Xin nian kuai le!!!

It's 2013 here in China.

So far this year, I have celebrated with my team and an awesome family, slipped and fallen on the ice, gotten to see a lot of Changchun courtesy of a very confused but chill taxi driver, nearly frozen while walking across campus, and finally made it home to my warm, semi-clean apartment.

And we're less than two hours in.

It's gonna be a great year!!

Happy new year, y'all!!!

Not My Favorite Word

My word for this year is surrender.  It's hung on my living room wall and it pops up on my screen when I power my phone on. 

That doesn't mean that I like it.

Lately Sara Groves' song Open My Hands has been on constant replay in my mind (and on my itunes).  And this morning I listened to Tim Keller speak about Rom 12:1-2, how we are to constantly offer ourselves as living sacrifices because we know that the Father is both infinitely wise and infinitely loving -- so in fact the only reasonable course of action is to surrender our lives full to him.  And then tonight it was Mark Driscoll, speaking on Luke 11:5-13, about how even very imperfect human fathers delight in giving their children good gifts -- how much more the perfect Father?  And shouldn't we, knowing that He loves us and is only ever good, be moved to ask boldly and trust Him fully?

Notice a pattern?

I still want to cling to my own ideas and plans and worries and dreams.  Which is dumb, and it shows how twisted my heart is.  I say that I believe He is only ever always good, but then I stress out about everything that you can imagine.  If I'll find another job that I love.  If I'll be single for the rest of my life.  If I'll get my grading done on time.  If I will ever get to see broken relationships being used for good.  If I'm going to fall down the stairs and break my leg.  What grad school I should go to.  What activities to use in a lesson.  You name it... chances are that I worry about it.

And then there are the good things that I really want to hang onto.  Last week my team was talking about Abraham sacrificing Isaac -- can you imagine how hard it was for him to be willing to obey and not to say, "EXCUSE me??  Do you remember that this child is the miraculous fulfillment of a promise that YOU made to me?"

Yeah, I do that a lot.

But instead -- instead I need to let go of all of my life, all of my worries and all of my plans and all of the things that have only been given to me to steward -- and instead trust that He is good.  I want to learn more and more to live and to pray as if I really believe that He withholds no good thing from us.

I believe in a blessing I don't understand
I've seen rain fall on wicked and the just
Rain is no measure of his faithfulness
He withholds no good thing from us
No good thing from us, no good thing from us

I believe in a peace that flows deeper than pain
That broken find healing in love
Pain is no measure of his faithfulness
He withholds no good thing from us
No good thing from us, no good thing from us

I will open my hands, will open my heart
I will open my hands, will open my heart
I am nodding my head an emphatic yes
To all that You have for me

I believe in a fountain that will never dry
Though I've thirsted and didn't have enough
Thirst is no measure of his faithfulness
He withholds no good thing from us
No good thing from us, no good thing from us

I will open my hands, will open my heart
I will open my hands, will open my heart
I am nodding my head an emphatic yes
To all that You have for me

No good thing from us
No good thing from us
He withholds no good thing from us

I will open my hands, will open my heart
I will open my hands, will open my heart
I am nodding my head an emphatic yes
To all that You have for me

[Sara Groves, Open My Hands]

--
overcome evil with good

Thankfulness and the struggle between consumerism and relationships

Around Thanksgiving, some of my classes were writing down things that they were thankful for or reasons why people give thanks.  The activity overall bombed, but I thought the things they were writing were interesting, so I saved a handful of the slips of paper that they wrote on.

Here's the list.

thankful teacher teach me. made me knowladgeable.

parents

My parents gives my life.

mother

it is the way of manners

Family gives me love

My parents love me.

sun

My parents give me life

thanks for my friends give me happiness

My girlfriend play with me ["play" is common Chinglish for "hangs out"]

love. friendly

My boyfriend like me.  Me too.

Parents give me life

friends

thankful my small brother bring me many happy time

harmonious family

Friends give me warm

study in class

Teacher educate me

my parents, because they birthd me.

