Travel – Guangzhou Zoo & Safari Park

Posted on September 1, 2012 by flamidwyfe

Last week Rose and Jack invited me out for a touristy day. We started out at the zoo, visited the Canton Tower and ended with another amazing dinner at Hunan Home! This post will be about the zoo… In pictures 🙂 Let’s call it Lions and Tigers and Moon Bears, OH MY!!! I was very pleasantly surprised by the happiness and apparent good health of the animals. The other thing I loved was that it was, for the most part, a no boundaries park, where as, besides a hidden moat, you were very close to the animals.

The little girl in front of us made her daddy wear this hat 🙂

I got to feed this tiger. He was rubbing up against the cage trying to get me to get closer… Um, no! This was before the tiger show.

Yes, even the panda is smirking about my sweat stain… Lol

This meerkat came over to chat with me… Too cute!

I hope you enjoyed the tour 🙂

What is your favorite animal park?

Ciao!

Dukan – One year anniversary

Posted on August 21, 2012 by flamidwyfe

So this isn’t going to be the spectacularly huge post I promised 😦 I’ve had dodgy tummy for 2 days and I’m just not up to it. I think I drank some non-bottle water Sunday night and my normally iron stomach isn’t happy.

I did, however, go out with Rose and Jack yesterday for a spectacular touristy day, despite making a hundred trips to the bathroom! I’ll blog on that later in the week when I’m feeling better, as well.

I typed this up while riding the subway yesterday on the way to the Safari Park Zoo…

Wow! A year! A year since I took control of my life. A year where I changed my
body, my health, my job, moved countries, visited Thailand with friends, met the
most amazing friends in the blogosphere, found out who my true friends were,
learned to deal with resentment and regret, hosted a few expected and unexpected
people in my flat in China, cared for some extraordinary expats during their
pregnancies and birth, and realized finally that I CAN do anything and I’m
AMAZING!

A year where I lost 111 pounds in under 10 months. A year where I learned to run
and improve my yoga. A year where i participated in my first 5K. A year where I
committed to do a triathlon to celebrate my 2nd year of rebirth. A summer where
I’ve maintained that weight loss!

A year of teaching water birth and international standards of care in China,
where at 5 hospitals women now have that option! A year where I decided it was
time to go home. Spend more time with my kids and grandkids, stay connected with
the birth community at home through eduction while developing my next career
move.

A year where I went from this:

To this:

A year with ups and downs and all arounds!

A FANTABULOUS year! Thanks, so much, for sharing the journey with me xoxo

Ciao!

Running, blog stats and random stuff

Posted on August 1, 2012 by flamidwyfe

I’ve had a pretty exciting week from a personal perspective. I set two personal records running in the past 3 days. The first was my fastest run at 8:26 avg. min/km or 13:34 avg. min/mile. This is a full 1 minute per mile LESS than before I had my surgery in May! The second was that I ran more miles in July than any previous month! Below is my RunKeeper stats…

The brick color is walking, the green is running and the purple is hiking.

I’ve either walked, ran or hiked 544 kilometers since March. That’s 338 miles 🙂 Woot!

Another awesome thing that happened this week is that at some point I reached 50,000 hits on my blog! And I’ve logged nearly 3500 comments! It makes me so happy that so many people have stopped by. I started regularly writing this blog in August to share my journey with family and friends and it has become so much more and that makes my heart swell with happiness!

And that leads to the awesomest things that have happened this week. Actually it happened today… 4 people that I personally know, all of us on 4 different continents, contacted me today (yesterday for some of you) to tell me they are starting the Dukan because they want to be healthier and they’ve seen my success. All 4 have read my blog and I only knew that one of them was. I wish all 4 of you luck!!! I know you will succeed because I know all of you put your mind to something and accomplish it! 4 amazing women… starting on this journey… Good luck and remember that I’m here if you need anything!

I’ll finish by saying that August brings in the last month of summer. It also signals that I have 51 days left in China. I can’t believe I’ve been here nearly a year already! I get one more trip to Guangzhou where I get to hang with my Int’l crew down there, Rose, Jenny, Liza and Dianna. And get to mentor a friend from the Middle East, Aisha! And then back to Hangzhou to finish out my contract… I’m going to miss my ViviMokaLaka so much! She’s the one that brought me here in the first place. I’m going to try to take as many photos as possible in the next 7 weeks.

But I miss home and my kids and my grandkids and my mom and my family and my friends and the beautiful sunrise over the Roosevelt Bridge first thing in the morning. And there’s no place like home. I’ve had a fun 4 years living abroad 🙂 But on to new projects and fixing up my AirStream!

