Out and About

The task of describing what’s happened over the last month is rather daunting to me. Everything about this length of time has been sweet, refreshing, fun, challenging, and full of blessing. So instead of writing a detailed account of everything, which would only be exciting to me, I’ll try to highlight the best…

# 1 Dan’s Visit – The smile on my face might be the only thing you need to see in order to understand what it meant for Dan to come to China. We had so much fun together talking and catching up on the last 5 months of being separate. It was such a gift for him to spend time with my closest Chinese friends, get to know my team, and see our relationship grow even in the 2 weeks he was here. We traveled to the Great Wall, Tianamen Square, and then further to the south to Fuzhou to see his family.


#2 Staff Conference in Shenzhen – All 12 members of IECS + Newt, Claire, and Tony + Lee and Paula Corder + beach and warm weather = AMAZING. We enjoyed one another’s company so much! Lee and Paula came to host the first IECS Staff Conference with Newt and Claire, and they came prepared to pour into us. Each day we had 2 sessions with at least one additional Word study from one of them. Lee’s sessions were focused on developing core values and time management to put a big picture behind what we’re already doing. This has already proven to be a gift that brings freedom to my time, not burdensome routines and schedules. The week we spent here has energized me for this next semester! In addition to great learning, we all had a blast doing a picture scavenger hunt on the beach, going to Chinese theme parks, and spending a lot of time at Starbucks near our hotel. : )

#3 Relaxing in Sanya – My Baoding team planned to spend a week in the southern most part of China with the intentions of not doing much. Our hostel was a 5-minute walk to the beach, so that’s where most of our time was spent – well, in between hot spring visits with skin-eating fish and biking around the island on a tandem bike or a motorcycle. We found a Western restaurant that was strikingly similar to an Applebee’s, so if we weren’t doing any of the above, we were sitting at Rainbow eating big burgers or chicken wraps! I also happened to meet the friend of a girl I met in Beijing at Rainbow, so he hung out with us for most of the week. Nicole (the girl from Beijing) and Andrew (the guy I met in Sanya) came from the same university in America to study Chinese in a northern city. They both visited Baoding for a few days before returning to the north. Other IECS friends came to hang out also – Brad and Jess Distad and Peter and Shannon Lucas-Roberts…all of whom shared in the blessing of getting sunburned before returning to winterish conditions at home. : )


#4 Visa Hunting in Hong Kong – Due to only having a 180-day visa, our school had to send us to Hong Kong to get a work visa. We didn’t realize how ill prepared we were until we got there. In the process of trying to find the right building, we lost Jon for about an hour. Relieved to find him at our correct destination (which was unknown to us) we searched for another hour for how to get our visa. The happy ending is that it all worked out. Enough said. : ) Hong Kong is an awesome city. It’s so close to China, yet so far away from Chineseness. We enjoyed shopping, browsing an art museum, eating more Western food, and trekking up a mountain at night to see an incredible view of the city. But almost more amazing than all of that was watching the Steelers win the Superbowl 12 hrs after the fact at a sports bar we found!


All in all our escapades were great. Upon returning to Baoding, I’ve been relaxing as well as doing some reading and studying. I’m still awaiting my full teaching schedule for next semester, so until then I’ll prepare for the two classes I do know about. : ) I’m under the impression that classes start on February 23rd…we’ll see.