Youngest and Oldest Kids: Adventures of the Chongqing Nanny

I get along well with youngest children; most of my best friends and men I've been out with are youngest kids. I'm an oldest, so perhaps it's just an easy paradigm to fall into. My second year, most of the new volunteers assigned to Chongqing were guys. (New volunteers arrive every July; because we serve for two years, you serve with a different group your first and second years.) And almost all of them were youngest children.

Because I'd already been in Chongqing a year when the new volunteers arrived, I was happy to take on the role of 411 if they needed it. I told them about getting around the city and food and shopping and whatever else they needed to know. But then I started getting calls from restaurants, asking me to talk to their server to order their dinner. One of the girls sometimes called me and she was always "Hey, can you help me out? I've tried and it's not working." But the boys were like, "Hi, order my food, 'k thanks bye." I started to get annoyed by the boys. I started to feel like I wasn't their friend, I was their nanny. On the one hand, it was flattering they thought I knew so much. On the other hand, I'm not your mom. It's funny now to me how easy it was for us to fall into this pattern, because both sides were willing to take on the role of youngest/oldest. (Yes, I am stereotyping-- not all youngest or oldest kids act like this. But we did.)

I finally told them I felt like their nanny, not their friend, and I didn't like that. They started making an effort to make sure they knew I was their friend first, nanny second (haha), balance restored. Even now I sometimes still get emails asking for help with something Chongqing-related. I'm happy to help out. And they taught me more about being very laid-back, carefree and fun-loving. Youngest and oldest: it's a dynamic that works.

Happy Halloween! Hope you have a great time. Be safe! Here's a picture from last year I don't think I've shared before. He didn't know what to be for Halloween, so like a good nanny I took him in at the last minute, gave him my Chinese silk dragon robe, cut off the sleeves of this t-shirt, blew dry his just-washed gym shorts with my hair-dryer and gave him a (make-up based) black eye. I also taped up his hands but it disappeared by the time this picture was taken. I had to rush him past the guards outside my apartment because at the time they were still housing swine flu quarantinees in my building. But look at him: would YOU mess with this boxer? I still love the memory of us trying to get a taxi in our Halloween getups. Crazy Americans.

Dress Up

Doll Techno asked about pics of me in dresses. So, here are pictures of some of my favorites through the ages:


Me in kindergarten. I remember loving this dress, I wore it all the time.

















My 1950's retro cocktail dress. My work dinner with Will, he snapped this on our way out.

















My Naughty Nurse Halloween dress. I can still fit in this dress, but it's a bit tight now. Must run everyday again! (And stop eating rice and oily Chinese food, of course.)

Everyone needs the perfect LBD, right? In this case, B = blue satin. It's my Proenza Schouler for Target dress and I lurrvve it. So comfy. (Sorry for the bad shot, it's a camera phone picture.)

This is my favorite everyday outfit. I brought this denim skirt to China and I wear it all the time. This was at the Austin City Limits Music Festival with Will and it was 108 that day, hence the look of pain on my face. Ah, Texas summers! (It was the last weekend of September, but that's still summertime in Texas.)

Halloween, plus Bar Dancing

The best spot for dancing in a bar? On the bar. Especially on Halloween night in China, when the bars are packed with thousands of people celebrating this Western holiday (read: all the cool kids). Here was my view for most of the night. 

This was one of two bars I danced on that night; the other had a metal beam running the length of the ceiling above it, suitable for grasping while dancing. Someone thought ahead!  Alas, I was too busy dancing to take any pictures. (But we did get videotaped by several patrons.)

Austin was the one who got us onto the bar, I gladly followed Coyote Ugly style. Here we are around 3:30 AM, self-portrait. Very fun night!