besides that she loves to feed dogs with chocolate cookies and other things she might find somewhere in the shops. Her own dogs had all kind of stomach problems already and they have rotten teeth as she never ever brushes their teeth or give anything to help keeping the teeth more or less clean. By now you can smell the breath of her dogs a mile against the wind, one of the reasons why FIL doesn’t want to get near them.

Oh well, MIL is just like that and thanks to her “taking a walk” it took another two days till they could buy groceries as she didn’t buy anything after feeding the dogs. All very reasonable according to her and only her.

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Experiencing China

November 18, 2018 CrazyChineseFamily 16 Comments

It has been now over six months since our last holiday in China. It was a great trip and we are already planning for next years holiday session in the Middle Empire. I have mentioned it countless of times that for so many years we never really managed it to go anywhere besides Xi’an. This year was different as we had that wonderful week in Japan (Tokyo, Thomas Land and Osaka) and we are kind of planning on having next year a week-long trip in Thailand. This is not set in stone especially when taking into consideration that we should have been already to Korea, Taiwan, Bali, the Maldives and so forth. Main problem was always that my wife turns into a complete couch potato once we arrive at her home in China.

Anyhow even in case we won’t manage it to Thailand I am still looking forward to visiting China again. For one it is of course the food and I think I don’t need to touch that subject again as writing about it and sharing pictures makes too many people hungry. It is for me more like the whole experience in China. Even though I have seen so little so far it has been always such an interesting experience especially as each region or even parts of the city are so different. I have been mostly only to Xi’an but already there each section of the city has its own vibe. It goes as far as each “block” can be so different compared to the next one. For example the area where my in-laws are living looks to many people (like my parents) like a city shortly after an air raid while as the next block is a complete different matter as everything is relative clean and nice looking. However between those blocks the feeling is already different as in the older parts everywhere you have those wonderful street kitchens which are more rare or even non-existent in richer areas.

It feels sometimes to surreal to drive on some roads passing by mountains which look like just from paintings. To have old temples and other historical buildings right next to some huge shopping centres. Just going a bit outside the cities you even encounter traditional clay brick buildings and even cave houses. Of course there are always downsides to the whole experience especially due to pollution or overcrowded tourist spots but it does not really bother me that much. For me each holiday in China is unique as even in Xi’an I find new interesting thing which each visit. For next year we have another novelty as we kind of have to decide where we want to stay: Either in MIL’s new apartment in the middle of nowhere or in the old one where FIL is staying right in the city center with all the best food around. Guess this decision is a no-brainer.

Do you have already plans for holidays in 2019?

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Crazy Chinese People, Crazy Family, Our cute daughter, Our cute son

Strawberries and Raisins

September 23, 2018 CrazyChineseFamily 20 Comments

During our trip in China this year we really just started to see how different many things are. I don’t mean basics such as language, culture or anything like that. It is more the “think big” mentality in so many aspects especially buildings. Let’s take shopping malls as an example. Growing up in Europe I have visited too many shopping malls over the years. I always thought that they are pretty huge but oh boy was I wrong after really visiting multiple ones this time in China. While the shopping malls are big in Europe (the ones I have visited in several countries at least) they still don’t go overboard and usually just offer enough space for the shops and few restaurants, nothing more.

We were not even at the bottom of that side wing of the mall

In China it is a bit different, very much different. Alone the malls we have visited in Xi’an are just not normal in any way. For example there is the one mall with just some kind of glass roof (of course not glass, some other new transparent material which is like 90% lighter than glass or something like that) without any real walls. So you have that nice roof against the rain and the shops and restaurants are located in some smaller buildings beneath it. Now what will protect you in the hottest summer months from melting on the spot when walking around there as there is of course no air condition? Water mist of course! All around the pathways and buildings water mist is being sprayed every five minutes or so to cool down the air. I have seen similar before but that was on a totally different scale compared to this huge shopping center. Besides this very interesting cooling system there are some attractions such as a huge pillar covered in LED panels which sometimes looks like a giant tree or at other times like a crystal. Furthermore there is a gigantic “waterfall” which sprays water in certain rhythm combined with some music every hour or so. It is hard to explain so check out the picture and of course the Instagram post I had back then.

Some kind of musicish, lightish, waterish thingy thing

Then there is the nice other mall which has probably more restaurants on one floor compared to my hometown and all its surrounding villages combined. It is just insane to have that many different restaurants in one mall, it took us one hour to actually select one we liked as there were just too many to choose from. Besides that the mall also has a waterfall, okay not one waterfall but several spanning over five or six floors with gold fishes in the ponds in between. Sadly I do not have a picture of that as I was first of all too amazed by it, then I was too hungry to hold the camera and third of all I was scared for my life as thousands of other people were streaming through the passageways in that mall and I tried not be trampled to death.

I do not know why these experiences amazed me so much this time in China. For some reason I experience China each time a bit different or to be more precise I realize or learn something new and different during each visit. I had been in so many malls before in China but those visits never flashed me like this year. Strawberries and raisins anyone? Yes I can change topics in such smooth way but now you will learn what I mean with that headline.

Our dear Nathalie had her first birthday in China and we had to celebrate it with the whole family. One certain thing had to be at the celebration as well, one thing we had to walk and wait ages for: the birthday cake. This cake looked so great (and cute) now guess my horror when I took the first bite of that great looking strawberry cake to taste raisins. Yes raisins. Why on earth anybody in this world would add raisins into a strawberry cake? This was officially the worst cake I have ever tried in my life. This is something you give someone you hate, not love! Writing this I got goosebumps again from that horrid memory this cake has caused. Thankfully Nathalie is still too young to have any memory of this experience but I am still in shock how the whole rest of the family had apparently no problems with that cake and even stated how good it tasted.