Tuesday, May 13, 2008

Well, Rock Our World!

Thank you everyone for your blog comments and emails regarding our safety. We are fine. Thankfully, Kunming was spared. We didn't feel any tremors, which is odd, since reports had as far south as Vietnam (Yunnan Province borders Vietnam) and Thailand experiencing them. Around 2:30 on Monday, I just dropped off C. at school for the afternoon session and was on a bus heading downtown. G. was in the apartment with E. (the "why" is in the next paragraph). Due to the state controlled media, we hadn't heard anything about the quake until we were on the computer later in the evening and read about it on Yahoo! So most of you probably had earlier and more (accurate) information than we did. Sichuan Province is just to the north of us. You may hear the cities of Chengdu and Chongqing mentioned. That is where we traveled to in January. For an idea of distances, my guesstimation is Kunming to Chengdu is similiar to distances between St. Louis and Minneapolis. Not that far away! We have had our share of being close to troubles this year. During February, the big snowstorms were to the east of us, recently the Tibet uprisings and the Myanmar cyclone to our near west and now, the quake to the north. We have six weeks to go and only one direction left!

You also may have been reading about the EV71 (hand, foot & mouth) virus that is hitting the kindergartens and orphanages hard. It is especially hard on children younger than two years old and there has been about thirty deaths and about 30,000 confirmed cases. Well, our kids have a variant of this. The schools have been diligently checking each child's throat, hands and feet for about two weeks now. The government is being more upfront and proactive about the epidemic due to its' debacle regarding SARS a few years back. And of course, with the Olympics starting in less than three months, the government is trying to avoid making another big mess. On Friday, E.'s throat had the spots, and we had to take her to the Children's Hospital. She was given five medications and was to report back today, Tuesday. Well, this morning, C. now sported the spots in the throat area, which meant off we went with two to the hospital. E.'s condition was a lot better, but was not given the ok to return to school. Luckily, both kids have not had any sign of fever or spots on the extremities - very serious, if so. We now will have both kids home for 10 days, giving numerous medications and mouth rinses. Oh joy.

Between the natural disasters, political concerns and now this virus, G. is more than ready to pack it up and head home! Politcal events, rather than disasters or medical related events have more of an affect on me. We really want to enjoy the remaining time in China as much as possible, but for now, let's just say we are counting the days...

7 comments:

Anonymous said...

Ann & Gustavo...I am glad you are all ok. Good News. I will be glad when you are back home. You will have to contact us when you get back. Be safe and travel safe.

Cousin Sandy

Anonymous said...

Ann and Gustavo,

It was s-o-o-o-o...good to see your post when I got home tonight from work (and retirement banquet at MHS). What a relief! I hope that the kids are getting better. Illness would worry me a lot given the language barrier, etc. if I was in your position. I am so glad that all is well where you are. I am looking forward to the first post from Jackson, MI. Hope to see you soon. Marietta

Anonymous said...

Glad to hear that the quake didn't
affect you but sorry to hear the kids are sick. Take care of yourselves........Curious in USA

Anonymous said...

TIO!! ojala este bien!!, supe lo del terremoto, espero que se encuentren todos sanos y salvos, los chilenos sabemos de terremotos asi que supongo que usted supo resguardarce!, espero tener prontas noticias de usted!

MANUEL,CHILE

Anonymous said...

Ann & Gustavo,

we were talking about you and the kids this past weekend. Glad to hear all is well and you are all safe. We'll wait to hear of your safe return to MI!

Cousin Cindy

Anonymous said...

Glad to hear that you are safe! The news that we received told of a large area affected. Hope all goes well with the health concern, and your remaining time in China. Look forward to seeing you when you return.

Carmen

Anonymous said...

Ann and Gustavo....I've been thinking about you and hoping you are ok. It was good to see your posting on here so I knew for sure. I hope Elena's scalding gets better soon and both kids are out of any danger of this disease. My goodness! What a week you've had. I'll be very glad to see you all when you are back here in MI.
Take care,

Nancy