Pregnant and Abroad

Pregnant and Abroad

So, here we go again! I’m 7 weeks pregnant and Alfie’s little sister or brother is due on 16^th January 2012. I’m already sick as a dog and feel fluey, tired and miserable. Headachey, queasy and VERY grumpy. I don’t recall being in this bad a mood last time round but I’m sure Pete will say different. All I want to do is stay in bed and eat toast all day. Or crisps. Any carbs in fact. I don’t want to drink water unless forced but am constantly thirsty. Everything smells. The house smells, of what I’m not sure, but it’s not pleasant. Aircon smells, cupboard smells, cooking smells. Just not what I want to smell anyway. It all makes me feel sick. I don’t want to eat but can’t stop eating as it’s the only thing that seems to make the sickness abate for a while. That said, whatever I eat can make me feel sick too; nothing too rich, nothing too dairy, nothing too sweet or well, sickly.

Yesterday I went for a lie down at 11am and woke up 2 hours later. I did feel a bit perkier that afternoon but by 9pm I felt dreadful again and was sure I was coming down with something. How can a little apple pip make such a big difference? We had a scan while we were in Bangkok last week and you couldn’t even see our little baby at 1.4mm, just the yolk sac (yuk!).

Having a baby abroad, mmm. We can’t actually have the baby here in Myanmar because it’s not safe. Although there are plenty of hospitals, obstetricians and midwives the blood products (in case of emergency) cannot be guaranteed so most people opt for going home or skipping over to Bangkok. We had booked our trip before knowing I was pregnant but it seemed serendipitous so we checked out the maternity hospital and had some blood tests and scans while we could. We didn’t actually see the birthing centre but I have it on good authority, from ladies who have had their babies there, that it is much like a 4-star hotel. That is one advantage of private medical insurance I guess.

One thing I hadn’t considered was that after the birth we will have to wait for baby to get a visa before being able to return home. Which means we will have to wait for baby to get a passport too. Wowzer, hadn’t reckoned on that. And it took us over 6 weeks to get our visas. Great. What with having to go over a month early because I can’t fly past 36 weeks, we could be spending quite some time in Thailand. Hmmm.

One Night In Bangkok

Well, it was actually 5 nights in all; 2 days all to myself then the boys joined me for the weekend. And oh, it was lovely. Just to be back in ‘civilisation’ was a relief and I spent the first day shopping. All day. And so the second day was spent lounging by the pool, having some reflexology massage and getting my nails done. Bliss!

And my, it is HUGE isn’t it? Bangkok I mean. This was my first visit proper, not counting the dashes through the airport on the way to somewhere else, and I had no idea it was such a metropolis. So many big skyscrapers and modern buildings. Such great transport, including very cheap taxis (though they need to be with the traffic crawling as it does). And I loved how everything was kind of up a level; skytrains and skywalks, no need to set foot on the dirty old pavement, oh no. Just peer down at the traffic below and marvel at the shopping malls which come in sizes Huge and Huger. Real shops! Real food! Real retail heaven! (And real European prices… hmmmm.)

We stayed at the Chatrium Riverside so were out of the main downtown bustle. We had to get a boat to our hotel! Obvs massive brownie points from Alfie’s point of view. The hotel was very reasonable, great pool and gorgeous room with huge window and balcony looking out on the river traffic below. Downsides were uninspiring food (so disappointing, I love a good hotel breakfast) and expensive wifi.

I had a list as long as my arm of things I Wanted To Get Done, such as upload photos and videos, clean up my blog and other internet housekeeping chores which are impossible with the world’s slowest connection here in Myanmar. But I didn’t get round to it. We did find our Must Have food items; English tea, Swedish crispbread, vanilla essence, maple syrup, decent chocolate! Proper mustard, posh muesli and good black pepper. Sadly no bran flakes this time. But I did buy 2 bags of Salt and Vinegar crisps, woo hoo! And we stocked up on various medical items, mostly Calpol and Gaviscon.

Then we took Alfie to the Funarium which was oodles of fun. Just a huge warehouse for kids with padded climbing frames and ball pools and matting and slides and tunnels and ropes and well, you get the idea. Not to mention cooking classes, party rooms, storytime, rollerblading and much more. Kiddie heaven you might say. Alfie ran around with a huge grin on his face for the best part of 2 hours bless him, pausing only for some juice and a bite of fish and chips, before dashing back into the fray. Brilliant.

Mummy and Daddy treated themselves to a rather more sedate Sunday brunch at Trader Vics at the Marriot on the riverside. My goodness but it was great value. For about $25 you eat as much as you like from a vast array of cold cuts, curries, Chinese, Japanese, roast dinners, rice and noodle dishes, soups, cheeses and even a full English Breakfast Buffet. Salmon of all kinds, oysters, scallops and crab were also on the menu. Not to mention a chocolate fountain, a bewildering variety of cake and ice cream plus the pancake/crepe station and as much fresh fruit as you could carry, including the exotic, for us, blueberries, raspberries and strawberries which Alfie and I devoured by the bowlful.

Ah, Bangkok, Oriental City…

Cultural Differences

20.05.2011 Cultural Differences

One of the most difficult things to get used to here is that to a Burmese person, delivering bad news is considered very bad form indeed. So much so, that they will go to any lengths to avoid it, even outright lies if necessary. This is hard work for a Western brain to adjust to! For example, if a nanny is unhappy in her job she will tell her employer that she has a sick relative in need of an operation and must go up to the mountain region, down to the delta, off to the back of beyond immediately to help out. And never reappear. In some cases she may have been tempted to another employer by more money, which is considered VERY bad form by the expats, obviously, but often she just wants to leave but is unable to say so.

