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Week 24: 9/11/05

Hey There, Hi There, Ho There!

This was the week leading up to the grand opening of Disney's newest theme park, Hong Kong Disneyland. Of course, it's also the reason why we are here.

Labor Pains

This is the first time we've had the privilege to be a part of the "birth" of a brand new, stand alone Disney theme park. Yes, we lived in Japan and Michael worked on Tokyo Disney Sea, but Tokyo Disneyland was already there, running smoothly and paving the way for it's younger sibling. This time it was just Hong Kong Disneyland making it's way into China all alone. The press here has been brutal, I've never seen Disney so under attack as even the Southern Baptists were never this malicious. The Hong Kong government owns a majority of Disneyland, so they have a vested interest in it's success. However, based on the articles in the newspaper you would think that Disney was trying to build a leaky nuclear power plant rather than a theme park with rides and popcorn. It's been a tough ride for Disney, trying so hard to cater to local customs while retaining their "magic", when the locals aren't buying any of it. What's that saying about being darned if you do, darned if you don't... it totally applies here as they can't win no matter what they do, at least in the eyes of the South China Morning Post newspaper which we get delivered to our door each morning.

We've been able to go to Hong Kong Disneyland five times, having a very different experience each time. I wrote about the Walt Disney Imagineering Appreciation Day that we went to, which was our best experience at any Disney theme park world wide since our kids behaved, the rain stayed away, all the food and snacks were free, and we rode all the rides with no wait. We got to go with my cousin Josh on the first "Rehearsal Day" which was when the park first opened to invited guests and we got to see Mike's show for the first time and had pretty short wait times for the rides. Jeff's first day here we took him to see the park and the highlight of my day was scoring a LEVEL SEVEN on the Buzz Lightyear Astro Blasters... the highest score a mere mortal can attain- getting over one million points by shooting targets with a laser blaster. Yes, I'm cool, and I know it (or so my oldest son who has gotten to level three tells me!). Then we went twice this week, which was at least one time too many.

Disneyland sold it's first tickets for a rehearsal day on September 4th for a charity event. The rest of the rehearsals were all for invited guests, no one had to pay to get in. Since the tickets for charity day went on sale two months ago before I had any idea if we'd be able to go to any of the rehearsal days, I shelled out the cash to buy some tickets to ensure that Jeff would get to see Disneyland while he was here. Several things went wrong that day, we were tired and sore after having just returned from Beijing the night before. The weather was wetter than wet, with a heavy rainstorm that showed just how little covered space the new park has and everything we owned was soaked instantly, our feet blistering from the wet socks rubbing against our toes. And Disney decided to let 30,000 people into it's smallest park to test how the park could handle large crowds. The short answer: it couldn't. I absolutely hate to say it, but that was my worst ever day at any Disney theme park world wide, and as a paying guest, I'm allowed to say it. All the other rehearsal days had numbers from 8,000 people to 15,000 people. Doubling that number meant the Buzz Lightyear line was over three hours long and waiting in line to eat lunch at one of the largest fast food restaurants in the pouring deluge of rain soaked to our underwear even with umbrellas took over one hour. There were no short lines in the ladies restrooms, so Nathan got to have his first solo bathroom experience in the men's room when he couldn't hold it after waiting with me for 15 minutes in a line that wrapped around the building.

In the park that day were a huge amount of Chinese mainlanders, with a culture I cannot begin to understand. Here we are, waiting in a line that clearly looks like a line as there are barriers that force you to stand single file. The line is long, and of course no one really wants to stand in it, but that's what you do, right? Not to the people there that day! I was standing with Nathan in line for the spinney space ships in Tomorrowland under a sign that said the wait was 45 minutes. As I stood there, people kept pushing past us. I figured that they had already been in the line, had excused themselves to go to the restroom or grab some water for the wait, and now they were making their way back to the rest of their party. But after 20 minutes had gone by and we hadn't really moved much, I started paying attention to the people pushing past me. Turns out they weren't with anyone, they just didn't want to wait in the line so they pushed their way to the front and got to be the next people on the ride. Once I started counting, over 40 people did this until we got on the ride ourselves, with a one hour and thirty minute wait time, twice the wait that the sign had stated since so many people cut the line. Unbelievable! Jeff and I decided that we would just go ahead and go home, since we were exhausted and the kids were tired and what Nathan most wanted to do (ride Buzz again) was up to a three hour wait and I didn't have it in me to stand for that long with cranky kids. So we left. Jeff went home the next day, I actually had to haul the kids out of bed at 8:30 a.m. to say goodbye. Why is it they never sleep in when you want them to???

On Wednesday we got to go to Disneyland again, this time in combination with a stay at Disney's Hollywood Hotel, an incredibly cute art deco hotel with Mickey ears everywhere. Nathan, who adores Mickey Mouse, was ecstatic over staying at "Mickey's house". He kept asking if we'd get to see Mickey there. I said I didn't know. As Mike put the boys to bed, I was wandering the lobby and grounds, and there was Mickey Mouse, taking photos with guests. I asked the cast member how long Mickey would be there (five minutes) and I raced up to our room, plucked the pajama clad Nathan out of bed and ran carrying him back to the lobby with his stuffed Mickey to wait in the line that had formed. As the person in line ahead of us took their photo, the cast member said "Okay, no more photos! Mickey has to go to bed!". I pleaded, begged, cajoled and was about ready to pass the cast member some cash when she finally said Nathan could take a photo with him. Nathan held out his Mickey doll and the real Mickey did a little dance and gave him a giant hug. Nathan's smile nearly split his face in two. I snapped a quick photo and off Mickey went while Nathan and I went back to the room. Nathan asked if the "real" Mickey was just hiding under the obvious costume that the Mickey in the lobby was wearing, and that's why he didn't talk. I said "What do you think?", and he said "Yes". So we left it at that, since the magic of childhood imagination and fantasy is ending sooner and sooner these days, and I don't want to be the one to give him a dose of reality, it will come quick enough.

