One Year

It's cold, and rainy, and the Toffee Nut Latte is back at Starbucks. Has it really been one year since I first set foot in Shanghai?

That house-hunting trip seems like a million years ago, and then in other ways it seems like it was just yesterday. What really seems like a blur is last December. Christmas will actually seem calm and sedate by comparison without the three week move-out and cross-country tour.

We have settled in to a comfortable routine, and many of the things I was so worried about have either turned out OK, or I have just become numb to them. I don't so much care what color taxi I take, as long as it is available and running. I have and will continue to pay ridiculous import store prices for Tostitos and Goldfish, but I have also embraced the drinkable Chinese yogurt (melamine? what melamine?) and have learned to love my rice cooker.

We have made friends with some dear and amazing people, and have already been here long enough to see some of them move on -- some headed home, some headed off for another international assignment. It seems that in expat culture, you hold close to your friends for support and for dear life, while always being prepared to say goodbye with just a few weeks notice, and, very likely, to never see them again.

We have mastered technological loopholes, video teleconferencing, international banking systems, and re-charging our cell phone cards at the Family Mart. We have learned enough Chinese to get by, but not enough as we would have liked.

As such, I have pantomimed my way through elaborate conversations including getting a pair of pants back from the dry cleaners before they started cleaning them, having the air conditioning sanitized, and ordering Chinese take-out -- which, surprisingly, is not standard practice.

I have learned to love coffee, and walking. Though to say I don't miss my car would be an outright lie. I have walked through intersections where I could reach out and touch the city bus that is crossing the intersection in front of me. The secret is to keep from looking intimidated. And to walk quickly.

I have stopped thinking that it's cute and sweet when people stop to fuss over my kids, or to try to hold them, or to give them candy. Now I just let the kids deal with it themselves, and they really do a better job. I still haven't (and probably won't) get over the whole "babies-who-don't-wear-pants" and their "parents-who-hold-them-over-bushes-to-pee" thing. Call me crazy.

We still have a month or two before our official one year in China anniversary. But I like thinking about that first step off the plane -- that first breath of smoky, smoggy air, the first inkling that we were totally insane -- and how much better it has gotten with each step since.