Because they always help me. when I was in difficult.

Because the people have a thankful heart.

harvest

thankful: my parents give my life and educate me.

thanks for my families careness to me

love

good health

A healthy body

thanks for our teachers tell more things about the world

Notice a theme?  Like how nearly all of these are focused on relationships?  China is caught in this really weird tension between a history of valuing relationships and community a ton and the alluring pull of consumerism and materialism.  

This was super evident as I gave their finals these last two weeks too.  Finals were great because I had time to talk with each student individually and in small groups, and since we had talked about a lot of things this semester, I could ask them questions like, "What are life  lessons that you have learned?"  "What are your biggest dreams for your future?"  "If you had a time machine, what time in the past/future would you want to visit?"  

Their answers were probably pretty evenly divided between really obvious/shallow and heartbreakingly honest and deep.

The label "shallow" doesn't mean that they weren't honest, just that I hope they get more significant dreams at some point...soon... -- "I want to be a successful businessman" and "I want to earn a lot of money" and "I want to buy a house and a car" and "I would go back to my childhood because there was less pressure."

Then there were answers like, "I would go back to my childhood because I was unkind to my grandmother... and she is dead now... and I wish I could do it again" or "I want to go forward in the future, to know how long I will live" or "I want to know when the people who are important to me will die, so that I know how much time I will have with them."

They know life is short and that they fail in a lot of ways.  There is so much pressure to perform well in Chinese society that it's pretty impossible to not realize that.  

And so...

And so I hope that they will learn quickly, learn soon, that no material things, no amount of success, not even their relationships with their friends and family will be able to make those things right.

Finals are done, hello grading!

So I had this brilliant plan that eventually I would blog about all of the crazy names that my students have.  I was going to write that post last night as I was grading their finals, and I even began making a list of the names.

But then I realized -- maybe that post would still be funny, but it wasn't as funny to me as it was at the beginning of the semester. 

After long enough in China, it becomes very difficult to remember what is and is not a normal English name, and it just doesn't seem terribly relevant.  So my students named Panda and Vampire and Savis and Wisdom and Vinki and Rainky and Fairy and Gang Woo and Yellow and Coca and Sosy and Simy and Talent and Sky and Leaf and Ice and Seven --well, those are just their names, and now I have a semester-worth of memories associated with them by those names, and it seems weird to think of changing them.

I think a lot of life in China is like that.  At the beginning, it's really strange to do dishes by filling up a plastic tub in the shower (because that's where the hot water is), and it's strange to take taxis all the time (because they are not that expensive in China), and it's strange to not be able to drink water from the tap (because that's habit), and it's strange to be on a bus so full that you and three other people are standing down in the stairwell and nearly getting smashed by the doors every time they open, and it's strange to be practically illiterate.

But then -- gradually -- those things stop seeming so weird and you realize that you're doing all of those things by habit.  It makes readjusting to living in America challenging, because your brain has to compartmentalize what is okay in China and what's okay in America -- or decide which things you want to hold onto in both places.  

I love living in China, but sometimes it's confusing because there are so many things that are so different from what my life would be like in America... but they are just totally normal here, so I don't think about them much.  It's hard to know what to talk about with people who aren't in China, because so much of it doesn't make sense until you live here.

And maybe it doesn't make sense even then... but it works.  :)

圣诞快乐！

We've got a white Christmas...

Happy last Sunday of Advent!!

Random thoughts and updates

It's been a busy week here.

Full of giving finals to students (most of them did half of their finals this past week and will do the other half next week) -- which is great because I get to spend time with them one on one or in small groups, and I get to ask them questions such as "What have been turning points in your life?"  or "What do you want to do after you graduate?  Why?"  It is exhausting because it's hard to try to listen to so many answers and grade them too, but it has really been a good time of getting some more individual time with each student.