I hope everyone has a wonderful Wednesday!

Ciao!

Letting Go

Posted on July 31, 2012 by flamidwyfe

More wise words from Marc and Angel.

The past can steal your present if you let it. – You can spend hours, days, weeks, months, or even years sitting alone in a dark room, over-analyzing a situation from the past, trying to put the pieces together, justifying what could’ve or should’ve happened. Or you can just leave the pieces on the floor and walk out the front door into the sunlight to get some fresh air.

Wise words, but OH SO HARD to do. There are many, many things that I have easily let go of… toxic friends, toxic work relationships, toxic people in general, but the one thing I am still having a hard time letting go of is the resentment I have from leaving Abu Dhabi last year due to working with a sociopath. Beating myself up for quitting a perfectly good job at a wonderful hospital (and turning down a promotion!) to try something different, start a maternity unit that was going to offer water birth for the first time in the Middle East. I ended up working with someone who was truly sociopathic in her behavior. Scary at times, to be honest. Many of the upper level management, like myself, have left the job because of her.

So why can’t I get past it… almost a year later? I did some work with my friend Julia Murchison, the most amazing massage therapist in the world. She was doing myofascial massage and we were chatting away. While we were chatting away she began working on an area of my abdomen. I suddenly burst into tears. I was quite confused about all of the emotions that I was having at the moment, for no apparent reason (at least to me). She asked me what I was thinking about right at that moment and I was thinking about how much I missed working in Abu Dhabi… the place she was working on represents resentment and that is exactly how I was feeling at the time.

I don’t know how long I’ll hold on to this anger about leaving. I really loved it there. I loved the culture, the people, the life style and my friends. I learned SO much from the midwives that I worked with at the Corniche Hospital… I was the only American… my mates were from England, Scotland, Ireland, Wales, South Africa, Australia, New Zealand, India, the Philippines, Pakistan and more. It was rich with culture, religion and birthing differently than I was use to. I miss it and I miss my friends that became like family.

I am going home, to Florida, in September. I am excited about it. I can’t wait to be back with my family and friends, but I will always have this little side of me that says, “What if”, about Abu Dhabi… my home away from home. I guess Julia has a LOT of work to do on me! 😀

I’m off to put on my “big girl panties” and get on with my day. I don’t regret leaving the pieces on the floor and walking away from the job I switched to. I am working towards being appreciative of the time that I did have there and the 1 year opportunity I’ve had working and living in China.

What do you have a hard time letting go of? If you’ve been successful at letting go, what is your secret?

Off to finish my work day!

Ciao!

Dukan – Consolidation Day 80

Posted on July 30, 2012 by flamidwyfe

Daily Weight: 147 lbs
Goal Weight: 155 lbs

Spent the night last night in Shanghai and after dropping off Suz at the airport I headed back by subway to the train station and then the train back to Hangzhou.

My driver, Jerry, picked me up at the train station and took me to the Wet Market to buy meat and veggies… so much cheaper than the grocery store!

I then got home and started packing boxes for my move home in September. I packed two boxes and will ship them on Thursday… September 20th… leaving for U.S. date 🙂

Breakfast: Buffet at the Courtyard Marriott… I had a 3 egg omelet with onions, peppers and mozzarella cheese.
Lunch on the train: Beef jerky and a handful of almonds
Snack: Yogurt with Splenda and cinnamon
Dinner: Stir fried pork with onions and asparagus. Dipped that in Tamari (which is soy sauce without wheat in it) and wasabi… Oh My Was That Good!

Dinner Cooking 🙂

Dinner Plated!

Now I’m off for a 5 km run and then bed. I hope you all enjoy your Monday!

Ciao!

Rock You Like A Hurricane

Posted on July 24, 2012 by flamidwyfe

So, exciting couple of days I’ve had! That little tropical storm that I blogged about yesterday morning turned into a full on Category 4 Typhoon (known as a hurricane in the Atlantic) and headed to come on land just a smidge west of Hong Kong in the middle of the night.

Yesterday afternoon, when it started heading north towards HK and became a slow moving Category 1 storm, I decided to ditch the free night I earned at Best Western and pack up. I then headed out in the torrential rain, that no umbrella would have protected me from, to see if I could get a train back to Guangzhou.

