Where the Action Is

The playground is our version of the town square that you find in European cities. Everyone, at one point or another during the day, can be found at the playground.

In the early morning, there is a group of people practicing tai chi here. It is really beautiful to watch. Then the kids and nannies/moms come out around 8-ish before it gets too hot. Then they return to the playground in early evening before dinner. In the afternoon, I'm told by Yu that everyone can be found in the indoor playroom.

Sydney loves it out there. Yu keeps telling me that Sydney keeps pulling her to the door to go outside. And of course, Yu relents and takes her outside. Her favorite is the swing. She can't get enough of it. She'll start squealing as soon as she sees it. There is only one baby swing though so Sydney can't always get on it. Though she hovers around it a bit using her Jedi mind trick to get the kid on it to leave.

When that doesn't work, we are off to the slide. It took a while for her to understand that you go down slides, not up.

Sydney gets very excited whenever she sees other kids but she doesn't want to interact with them. She just likes to watch them and be around them. I bet she misses the kids at daycare. It will be much better (and I will feel less guilty) once she starts school next month.

I've met a couple of nice women at the playground. Yin is Chinese and is trying to learn English so we get together once a week at my apartment and she teaches me Chinese in English and I correct her English as needed. She has a 7 month old little girl who is really cute. There is a group of English speaking women that huddles together at the playground. I've met some of them individually and they are nice. I've never joined them as a group because their kids are old enough to play unsupervised and I'm busy chasing Sydney around.

There is little club house as part of the playground and to get into it, you have to climb a little stair way. Sydney can't climb up by herself but she ardently tries everytime. And she always starts off in this "ready, set, go" position.

And as with every playground, there is a bully. Ours is a little 6 year old, cross-eyed boy. He's literally cross-eyed and he is mean spirited. He is constantly trying to ram his push toy into other kids, or taking their toys or throwing rocks at other kids. His nanny tries to restrain him but I could tell that she is no match for him. Whenever he sees Sydney, he runs to her with outstretched hands and I always pick her up because he doesn't look like he knows the word "gentle". Then his nanny pulls him away from us. Sometimes I bring with us a bubble maker for Sydney to chase the bubbles, and very quickly we are surrounded by other kids. They seem really amazed by it that I don't think that they've ever seen anything like it before. When I let the other kids blow on the stick (but not the mean, cross-eyed boy), they blow hard like they are blowing out candles. The little girl below is the only one that could blow correctly so I let her be in charge of the bubbles.

I came home yesterday and the apartment was empty so I went to the window, and sure enough, Sydney and Yu are outside. Sydney is riding on a red truck scooter and a boy is standing by watching her. The nannies are conversing. I remember thinking how nice it was for the boy to share his toy because Sydney is very possessive about her Pooh tricycle at the playground. If she catches another kid coveting her tricycle, she will walk over to the tricycle and hold its handle, and stare down the other kid until he or she leaves. And if the evil eye doesn't work, Sydney will push her tricycle away from the other kid. Like her mom, she doesn't like people touching her stuff.

When they came inside, Yu told me that the boy didn't want to give Sydney the scooter but Sydney pointed to the slide and started to walk over to it. The boy got off the scooter and ran to the slide ahead of Sydney, who immediately back tracks and climbs on the scooter. THAT'S MY GIRL!!!