This past week has also been full of trying to get ready for Christmas!  We won't teach on Tuesday (the classes were rescheduled to other days), which is great, but it feels strange to still be in the middle of working around Christmas.  I'm excited to celebrate it with my team though, and both Christmas and a lot of talk about the end of the world have been raising great opportunities to talk with students about deeper things and what we value in life.  :)

The campus is beautiful with all of the snow... and we are all looking forward to the upcoming break for Chinese New Year and the chances to travel to warmer places!  

Internet in China is being kind of limited lately, so I have not really been on facebook and other things may or may not work, although email is usually pretty reliable.  :)

Please be asking for all of us to have endurance and a lot of love as we finish out the semester -- everything from truly listening to our students and continuing to forge relationships to dealing with logistic hassles that arise with exam times/rooms and grading a lot of stuff.  :)  Also as we all seek wisdom on what to pursue next year...

Thanks!

--
overcome evil with good

Advent

Today I lit the third candle... this month has been flying past!  A few nights ago I watched part of The Nativity Story with some sisters and some of their friends.  It provided a good backdrop for them to have some conversations.  I had never seen the movie before, and it made me think about some things too.

The movie opens with a voice singing
Veni, veni Emmanuel
Captivum solve Israel
Qui gemit in exilio
Privatus Dei Filio...
and the next scene is Herod's men butchering the babies. 

It's a gruesome and sickening scene, but I am so thankful that the Word has such gritty and dreadful stories. 

Because if that wasn't the kind of unpleasant, bloody,sarx world that He came into to save, there would be no reason to celebrate at all.

But He came here.

Into this world where people starve and fight and abuse and cheat and hate and kill and die.  And didn't I just tell all of my students last week that's why we decorate with lights at Christmas time?  Because we know that the world is darker and harsher even than the cold, early-dark nights here in DongBei, in the northeast.  And we rejoice (because what other response could there be?) because He came here.

And after we talked about that in all of my classes, we sang (in English though, not Latin).  It's a song of longing.

And I long for Him to come in so many ways.  To come again and renew this world and make all the sad things come untrue.  To come to my students.

These Hebrew words seem incredibly appropriate at this time, as we wait and long together: ברוך אתה ה' א‑לוהינו מלך העולם, שהחינו
וקימנו והגענו לזמן הזה.‏

Blessed are You...Who has kept us alive, sustained us, and enabled us to reach this season.

Happy advent. 

If You Give a Mouse a Cookie....

No matter what Pittsburgh Dad has to say about it, sometimes If You Give a Mouse a Cookie... really is where it's at.

At least, it perfectly described how I felt this morning in my first class.

Please keep in mind that sometimes I can guess how my classes will react to certain situations. For instance, if I walk into a wall to illustrate my point in telling them a story, it is highly likely that they will laugh. If I give them a quiz, they will groan. If they are speaking Chinese in their group during class and I walk over, they will smack each other and say, "Speak English!!!" (And then I will laugh.) If, when it is time for break, I yell, "SPEAK CHINESE!" they will laugh.

Sometimes, though, I fail miserably at predicting how they'll respond to things that I do, and sometimes all that I can say to myself is, Well, you should have seen that coming.

This week all of my classes are reviewing main points of the material we've covered over the semester in preparation for their final exam, which will be spread over the next two weeks. Also, we are talking about Christmas. Part of talking about Christmas means talking about various traditions and where they came from (trees, lights, gifts, caroling, etc) and then part of it is them guessing what I do for Christmas. So there were various questions, like, "What do you think I eat on Christmas?" "What do you think I do on Christmas Eve?" "What kind of cookies does my family make?"

Here's the question that was the kicker: "What is my favorite Christmas song?"

Now, O Reader, maybe you can anticipate what happens at this point. I'd like to say that it was just the fact that it was an 8 am class, or that we're nearly to the end of the semester... but for whatever reason, I hadn't thought about the consequences of posing this question.

This is what I should have realized:

Of course, if you (being their foreign teacher) tell the class that you have a favorite Christmas song, and if it furthermore is one that they don't know (which is to say, if it isn't Jingle Bells) – say, maybe, O Come, O Come Emmanuel – they will all beg you to sing it.