As we got to Disneyland the next day and Mike prepared to go into the office while the boys and I played at the park, Mike got a call saying that instead of having Friday as his scheduled day off, they were giving him that day off. I was disappointed since I had planned Friday all out... Mike could sleep in and just stay home all day. The boys could have their dad all to themselves. I would go shopping until my wallet was empty at all the places I haven't been able to go with the boys who complain and touch things. That night the babysitter would put the boys to bed and Mike and I would go to our friends house for a final goodbye to the group of people we have hung out with every Friday night for six months. Now we were already standing in Disneyland an hour and a half from our home, so it wasn't like we could just leave and try to replicate part of Friday's plans for Wednesday. Well we could have if we didn't have the kids with us. Nathan would have been inconsolable if we dragged him out of Disneyland for no good reason just minutes after arriving. We did a half day only, I did a bit of shopping, a lot less than I had hoped to do since I was just so bummed about the day off and harboring bitter feeling towards the company who's merchandise I was there to buy. So my apologies to those of you who were hoping for Disney souvenirs... it's not going to happen. We left in the early afternoon, happy that there weren't very many people in the park. By the time we got home, Mike wasn't feeling well, the kids were bouncing off the walls, and I was just too tired to consider going out to do the shopping that I wanted to do before the movers come to take away all our stuff and send it on a slow boat to America.

Real Labor Pains

On Thursday night I got a call from my friend Rachel in California, pregnant with her fourth child, that she was starting to have some contractions. On Friday morning I got a call from her husband Mark saying that Michael Andrew had been born, making that the fifth baby born to friends of ours since we've been here in Hong Kong. We are going to go on a "Baby Tour" as soon as we get home to visit three of the five babies who still reside in California. Congratulations, Mark and Rachel!

A Real Pain

I took Nathan down the hill to the hospital to get his stitches removed, and that was quite an adventure. I don't think Nathan will ever return willingly to see a physician again. I had Benjamin in the stroller in the corner of the room, and the doctor had Nathan hop up on the table to lay back. Nathan needed tons of encouragement to do that, and then the doctor turned on a bright circular light with a magnifying glass in the middle and swung it around to look at Nathan's head close up, and like a bullet from a gun, Nathan screamed like a horror film queen and jumped off the table, flung open the door to the room, ran out of the office, looping around the round corridors, through the lobby, and into the taxi line at the entrance before I caught up with him. I had to carry him back, where I explained to the doctor that when the stitches were put in, Nathan was given no pain killers and that we had to hold him down while he screamed and kicked. "How traumatic that must have been", said the doctor. Uh, yeah, just a little. To get Nathan to lay still for the three seconds it took to remove the stitches was nothing short of a miracle. I'm just grateful that Ben stayed calm and quiet in his stroller in the corner instead of joining in with the cacophony of shouts and screams coming from the table. The doctor said that for the next six months to a year Nathan needs to wear a hat or high SPF sunscreen to keep the sun off. And he also voiced his displeasure at the stitches that were given, as Nathan's scar looks a lot like Frankenstein's. Nathan is being such a champ about all this, reminding me to bring his hat with him and to clean the wound. He's already starting to play up the macho side of having a scar. We went to his school here in Hong Kong to collect his things from last year and his teacher asked what had happened to his head. He acted out the whole thing for her, and then tugged on my sleeve and whispered "Don't tell Miss Ruth about how I ran out of the hospital when they tried to put the light on me". Truthfully I'm doing much better about it now that the initial shock has worn off. My biggest obstacle is going to be getting Nathan to not despise the medical profession and to stop making death threats towards them while he's playing in his bedroom.

The End Is Near!

As I write this, we have two more days until we are on a plane bound for Los Angeles. We arrive at LAX on Sunday September 18 at 10:10 a.m., where both sets of Grandparents and Aunt Holly are going to meet us and hug and squeeze the kids until they beg mercy. We can't wait. We had hoped to do a little layover in Tokyo and visit our friends in Japan as well as Tokyo DisneySea, but at this point our tired bodies and our empty pocketbook are saying "Beijing was enough, just go home!" I have one more week to write about however, so you'll be seeing one more update and then I'm taking a nice long sabbatical... For now you can take a look at some great photos!

Happy traveling!

Heather, Michael, Nathan, and Benjamin Chase

All American Boy Nathan with his souvenir from Beijing, China.
The lobby of the swanky Disneyland Hotel, Right next to Disney's Hollywood Hotel where we stayed.	Our room at Disney's Hollywood Hotel had Mickey everywhere.
Mickey was in the shower, too!	The three most handsome guys I know!
The man himself! Or is it mouse? Nathan introduces Mickey to Mickey.	What a wonderful hug to get right before bedtime!
The not entirely hidden Mickeys in the hallway carpet at Disney's Hollywood Hotel	Little touches of Mickey in the amenities and the elevator button
Outside Michael's Theater
The Golden Mickeys	The opening scene
Lunch at Disneyland, Duck and Pork	Breakfast at Disneyland, Steamed Custard Bun
Coolie Dale with the Chase's	Nathan rebuffing Mulan's advances
Farewell Hong Kong Disneyland! Our final visit to the Park.
Nathan saw this costume at Stanley Market on our first visit there six month ago. For six months he has begged us for it so it can complete his superhero "Nathan to the Rescue" persona. We finally got it for him. He won't take it off. The good news is that it only took four months for him to stop wearing the Peter Pan hat we bought him two years ago. At least it's not a tu-tu, right?