The second week

In Mum’s eyes:

Kai seems to have got used to the life in the new nursery. No more tears in the morning, and more happiness in the afternoon. Now we begin to walk home through the massive park on clear days. He really enjoys walking hand in hand with me. On most hot afternoons he can get an ice cream, and sometimes some fish food to feed the already overweight goldfish in the lake. Kai likes to walk on the square drains beside the pavement. Some of the drain covers are not perfectly fitted, and Kai likes to hear the funny noise when walking on them.

I normally pick Kai up at 4:30 pm, when the sun is still hot. A long walk in the park gives him better appetite and better sleep in the evening.

In the teacher’s eyes: (more photos from the teacher)

Kai has got a very good friend, called Ming. Kai is doing almost everything with him in the nursery.
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(The boy in the orange T-shirt is Kai)

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Kai is having a nap. Two or three hours after lunch every day in the nursery.

Kai’s first three days (Some photos Kai’s teacher took)

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Kai’s nursery provides two meals a day, plus two snacks, one in the morning and one in the afternoon. The snacks are often fruit, and melon is Kai’s favorite. Kai likes the nursery meals very much. Now he even sometimes says that mum’s cooking is not as good as the teachers’. I feel a bit jealous, but on the other hand, I feel assured that Kai is enjoying his eating in the nursery, which is good for his growth.
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Kai looked completely immersed into the new nursery life from the pictures the teacher took, which explains why he is always happy when I pick him up.

The first three days in the new Kindergarten

Just two days after we returned from the UK, Kai began his new kindergarten. He was still having jetleg and didn’t fall asleep untill 2 am the night before his first day. I was worrying if he would fall asleep in the kindergarten.



The kindergarten isn’t very close to our home. It’s about 15 to 20 minutes walking distance. When we arrived there, many children were having breakfast. Some of them were crying, even screaming, and other children, who were not crying, looked very puzzled. Not a very welcoming environment for the first day! I had to leave after Kai went into the classroom., though the overwhelming noise of children still rang in my ears. Many children were probably having separation anxiety from their carers when they started the new life in the kindergarten. I knew Kai didn’t have the problem, but I was anxious about how Kai would react to such an unusual atmosphere – in his old playschool children began every day with playing indoor toys, only very few children would cry for their carers.



My worries eased when I came to pick Kai up. He looked very pleasant, not only because he saw me, but also because he was in very good mood. The teacher told me, he was the first one who finished the lunch before I came. Furthermore, he sang English songs to the teacher and the children there, and they all liked it. So, Kai must have a good time there.



The teacher must have worked a wonder on the children, especially on the screaming ones. How they did it, remained a secret to me.



On the second day, the same crying story went on, and this time, the screaming from other children sounded even more unpleasant to me when I saw tears well up in Kai’s eyes upon my departure. But again, when I came to pick him up, he was more than happy. Really weird. The teacher told me, a child kicked over a chair naughtily, and Kai went to pick up the chair, and was going to throw it onto that child. I was very surprised that Kai had done that.



On the way back he mentioned his old playschool, and he told me he wanted to go back. But when I asked if he liked the new kindergarten, he nodded his head as well, how bizarre.



On the third day, Kai nearly cried again when I left and was cheerful when saw me again. On the way back he was singing some songs learnt from the kindergarten. This time no praise or blame from the teacher.



I look forward to seeing what will happen next week. Probably some of the children will begin to get used to the new kindergarten and cry less?

An update (August 2010) Kai's bit

Kai loves singing and dancing mainly thanks to his teacher Miss Jian in the playschool. Miss Jian is a lovely lady, she is kind, patient, energetic and enthusiastic. Kai has never had any problem with going to the playschool, as he knows he can see Miss Jian there.









Kai likes singing to show his happiness. It's great fun to watch him singing action songs in front of us.





Kai has made a lot of friends in the playschool, as well as in the neighborhood. He goes to the playschool at 8:30 in the morning and comes back at quarter to 12. (Only recently he started to go full-time, from 8:30 am to 4:30 pm when mum is at work) After lunch and a nap, he plays with the little neighbors. We have a big fish pond in the communal garden. Kai's favourite activity in a summer afternoon was fishing baby frogs with friends.





Kai's friend has a little white dog. Kai loves to see it, but is afraid to go anywhere near it.





Kai loves books as well. Bedtime story is one of his most enjoyable times. We read some fairy tales to him, as well as some English nursery rhymes. His favourite fairy tale is Frog Prince, and his favourite nursery rhyme is "Pussy cat". When he is asked "Where have you been?", his answer is probably "I've been to London to look at the queen."!

Kai's Chinese is better than his English - he can beat his Dad on speaking Chinese. His listening in English is pretty good, he can understand most of the things. With speaking, he can say many words, but he is not so advanced in complete sentences. He does need more practice on it. In China, the most asked question is probably "Can he speak Chinese? What about English?"

Kai had been modelling for mum's little taobao shop (online shop). His image did attract some buyers for mum. Many of mum's favorite photos of Kai came from clothes photo shooting. Kai also had two more modelling jobs done for corporate use.








