大理 Dali

Hard to convey in a blog post how cool it was to spend four days with one of our students in her hometown of (Yunnan) Dali, meet her relatives and friends, hear stories of how life has changed over the years in this beautiful province in south-central China and to enjoy exquisite meals and precious time with her sweet family!

L2R: Jessica's "second parents", cousin, teacher, grandfather, dinner entertainer, teacher's wife, grandmother, mom, aunt, cousin, self, uncle

Chinese New Year

Jackie (Loftsgard) Miranda introduced us to this precious Thai family last year while we were in Chiang Mai.  They hosted her for a portion of her last semester at Calvin College.

This photo was taken in their living room, right after dinner and before we joined the festivities in "China town"... traditional new year street food, a talent show, lion dance, fireworks, acrobatics and the ubiquitous dragon... things wrapped up around 12:30 a.m. (past our bedtime ;-)

Travel Plans

Grace and I will be at this airport tomorrow morning early... sure that we will not get the reception Dennis Rodman got there last week on his trip home from North Korea, which is fine with us!

We'll be away from Beijing for 27 days (mostly for our annual conference in Thailand), but also to visit a student at her home in Yunnan province on the return!

Good and Bad

The air quality is so bad right now that city officials have decided to project a virtual sunrise on their Tiananmen Square jumbotron to lift spirits in the nation's capital... on the positive side, we've all been advised to stay indoors, which is right in line with our plans to spend time with our students before they leave for the semester break and Chinese New Year.

Tea & Cookies, Round 2

Thirty or so showed up for this afternoon's event at our apartment... a few too many to take out for dinner. 

The three pictured below stayed to help us clean up... so we walked the mile and a half to their favorite local restaurant... got to talk to them and our father about their hopes and dreams for the future (two Pre-Law and a Business Admin major)... precisely the way we had hoped these occasions would go!

茶话会 Chá huà huì

We called it an "Open House"... these next two weeks, students only have exams on their schedules, so we thought they might like to spend an hour or two with their former teachers... these eight took us up on our first offer!

Dinner on the third floor of the South Canteen... a more-or-less candid shot.

Foreign Expert Reception

The BIT Liangxiang Delegation

Schedule conflicts had prevented us from attending functions co-hosted by SAFEA (State Administration of Foreign Experts Affairs) and CAIEP (China Association for International Exchange of Personnel) in the past, but this term we're done a little early and made it to the New Year's Reception!