here's a picture (if it works) of our church family. we were saying goodbye to someone (which is very common in this kind of community) and they wanted a group picture.

by God's grace we made it through this week. lots of fun and lots of busyness. every day was just packed full of things. I tried to fit in some teaching in between all the other music and Christmas activities going on. I look forward to things settling down in the New Year. though apparently it's quite busy with Chinese New Year, Enrichment Week, Spelling Bee, Brain Bowl. the fun just never stops!

our Christmas performance was on Thursday night. the kids did such an incredible job! they are all such enthusiastic singers and musicians. it was a long day and a lot of work, but we had a good time. and it was all worth it to show off to the parents :) I felt a lot of relief once that was finished, but even more after today was done. today the students were dismissed at 1:30. We had a spelling test in the morning, finished up some crafts, then had a tournament of Contig with the other class. then parents showed up with lots of food, we had a feast and then they went home! I got some cool presents too! my favourite being a quilted sign that says Merry Christmas in mandarin. pretty cool.

once the kids were gone I cleaned out the room of all Christmas things in preparation for the new year. I finished some last bit of marking and exported my grades then celebrated by going for a Starbucks run one last time with Hannah, who is leaving tomorrow. tonight we just relaxed! it feels so good to be on vacation. we're really looking forward to this trip. it's nice to have the weekend to get ready to head out. we leave early Monday morning!

Merry Christmas everyone!

it's snowing!

yes, it finally feels like Christmas here in China. This morning when I stepped outside I was welcomed by a light blanket of snow. It's still snowing lightly and the trees outside my classroom window are white now. For some reason we'll be having indoor recess today. Maybe because the snow is really wet.

What a good weekend we had! Yesterday was probably the best day of all. First of all, Scott shared his story (testimony) at church, then we went out for some dumplings with a fun group of friends. After a few episodes of LOST in the afternoon we went to Hannah and Becky's for a Christmas movie night. We enjoyed some Christmas treats, and hot chocolate as we watched Charlie Brown's Christmas and then Elf. Everyone was in such good spirits. We even played chubby bunny! This is Hannah's last week with us. She's a student teacher from Minnesota and flies home on Saturday. She even gave us all mugs filled with goodies. We'll miss her greatly.

On Saturday we had the special treat of going to see Handel's Messiah! A friend from church is in the International Festival Chorus, and they perform it each year. Best of all, it was in the Forbidden City concert hall. A modern concert hall in the middle of the ancient city. pretty cool. It didn't feel like we were in China, because the place was filled with foreigners.

Friday night was the Christmas performance of our school's middle and high school students. The newly renovated auditorium was an excellent venue. Apparently they used to have it in a room at the hotel, but it was too small and chaotic. This week we'll be going there with our students on Tuesday and Thursday mornings to practice. (The auditorium is at the other campus). Our performance is Thursday night. They definitely make everyone feel the Christmas spirit, because they are so enthusiastic about singing! Our report cards are also due at the end of this week! Yikes!

We were offered a dog this week! :) Our chinese neighbours are planning to move to New Zealand in February and have 2 dogs to get rid of. They know we like the little puppy...but we don't really think we'd want that responsibility, especially if we'll be travelling around in the summer. We went out for dinner with them on Thursday to a nice korean BBQ place.

there are so many funny stories I wish I could remember to write here. silly things that happen to us, or things we see. I can't even think of any right now....but we haven't forgotten that we're in CHINA, where you pay 70 cents if you want to use shrink-wrapped dishes (which is supposed to guarantee their cleanliness)...where my new gloves bleed colour dark blue into my hands....and where they kick the poor people out of the city so foreigners don't know about the poverty here. Annie, our neighbour says chinese kids mature faster because life is much harder. so many people means lots of competition if you want to achieve anything.

we are grateful for everything we have...and are glad to share it with others. it's great to have a community of people that is generous beyond words. we love our family here!

we love you and miss you all! Christmas will be very different without seeing all of you! this time next week we'll be in Hong Kong and then on to warmer places! yay!

some more pictures

Scott flying a kite in front of our hotel, in a city square




On the City Wall

a week since Xi'an

Well this week has just flown by. I intended to write earlier about our trip to Xi'an but I don't know where the time went. It seems we're getting busier. We only have 2 more weeks of school and the kids are a little hyper already. They're also preparing for the Christmas program so there is lots of excitement. But we're still having fun. The last week is basically a write-off, because we will be spending most of Tues. and Thurs. practicing on stage in the auditorium (at the other school). And the last day will be our Christmas parties.

