June 18 - Farewell China

This is the "Little Woods" on our Central Campus of SDU.  The old wood was rotting and dangerous.  They took about four weeks to finish it.  It looks great!

The last week has been such a busy time for us. We needed to sort through things, pack, clean, and prepare the apartment for the new BYU China teachers that will be coming in August.  With all of that going on, we also had lots of invitations to share a meal with friends that we may never see again, but always hope to see in the future. 

We had our usual lunch with Eva on June 12.  Eva invited us to go to the “noodle” restaurant that is on the west side of campus near McDonald’s, where we have eaten several times before.  We like the food there.  Jane came along with us.  We were having a nice lunch, when suddenly a big commotion interrupted us.  Two of the male cooks in the kitchen started fighting.  They were eventually pulled apart, and it didn’t seem like there was any damage to either person. We have only seen something like that once before in our experiences in China.  I know that they are still human, that there are still bullies in the world, and that sometimes tempers flare for different reasons.  But this incident marred our last meal.  David and I both lost our appetites after that.  I was so afraid, because in the kitchen, there are knives and fires.  It could have been worse than just the yelling and the beating, but it was a rather sad ending to our last lunch with Eva and Jane.

Zhang Xiaoli often came to pick us up and take us to the English Salon at Qilu Hopsital.  She had shirts made for David and I with this picture from his WeChat that he had posted.  I didn't put mine on though.

Sunday evening, we had dinner with Bob, his parents, Jay and Tresa Wilkins, and Eva.  Bob is doing really well in his schooling at Duke University in the US.  He has been accepted to a program at UCLA in the Bio-physics area, so he had to come back to China to get a new visa so that he could study there in August to November and then go back to Duke to work with the professor who sees the greatness in Bob.  He is such a great person!  It was nice to be with them again.

Bob's dad, Eva, Yi Bing, and Bob.

Tresa Wilkins, Eva, and Jay Wilkins.

We also had lunch with Daryl Reeves on Monday June 17.  He has become a good friend, and I know he will miss us.  Daryl is on the Autism spectrum, and it is hard for some people to understand and accept those with Autism. We had some fun and interesting visits with him.  Our door was always open to him, and he would just stop in when he felt like it.  Sometimes, he just wanted a listening ear and other times he wanted our opinion.  He always had some interesting stories to tell of his experiences and travels.  He was a great help to us several times, because of his connections at SDU.  We wish we had known about the restaurant that he took us to earlier.  It was close to campus, the food was great, and they had “yam balls.”  We love fresh yam balls!

The banners are raised above the main street of our campus to thank the professors and colleges of the university.

Monday evening, we had dinner with the Wilkins, Kaycee, and Aaron at Lydia’s restaurant.  We had gotten a lot of packing finished during the day, so we felt like we could spare the time to go enjoy a last meal with them in China.  We will surely miss Aaron!  What a strength he has been and a help to the BYU teachers!  He is coming to the US this summer because his brother is getting married in July.  He is also trying to get into a special program in the US for dentistry.  I hope he is successful.  We will be able to see to Kaycee in the US also.  She lives in Boise but comes to Salt Lake to visit with her mom frequently.  

We saw this truck loaded down with all the bicycles.  These are the rental bicycles that line the streets of Jinan and most cities of China.  You can rent one for one Yuan per hour.  Periodically they will load them up to take them for repairs or just move them to a different area of the city.

Tuesday morning turned out to be rather hectic.  I had to call AT&T to get our phone service turned back on, finish the last details, and also get the last of the packing in.  There is always more than you think there is.  We knew, especially with the ceramic plates, that we were given from the group at Qilu hospital, that we were going to have problems getting them all to fit in the bags, so we decided that we needed to send another box of stuff home.  David got that taken care of on Monday after we took care of all the Exit requirements that we had to do to check out of SDU. 

When we were at the office to get the papers to check out, we didn’t know what department we had to go to, to get one of the red stamps from.  One of the workers in the office started calling, and when she had to wait for a call back from one person, she started talking to us.  She expressed how sad the entire university was that we would not be back.  We are a legend here, she said, in many ways.  She told us that Eva would talk about things that we had done.  We gave Eva a copy of the book we had made of our first year here.  The woman told us that Eva would share some of the things from our adventures, and how impressed that many of them were with the things we did.  It was so nice of her to tell us.

