Jen and the Brownies, Cooking with Catherine, Packing and Flying

On Monday, David had work to do on his presentation for the engineers class that night. I needed to go to the store and get some things, so I took off by myself.  When I got on the bus, someone gave up their seat for me.  That is a common occurrence here, to show respect for elders and those with young children. The man I was sitting by wanted to talk to me.  I used up most of the Chinese I knew with him, telling him where I was from and what I was doing in China.  I know he would have loved to talk more but that language barrier was too high.

I was able to run my errands pretty quickly.  While I was on my way to catch the bus home, a man had stopped on the side of the walkway.  He was carrying filled water jugs after his trip to get the day's water at the Black Tiger Springs that were close to the bus stop.  It is cheaper for them to go to the springs and get their water, but it does make a heavy load to carry back to their apartments.  As I passed, he smiled and said in Engish, "Good morning!"  I was quite surprised.  Then he asked how I was, so I stopped to talk to him.  Since he had better English skills than the first man, I was able to tell him a lot more.  I was getting a little nervous that the bus I needed to ride back was going to come by, and since I was in a hurry to get back, I kept glancing at the bus stop, so he let me go.

Jen came over for her tutoring lesson after lunch.  David worked on Science terms with her and then when he needed to take a break, I made brownies with her.  We started by melting the butter in a pan.  I let her stir it.  Jen seemed fascinated by the melting butter.  Since she had just finished Science terms with David, I mentioned that it was a physical reaction and how even in cooking, we use science.  After all the ingredients were in and the batter was poured into the pan for baking, I told Jen she could lick the spoon.  She was confused by the word lick, so I demonstrated it for her.  She tried the first lick and the let out a noise that expressed extreme delight!  The look on her face was a delight to see!  David heard me laughing and came in.  He got the spatula to lick.  Then we got the picture.

Jen stirring the brownies.

Hard to fit two people in this tiny kitchen. 

Jen's first time licking a spoon! 

Jen and me, just before she left.

After David had covered the last of the math terms with Jen, the brownies were done baking, and we still had about fifteen minutes of time left.  We decided to play some card games with her while we ate our brownies.  Then we sang a song for her, and it was time to go.  We are going to miss her.  It has been fun working with Jen, a delightful girl.  After giving her a bag with several brownies in it and a hug, we said good bye and good luck to her.  I sure hope it goes well for her.  Jen is a bright, intelligent girl.

 David worked with the engineers each night.  Monday, they were supposed to do some reader's theaters.  After two of the plays, he decided that he needed to back off of doing all four in one night, so he went on to other activities.

Catherine is a Chinese girl who is working on her Doctorate in Education.  She became familiar with some of the women at church, and they invited her to eat lunch with us.  She has become a regular for lunch now.  A few weeks ago, I brought a pumpkin roll for dessert.  Catherine fell in love with it and wanted to learn how to make it.  I invited her to come on Tuesday so that I could teach her how.  We had a fun time working together.

Kayce had planned to come with her, but ended up having to teach an emergency class for about an hour, so she came later.  While we waited for the pumpkin roll to set up in the fridge, we played some card games.  Catherine had never played before, so we explained the game to her and had fun playing.  She was the one who won the second game!  We all enjoyed a slice of pumpkin roll and then they left, each happily fed with pumpkin roll.

Wednesday was our last day in China for five weeks.  We spent the morning getting things ready to go, laundry, cleaning, etc. We had made an appointment with a young man for some tutoring that afternoon, but we had forgotten that we were going to visit Dr. Tricia that afternoon, so we had to try and arrange a different time for him to come.

A man that David had met with before named, Samuel, wanted to take us out to lunch.  Samuel is a man that is connected with the Rain Education group.  The goal of their company involvement with Rain Education is to have better understanding between China and the US and the world.  They think that because David was in the Legislature, he has political connections that would help them.  Samuel was there with his "big boss," and we had a pleasant lunch and some interesting conversations.  They wanted to know more specifically how the Americans felt about North and South Korea working together to create a good Olympics experience.  When we were finished with lunch, they drove us up to Qianfushan Hospital so we could have our visit with Dr. Tricia.

Some of the lunch that we had with Samuel and his boss.  Lots of seafood!  

Dr. Tricia has had a rough week.  She realized on Sunday that it was the one month anniversary of her father's death and she was struggling.  She still feels guilty that she didn't get her father treatment earlier, and that it may have provided him with a few more years of live.  We talked for about an hour and she seemed to be a little more calm when we left.  She also had a gift for us to take home to our family.  It is a special type of chicken prepared in a special Shandong way.  We are excited to share it with our family!

We met Eva at the Yon Ho restaurant for supper.  She wanted to spend time with us before we left.  She had some gifts for us also.  More than 50% of our luggage is gifts!  Some we have bought and some we have been given.