And when you agree to this and begin singing, of course out pop cameras/cell phones to record, and you may crack up in the middle of singing, because of course you should have expected this – China is paparazzi grand central, after all – but it is still funny.

And then you may get to teach the chorus to your class and explain why you love this song and the story behind it.

And they may all sing with you.

And in that moment, you will not know if you should laugh with crazy joy at what is happening or cry with awestruck wonder.

So that was my morning.

Two funny notes.

1. I scare myself every time I sing this, because I'm afraid that I'll switch into Latin by mistake. Although my students at least are so busy gawking that it's quite possible none of them would notice.

2. After this had all transpired, as I walked around the classroom to answer random last questions about their final, one of my students put his hand up. "Teacher!!"

   "Yes Jim?"

   "Do you know Jason Mars?" he asked me. Poor Jason Mraz. His last name gets slaughtered a lot.

   "Yep," I said. "What's your favorite song by him?"

   "I'm Yours!"

   "Good song," I said, grateful for having just been at KTV last Friday and the way KTV forces me to sort of keep up on American pop music.

I enjoy being surprised by my classes sometimes. And the opportunities it brings.

It is a truth universally acknowledged...

that if a foreigner does not understand you, the best course of action is to speak at increasing volumes.

Some people take this to new levels by skipping moderate volumes entirely.  A few nights ago, Sydney, Kelsey and I were taking a taxi back from JiangShan -- it's only about a five minute drive -- and the driver began yelling as soon as we got in.  Fortunately his Chinese was quite clear or at least he had an accent that I'm familiar with, so I understood more of what he was saying than I normally do.  (For the record, my Chinese really is pretty terrible and I haven't learned much more this year, due to being busy with other things... like teaching...)

Anyway.  Here was the conversation as I remember it...  it was dark out and quite cold so we were in a hurry.

me:  *flagging down the taxi and then dashing to get in*  "Huaqiao Wai Yuan!" [name of our school]
Sydney and Kelsey jumped in the back.
driver:  *yelling something something something, possibly with KUAI KUAI KUAI LE*  [about how we were in a hurry]
all of us:  *laughing*
driver:  "NIMEN SHI NAGUO REN????" [what country are you from?]
me:  "Women shi meigguoren!" [we're Americans!]  "Ni ne?"  [how about you?]
driver:  "ZHONGGUOREN something!"  [I'm Chinese of course!!!]
me:   *deciding that this was absurd and if he was going to yell, I was too*  "ZHENDEMA????"  [really????}
driver:  "ZHENDE!!  NI HUI SHOU HANYU MA?"  [of course!! you can speak Chinese?]
me:  "YI DIAN DIAN.  NI HUI SHOU YINGYU MA?" [just a little, can you speak English?]
driver:  "NO!!!"
me:  *laughing*
*random conversation about how I was sort of translating for Syd and Kelsey and they sort of understood, at this point I wasn't catching a lot of what he was saying so I was just using a sound that is the most useful sound in Chinese since it either means "Yeah" or "I have no clue what you're talking about" or "what???" depending on what intonation you give it...]
Sydney and Kelsey:  *begin singing in the back seat*
me:  "TAMEN SHI FENGLE!!!"  [they're crazy!]
driver:  *yelling something about being crazy and asking if they were my friends...*
me:  "...Dui... tamen shi wode pengyou..." [yeah... they're my friends...]
*random other conversations about craziness and other stuff I was not understanding...*
me:  *as we got to the university*  "NI KEYI JINRU MA?"  [can you go in? -- rather than dropping us off at the gate]
driver:  "BU KEYI!!! something something something"  [I can't!]
me:  "SHENME??? WEISHENME??????"  [What???? WHY?????]
driver: "TA BU something something" [he (the guard) won't let me!]
me:  "WOMEN SHI LAOSHI!!!"  [We're teachers!]
driver:  "NIMEN SHI LAOSHI??  Ahhh... KEYI!"  [You're teachers?  Oh.... I can!]
...and then he dropped us off and we paid him.

It was an exciting ride.