Kai is a very typical boy. He likes all the stuff other boys like, for example, Toy Story, Thomas and friends. He also showed very much interest in cars. He currently owns several car models, including Morgan, Lamborghini,VW, Mini, Mercedes. His father succeeded in teaching him many car symbols. Every day on the way to and from playschool his enjoyments are singing loudly to me and recognizing all the car makes of the cars parked on the road. He is very familiar with Honda, Toyota and VW, as we see them most on Chinese streets.

At the end, Kai is also a warm-hearted boy. He seldom asks me to carry him if he is not on a pushchair. One morning, after I woke him up, I felt like that I wanted to carry him out of the bed. He rubbed his half-opened eyes, and asked me:"Mum,is your back not painful today?" I nearly broke into tears when I heard it. How sweet is he at that moment.

an update (August 2010)

Dear all,

I still can't use facebook in China, so every time when i come to the UK, I write a short update, so that you know we haven't forgotten you, and at the same time, to make sure, that we haven't been forgotten either.

Jenny's part:

I started teaching German in a language school in Guangzhou, China, one month ago. I do enjoy teaching. Although I haven't spoken or read German since I left National, I did pick up the language very quickly. My students are mainly university graduates who plan to study in Germany in the near future. The big advantage of the job is that I don't have to sit in an office 8 hours a day, which is good for my back, and furthermore, I finish work at 3 pm if I have a class in the afternoon, so I can pick up Kai from the nursery myself and then have enough time to prepare the dinner, which is perfect.

I developed the hobby of photography from some point. My current gear is Canon EOS 450D. It's just an entry level digital SLR (Single-lens reflex) camera. I was exchanging skills with a professional photographer. I taught him English, and he taught me photography. We met once a week for a three-hour exchange session. We have been doing this for quite a while until he was far too busy with his job. I am still very interested in photography, and hoping to find a way to learn more when Kai goes to proper nursery this September.

I went to India with Jonathan in April. He was on a business trip and spent most of his time in the office in Gurgaon near Delhi. I travelled to Delhi, Rishikesh (the Yoga town), Haridwar (a holy town) and Agra (where Taj Mahal sits). Most of the time I travelled on my own, and I did enjoy staying in those beautiful places. Most of the people were very friendly, and I was always lucky to get help from others, while some of the people were dishonest and trying to take disadvantage from tourists, which is fairly typical. India, as a country, like their sarees, is very colorful in scenery and culture. Many people are having a hard life, but they seem to be very happy. I think I will go back again, and travelling alone, is not a bad thing to me.


(to be continued...)

It has been a long long time...

Hello, everybody, it has been a long long time since we last saw each other, right here, on the Blogspot. The Orton family (Jonathan, Jenny and Kai) didn't mean to do that, but we couldn't help - Either Blogspot or Facebook "happened" not to function in China. But you know for sure, we have been missing you a lot. You see, as soon as we've got a chance, we tried to catch up.

From the photo below you may notice how much Kai has changed since April, when I last updated Kai's blog.



Kai hasn't only got the appearance of a proper young boy, he's also got the attitude.

Below is an extract from our 2009 Report to the family in the UK.

"Kai began walking unaided just before his first birthday and quickly found that was far too slow so moved on to running. He is very active and insists on going out and about every day.

Since August Kai has been attending a local nursery for 2 hours per day, 5 days a week, which he enjoys very much. We think he will start full-time from next summer.

The swimming pool of our estate is open from spring to autumn and Kai enjoyed splashing and wading around in the children's pool. He's not yet ready to learn to swim but hopefully in the next couple of years.

He seems to be a bright boy (he even had an IQ test at his nursery to prove it!) and is learning to speak both Chinese and English, with very good pronunciation for most words. Chinese is dominant since that is what he hears for the majority of the time, but quite a lot of words he knows in both languages.

Kai's favourite activities
Drawing (or scribbling, more precisely)

Galloping around like a horse
Looking at books
Riding up and down escalators(and making impression of others, especially his Daddy)

Watching DVDs
Climbing
Wearing other people's shoes
Singing and dancing("Twinkle twinkle little star" is Kai's favorite song. He can sing in both languages, but strangely he is only willing to dance to the Chinese version)

Playing on slides
Making himself dizzy

Kai's favourite food and drink
Formula milk
Cow's milk
Soya milk
Yoghurt
Ice cold beer (Yes, I am serious. Pretty much like a typical English man, right?)

Raisins
Most fruits
Cereals
Rice
Bread
Noodles
Dumplings
Fish
Most meats
And of course anything sweet
(Unfortunately he doesn't like most of the green veg at the moment, he may decide to like it again later though.)

Misshaps of the year
1. Fell off the bridge and into the pond in our communal gardens
2. Pushed the glass cover of a tabletop off and smashed it
3. Broke a Ming Dynasty flower pot in a restaurant (pretty sure it was fake though)"

PS: I did miss writing Kai's blog. It's nice to keep track of his growth. I think I will find somewhere else to accommodate Kai's World. Hopefully we will see you again soon.