David finished his class with the engineers.  He hopes that he gave them some skills to help get them through and be able to do their work. 

While David was working with the engineers, I was helping the young man that we had rescheduled from earlier Wednesday. He is auditioning to go to Columbia University in New York.  He is nervous about what to say and how to introduce himself in the interview.  We went over some strategies that I hope will help him.  He seems like a bright young man.  His goal in life is to become a film and play director.

Lily sent this tie for David and the scarf for me.  It is beautiful hand woven brocade silk.

We arrived at the airport in time for our flight and everything worked well for getting back to the US.  It is a long, long time of flying and waiting at airports.  It was hard to sleep before the flight, hard to sleep on the flight, and then hard to stay awake until time for bed in America.  These next five weeks will be late Christmas, family parties, a trip to see my dad, and hopefully, a LOT of (busy) rest!

Shanghai airport. Waiting to leave China.

Exams are Done!

David with the class of Engineers that he is teaching this week.

We finished up the Oral Final Exams this week.  Once again, I felt like a pre-marriage counselor.  So many questions, trying to give them some good advice that they will be able to understand and also be able to use in their lives when the time does come for them to take that step in their lives.  The next step for us, will be getting the grades that we have assigned in the right place on the SDU website…. that is all in Chinese…  Eva will be helping us.

I did have one girl that got the question card that said, “Tell an experience that you had with your grandparents.”  She immediately started to tear up and had a hard time telling me.  As are most Chinese children, she was raised by their grandparents while her parents worked.  She was very close to her grandparents and had many fond memories.  The reason for the tears?  Her grandmother now has Alzheimer’s.  She doesn’t remember her or the memories that they shared.  It is very hard for her to visit her grandparents now.  Her grandmother does remember the pet name that she had for her granddaughter, but going through this is so hard. Needless to say, I took a little extra time with her.

Monday, Thursday and Saturday afternoons, we tutored Jen.  Thursday, I taught her to make banana bread.  She really gets into the cooking.  We alternate working on words and having an activity with her. We have played several card games with her, and talked about the family that she has chosen to be her host when she goes to Canada for school.

Two BYU China Teacher couples that teach in Qingdao wanted to take a quick little trip to see what Jinan was like. They spent the day hiking and exploring the city.  Some of the teachers at SDNU were able to go with them.  Then we decided to have dinner at the hotel as a group that evening.  At first, we were going to have dinner at a "hot  pot" restaurant, but they were all so tired that they decided to just have it at the hotel.  David and I were already on our way.  We could have finished going on the bus we had started on, but we would have had a fifteen minute walk on a very cold evening, to get to the hotel.  The traffic was nightmarish, but we finally got to a stop where we could easily change to the bus that would take us closest to the hotel.  We had a fun dinner with them all.

Tuesday, we had supper with Anna and Bob.  The canteen has started to sell American style hamburgers, chicken sandwiches, fish sandwiches and bacon sandwiches (the bacon is a little more like ham, but still tastes good).  They are a big hit and Bob and Anna wanted to introduce us to them.  It was a fun way to have dinner.  Anna and Bob had to go study for the tests that will be happening in the next three weeks, so we made a short night of it.

Kayce and Deniece wanted to go to the little shop that David and I had gone to last Saturday evening with Eva.  We decided to go there on Wednesday afternoon.  Deniece and Kayce met us at the bus stop just south of our campus and we rode over together, since they weren’t quite sure where to get off the bus.  The ladies that run the shop were SO happy to see us again… and that we had brought more foreigners with us!  It was so funny.  They let us browse to our hearts content and were more than happy to take our money when we decided on what we wanted to buy.  They know a little bit of English at that store, and that makes working with them even more fun. 

Last week, as David and I were coming back from the baking store, a guy with a girl on the back of his scooter, hit into our little grocery cart.  We almost didn’t make it home with our heavy load of groceries that we had bought because the wheel kept falling off.  It was a long, slow trip home.  We had the choice of trying to buy a new wheel for the cart or buying a whole new cart.  We asked Andrew, who has helped us so many times, to look into it.  We didn’t know how to find the brand of cart that it was, so he looked up what a new cart would be.  It turned out to only be 45 RMB ($7!), so we opted for the new one.  It also has a cool wheel design that makes it easier to take up and down stairs.  David always had to pick up the cart and haul it, groceries and all, up the three flights of stairs to our apartment.  Life just got easier!

We invited Lily to come have dinner with us on Friday, as she was going to be in Jinan for a seminar.  Andrew brought the cart over because it had come earlier in the day.  It was a good thing that Lily was here as we tried to put it together… the directions were all in Chinese!  We are now excited to take it to the store on our next shopping trip.