After the taxi came, I was still trying to put some things away, especially the stuff in the kitchen.  I had to leave some things undone, and I feel bad about that, but I don’t know what else I could do.  I couldn’t wash the rest of the towels, and I had put some bread in the microwave when the maid was there to clean on Monday afternoon, that I had planned to get out, but each time I headed to the kitchen to do that, something distracted me.  

We hope that they will avoid putting other people in the apartment for the summer.  There was too much BYU stuff to put in boxes and hide away. Eva took the things that were more expensive to her apartment until the next couple comes.  It would be nice for them to extend that courtesy, to just leave that place empty for those two months, but it is business, and if they need the apartment, they will use it.  If we had been allowed to pay for the two months of rent, then they would have left it.

As we were leaving the apartment, I put my key on the table next to where David had put his key.  Then I tried to think if there was something else, but Eva was kind of pushing me to just go.  I walked out the door and started down two steps and remembered what I had forgotten and needed - my cane!  Eva quickly called over to the International Office that is in charge of the apartments and a woman came quickly with the extra key to open the door.  It did set us back about 10 minutes from our desired leave time, but I didn’t feel we needed to be in such a hurry that I couldn’t take a minute to really think about the last few things.  Anyway, I got my cane, and we hurried down the stairs, but not until I grabbed the key that had been mine and put it in my purse.  I will give it to the new couple when we meet them, and then they will have it.

We had to wait in line for almost an hour before they would open the doors to go check in at the international area of the airport.  The taxi driver had helped us get our bags put on two of the carts at the airport.  We knew it was going to be difficult to maneuver all the luggage we had, but it wasn’t too bad.  

Four large bags, two larger carry-ons and two smaller bags.  Waiting in line for the doors to the international flight are to open.

Jinan airport.

The flights were long, and they had wheelchairs and people there to help us get through the maze of leaving China and entering the US.  Working through the fog of jet lag is always hard.  We know it is a part of the travel back and forth over the ocean, probably the hardest part, but necessary to do what we did in China.

Jinan from the air.  Last look.

China will always be a happy memory in our lives.  We hope that we can travel back to visit, but a lot of that will depend on how David’s cancer goes.  We also hope that some of our friends will be able to find their way to visit us here in Utah.  I know it’s not easy to travel, and more expensive for most of them, but it is still a hope that we can host them in our beautiful country as we were hosted so gracefully and kindly in China.

In order to get our precious plates from the Qilu Hospital home, we had to find bubble wrap.  The smallest amount we could find was this!  50 cm by 50 meters!  It only cost us about 40 Yuan ($6).

Getting these plates home without breaking them was a big deal.  Little David and Porter were happy to have us home!

Farewell China, we hope to see you again!

June 16 - Busy Week, Heading Home

We had a busy Sunday.  After church at the Hanlin, we had lunch with everyone.  Last Wednesday, Jugita had been hospitalized, and we thought she was going to be released today, but they decided to do some more tests on her, so she couldn’t go home.  At least she was able to be with us at church and for lunch. 

After we got home, our friend, Simon (Kathy Guo’s husband from our friendship five years ago), had asked us to help him with the school that he has for English-learning students.  He wanted to test the 12-year-old students on their English.  It was a pretty big deal to have two native English speakers to do this.  I’m sure it gives Simon’s school more credibility.  

A special taxi picked us up about 3:00 p.m.and drove us to his school.  Simon took us to a classroom that he had set up for the testing.  We would both be listening, one of us would write some notes, and then we talked about the scoring after the student left.  Nine students were being tested that day, four boys and five girls.  A parent was allowed to come in and photograph, or video, parts of the test.  Some of the students seemed to do quite well and the others were okay.  

After the testing, we were all taken to a restaurant, and David and I were put in a dining room with the students.  Simon and two of the mothers would eat at a table just outside of our dining room, and we were alone with the students to help engage them in conversation and help them with their skills.

Simon ordered all of the food, and it was a lot of delicious food!  At first the students were rather awe-stuck and didn’t say much.  We decided that a good strategy with them would be to ask them questions and try to get an answer from each student.  That did loosen some of them up more.  Two of the older boys were getting quite relaxed with us, but the other two boys were quieter, and the girls we really had a hard time getting a lot of answers.  One of the more silent boys wasn’t feeling well but insisted on coming anyway.  I think if he had been feeling better, he would have been more talkative. 

