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 Posted: Mon Sep 01, 2008 3:37 pm
She nodded, plume like feathers swaying a bit. "Dey're quite a sight." She mused looking to Joel and chuckling at the wide-eyed look on his face. Keeta had provided more information than she had expected. It was welcome but all she had been wondering about were names.
The Keincho-Jin made a mental note to come back sometime so she could do a bit of sketching. She hadn't even thought of that as a skill she could use when job hunting.
Children chattered behind them and Jiao'lan only caught a few words of the excited babble, 'elephants, bird lady' and such. She was used to the latter and didn't mind. She had had a few adults come up and ask her questions as well in the past and she saw it as a necessary thing. Afterall, she would probably have questions abut someone else who looked quite different from what she was used to.
Her tail swished slightly as a horse-fly landed on it, attracted to her black plumage. She dug in her bag and pulled out a watch on a fob chain. It was nearing noon. She grabbed a small bottle and shook out three pills before palming them and taking out a bottle of water. She downed them easilly and put the water back in her bag.
"Ah'm glad my chillin'll be able t'grow up with such experiences." She said with a wistful sigh.
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Posted: Tue Sep 02, 2008 4:42 pm
"More of your meds?" Keeta asked sypmathetically as she watched her friend swallow the pills. She really hoped it would cause discomfort while they were at the zoo and ruin the experience for Jiao'lan.
"I'm glad Joel will be able to as well. Although, I think I'm going to miss him having some of the experiences of running free through the forests and exploring nature and such that I had. But....with the way the world is here, I could never trust letting Joel and any of his friends run off by themselves as younger children. Maybe when he gets to be a teenager, but still..." Keeta's mouth pressed into a straight line. While life here had it's comfortable aspects, it was decidedly more complicated.
Keeta sighed and glanced at the map, but grinned when she read what was in the next pen over.
"If you think the elephants are a sight, wait until you see the Giraffes over here..." Keeta said, still carrying Joel on her hip and pushing the stroller ahead of her to the next enclosure.
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Posted: Tue Sep 02, 2008 7:33 pm
Jiao'lan nodded. "Dey go down easy but...aren' de most fun tings." She said pulling a slight face. "But again Ah jest 'ave t'think 'o de beeg pict'a." She said with a soft smile.
The female grew pensive for a moment. "Yes, Ah know what yeh mean abou' dat. Ah'd like nothin' more den to show 'im or 'er what 'is 'ome was like...takin' walks in de jungle an' such. Dere was always so much t'see. Birds, butt'aflies, monkehs...jest loads o' critt'as." She gave a slightly humourless laugh. " 'Is grandfolks in perticul'a. S'kind'a a ting I wanted t'share with me moth;a...but...heh, ah well Ah 'as Ke'rehl...an' you a'corse." She smiled slightly.
Jiao'lan merely took Keeta's word for it and followed her to the Giraffe enclosure. Again, the sight left her almost speechless. "Merceh-full 'eavens...I didn' know anyting came dat big." She craned her neck up, shielding her eyes with her hand, to look at the Giraffe's face. It plucked a spring of leaves from a nearby tree and ate slowly, much like an odd sort of cow, its tail flicking at flies every now and again.
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Posted: Wed Sep 03, 2008 5:41 pm
Keeta chuckled slightly at Jiao'lan's exclaimation, but nodded in agreement.
"They were certainly a shock to me the first time I saw them on television too...but somehow the screen can't truly portray the vastness of their height." She craned her neck back slightly to get a better view of one as it came closer.
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Posted: Sat Sep 06, 2008 7:03 pm
"Do yeh min' if I ask yeh a kind'a personal q'estion?" She asked, hoping it wasn't too forward.
Jiao'lan had a very confused and muddled sense of what was socially acceptable here versus where she had grown up. She knew sex was taboo as it was where she lived, speaking about it anyway so she wasn't too sure the results of it weren't as well. She dug around in her bag and found a sandwich bag of crackers and began to nibble on one, focusing on that instead.
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Posted: Sun Sep 07, 2008 8:55 am
Keeta shifted nervously and gave Jiao'lan a sidelong glace. Personal questions weren't always safe, but by Jiao'lan's expression, she knew that. Well...she figured from the way the feathered woman seemed overly cautious about things sometimes, perhaps it wouldn't be too bad.
"I guess not...." Keeta said, a hint of reservation in her voice. Joel was starting to get heavy and she placed him back in the stroller, where he continued to carefully watch the giant animals whose heads were far above him.
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Posted: Sun Sep 07, 2008 8:45 pm
She nodded and chewed a cracker in silent contemplation before looking up. "'Ow'd yeh feel when ye firs' got pregnant?" She asked, waiting for some look that would tell her she had said the wrong thing.
Only mothers and grandmothers talked about this in her village and it was a strictly need-to-know basis so she assumed she was really overstepping the boundaries.
"Ah'm sorreh! Et jest...scares de piss outta meh an'...Ah...Ah'm sorreh!" She added quickly, blushing deeply, head bowed.