Our new shopping cart.  The wheel design makes it so that you can walk it up or down the stairs easily.  So excited to have this as it makes our life here a little easier.

Saturday, David went to the initial meeting of the class for the engineers that he will be helping improve their English skills before they go to the rest of the world and build on projects that the China State Construction Company.  He showed them a power point presentation and then after all the introductions of who the important people were, they had pictures. David called me about 11:15 to ask about going to lunch with the head man and the other people that were helping with the English learning project.  Lunch was just at the hotel that we live by, so I walked over and waited for them to come.  It was an okay lunch, but a small taste of several of the dishes was all I wanted.

Sunday night was the first night of the Engineers class.  David felt that it went well.  Their English skills are really poor and it is going to take some effort to get them to where they need to be, but they also need to work on it themselves.  Oh, well, we do what we can. 

David is with Rose, she was interpreter for the evening.

Doing his introductory PPT for the engineers.

The class of engineers.

More of David's PPT.

New Year's Day, New Washer, New Baking Student.

We just thought that these "Minion" bikes were hilarious!  

 We started out the new year with a loud bang at midnight and then some students rejoicing and then after about ten minutes, it was quiet so we could go to sleep.  Kayce came over about 9:30 so we could go over some information about Visiting Teaching.  Aaron came about 10:15 and we played lots of fun card games until about noon.  We had decided that we wanted to take them to the little cafe on our campus to try the food (especially the strawberry yogurt smoothies!), so we went there for lunch.

When we were finished, we decided to go and get some Korean sushi across the street, since we were so close, but as soon as we got to the crosswalk, Aaron pointed out that they were closed, so we didn't go and just decided to go back to our apartment and play some more.  After a few more games, we paused for a little bit while Aaron hooked up the DVD player so we could watch a movie.  The DVD player is broken, but Aaron saw a cord that could be used to hook up my computer to the TV, so we did that and watched a movie.

Aaron had to leave about 3 p.m. and Kayce needed to leave about 4, so that left me to finish watching the movie by myself until David came out to watch the last half.  It has been a fun day.

Tuesday began final exams for my students.  David did his first day on Christmas Day because we had New Year's Day off.  It is such a great experience to talk with these young people one-on-one.  I wish we had more than five minutes per interview to talk.  Some are still struggling to get the words out, but most have a lot more confidence to do so than at the beginning of the semester.  It is so rewarding to see and hear of their progress.

During the exam, we let the students ask us a question.  Most are: "Why did you come to China?"  "What city to you like the most?" "Do you like Chinese food?"  That type of question.  One of the students asked me, "Are you Christian?" "What is your religion?"  "What religious experience have you had that means the most to you?"  I was nearly floored by that direct of a question.  I was happy that I felt I knew how to answer these questions without violating the letter I had signed from the Chinese government about not preaching religion to Chinese Nationals.

I have also been asked a lot of premarital advice.  They all think I have a perfect marriage, and they want the same for themselves.  They ask things about finding a boyfriend, how do you know you are in love, and what do you do to make a happy marriage.  I felt more like a family and marriage councilor!  One more title to add to my list...

There was also one other question that really threw me for a loop.  I have sung a few times for my students: a snow song, and some Christmas songs.  This student wanted to hear me sing one more time, so that was her question to me, would I sing for her.  I fumbled around for a few seconds looking through the songs on my phone and finally decided on, "Happy Together" by the Turtles (1970's)  I sang a little bit of it and that made her very happy.  Then the time was up and I had to move on to the next student.

We were invited out to dinner Tuesday evening by a former student of David's from four years ago.  He is working in earnest to try and pass the IELTS test so that he can go to Canada to study there.  We had a nice meal at a restaurant that we haven't been to before.  I think I saw a few jaws drop by workers in the restaurant when we first walked in.  We had a good visit but it was a cold walk to and from the restaurant.

On Friday, Kayce, Deniece and I went to the big market.  Kayce had bought a cool sword there to send home to her son that collects them and wanted to get another one.  We couldn't find it the last time we were there, so we went back to look and shop a bit.  Deniece hadn't been there before, so she came along.  We had lunch at the KFC near my campus and caught the bus we needed to get to the market.

We were riding along, and as we were getting closer to the market, we were looking for familiar signs to show us where to get off.  The bus kept going and going and finally, it pulled into a bus garage and everyone had to get off.  We were NOT at the market!  Now what?!  We saw where a bus stand was, so we walked to it to see what buses stopped there that we might know. Not a ONE of the fifteen numbers of the buses that stopped there even looked familiar!  Now what?!

