This week I was thrilled to really start teaching English, English, English- done with intros, rules, etc, and this week I decided to teach Animals and adjectives. Well my first two classes were fantastic, but then I got told that I wasn’t supposed to teach until further notice because they hadn’t figured out our schedules completely yet. Well they’d given us our schedules, but they’d put us teaching a class the same time another teacher was supposed to, so it was a game of ‘whoever gets to the classroom and starts teaching first gets the class’ type of thing, which of course meant we always won and they were having issues with that. Here in China they like to keep everyone on their toes at their will by deciding schedules last minute-well apparently that didn’t work so well here, so I only taught two classes this week, which made me a little sad, but it’s life!
Instead I made good time of my free week! I FINALLY HAVE A KITCHEN!!! The foreign teacher who lived here before me never used his kitchen- he would go out to eat or keep snacks in his fridge or on top of it. After spending about 4 hours cleaning it, hunting down the propane guy for 3 days to fill up my tank, pressing the school for a rice cooker (as well as to fix all my electricity problems…which there were a lot), I finally got to cook in my kitchen! I made an egg-tomato rice dish and some vegetable fried rice in a wok, which I am excited to try at home! Oh cooking makes me so happy, especially knowing I’m learning how to cook foreign food. Sam is awesome. He taught me how to cook and I love it. Remember how I used to not like cooking at all? I guess I’m growing out of it.
On Tuesday I got my bank account set up and me, Madi, and our liaison talked about the idea of religion and even though we couldn’t talk about ours he knows about our standards and thinks they are good and our religion must be very good to send out such great teachers who have self control, dependability, and who are so happy. That made me happy too. Tuesday night our student, Twinkle, came over and made Madi work out at 11pm and then she spent the night to take us to a town about 45 minutes away the next day. Needless to say we are living it up here, joining the culture with hardly a reservation-the people are just so wonderful out here! Well the next day we went with Twinkle to Lengshuitang and got to visit Twinkle’s boyfriend’s “adopted mother”s primary school, which pretty much made my week! Have I mentioned how much I LOVE Chinese children? Well I surely do! Madi and I sang them some songs and then we all ran outside (all 170+ of us) to play the ultimate game of “Duck Duck Goose”. Well the game didn’t go according to plan, but just being able to see the children, talk to them a little, take pictures with them, run around the playground together, and laugh together just filled every part of my heart with joy! There is a great light in their eyes and purity, and just thinking that this generation will probably be able to accept the gospel and become missionaries pierced my heart. I love these people so much- they are some of the most beautiful people I’ve ever met.
Thursday I got to go to my first birthday party here, and that was fun. We just had it in one of the outdoor garage restaurants. Basically someone brings a cake (they are very beautiful but don’t taste all that good), we sing happy birthday, the birthday child makes a wish, blows out candles, and then everyone starts eating cake. It goes like this: Step 1: Cut the cake, Step 2: Pretend to be enjoying the cake, Step 3: Grab a piece of your own cake and shove it into the face of the person nearest to you OR better yet into the FOREIGNERS’ faces! Madi and I knew it would happen, but why not become a part of the culture? It’s so much more fun when you get involved with the Chinese people. They are so good and sincere for the most part, and it’s so hard not to love them.
This week has just been beautiful! It’s been in the 60’s and 70’s, and one day I just sat up on the roof of my 8-story apartment and read all afternoon. Oh life is so good here! I can communicate all I really need to here, but I would really like to practice conversational Chinese, which is a little more work, but I’m trying my best. I found the post office here! I pretty much know where a lot of things are here in town. For church this past week we went to Dong’an, where our area leader Matt Carter (and his wife Kristal) live, and Madi and I were quite proud that after only being there a few hours we knew our way around town. Culture shock is pretty much over, I realized that this week, and it made me happy!
Actually, almost everything makes me happy here! A functional kitchen, friends to talk with, wonderful students to teach, little children, little opportunities to share glimpses of my testimony, my wonderful roommates Sam and Madi who make being here so much more fun, my acceptance into BYU Idaho for Fall semester, traveling new places at my own leisure, opportunities I have every day to practice my Chinese and make friends, glorious Chinese food, a warm apartment with everything I really need, time to change my habits and become the person God wants me to be, the prayers I feel from back home, everything! What is there NOT to be grateful for?! It’s all here! Yeah fresh water running through the pipes, my comfortable bed, a bunch of friends around that speak my language, and American luxuries would be nice, but I am perfectly happy here. All those I could give up if I had to-I love it here so much! People live so simply, happily, and they work hard for what they get. It’s wonderful to be around people who aren’t always trying selfishly to jump to the next big thing, stepping on eachother, worrying about a million things to do…so nice. ;)
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