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Spring Break
International Day has come and gone! Usually we have a day in the fall where we put on a show for the students during the school day and have some foods from different countries. This year the event was turned into an after school carnival, including games put together by high school students and booths from local restaurants, as well as performances from many different countries. It was an exciting time to celebrate the diversity in our school and in the world.
This being finished, We’re on our spring break! May 1st is Chinese Labor Day, and we have a week off. This is the last year the break will be so long; China is realized the issue of having the entire country’s population on a vacation at once (kinda like Christmas break - only with 1.3 billion people) and has now made other days official holidays: tomb sweeping day and the mid-autumn festival are two new celebrations.
But for now, we are enjoying our break - today we went to floraland, a recently built theme park outside of Chengdu that has taken some “creative license” with its design. In other words, Disney would be proud…if they could make royalties off the place. It was a nice day for the trip.
Tomorrow we are taking a few days away from Chengdu and heading to Chongqing, a trip by train of about 4 hours. I’m sure there will be stories to tell when we return!
International Students
We are going to have an international day carnival at school on Friday, and for some trivia, our vice-principal sent out some information regarding the nationalities of our students. We have many countries represented from outside of China:
| NATIONALITY | NUMBER |
| Australia | 1 |
| Canada | 10 |
| Federal Republic of Nigeria | 3 |
| Hong Kong | 4 |
| Japan | 5 |
| Malaysia | 11 |
| Republic of Korea | 114 |
| Republic of the Philippines | 3 |
| Singapore | 13 |
| Switzerland | 2 |
| Taiwan | 3 |
| Thailand | 1 |
| The Netherlands | 2 |
| United Kingdom | 2 |
| United States of America | 53 |
It makes for quite a diverse school! Pictures sure to follow after the international day festivities…
This is the final post…
…from our desktop computer. Don’t worry - we plan to keep updating this site for awhile!
We are currently in the middle of the transition process, which right now includes selling all unnecessary items. We bought this desktop computer when we came to China; though it is much newer than our laptop (5 years old, but still ticking! They’re both Dells, if you care), it is much larger as well. (I know - a desktop is bigger than a laptop. It suprised me too.) So, all of our music, pictures, and the rest are being transferred to a portable hard drive, and soon our computer will belong to someone else.
This sounds a bit like an eulogy. For a computer. Is that weird? I mean, I expect such fanatisim from an apple user, but maybe I’m going a little overboard. Anyway.
We had an absolutely beautiful weekend here. Sarah presided over the annual solo and ensemble competition, while I took a much needed weekend off. The sun was out in full force, which is an oddity for our cloudy city, so some students took advantage of the rays…for six hours. At least one didn’t come to school yesterday due to his sunburn.
Many more “moving” stories to come…
Website Update
I just updated some software on this website - so if it was down before, that’s probably the reason. This should change much for you, the reader, but if you see any problems on the website, let me know. I’m very thankful for Wordpress, the company who creates this open-source blogging software and let’s me and thousands of other people use it for free. You can keep a blog on their website, if you want - simiilar to blogger, typepad, etc. Since I’m throwing out props, I’m also thankful for plogger - this program sets up picture galleries in a very user-friendly fashion. Open-source software is nice for cheap people like me…
Shout to the Lord
I’ve never been much of an American Idol fan, though I do get some odd pleasure watching people make fools of themselves when they’re really bad. Being in China has kept me further from this show, but I just saw this clip:
On network television. Powerful. It’s not too surprising that they changed one word in the song (Know which one? It’s in the first verse - the first line, actually) and decided to follow it up with a closing gag like they did, but it was powerful, nonetheless.
Well, our crazy-but-fun weekend has come to an end. We spent Saturday evening partying at the Crowne Plaza with our middle and high school students.
Leah and Kyla
some of my high school choir
Dan spoke at fellowship on Sunday, possible for the last time. It was a little overwhelming yesterday, hearing people sing and pray in different languages, and wondering when we’ll be part of such a vibrant and diverse community again. I suppose it’s just something we’ll have to seek out.
Modern Transportation
Here’s another thing I want to add to my wish list.
I’d build it myself, but I don’t think a theology degree has provided me with the necessary skills.
That, and it cost the kid $10,000. I find it hilarious that people called the police. “Hello, 911 emergency. What seems to be the problem?”
“There’s a tank driving down the road!”
“I’m sorry - did you say a tank?”
“Yes - a tank!”
“Um, has it, well, attacked you yet? *snicker*”
getting there…
We have a final quote for shipping some things back to the States, the rest of our stuff is selling quite nicely, and we’re still standing. It actually looks like this all might go smoothly - gasp!! That can only mean that you all are keeping us and this move in your prayers. Thank you!
There are a few pictures posted from our trip to Tianjin (choir and soccer) as well as the spring play. Look in CDIS-Spring 2008. We should have some better pictures from those events added before the end of the year. This Saturday is the Spring Formal (I got a new dress!), the next Saturday is Solo & Ensemble (pray for judges!), the Saturday after that is a work day before a week of holiday (we’re planning to travel to Jiuzhaigou), the next Saturday is an open house/yard sale, and that puts us smack dab in the middle of May and the last leg of the race.
Whew!! Fun times ahead! 