I know of one family who are on their 6^th or 7^th driver and cannot fathom out why they keep disappearing without a word. Now clearly there is something going on for that amount of drivers to be pissed off but the family are blissfully unaware and as such are unable to change whatever it is to improve conditions and thus keep a driver for longer than 5 minutes.

It’s not only domestic staff. Pete’s organisation broke for the Christmas holidays and one chap just never returned in the New Year. Turned out he had got a job with the UN and never thought to let his old employers know. When they did find him of course, they weren’t bothered that he had moved on but a bit annoyed he hadn’t finished the reports he had been employed to do.

We have been looking for a housekeeper/cook for almost two months. In a country where labour is cheap and plentiful it is proving remarkably hard to find someone. One of the most annoying things is that our neighbouring housekeepers know of plenty of people looking for work but won’t recommend them in case something goes wrong. They would be embarrassed if we didn’t get on with the person they had put forward for example, and they feel it would reflect badly on them. To me this is completely bananas! And most frustrating. On we plod, trying to find someone far enough removed from anyone’s acquaintance to come for an interview.

You can imagine how the NGO’s struggle, where most decisions mean bad news for someone, somewhere. One organisation wanted the staff to have ownership over their projects and so spent considerable time and resources workshopping the possibilities for future funding. At the end they were expected to decide which regions would benefit and which would, inevitably, be wound down. They couldn’t do it. The staff dithered for so long, not wishing to be the bearers of such bad news that the management had to step in and make the decisions for them in the end.

I worry that Amber will walk out on us one day so drill her weekly about how we are doing and if she’s happy and tell her often that she MUST come and talk to me if there are any problems. Having been brought up in the American embassy I think she is used to our funny Western ways and I know that she and Alfie adore each other so I content myself with that. Still, if she does end up having a poorly relative I will be on tenterhooks!

Chronicles of Burma

08.05.2011 Chronicles of Burma

This book is HIGHLY recommended!

If you are at all interested in Burma and what it is like living here you MUST read Guy Delisle’s Chronicles of Burma. He is a Canadian animator who came to live here when his wife got a job with an NGO. They had a son not much younger than Alfie and he was the house husband who got to stay at home while she worked.

The book is in cartoon format (does that make it a graphic novel? I’ve no idea about the definitions of these things) and his observations are wickedly astute. It’s like he’s writing about our life! I read it through in an hour and a half and immediately read it again. Pete and I laughed at every page. It really is brilliant.

I have tried to contact Guy via his website but it is very blocked, as opposed to the usual blocking you can get around sometimes, which I guess is due to his less than flattering portrait of the military regime here.

In case you ever get to read this Guy, I LOVE your book and thank you for putting pen to paper.

The Hash

03.04.2011 The Hash

You may have heard of the Hash House Harriers. Or, like me, have no idea that they are the world’s largest sporting club. With no members. Eh? Well, it’s like this. Some guys (Brits in Malaysia I think) got to thinking that they wanted to be able to carry on their favourite sporting pastime, running, wherever they were in the world. So they set up a club called the Hash House Harriers. Except there is no clubhouse or official membership as such. The Hash, as they are affectionately referred to, meet all over the world, in practically every large city you can think of, on a Saturday afternoon at 3pm. And go running. Simple as that.

Except of course, there is a bit more to it, mostly involving beer. And while keen and able runners are catered for, so are the families and the slower amongst us, who go on the walking route instead. Earlier in the week, two intrepid hashers will map out a route for runners and a route for walkers, marking them out with shredded paper (biodegradable don’t you know). And the Yangon Hash meet at the Sailing Club every Saturday at 3pm, come rain, shine or unbearable heat.

To our astonishment there must have been about 50 people turn up on the Saturday that we went, including plenty of families. We duly paid our fee, about $4 each and hopped in various cars and drove to the start point, a residential area to the east of the city. One of the best things about the Hash, apart from the social aspect and the exercise, is that you get to see parts of the city and surrounding countryside that you would never usually see. So we had a lovely walk, through allotments and over railways and through a street selling nothing but chillies, big beautiful sacks groaning with various types of chilli peppers. Our finish point was right by a park where people were flying kites, not just for fun but actually kite fighting too, awesome to watch!

And then there was the beer. Everyone has to form a circle at the end, thank the route planners, beer providers etc and then nominate participants for various things (being late, getting lost, being rubbish at running etc) for which they have to down a beer of course. Hash virgins like us included! And children are not left out either, though they have to down lemonade instead, thankfully. Well, except where the child is even too small to drink lemonade, say like Alfie, so the parent has to step in and down more beer (at which point Pete pushed me forward. Thanks darling). Lots of singing accompanies this ritual and the hardcore all have Hash names too (think ridiculous nicknames). You can then also go on to a bar and carry on the drinking and even have an evening meal but after all this beer, we were certainly ready to go home.

It was a really fun afternoon, not too taxing and lovely to meet such a varied mix of people and nationalities. Everyone is welcome, whether resident or just passing through and some people had brought their visiting guests too. Some runners were superhardcore, having attended Hash events all over Asia (they often organise charity runs and cross country challenges) but a fair few were newbies like us. We’d love to go again but are finding the temperatures a bit off-putting at the moment. Still, I can highly recommend joining the Hash wherever you are!