Category 1 in the afternoon, local HK time…

There were two reasons I wanted out of HK… 1. I was staying on the top floor (37th) of a hotel on a small island and 2. I had an interview to do in the morning and didn’t want to let the hospital down.
I got to the train ticket office, soaking wet, only to be told, “NO” 😦

The good thing about the typhoon was that I was forced to actually relax and I never lost my Internet connection! I chatted with Miri for awhile and her wit kept me distracted. Then, around 930 pm I thought I was having vertigo because the room was moving… Well the room WAS moving, the wind was howling and a peek at http://www.wunderground.com told me this…

Yes, a Category FOUR hurricane with winds that were shaking the building!
I took this shot of the outside…

So, while I’m Facebooking updates and pretending all is well with the world I’m freaking out and scared… Thank God my friend Teri popped up to chat…. Teri, you calmed me down and distracted me and I’m so grateful 🙂 I took a Lunesta and decided to sleep it away… Gently rocked (literally) to sleep by the winds!

I woke up at 515 to get ready to go to the train. The winds were still quite high and it was pouring rain. The concierge said that the subways were working and that my train was delayed because of trees on the track. I thought I’d risk it and go anyway. My train left just 13 minutes late!

My trusty personal assistant, Rose, met me at the station in Guangzhou and off to the interview we went. The interview was for a company called qq and it was about my passion, water birth. Here we are during the interview…

And the storm has followed me north… Downgraded to a Cat 3 typhoon now. Very odd that I had no idea about this storm until I was in the middle of it. At home, in Florida, everyone would be broadcasting around the clock if there was a storm brewing like that! No storefronts boarded up this morning and the street pork guy was opening his shop while I made my way to the subway! Different perspectives, different countries… Ahhhh, what an interesting life I lead 🙂

Ciao!

Dukan – Consolidation Day 73

Posted on July 23, 2012 by flamidwyfe

Wow! 73 days! I can’t believe it. And you know what? My weight has been between 144 and 147 each and every morning for about 6 weeks now. Woot!

Daily Weight: 146 lbs/66.22 kgs
Goal weight: 155 lbs/70.5 kgs

I’ve been eating very well. Mostly 3 egg omelets for breakfast, meat and veggies for lunch and dinner. I’m loving all the veggies and a sweet potato 3x a week. I’m doing a PP day once per week and a celebration meal.

I’m on week 2 of being in Guangzhou working, so eating out more than I like, because I’m not suppose to cook in my room. And I’m on my 2nd 2 day trip to Hong Kong in as many weeks. Hong Kong is a $20 train ticket and only 1 hour and 45 minutes away from Guangzhou. It is heaven. Although maybe not right now as you’ll see from these pictures…

About 10 minutes after arriving in Hong Kong yesterday, I stripped off my clothes, put on bathing suit and headed to rooftop pool… It is a small pool, just 15′ x 4′. I was perplexed as to why the wooden chairs and table weren’t there, but laid out my towel and took this glorious picture…

About 25 minutes later I noticed an abrupt change and looked up to see this…

And then the rain started… So inside I went. While waiting for the elevator I noticed this…

So WTH does that mean you ask? This…

So, I went from this…

To this…

Pretty quickly. But that’s OK because I still got a good walk in last night and a run in this morning and I’ve been forced to RELAX by just chilling in my room here at the hotel, which saves me money because it’s too yucky to be out shopping 😀 So all’s good!

Happy Monday, Everyone!

Ciao!

Travel – Hunań Dinner

Posted on July 19, 2012 by flamidwyfe

So, I’m working in Guangzhou for 2 weeks and my personal assistant asks me the other day if I like spicy food. I say yes…. In China spicy = burn holes in your mouth. This I learned last night! 😀

Last night Rose and her boyfriend Jack took me to Hunań Home Restaurant for dinner. I immediately knew it was going to be spicy simply by coughing the minute we walked into the restaurant because of the pepper in the air… Whew boy!

Hunań cuisine is also known as Xiang cuisine, in Chinese 湘菜. Xiang cuisine is known for its liberal use of hot chilis, shallots and garlic. And boy did we have a lot of all of those! It is also known for changing the menu to suit the season. In the summer they start you out with cold dishes that have the hottest chilis and then milder dishes towards the end. Hot Pot is served more in the winter.

We were served a very “earthy” tea. Grown in Hunan.

My dinner companions Rose & Jack…

And food in the order it was brought out… Spiciest first!

Spicy Black Fungi (aka mushrooms). These were AMAZING and HOT… Spicy, spicy hot. Those little teeny red peppers in there… Whew!

Next up, Spicy Shrimps… Yes, with an ‘s’. They were nearly as spicy as the fungi and had their skin still on, but I got used to the crunchiness 🙂

And then the cauliflower. Spicy, but not too HOT. These were yummy!! Notice the whole garlic cloves… Mmmmm Mmmmm Good!

