General Health Update

I know there are some people out there wondering how I have been doing health wise. Here is a general update since I have moved to China. I have been sick three times since I came here. The first time was the worse, the second time was bad but not nearly as painful as the first, and this last time was just a cold. Some people have said that it looks like I have lost quite a bit of weight and they are right I have. When I moved here I weighed about 170lbs. and since moving here I have lost up to 20lbs. Though I have gained a little bit back in recent weeks with the Chinese New Year and traveling to Guilin and Yangshuo. Also, it is freakin' cold.

Why I came to China?

Last week, I had a moment of incredible clarity of why I came to China after assigning my students with a poem, and asking them to write about what they are experiencing right now. The students had just taken their midterm exams, and seemed to have had a very stressful week. While some students were unequal to the task many just translated a poem form Chinese to English though it did not always mean much to them. Some students did write poems themselves which I was happy to see. After writing their poems I gave them a chance to read their poems to the person next to them and tell them what it meant to them. While they did this I walked around the classroom and spoke with a few students about what their poems meant to them some said they just wrote it to complete the assignment while others spoke about their life. In the first class a student just broke my heart because he said that he just missed his mother and felt alone.

I was confronted with how I could say nothing to this boy who had not seen his family for months, and was working towards the goals his parents had for him. The one child policy in China causes many families to pin their hopes on their one child causing all kinds of pressures. This causes families to spend thousands of dollars to have their children receive the best possible education causing students a huge amount of stress. People in China know the way to success is an education, and education as become something that is both good and evil. It remains good because it imparts knowledge to its students, but evil because of the loneliness and pressure it gives to students here. It is hard to imagine a world in which many of the students you teach have gray hair from the weight they feel. These weights they hold could create a sense of unity in the students, but it is undone by the system of class rankings. Every student knows who is the top student in their class and who is the worse which creates an emotional rift for the students which is difficult for them to overcome. My hope is that somehow God can use me to show these student's hope.

Beijing

Beijing is a witness to China's radical capability of developing its own infrastructure. From the second we left the train station we were confronted with a cosmopolitan city not much unlike other great American and European cities. It was surprising to see greater diversity in the city; and very nice to have a few less people staring at us and asking for photos. The city was quite a bit busier then normal because it was China's National Day, and the people were still excited from the Olympics this last summer. Everyone was glowing with National pride not entirely dissimilar to the United States of America after the September 11th attacks. The only thing missing is the anger that everyone felt in America.

Train travel was something new and exciting to me on this trip. What you do is buy a ticket for an overnight train, and sleep in a bed for an entire night and then wake up the next morning at your destination. Personally, I found this much more enjoyable and less stressful then a plane ride with a couple of huge airports attached at each end. Though a plane ride does take less time it is nice to have the option available to you. The trains have three different types of tickets on this particular trip we had what is called a soft sleeper; there are two more types a hard sleeper and seats (which I will definitely never try). The soft sleeper was nice you are in a small room with three other people and there are two bunk beds attached to the wall. The beds are not the best thing you have ever slept on, but they are not your kitchen floor either.

The first thing I did in Beijing was Taylor, a Chinese friend, and me went to the China Open Tennis Tournament Finals. The tournament is not a famous one in tennis, but seems to be growing in popularity over the last couple years. Unfortunately though Chinese people are not familiar with proper tennis edict, and the tournament resulted in some of the players expressing unhappiness over the quality of the tournament. I expect this will change as tennis grows in popularity with people here. There was one event I was particularly fond of. A guy started walking around in the lower stands and when Andy Roddick lost the point he yelled at the guy; "Do you mind?!" and the guy just waved back then Andy Roddick just yelled again "We are only playing a game here." The best part was the guy was a foreigner and probably understood him. The whole mens single finals were kind of comedic because you could tell Roddick was frustrated with the lack of Tennis ignorance being displayed.

The Great Wall was the first sight I visited with one of my friend's. The experience was a pretty interesting one and an all day event, since we were traveling on a small budget at the time we had to budget ourselves carefully. So we ended up taking a public bus there instead of a private tour bus. The bus was much less expensive, but we ended up waiting in a really long line, though the line took surprisingly less time then we thought upon walking up. The bus was made like a tour bus (there were some that were converted from public transportation, which is less comfortable), but in the traditional Chinese way they piled in as many on as they could so people were standing for two hours with no room to move (Which is not as bad as I thought). When our bus was coming towards the wall it seemed like the top of it was just a moving sea of people. Walking on the wall can be quite an adventure because of the steepness of the wall and how smooth some of the stones on top of the wall were. Some Chinese people again asked to take photos with me as we were climbing it is always so strange to me when this happens.