As the dinner was winding down, we decided that each student needed to ask us a question.  That was hard, because I’m sure they had questions all along, but not the skills to find the right words to ask us the question with.  I noticed that several were using their phones to help them find the words.  I guess I think that is okay, because it still helps broaden your word base when you have to look it up and then use the word.  

The students from Simon's School.

Simon and us.

 We finally finished with the meal and all the questions at about 7:45, so Simon ordered a taxi for us, and we were taken home.  Had to get pictures first though.

In our classes this week, we were finishing up our final exams.  It is still hard to believe that this is the last time we will be teaching Chinese students here at Shandong University.

We were informed during our classes the week before that we needed to pick up our documents and take them to the police station.  Our work permits only lasted until June 8th, so to be legal here, we had to get an extension.  It was fortunate for us that Jackson was available, so that he could get us a taxi and go with us to the police station to turn our papers in.  

Having done this last year, we pretty much knew what to expect and all went well getting the papers in.  Then we got another taxi and took it home. 

Tuesday, we went for our massage in the afternoon.  We had planned a reception for our former students to come and say good-bye to us for that evening.  There were quite a few that weren’t able to come on the short notice that they had for the surprise party last week.  One of David’s former students booked us a room in one of the buildings, and that is where we held the reception. 

Most of the students that came were David’s students, but I had some that heard about it and came.  We sang them some songs with the guitar and then reminisced about some of the class activities and such.  We told them our “love story,” how we met and got engaged.  They really enjoyed that!  Then we had time to talk with individuals.  We only had the room booked for two hours, but it was a full three hours before we left.  It keeps getting harder to leave.

Wednesday, I needed to go to the hospital after my classes and help get Jurgita checked out from the hospital.  I hope that she can stay well now and be happy here.  They were able to catch the bus home to Zouping and get there safely.

David had forgotten his papers with his students’ evaluations at the Qianfoshan campus, so as soon as I arrived home from the hospital, he had to hurry over there to get them.  Eva was here at the moment, so she drove him to the bus station.  He was exhausted by the time he got home because of the heat.

We had our last Chinese massages on Thursday.  They were a fun group of people to be around.  I think it kept our bodies in fairly good shape for us to finish this year.  

We got home just in time for the car that was here to pick us up and take us to the English Salon final party.  Dr. Liu had a taxi waiting for us, and we were driven to a special party room.  The cuisine for dinner was Guandong style.  I LOVE Guandong style food!  We were very early and Dr. Liu ordered a movie for us to watch while we waited.  It was only supposed to be about 45 minutes, but it turned out to be closer to an hour and 15 minutes before most of them came.  Dr. Yang didn’t get there until almost 7:30. He’s a busy man.

Dr. Yang, David, and me.

Dinner was SO good!

Sun Bo? Who's behind the balloon?

It's Ling-ling and Sun Bo!

The guy in the pink shirt had a great voice!

More of the group from Qilu.

We had a lot of fun!

 The special that night was Haagen-Daz ice cream cake.  Ling-ling was so proud of that!  We did some karaoke, and after everyone had eaten, they went around the room and each person there either gave a speech or sang a song to us.  It was a sweet, warm evening.

The lovely and delicious ice cream cake!

Our farewell toast.

Dr. Yang had these plates made for us as a thank you gift.  They are made in Zibo that has a special factory to make these.

Kaycee Furhiman came back to Jinan for a visit and we decided as a group to try and catch the tourism bus.  We all met at the south entrance of DaMing Lake, where the bus was supposed to stop.  We waited and talked and waited and talked until it was finally time for David, Nancy, and me to leave.  Nancy needed to go teach a class, and we were scheduled to have our farewell lunch with Dr. Tricia.  We started walking away to go to a regular bus stop, when we finally see the tour bus come!  Too late for us, but I assume the others had a great time.

We visited at the hospital with Dr. Tricia for a few minutes, and then she gave us a map to get to the restaurant she wanted to go to.  We had to wait for a bus for over twenty minutes!  That is rare here.  We ate some great food and had a good talk.  Another hard person to say good-bye to.  

We have been packing and cleaning and getting things ready to go.  We had two visitors that evening.  Jackson came over with a gift from his hometown for us.  It was two different bottles that had the painting on the inside.  Very pretty!

June 8 - Leshan Buddha and Ebony Museum

The guide had a car and driver for us today.  We were the only ones of our group that didn’t go on to Tibet.  Leshan is a city that is about a two-and-a-half-hour drive south of Chengdu.  It boasts that it has the largest Buddha in the world.  I think he said 71 meters tall.  We were afraid that the line to go see it would be really long, but not so long that we needed to start any earlier than 9 a.m.

