Saturday Night Briefs

What I am Wearing

Nothing but my gray Jockey brand briefs.

Chinese History Tests

I had a grade eleven student rattle off the courses he was taking at school:  Chinese, Math, Chemistry, Biology, Physics, English, History, Politics, and one more that I can't remember.  I asked the student what his History classes were like.  He told me that the students just listen to the teacher and take notes.  They never write essays, but instead study for multiple-choice tests.

Kissing Tony

Tony has been giving me lots of kisses lately.  Jenny tells me that he is also kissing other boys.

On a more, unambiguous, positive note, Tony is going to bed at civilized hours.  Tonight, he was asleep by 930 PM.  The time out in the countryside was good for him in that sense.

Toilet Training

Tony can't yet use the toilet, but he can pull a parent to one to help him use it.  My wife took him downtown for the first in underwear, not diapers. 

Here is an article about toilet training a mixed-blood baby in Nanjing.  My wife has said that Tony is behind other children his age in China because he wears diapers.  Here is how the Chinese parent copes without diapers:

Chinese children don't typically wear diapers. Parents potty train their children from a very young age using a method called EC or elimination communication. With this method, a child can tell his or her parents they have to use the toilet sometimes as young as 3 months. Then, the parents will take the child to the bathroom, and make a "ssssshhhhhing"noise as the child relieves him/herself. To westerners, this method is a little scary sometimes. Parents just wouldn't know how to handle the mess if there ever was a "miscommunication."But it's no big deal here. During those times when accidents do happen, most Chinese parents laugh about it, clean up and move on. It's the way they've been doing things for as long as they've had babies.