Beijing also has many some American restaurants that I was kind of surprised to see Outback Steakhouse and TGI Friday's, but a welcome surprise when you need some more familiar foods. Food has been one of the more difficult adjustments for me. I also saw a Bally's Total Fitness which was probably the biggest surprise to me. Some of the other places we visited were the Olympic Stadiums, Tiananmen square, a couple temples, and the silk market. The nice thing is that public transportation is not all that expensive with the subway system and bus system in Beijing. If you want to take a taxi though it is a little more than three times the intial cost in Wuhan. The cost of living is significantly higher in Beijing like most famous big cities as well. I would probably need to make four times what I make in Wuhan to maintain the same lifestyle in Beijing.

The Forbidden City was a place that created a lot of questions for me about China. Most of the famous architecture in China is known for its incredible size. Things like the Great Wall, the Olympic stadiums, and a few others. Also, when I visited the Forbidden City there was a giant portrait of Chairman Mao Ze Dong over the entrance, and it is supposed to represent the man who took them out of imperial China and into communism. Since, being in China I have also found out that you must pay the government to be a part of the Communist party and have no religious belief. Only ten percent of China are actually party members due to the cost and a few other things that I am not yet clear on. Some of these things really make me wonder about the relationship between government and our desire to believe in its ability to bring us justice and prosperity. I wonder what it says about Christians.

Anyway, Beijing was wonderful tip and it was wonderful to be there during the National Holiday and observe how China celebrated its National Day in comparison to ours. But I would like to go back some time when it is a little less crowded. The pictures tell all you need to know about the crowds.

