After being here in China (Suzhou) for three months, my family and I have had several ups and downs and I thought we were starting to 'be ok'. But now, we are running into problems all at once, such as, we just found out that our newly found Ayi has Hepatitis B, so we had to let her go. Uggh, it took forever to even find that one. Now my husband and I are back to the problem of never being able to have a few hours out by ourselves. Just the fact that the Ayi did not speak any english and was fairly new at being an Ayi for a family always kept me a bit nervous.
And just today, I found out that there were a couple of mornings when the Ayi took my young son out to the kindergarten van, some 'men' would come up and take pictures of my son with their cell phones. I have been told that, however not common, it could be a perfect setup for a kidnapping. Especially since those type of people really take notice to a 'daily set schedule' of an expat. I now feel like I have been ignorant in ever putting so much trust into this place and feel like I need to stay very close to our apartment, and Not take our children into crowded areas.
If the lack of sanitary practices don't get you, then the bad guys will, is how I'm feeling.
Now what ? We still have 16 months to go here !!?? Any words of wisdom or ideas ? Im at wits end.
signed, Worry Mother