So last weekend we took an adventure to Xi'an to see the Terracotta Warriors. We were excited because it was our first trip out of the city on our own! Some of the office staff at the school helped me book train tickets. We left Thursday night. There are 2 train stations in Beijing and we had to go to the furthest one, which took almost 45mins to get to. that was an expensive taxi ride! 60 RMB, which is......$8! well that's expensive for us! we were booked for the "soft sleeper" train. it's basically first class. each cabin has 4 beds (bunk). each bed had headphones and little TV's. and there's a little door to the cabin room. it was quite comfortable. the train left at 9:20pm. We read for a bit then went to sleep. when we woke up at 8am, we were there! We immediately went to buy our tickets home (couldn't do before) then worked on finding a driver to take us around for the day. We found an English-speaking tour guide with a car but his first price was too high so we walked away. We found him again later (because the other chinese drivers avoided eye contact)....and he was speaking with another foreigner. so the 3 of us decided to go together for the day for 100 RMB per person, which is $15! and that was for the whole day!

The first place he took us was the Banpo Neolithic Village. They have found remains of a supposedly Neolithic village. Pretty cool. I'm not sure it was worth the entrance price though. Then he took us to a factory where they make traditional clay crafts, including all sizes of terracotta warriors. I had a feeling he got some kind of commission if we bought anything, but we didn't!

Next stop was the Terracotta Warrior museum, which is 45mins out of town. This site was found in 1974 by farmers who were digging a well. We actually met one of the farmers. He hangs out in one of the entrance buildings to shake hands with people. He's famous now! There are 3 different "pits" they have found that contain the warriors. one is closed for construction, but they put some of the artifacts in an exhibition hall. the biggest one is Pit 1 where there are thousands of warriors lined up. It seems they've done a lot of work restoring them. They were originally all painted, and each one is designed differently. they were found partially destroyed already by a fire long ago. Scott has some picture up on facebook. I keep trying to upload pictures here but it hasn't been successful lately. anyways, it was pretty cool. our last stop was the tomb of the Emperor that had the warriors built. it's basically a big hill you can climb to the top of. the soil around his tomb supposedly has high levels of mercury, so it hasn't been dug-up.

He drove us to our hotel in the centre of the city. We spend the evening strolling around the Muslim district. Xi'an is kinda in the centre of China and is where the Silk Road actually starts, so there is quite of bit of influence from just west of there, hence the Muslim population. they had lots of interesting street food. most interesting was something we thought was fried potatoes. it was in this massive pan, with some spices. we bought a bowl and when he handed it to me I noticed it kinda jiggled a bit. I shook it some more, and sure enough it was all square pieces of something with spices! it looked like fat! gross! I took a tiny bite and only tasted the hot spices, and then we put the bowl in the garbage! gross! why would they eat fat like that?! yuck! we found a delicious treat though of meat (who knows what) on those vertical rotisseries....like at a Greek pita place. and they put it inside a bun with some lettuce and spices. yum!

our hotel was decent enough for $35 US. though the bed seemed harder than our own! my neck hurt in the morning. The city of Xi'an still has it's ancient city walls. they've been mostly restored, and you can rent bikes and go all the way around. so we got a tandem bike and rode the 14 Km all the way around. it was cold and foggy.....but we made the most of it. it took 1.5hrs to do. after checking out of our hotel we took a little break in Starbucks. it was one of the nicest ones I've been in! the comfy chairs were soooo comfy that we both fell asleep! :) in the afternoon was walked around the city, to the arts and crafts district and then basically made our way back to the train station. we were tired of paying entrance fees to places so we didn't go into any more museums or historical sites :)

for the train ride back we opted to try the "hard sleeper" - so we can say we experienced both. hard sleeper was definitely not as pleasant as soft sleeper. each cabin had 6 beds. the beds were very hard and narrow, and it seemed like people had been using them already! there was no little door to close the cabin room so I had a light in my face all night from the hallway. people were generally respectful and quiet, but it was definitely more crowded. and I refused to use the bathroom :) I waited 'til we got all the way home to our apartment!

we were excited to be home. we got back around 9am, cleaned up then went to church. Scott will be sharing his story/testimony at church this week, and then me maybe next week.

and right now, while Scott is at a volleyball tournament, I'm going to go shopping! I really need to find another pair of jeans. I hope the prices aren't too steep at the Levi's store. and boots.....hopefully Aldo has something decent in my size!
bye for now folks!

Happy Thanksgiving

American Thanksgiving is coming up, which means this coming weekend is a long one for us! We get Friday off! We're planning a trip to Xi'an which was a former capital of China. It is also the site of the Terracotta Warrior Army, if you've ever heard of that. We're taking an overnight train Thursday night, arriving Friday morning. We'll spend Friday and Saturday there then come back on the train Saturday night. It should be an adventure since neither of us have travelled by train yet here. It's about 8hrs by train. We could fly but that costs more money.