The Long Overdue Update

Ni hao (hello) everyone this is the long overdue update on how I am doing in China as many of you have been asking me to make a post. I am sorry for taking so long, but luckily now I have tons to write about. So get out those reading glasses. The photo to the left was taken just after we got out of the airport in Wuhan, China; it was really exciting to know I had finally made it here after months of planning and thinking. I will never forget my first drive through China; to say the least it was definitely an adventure. I have heard it said, "there are tons of laws in communist countries, except for on the roads." I had no idea how true this statement was until we pulled a u-turn on a road due to a major traffic jam and started driving THE WRONG WAY on a one way road. After an hour of wide eyed amazement at the maneuvers our driver was pulling and thinking we were surely going to have an accident of some kind, we stopped to my infinite pleasure to have lunch.
My first meal in China, as I entered the restaurant I was taking it all in. The differences between our cultures: the flexible plastic hangings that you walk through in the door way, the men eating their meal at the table with their shirts off, smoking, the amount of people helping us, our plates and bowls wrapped in plastic, and my worst fear chopsticks laying on the table. Dustin and Teresa I know what you two are reminiscing about right now. Let me tell you they eat some freakin' spicy food compared to most Americans (a glass of milk has never sounded so good to me). I suddenly understood why so many men eat with their shirts off in China and it was not just because of the 100% humidity in Wuhan. At the table I had to face the decision I had made to try everything put in front of me at least once, and make sure that somehow I get it down into my stomach somehow. They did order a couple bottles of Coca-Cola, which was helpful, but I noticed some taste differences like they may have added a tiny bit of alcohol to the drink (probably to make sure it stays good, but not every Coke and Pepsi tastes like this so I don't really know) and it was a lot less carbonated (as remained true).
The living conditions and apartment have been a little tough at times, but not anything totally unbearable. My apartment is located in a group of apartments dedicated to people and families of people who work at the school. I live on the fourth floor and it normally takes about ten minutes to walk to class. My washer leaked water for about two weeks and one of my drapes fell off the wall after a few short days. As for cooking, I have yet to make anything besides sandwiches, but this was mostly because I did not have anything to cook on until last week. Most of the furniture in my apartment is wood. On the plus side the toilet is set almost directly under the shower head so if I was ever in a hurry... The walls are concrete so hanging anything can be very difficult, also the apartment does not hold its temperature very well so that can be a little frustrating when running the air conditioning. Also, I only have a washer and all my clothes must be hung to dry outside my bedroom window. I know this sounds like a lot of complaining, but for the most part everything works pretty well and it is a very quiet area since it is out of the city a little ways. I hope this helps to give you an idea of my apartment.
After telling you I had nothing to cook on for two and half weeks some of you may be wondering what in the world I have been eating. If it is a school day I have a pretty regular diet of yogurt and a piece of fruit in the morning for breakfast. At lunch I normally I have some type of sandwich or I eat at the teachers lounge for around 5 yuan (a little less than a dollar). Dinner normally involves going out to eat somewhere, and depends on where I am. I am seldom at home during those hours, but that may change as the year moves on. We do have some regular places that we go to a Chinese restaurant about a quarter mile walk away which is pretty good. There is also a restaurant which serves good American food that we go to every Saturday when we attend our foreign fellowship group; a burger never tastes as good after eating so many unfamiliar foods. For the most part though Taylor and Stasi have been taking us to different places they enjoyed eating at last year which has been a lot of fun.
One place in particular stands out in my memory it was a restaurant in a street market, but most would probably not call it a restaurant it is more like an abnormally wide hallway with a barbecue in front of the door that just happened to have tables and plastic stools. The barbecue itself was an oddball creation itself with a large fan over the grill keeping the smoke from entering their hallway. If you have ever wondered where the glass bottle of Coca-Cola or Pepsi went well I found it in this restaurant. The food was served on metal and wood skewers, and you had to remove the food with your chopsticks which could be a pretty difficult task with meat on a wood skewer. One might ask how in the world they found this place, and I really have no idea. But yet here we were eating and sweating from some of the spiciest food we have all ever eaten. After the damage had been done between Taylor, Ernesto, and me we had all consumed four sodas and a water a piece. We had all ultimately found our limit with spicy food; my mouth burns just thinking about that place.
As for teaching an oral communication focused English class I have found it to be quite a challenge since my smallest class is forty-eight students making any activity we might do
extremely difficult. The students' abilities vary quite a bit, some can keep up with me while I am speaking at a normal speed while other students could use a lot more one on one time then is possible. Most of my classes I only see once a week (these are called general classes) which makes improving their English extremely difficult, but still I try my best. I only have three classes (these are called international classes) that I get to see twice a week. So for the most part I teach the same lesson all week with small variations. On Mondays we have something called English corner where the students get a chance to speak English and practice those skills with us. These students are typically the better English speakers in our class as well. Most students can do the box conversation, but when they get beyond they seem to struggle. For now I have tried to keep my self distant and strict so the classroom keeps a more teachable environment. About twice a week I go out to play sports with the students one day I play soccer and the other I play basketball. I have found this to be an alright way of meeting students, but I still have a lot of work to do. I should also say that when I tell people that I work at this school it invokes in them an instant amount of respect for me, since this is the no. 1 school in central China. If you would like to see some pictures of the school here is the link to the school's English website: http://www.hzsdyfz.com.cn/english/Overview.php?lanmu=School%20Overview

One of my favorite activities as been to go to this coffee shop, Mr. Mai's, it is place where Chinese people can come to practice their English, and meet and ask questions of foreigners like myself. The people who come here are mostly college age to young adult. I have found this place to be a great chance to meet and talk with people about whatever they want. I have even had the opportunity to hang out with some of them out of the coffee shop as well which as been very exciting. The conversations I have with people here are always encouraging, and seem to keep me motivated through out the week at times.
When I speak with people I notice a real lack of hope at times, and an acknowledgment that something is missing from their lives. Many feel a sense of doubt about life and of religion, and I think rightfully so. Life in China involves a lot of pressure to succeed and to be what is desired by structures bigger than themselves; these pressures create nothing in people, but just leave emptiness and darkness. While religion is terribly damaging at times to these people as well especially when people admit to having doubts about their own beliefs. To these people I say the questions we ask do not always have satisfactory answers or solutions that we can or want to understand, but I have or have had some of those same doubts at times and maybe we should pray anyway not because we will get answers but because God sent His son.

Well I hope this update was a little bit helpful I have yet to cover transportation, construction, what I do when I go explore, and where I go to buy groceries. All topics I look forward to telling you all about. I hope that we can live in a way that tells people our kingdom is not of this world. Good bye for now. Shalom.

Leaving for China

Hey everyone I just wanted you to know that this will be one of the ways I will be attempting to keep you all up to date as I am teaching in China.