I called David, and he suggested that I call Eva.  I told her our predicament.  She said to get a taxi, and she would text me the address of the market for us to show to the taxi driver.  It's all well and good when you are Chinese and can easily hail a taxi, but try three Anglo women trying to get a taxi!  The bus stop happened to be right next to a Children's hospital (the sign was in Chinese and English!), and there were taxi drivers and other cars lined up in a special lane to drop people off.  We walked to that lane and stood there looking at the taxis.  One driver rolled down his window and said something to us.  Didn't understand him, but I showed him the text on my phone.  He nodded his head and then the people that were in the taxi got out (they were headed to the hospital) and we got in.  What a relief!  He drove us right to the market area that we were familiar with and let us off.  So grateful for small miracles!

Since we had been there a short time ago, and didn't have success finding the little shop that Kayce wanted the sword at, we were really wondering what to do.  There are two different escalators in the building that you can take down.  One of them goes down one flight, another one goes down two flights.  We had taken the one that goes down two flights before, not realizing what a difference an escalator can make, and didn't find the shop.  This time, we took the escalator that only goes down, one flight then turned to our left, and there was the shop right before us!  We just amazed ourselves with the marvelous things we had done that afternoon.  We made it home without any more problems.

We tutored Jen, the fourteen year old that is going to Canada on Thursday, and then they asked if we could do another lesson on Saturday.  We didn't have any other plans for Saturday, so we said, "Yes." We decided that one thing to do with her would be to make some cookies.  When we told Jen that is what we planned to do, she was very excited.  I showed her how to mix the cookies, and then she took over. She stayed with it and did most of it.  She hasn't even stepped inside a kitchen that I know of except to get some food to eat.  We had so much fun!  Getting her to talk is quite a hard problem.  Chinese students are not taught to ask questions, so we are trying to teach her that.  I assume that Canadian students are taught a lot like U.S. students in that they are allowed and encouraged to ask questions.  So we asked questions and kept trying to get her to ask some questions. At the end of the time, I was in the kitchen taking the last batch out of the oven and started to bag some cookies.  She came in the kitchen then and asked if she could take some cookies home.  When I told her that I was getting some for her Jen was pleased and excited.  A post that she put out on WeChat later for her friends said, "Well, now I'm a person who makes cookies... and I'm really good at it!"

The clothes washer had totally broken down and the manager of our apartment complex had said that they would get us a new washer in February and that they would send someone to repair this one until that came. We had to wring out the clothes by hand last time, so I kept putting off washing clothes until they repaired it.  When no one came by Wednesday, I emailed them to ask when someone would be coming to repair it.  No answer.  Finally on Thursday afternoon, when no one had come again, I emailed again and told them that I was not capable of washing and wringing out the clothes without a washer because of the arthritis in my wrist and hands, would they please send someone to repair it.

My new clothes washer!  Something to get excited about, right?!  The guy who installed it spoke no English, and we wouldn't have understood his Chinese, so he showed me how to do it and then left.  When I went to try to start it later, I kept getting an error message.  I was asking a friend that reads some Chinese to help me, but then I put the lid down, and it worked!

The next day, I got an email from the manager that they were sending someone out to buy a new washer and that it would be here on Monday.  Well, it came on Saturday!!  I was so excited!!  Clean clothes again!!  We did a batch of laundry that evening.

Earlier we had made a plan to go to a fun mall area of Jinan that Eva has told us about several times.  We met her there after the washer was in.  We stopped at a few shops and got some snacks.  Some were better than others, especially a little cheese tart.  We stopped in to a little Chinese craft store and had fun looking at all the things there.  We bought several things and had fun looking at it all.  Later we stopped at a restaurant and had some supper.  In the restaurant, you are given a metal bowl and you have lots of veggies and meats to choose from to put in the bowl.  I really wasn't feeling that hungry so I put what I thought David and I would eat in a bowl and then went to weigh it.  The guy at the counter said I didn't have enough, so I had to go back and put some more in.  Then they cook what was in the bowl, make a crepe-like pancake, roll it up with the veggies and meat inside, cut it in half, and then serve it to you on a tray.  I was sure glad that David and I were sharing this.  Eva made him eat half of her sandwich, so we had some to take home, because there was no way to finish eating all of that!  It was a fun evening.

These cute little bunny seats and tables were scattered through the mall area.

Looking over the Chinese crafts.

The guy wanted David to buy his BBQ, but David only wanted to warm his hands.

David the shark!  Eva refers to us as American Sharks, so it was funny to find this in the mall area, and of course David had to have his picture taken in it!

They tried to pattern this area to look like an old Chinese market would have looked like.  It has a lot of places to eat and some places to shop.

The sign at the entrance of the mall says something about toleration for neighbors.  Eva told us of the story of two neighbors that were squabbling over some land.  One man had a relative that was a high man in the government.  He wrote to his relative, and the relative wrote back that what was more important were good feelings between neighbors.  Sharing the land, even just a few inches would do more to bring peace and harmony.