We also finalized our Christmas plans this week. we're leaving here the 17th of Dec. and flying to Southern China where we'll spend a night with friends in Hong Kong. then we'll head over to Macau and fly from there to Manila. We're excited about going somewhere warm and having 3 weeks off! there are only 4 weeks left until the end of the semester, which means we have to start thinking about report cards again! really feels like we just finished those. but this semester is shorter than next semester.

lots going on around here. we had a seemingly busy week. lots of stuff happening with accreditation of the school. so many meetings and extra things to take care of. the students are also busy getting ready for the Christmas program. this week we also made a spontaneous outing to see the Chinese Acrobats. so amazing! seemed like a short program for almost $30. oh well, we had fun going with a group of friends.

we also had small group on Friday night. we're meeting with, so far, 2 other married couples. it's great to learn from one another. we're all at different stages in our marriages. one couple has been married for 2 years, and the other for 16. it's great to share our experiences and grow together.

yesterday we had my co-worker and her husband over for dinner and then we played Settlers! they've played it before, but hadn't in awhile so this was a refresher. but they are excited to play again! we're really enjoying the ch-rch we're going to. it really feels like it's full of authentic christians. we've been asked to share our stories, or give our testimonies. we'll probably do that in the next couple of weeks.

anyways, it really is feeling like home here. we've made our home together and everything is 'familiar' now. we have our routines, but always have things that throw us off. actually, about a week ago I woke up in the middle of the night to the sounds of a woman crying. it sounded so close. it must've been upstairs. she was wailing and it sounded like she was just aching with grief. It kept me up for awhile...all I could do was pray for her. I have no idea why she was crying. she could've been mourning someone, or maybe it was domestic abuse (which is common here)...and it kinda haunted me into the next day....it's as if G-d wanted me to know about the pain that many women suffer in China. we've heard about it from other places before, but this time I felt it deep down.

Scott and I are happy to be here, growing together....I can catch a small glimpse of the work He is already doing in our hearts to open our eyes to what he's doing, and to see the people he loves deeply. (you should all read Sacred Revolution by Shane Claiborne)

zaitian!

first weekend apart....

yes, Scott and I actually spent a weekend apart! He wanted to help at youth camp. I was going to, but felt it might be too tiring, and I'd rather stay at home to relax and take care of some things. we both had good weekends. I went out for dinner with a co-worker then she came over and we watched Planet Earth (nerds!). On Saturday I went with another co-worker and her visitor to an Antiques market. so busy! and what a great big place! I didn't buy anything big because we don't want to accumulate many things here, but I found a couple of interesting small things. including a birthday present for Scott. I'll tell you about it later!

back at home I decided it was finally time to go out and buy a little vacuum. we'd talked about it but never actually gone to buy one! and I could go find what I wanted! I found a powerful little dust-buster...didn't realize how LOUD it was until I got home. but at least it sucks up a lot of dirt!

as I was cleaning this weekend I may have gotten a little excited about the power of bleach! I was looking at our ugly, tiny counter, and all the little stains it had...and I thought "I wonder if bleach would take this out?!" sure enough, as soon as I poured some on it started to clear up! cheap counters! how terrible. but at least it looks nice now.

I also took advantage of the weekend on my own to watch a girly movie (Girl with a Peral Earring) - based on a novel, about the Dutch painter Vermeer and his famous painting. I also slept very soundly this weekend! no one to wake me up with their snoring :)

anyways, I have some more marking to do before my class comes back from gym class.
ta-ta for now!

Thanksgiving again!

tonight our staff is having a social....celebrating Canadian and the upcoming American Thanksgiving holiday. the hotel where our main campus is located agreed to roast the turkeys for us, which is a big deal. because there are only a few staff that have full-size ovens and it's a big job, especially to then bring it to the school. I'm going to make carrot cake this afternoon for the ocassion.

this week was a short week of classes, but a busy one! we had parent-teacher conferences Thursday afternoon and all day Friday. about half of them had Korean translators....which made for one awkward situation when the translator was the mother of another boy in my class. it's been stressful for me....I found out some things about some of my students. for example, one boy I thought had poor English because he just came from korea. but he's actually been attending international schools his whole life. so he's not fluent in either english or korean! a bit of a shock. I barely understand him when he speaks, and his writing is terrible.

and then a big incident between two girls. they came to me on Thursday morning to say that one of the girl's diary and wallet were missing. I found out from the mother on Friday morning that it was that same friend who stole it! one mother came to me crying about the situation, meanwhile the guilty one's mother didn't want to talk about it and brushed it off as not important! social situations seem particularly important to korean parents. another mother was crying to me because she feels bad about taking her daughter out of her previous school where she had close relationships. AAHHHH!!! I just have to remember not to allow their burdens to become mine.

what else have we been up to? umm....last weekend we tried to find a community center in a migrant village where we were going to volunteer for the morning. but we couldn't find it! but it was a good experience to walk around in this poor migrant village, which is right here in Beijing, not far from our house! welcome to China!

our neighbours also came over last weekend and taught us how to make dumplings and play Mah Jong. really nice of them! we are quite blessed to have neighbours like them.

last night we had another small group with two other married couples. we're studying a book by a christi-n author about communication. it's nice to fellowship with other married couples. so far we just hang out with non-marrieds our age.

anyways, I should go do some laundry, cleaning and baking. I'm really hoping to get a dust-buster or some sort of little vacuum. the dust is just overwhelming! Scott's at another soccer tournament. oh, and he starts coaching girl's volleyball next week. meanwhile I'll just get used to this teaching thing :)