The drive to Leshan was a little boring, but I had a book to read, so it didn’t bother me much.   When we arrived at the place to get on the boat, there wasn’t much of a line.  Our guide had us go stand in line while he went to get the tickets for the boat ride.  While we were waiting in line, an old guy beckoned to David to follow him and David started to go.  I yelled for David to come back because it didn’t seem right that it wasn’t our guide.  He came back, but the man went on, so we waited for our guide. 

The river in LeShan has a place where three rivers come together.  The rivers are the Dadu, the Qingyi, and the Minjiang rivers.  We only had to wait to get on the boat for about ten minutes.  The guide was afraid that it would be an hour.  We got on the boat and they had us go right up to the top open deck. When we got to the part of the river where the three currents came together, the boat started rocking.  It hurts my leg to have to try and balance on it, so I was in a fair amount of pain by the time we got through that rough current.  That was where the boat capsized that prompted the creation of the Buddha.  All hands were drowned, so a Buddhist Monk took collections to create the Buddha.  It took 90 years to build.

As we rounded the corner and started seeing how huge this Buddha was, I could easily believe it was the largest Buddha in the world!  

This is a gate that leads down to the river.

This isn't the largest Buddha, but it was pretty big.

If you want to get up and personal with the Buddha, you can walk down this stairs.  Most people were just going on the boats like us, but plenty were going down the stairway that was cut into the sandstone rock.

Giant Buddha.  Largest in the world.  71 meters tall (almost 233 feet).  Took 90 years to build.  

This guy stands on the other side of the giant Buddha.

Once you have seen the Buddha, you climb back up to the top of the mountain this way.

After getting off the boat, the driver took us to a small local restaurant to eat.  They made some fresh dumplings for us that tasted really good!  We weren’t terribly hungry, so after we finished with those, the guide gave us some suggestions of things we could do with the time we had left before we went back to Chengdu to catch the plane home.  We decided to go to the Summer Palace and Ebony Museum in Leshan. 

Ebony is a wood that is so dense that it doesn’t float but sinks to the bottom of the river.  The Chinese find it in the riverbeds and use it for carvings and designs.  We saw some fascinating artwork at the museum.  There was also a museum of the Chinese Zodiac and a replica of the Summer Palace that used to be in that area.  

This giant lion greeted us when we entered the museum.  He is basically one log of ebony with some parts (like his tail) glued into it.  You can hardly tell that it is not a part of the original log.  He had a twin brother on the other side that looked just as welcoming as this one did.

I loved this beautiful door (and the man standing beside it).  I took one picture and our guide wanted to see it.  She said something in Chinese the our guide, Echo, interpreted as, "It looks like an old time movie photo."  It was rather funny .  I don't remember if this was her photo that she took after, or the one that I took.  I think it was the lighting.

These statues commemorate the grandfathers of Feng Shui.

This is our Chinese guide in the museum.  She was always so kind and considerate of me and my cane.  We were friends by the time the tour was finished.  It's not a very good picture of her though.

Our guide at the museum had some of these flowers hanging around her neck.  I was very curious about them and asked what flower they were.  She took one off and tried to hang it on my shirt, but I didn't have a button to hang it on, so she put it on my purse.  They wear these flowers because they emit a natural insecticide that keeps the mosquitoes off of you.  I like them and the way they smelled wasn't bad either.

This dear was made of a piece of ebony.  There were a few pieces added to it, like part of its face, but mostly it was one piece of wood.

This ebony carving has the dragon and the phoenix.  The dragon represents the king and the phoenix represents the queen.

This peacock has been brought to you by the roots of an ebony tree that was found buried in the river.

Ebony carving of a village on the mountain.

This carving tells the story of one of the three most famous books in China.  Journey to the West, A Dream of Red Mansions  and one that I don't remember the name of now.

This part of the museum is a replica of the summer palace that was once destroyed.  It has the signs of the Chinese Zodiac in it.

These roots of the persimmon tree were in the shapes of some of the Chinese characters so they put them together on the board.  I assume that it is a poem or something.

We left the museum at 2:45 figuring that we would be able to be at the airport by 5 p.m., however, there was a lot of construction going on, and it made it slow going.  Several times, the driver thought we were on a road that would take us to the airport, only to have it blocked and we would have to back track and find another way.  