I have to say, though, he was one of the calmer drivers I've had.  On the way to the Thanksgiving dinner in our city or something, I was in a taxi with an insane driver.  He nearly rearended the car in front of us... which was a police car... which had no license plate.

If I was a taxi driver, I'd probably yell at foreigners too.

*facepalm* Time to get a t-shirt made....

To be honest... that is my (internal) reaction to a lot of things that my students ask me about...

Especially this question, which a student just asked me over QQ (instant messaging):

i don't know what topics should we choose to talk with foreigner

I have gotten variants of this questions so many times that I think I should get a response t-shirt made.  Any suggestions for what that t-shirt should say?

Here are my two ideas:

Foreigners are people, too.

and

I'm from another country, not another planet.

(Usually what I tell my students is, "...well.... what do you talk about with Chinese?"  And then they stare at me as if they have no idea how this could possibly be relevant.)

(picture taken earlier this semester on campus, because the yellow hoodie "I wear what I want" summed up China fashion.)

One final down, 307 to go...

Or something like that.  I have about 308 students, but I may have forgotten one or two.

One final down? you may be asking.  I thought finals weren't happening for another week or two.

So did I.  As scheduled, this week all of my non-English classes (students studying marketing, accounting, business administration, human resources, tourism...) were finishing up the last chapter in their text book.  Next week we'll review for the final and talk about Christmas, and then the two weeks after that is when they'll take their finals.

Well, most of them.

Yesterday I walked into my HR class early and was chatting with some of them about the jiaozi (dumpling) making party that we're having in my apartment on Saturday evening. 

"Excuse me teacher," said Kyla, Blake standing behind her.  "He joined the army, so he needs to take his final today."

She said this in the same tone of voice that they use to comment on the weather or ask me if I've eaten breakfast yet.  Matter of fact, in other words.

I was taken aback (to say the least) and confused (also an understatement.)  Joining the army means that he needs to take the final today?  Sorry, what?  I hadn't even finished deciding that rubric I was going to use or actually thought much about administering the final.  Fortunately, Hilary, Chandler and I had written the basic final last weekend since we teach the same grade level from the same book.

"What?" I said, sort of hoping this was their idea of a joke on their foreign teacher.  "But the final isn't for a few more weeks."

"I know," Kyla told me.  "But he joined the army, so he needs to take it today."

"I don't think that's possible," I said.  (This is a pretty good answer in China; it is possibly the firmest negative you can give, while not really blaming the impossibility on anyone specific.)

Kyla was undaunted.  "He needs to take it this week, our other teacher said so."

"Huh," I said, pulling my cellphone out.  "Let me talk to my team leader and I'll get right back to you on that."

It was a surprise to Danielle as well that I had a student joining the army, but at least she understood the situation.

So... Blake took his final this afternoon.  Giving finals is pretty fun for me (aside from grading) because it means that I get one-on-one time with each student.  It also means that there is a time limit on this (which is a good thing with some students.)

Sometimes living in China feels like an extreme obstacle course.  Something is always different than what I was expecting.

...such as the power going out for a few hours last night.  It's back on now, along with the heat, for which I am VERY thankful!

And....

Because I have a bunch of great pictures to share....

Here are some not particularly related pictures.



Hilary and I dyed my hair.  This was a picture I took to satisfy a friend who was being impatient about seeing it.  Question from my students (who I've been teaching all semester, mind you...) "Teacher, your hair... is it the nature?"


Sometimes my students' English runs out in the middle of a quiz, and then I get answers like this about American traditions about Thanksgiving:  pum....... (something in Chinese which maybe mentions pie?)


Coming soon to a dining hall near you, for only 16 kuai... Exploding Chicken!


The library :)


What do you do when the power goes out?  Head to a coffeeshop on the other side of town so you have electricity and heat.  And then set your camera on the table and proceed to take pictures.  Duh.


Please note the length of the spoon relative to the bottle of milk tea.  Anyone else seeing a potential issue there?

I love living in China.

Baby, it's cold outside!!!

Here is the view from my office window.