After that the short ribs arrived, covered in rice. They were steamed… OH MY, NOM, NOM!!! I shooed the rice off…

And to finish the meal off, Fried Pumpkin 😀 Very naughty, lol. BUT… They used rice flour, not wheat flour, so no tummy troubles… YAY!!

After dinner we took a 4 km stroll along the waterfront, in the rain. It was a beautiful night with boats and ferries floating down the river.

This is me and Rose.

And Rose and Jack… Who really is a delightful guy… He just doesn’t smile for pictures 🙂

It was such an honor to share dinner with them. Jack is the first boyfriend I’ve met here in China. It’s usually just the girls who go out. I had a fabulous time getting to know Rose even more and meeting her boyfriend, who is perfect for her 😀

Ciao!

Dukan – Consolidation Day 65

Posted on July 15, 2012 by flamidwyfe

Saturday was Bastille Day and I chose it to be a Celebration Meal Day!

Daily weight: 147 lbs/66.8 kgs
Goal weight: 155 lbs/70.5 kgs
Weight still hanging in there… It’s amazing 🙂

Traveled to Guangzhou on Thursday. Will be here for 2 weeks.

Friday assisted a woman who wanted a water birth. The patient and her husband gave permission for our marketing department to film the event. Unbeknownst to me there was a reporter from a national online pregnancy magazine in the room as well, blogging live and uploading pics from her iPhone (apparently with the patients permission, lol). The funny thing is, I thought she was our staff and kept telling her to put her phone away 😀
This photo is courtesy of the magazine website…

Saturday was Bastille Day. So far this summer I have celebrated British Day, the 4th of July and Bastille Day all in China. We were invited by the French Chamber if Commerce to a huge beach/pool party at a local hotel. Goodie bags when we arrived included a bikini, that fit I might add! We had a great time. I decided that I would make this my weekly celebration meal. I had BBQ meat and grilled veggies and my celebration food was two teeny scoops of decadent French milled ice cream… Coffee (my favorite since I was an itty bitty) and BLACK SESAME… Holy scamoly! We danced the night away to a live band that played some awesome music and a had 2 glasses of French white wine that caused me to have a headache 😦

This is Rose (my Guangzhou Personal Assistant) and Liza who works in the Int’l Department at he hospital.

Sunday was a routine day in the office. On my morning break I wrote my guest post for AGoodRun. I submitted it for publishing tomorrow… How exciting is that?? And in the late afternoon we headed to the Bud Theatre for a marketing event. I did a water birth presentation for over 400 parents to be… It was awesome. Immediately following my talk there was a live theatrical performance of The Wonderful Adventures of Nils. I believe it’s a Swedish story… Hearing it in Mandarin made it even more fun 🙂

I also got to pass out the prizes that we awarded. After the show ended Rose, Liza and I went to the Oriental Palace Arabic restaurant for dinner… Again… Lol. I love the friendly atmosphere and the food is gorgeous!

I’m off to Hong Kong in the morning! So off to bed I go!

Ciao 🙂

Travel – Not Quite Back in the Groove

Posted on June 25, 2012 by flamidwyfe

Exhausted. Knackered. Achy.

Weight? Who knows, but the pants still fit… scale is missing in my “delayed” luggage. I did stick to my diet while on my vacation and since I’ve been back in China.
Exercise? Worry? Does that count? I can’t run, since my running shoes are also in my “delayed” luggage… along with clothes and underwear! I did walk all over Shanghai yesterday and to and from work on Saturday morning and to work, home for lunch and back to work so far today racked up 3+ miles.

That about explains the 3 ways I’m feeling right now. Even after having an 8 hour sleep
last night. Jet lag sucks… BIG TIME. So, I’m not quite back in my groove, but feel that an update is overdue, for sure!

I left Florida on Thursday morning at 1145 a.m. for a flight to New York’s JFK. As I blogged before, they actually have Wifi on flights in the States now… how cool is that? Nice 1.5 hour layover there then off to Beijing, except the flight is delayed and they are talking about me not making my flight to Hangzhou, blah, blah, blah… I actually said to the lady at the counter, “seriously, please don’t tell me that… I have travel anxiety related to timeliness!!!” I decided I was going to try not to fret over it… what will be, will be. They made up some of the time, but the transfer time was close in Beijing and I had to go through immigration, collect my bags and then recheck my bags and get on the flight. I had 47 minutes!