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Posted: Tue Sep 09, 2008 6:38 pm
"No need to apologize....but I suppose I want to know whether you mean physically, mentally or emotionally..." Keeta said, blushing slightly herself, vaugely hoping that Jiao'lan was only referring to the physical effects. The manner in which Joel had been conceived had caused her mental and emotional stress and was not always a topic she felt comfortable discussing. And if the topic of pregnancy and childbirth in general was considered taboo in Jiao'lan's culture, what did they think of mothers who conceived out of wedlock? Keeta absentmindedly ran her fingers through Joel's hair while she waited for clarification from her friend.
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Posted: Wed Sep 10, 2008 10:33 am
Jiao'lan smiled softly, quite relieved that she hadn't been scolded by the other woman for asking too personal of a question. "Well, Ah assume de meentle an' emotional aspec's is deef'rent fer every'un so...Ah was askin' abou' de physical part." She said. She chuckled uneasily. "Ah'm kinda flyin' blind 'ere." She said sheepishly. She was also afraid she'd do something wrong and harm her baby once she or he was conceived.
She was sure she could handle the baby once it was born. Her mother had a lot of postpartum haemorrhaging and her father had to care for her, leaving Jiao'lan with her new infant sister. She had only been fifteen at the time and was very adept with young children. While her mother was weak she was still producing milk so she had to prop her up and hold her sister so she could latch on properly.
It was tiring but worth it.
It was building the baby and the process of getting it out that frightened her.
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Posted: Wed Sep 10, 2008 5:22 pm
"Well...I didn't really notice until I was 7-8 weeks along. That's when I started having morning sickness and began to suspect....I really didn't have much physical difficulties overall. Like the mental and emotional effects though, it's different for every woman. I can't predict how it will go for you, particularly with your unique circumstances...I imagine our gestational processes are rather different..."
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Posted: Thu Sep 11, 2008 12:49 pm
Jiao'lan nodded but she seemed slightly confused. "What kind 'o seekness es, 'mornin' seekness'?" She asked, not too sure about the term. The rest of what Keeta had said made prefect sense.
She was, after all, more human than not. The black and white female knew she was very different. "Ah s'pose Ah'll jest have'ta ask loads a' questions when Ah manage t'get mah engagem'nt at de cleenic." She said.
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Posted: Sat Sep 13, 2008 9:05 am
"Morning sickness is just a common term applied to the nausea that often occurs in the early weeks and/or months of pregnancy. It doesn't always happen in the morning, and doesn't always happen to every woman. I think your best bet to understand everything is getting an appointment, like you said.
"Joel is my first child and I didn't know much in the way of anything regarding pregnancy and childbirth before that, so I'm not expert. The people at the clinic, well that's their job, so I'd hope they'd know more." Keeta shrugged, pushing the stroller ahead of her. She had started walking down the path again towards the next enclosure which contained the lions.
Joel was happily gnawing on a toy, smiling up at some of the faces they passed. This almost always elicited a smile back, until they looked a few degrees higher on his face and many times the smile disappeared to be replaced by a perplexed expression. It would seem not everyone was comfortable with his unusual feature.
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Posted: Fri Sep 26, 2008 9:13 pm
Jiao'lan noticed the looks and couldn't help but glare slightly. She knew she would get the same looks when she had her baby, hell, she got them now! But directing them toward a child was something she was not ready or willing to tolerate.
As they neared the lion enclosure Jiao'lan didn't seem quite as excitable, this animal looked slightly familiar to the Jaguars and Ocelots she grew up with. She smirked. "Hehehe, what'd yeh know? Cats're everywhere." The woman chuckled. "Ah'd 'ate t'be at de wrong end o' dose claws...jag'ars ees bad enough." She said.
She looked to the infant and knelt so she was eye level with him. "Dey're big'uns aren't dey?" She asked him with a smile, knowing he couldn't really respond besides in babble.
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Posted: Sat Sep 27, 2008 4:30 pm
Keeta found herself glaring and frustrated by the glances as well. She;d endured some of them before, but it was rare for her to be in such a highly populated area with Joel. She usually tried to get Annata or Tess to watch him if she was going shopping.
Eventually she found herself mutting under her breath and gripping the handles on the stroller tightly to keep from giving a tounge lashing to some of the passers by. What was their problem? She was grateful when Jiao'lan's words brought her away from her thoughts for a moment.
"Indeed. Some people keep them as pets, when they come in the smaller varieties. I've even considered getting one, although I hear they can be quite destructive with their claws even pint size. You saw a lot of Jaguars where you lived though?"
Joel grinned at Jiao'lan and shook his toy excitedly, wiggling in the stroller seat. His free hand reached out to touch her face.
"Buhbuhbbtttttttttt."
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Posted: Sat Sep 27, 2008 6:23 pm
She touched Joel's hand lightly, chuckling before rising to a full standing position. "Oh yes, all de time. We 'ad t'watch our cheelin's when dey were out an' about t'make sure dey deedn't get snatched." She explained. "Dey were all ov'a de place. Dat an' tapirs...but one begeets de oth'a." She said. "Ah've neever seen a cat quite dat big dough. We keept ocelots as pets. Sweet cats."
Jiao'lan began to feel a bit nauseous and dug into her bag and fished out a cracker. Her fertility medication was starting to catch up with her and she nibbled on it slowly.
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