School Enrollment

By the time the results of the medical exam came in the school was getting antsy to receive our tuition. We are in a Chinese public kindergarden, but everyone pays about $2,000 in tuition per child for the year, and another $2,000 per child for food, bedding, etc. The school requires you to pay the tuition first in a lump sum cash payment - no wires are accepted. So I couldn't pay that from the U.S.

As my trip to China got closer I was worried about arriving in China and being forced to give my children immunizations in China that were required by the school. So I didn't want to pay tuition until I knew that my kids passed the health exam, and that I knew they would not be given any immunizations while living in China.

Sam and Gavin passed the health exam, and I took the results to the school. If you are reading this as a how to manual on emmigrating to China - there was also a little booklet that I had to buy from the hospital and take it to the school so that they could keep a log of the children's health....or maybe we took that booklet back to the hospital. I can't remember, but you might be required to do the same thing.

Come to find out that I did not have all of the necessary immunizations. I begged and pleaded to wait for the immunizations until our next trip to the United States. At first the school nurse resisted, but then gave me a waiver of liability, and I signed it. Not being required to be immunized is a new policy. It is really monumental - before you didn't have the right to regulate what was put into your body. In essence the state owned your body. Now in China in their immunization policy they are telling you that you own your body - that it is not owned by the government. In the U.S. we are moving in the opposite direction.

Actually it worked out in my favor because if they had all of their immunizations I would have had to have the immunization record translated, stamped by a seperate hospital (not the one of the health exam), and then that would have been submitted to the school. I got to skip that step. I am always happy to avoid government bureacracy!

Next we introduced the boys to their teachers and showed them their classrooms. We were invited into the school because of one of Gavin's friends from PreK in Los Angeles had moved back to Beijing, and her mom got us into the school. We had been so busy upon our arrival that I had seen my friend, but Gavin had not seen his former classmate. While he was visiting his new classroom we said hi to her. Instead of being welcoming of Gavin she turned her back and when he tried to get her attention she began to cry, and wouldn't even say hello to Gavin. It was really a sad moment. Here we had come all that way, and Gavin was so excited to see his friend and she wouldn't even look at him. I was afraid of what he might be feeling as we left the classroom. In Gavin fashing he said, "It is just okay, mom.", and he went on a little sad, but moving forward. I was nervous about what he would be feeling and experiencing tomorrow in his new class led entirely in Mandarin, new foods, new teachers, new customs/culture, etc., and feeling alienated by someone who just months before he played with every day and had had such a warm friendship.

After we left the school we set up another bank account at the Agriculture Bank of China. That is where the school has their account, and they require that all parents have an account at that bank and give the school permission to do automatic withdrawls from your account to pay for the ongoing monthly expenses (food, bedding etc.)