I sailed through immigration and went to the baggage carousel… one of my bags was the first one on the carousel!!! What luck! LOL… until after 25 minutes, the bags stopped coming and I realized that A. I had 15 minutes to haul my butt to my connecting flight and B. my 2nd bag was missing… PANIC set in. I ran to the missing baggage office and they put my baggage number in and found that my bag was still in New York… tears were shed, I’m a cry baby when I’m tired, and I ran to check my bag for the Hangzhou flight and actually made it on the plane… because it too was delayed.

I get to Hangzhou at midnight, collect my one bag and head to the lost baggage office to file a claim. It is now officially Saturday morning (I’ve missed all of Friday being in the air) and I have to be at work at 8 a.m. Through more tears I realize that the bag I have is NOT the bag with my clothes and my Brooks Addiction running shoes and MOST importantly MY SCALE… can anyone say MELTDOWN!?! She files the claim with the Air China office in New York and says, as she hands me the paper… it’s just “delayed” baggage, not “lost”… with the sweetest little smile. It’s hard to be angry with her 😦

I get a taxi home and fall into bed after loving all over Tits the Cat, who has apparently missed me immensely. He insisted I carry him around like a baby for half an hour! I got into bed at 3 a.m. and woke up at 558 a.m…. ugh! Made coffee, checked email and got ready for work… at work by 730 a.m. On my way to work I picked up tea eggs… I was so happy to see my favorite tea egg lady…

Those are the tea eggs in that ginormous crockpot!

I think the exhaustion hit me around noon. I felt like someone was sitting on my head! But I made it through most of the day. At 3 I decided to leave and called my friend Alice, a midwife from Florida who is visiting her son here in Hangzhou. They just happened to be at my favorite restaurant in town, The Vineyard, and I took a taxi there to meet them. It was so wonderful to see her. I think it’s been 15 years or so since I’ve seen her in person, but she is the one who inspired me to walk the Camino 2 years ago.

In bed Saturday night before 10 and up at 458… UGH! No problem, got up, made a breakfast of steak and onions and showered and dressed and headed out the door to get the train to Shanghai! A fellow blogger, Mona, was in China for a summer assignment and we were going to meet in person! How awesome is that? I love her photography on her blog and even though I was knackered as all get out, it was worth the trip to meet her!

Mona on the Bund… The Pearl in the background.

Walking to the Bund.

We met at her hotel and walked to the subway. We took that down to the Bund, which is the waterfront walk on the Pearl River. It was an overcast day, but we still had a good time! After walking the Bund we google mapped my favorite restaurant in Shanghai the Blue Frog. Unfortunately the address was incorrect and we ended up walking a heck of a lot more than we intended… no worries… the lunch and company was worth it!

On the walk we saw lots of cool things and some random things like the fresh piece of asparagus on the stairs of a walk over and this beautiful cherry in the gutter…

Cherry in the gutter… streets of Shanghai

After the trip back to Mona’s hotel, I taxied up to the subway and then took Line 2 to the Family Mart… the grocery store that I can get my Fat Free yogurt. Bought 8 containers and a few other items and then took the subway back to the Shanghai train station… it was a wonderful day!

Bye-bye Shanghai

Back to my flat… call to Air China “delayed” baggage office… “good news Ms. Blankenship, your bag is on the flight to Beijing! You should have bag tomorrow noon”… well, my assistant has just called and been told it’s still in New York… I’m trying not to panic. I’d like to have my clothes, my shoes and MY SCALE… my Vivien tells me it will come, “this is China, it’ll happen”… I take a deep breath, come back to my office and pray… yes… this is China… things do happen.

As I finish this post I am listening to the soundtrack of Rock of Ages… the music makes me HAPPY 😀 I HIGHLY RECOMMEND this movie. I know that it got crappy reviews, but they were wrong. It’s a funny, happy inducing movie and thinking of Tom Cruise (lovingly referred to as TC) singing and dancing “Pour Some Sugar on Me” gives this 48 year old giggles and smiles… If I was in the States… I’d probably have seen it 3 times already!

And now… Vivien has just walked into my office and said MY BAGS ARE GOING TO BE HERE, IN OUR OFFICE IN 2 HOURS!!!!!!!!!! OK, trying not to hold my breath, trying not to be too optimistic, but they asked her for directions to the hospital. Dear Lord, I pray it’s MY bag… lol.

With that… I’m outta here… if anyone has a secret to getting rid of jet lag quicker, I’d be ever so grateful!!!

Ciao!

“I’m hot sticky sweet, from my head, my head to my feet”… Pour Some Sugar On Me by Def Leppard… redone by the yummy TC 😀