This ancient instrument was used to predict the weather.  I couldn't get an answer as to how it did that.  Maybe if it was wet it was raining, if it was hot it was sunny, if it was cold and wet it was snowing.

This is an ancient seismograph to predict earthquakes.  In each of the dragon's mouths, there is a marble. If the marble drops, there is an earthquake happening.

We arrived at the airport at 6 p.m. and our flight was taking off at 7!  Our guide took us in, talked to the people at the ticket desk, and they took us in front of three other people.  I felt bad but didn’t want to miss that flight! 

Next was security. Our guide took us to the VIP security line and talked to the guard on duty to allow us to go through there, and to let him come with us as far as the place to be scanned.  We made it to the gate we needed to be at and had ten minutes to sit down before we had to get in line for the bus that would take us to the airplane.  We arrived without problems in Jinan, took a taxi home and crawled into bed.

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June 7 - Dragon Boat Festival in Chengdu, PANDAS!

Our guide, Echo, told us we needed to be down in the hotel lobby at 8 a.m. so that we could get in line early at the Panda Preserve.  Since today was a holiday, Dragon Boat Festival, they expected large crowds at the preserve.  The traffic getting there wasn’t too bad, and then getting in line was okay.  Because of Cindy McKay being in a wheelchair, they took us all to the front of the line and let us in ahead of a lot of people. 

Actually, there were less people than we had expected.  The Chinese National College Entrance Exam is always set for June 6,7, and 8, and it just happened to be on Dragon Boat Festival.  The tests are set, and it doesn’t matter that it is a holiday.  That was a plus point for us.  You also want to get to the preserve before it gets too hot, because when it is hot, the pandas just lay around or go inside.  They can’t take the heat. 

The first two enclosures, the pandas were rather sleepy.  They hadn’t woken up enough yet to want to eat.  They weigh the pandas every two days, and if the pandas have lost weight, they fire the keeper.  Keeping them happy and fed is the main job of the keeper.  We were successful in getting some great shots of the pandas. 

 

Cute panda sleeping in a tree.

Panda in the year of the pig.

This mama panda was trying to get her cub to move, but he didn't want to so she gave up and sat down like this.

 We loved watching this panda roll around.  It was getting hot, but they were still moving around pretty good.  They don't like the heat and will just lay around if it's too hot.

It was getting pretty hot and muggy, but we were able to see a lot of action from the giant pandas.  They keep the mothers and babies in a group, and they can keep some of the yearlings in groups, but when they are adults, they have to keep them separate.  The adults are solitary and don’t like each other.  They are also grumpy with their keepers, so the keepers have to be careful.

Red pandas

There was more action when we got to the red pandas.  They are smaller, and they get along better than the giant pandas.  It was getting close to lunchtime, and they seemed hungry, but then ignored the food when the keeper brought it.  

When we finished at the preserve, our guide took us to a local restaurant, and we had a great meal.  After we were finished, we sat around and talked and played with the owner’s baby.  There was a little shop attached to the store, but things were a little more expensive there, so we didn’t buy.  

 

David had gone to the shade to wait for the rest of our group to gather.  These children found him and wanted to talk.

When we were rested, we were taken to a market that had a great variety of things, probably the best variety that we have seen at any market in China.  We walked and looked, but we were really headed for a small theater that was located in the heart of the market to watch a “Face Changing” show. 

When we arrived at the theater, we were shown to a table that we all sat around.  We could have ordered some tea as we watched the show, but we’re not tea drinkers.  

Warrior women's dance.

This man was twirling the long necked teapot around and then he would point it at the tea cup and hardly spill a drop as he poured it in.  

Dancer with the long sleeves.  I like this elegant dance.

This was a comedy skit.  The girl tells the man that he has to do certain things and he has to keep that lit lamp on his head and not let it fall off.  We couldn't understand a word they said, but good comedy doesn't necessarily need words.  

The “Face Changing” act of the show was last.  This was the greatest part of the whole show!  We loved it.

Posing with our group in Chengdu.  Niels and Jolene Thompson, Alan and Shelly Holt, Cindy and Cameron McKay and us.

After the show, we walked around a little more, some bought some ice cream, and we posed for some pictures.  Then we went back to the hotel for an early evening.  The rest of our group would have to be leaving at 6 a.m., because they were going on to Tibet.  We didn’t need to meet our guide until 9 a.m.