GOOD NEWS vs. BAD NEWS

We have a bathroom.

It’s so small you can reach the exhaust fan from the shower OR the toilet.

We have a bathroom exhaust fan in a missing portion of the window.

The exhaust fan tends to draw up a nasty sewer smell from the drain.

We have a washing machine.

It is broken.

We will most likely get another washing machine.

With no dryer, our clothes will be a little crunchy.

IF our new/used washing machine works…

We can wash 2 days’ worth of clothes at a time (very small).

 We have a bed.

The 2 inch piece of foam on top of the box spring may not cut it.

We have air conditioning.

With only two units (bedroom and living room) it feels like Hell’s Kitchen when cooking.

We have blue sky.

You can only see it after HUGE storms, which happen infrequently.

We are still alive after one full month in Xi’an!!

No bad news on that one…it’s ALL good!

Live life to the fullest!!!  We are!!!!!

Jeep Excursion Photos

                               Horticulture Expo Preserve

                                Corn drying alongside the road everywhere!

                                  Planting cloves of garlic for winter

                                         Our 80 yr old friend!

                                     Inside his cave dwelling home

                              In front of his home with his best friend!

1000 Buddha Jeep Excursion

About 3 weeks ago (Sept 7, 2013) we went with some of our new friends here in Xi'an on a 1000 Buddha Jeep Excursion!  Eight of us in three jeeps spent an entire day from early morning until late at night on a fabulous adventure!  Below is the link to our host guide's website and an excerpt from Jordan's journal. Pictures to follow!

Explore Xian's surroundings by vintage convertible jeep: www.xianinsiders.com

     Yesterday we took a trip outside of Xi’an.  We really enjoyed ourselves.  There were 8 of us and we were picked up in jeeps.  We stopped first to see pandas and monkeys at a preserve, then went to this old textile plant that artists have turned into an art location and the city has now made it an official art gallery.  The pandas simply lay out on rocks and look like black and white throw rugs.  We actually enjoyed the monkeys more.  They were reddish gold color and just beautiful creatures.  They would come over to the edge of the cage and stare as if they didn't care whether you were there or not and then do a back flip away.  Next to the art area, the pandas were the biggest yawn of the trip.
     The jeeps were getting hot so we had them pull the top covers off and headed off in open jeeps.  We headed up into the hills by the mountains.  These mountains stretch the entire width, west to east, of China and on the west are extensions of the Himalayas, and then run non-stop to the sea.  They separate China’s climate into north and south.  On the south they grow rice because of the humid and hot weather.  On the north they grow wheat and corn because it is drier and more temperate.  Xi’an is situated on the northern edge of the mountains and east of the Gobi desert.  Because we are up against the mountains and just off the desert we are a sink hole for everything that blows or is sent up in the air from all around.  Therefore, we are constantly under a layer of dust/sand blowing off the desert and stopping at the mountains.  I suppose it makes the soil fertile, but that, combined with the fact that China has chosen Xi’an to be a capital for coal fired electricity (huge plants belching out thick acid smoke everywhere), makes it so we hardly ever see the sky.  Our guide humorously mentioned he goes through shirts constantly because of the coal smog eating away the shirts.  Even as we climbed up to the high plateau by the mountains it was still hazy.
     It was so interesting once we got up on the plateau.  We first went along what we considered to be tiny roads up among small villages.  I say we thought they were tiny because as the day wore on our “roads” became small foot trails through corn fields.  How our guide found all these roads (she was constantly on her GPS) was amazing to us.  Good thing we had 4-wheel jeeps, as many times the roads were impassable except for 4-wheeling it.  We stopped at this tiny way-out-of-the-way-someone’s-tiny-farm place for lunch.  They brought the pheasant to the courtyard we were waiting for lunch, killed it and then started fixing our lunch while we waited about 90 minutes for them to do it.  The trail leading to the location was small and hugged the side of a drop-off.  Our native drivers had no problem heading down, but the US guide driving the 3^rd jeep chickened out and parked up the dirt road and made those in his jeep walk the rest of the way.  We were in the lead jeep with a native.  As we were trying to turn the hair-pin turn from the main “road” onto the trail a small van was blocking the way.  Our driver yelled at them to move but they weren't too anxious to do so.  I think the driver didn’t know how to use a clutch and was afraid to drive away from where he was stopped for fear of gliding backwards and down the mountain drop-off.  Finally in exasperation in order to avoid moving, the passenger yelled back “Don't go down there!  It’s no fun down there anyway.”  Really?  They did finally move and we understood why they hadn't wanted to (could not drive a clutch).  
     After lunch we drove through lots of small villages and out to the foot of the mountains (they rose up 10-11,000 feet in front of us) and we saw a Buddhist temple of 1000 Buddhas that survived the cultural revolution.  Apparently the priest told the red guard that there was nothing in these shrines so the red guard only destroyed everything else around it. These statues and paintings are centuries old. 
     From the Buddha place we went through many small villages, jeeping right up through their street markets.  Sometimes I wondered how we were even going to get past the street vendors.  We stopped in one village and took pictures of an old man planting garlic for the winter.  Garlic, ginger and something else is used in the winter to survive.  All the local boys came to have their picture taken by us as they really haven’t seen weiguo ren (foreigners) before.  From there we continued weaving around homes and corn fields and I was completely amazed each time we would take another turn.  
     Finally we started down this footpath heading down hill.  People were picking berries that grew along the path by the corn fields and had to jump out of the way.  We stopped at a place to go see cave dwellings.  Around Xi’an, and I understand in many other places of China, the poor people would dig deep caves into the sides of the mountains and hills and then put masonry walls and doors on the entrances.  They would then live there for generations.  Their beds were slabs on top of a fire pit so in the winter they would start a fire in the pit and it would warm their beds.  As we stopped along the path, a small old man was climbing up the hill.  He had a post across his shoulders and on each end of the post was a bucket full of water.  The bucket was the same size we would think of in the states.  This was his source of water for drinking, cleaning and watering his plants.  It turns out that this was the man we were there to visit.  He invited us into the courtyard in front of his “house” (in China homes have courtyards which you enter to access the various “homes” that make up the sides of the courtyard), and as we entered we saw his cave dwelling.  He was 80 years old and spoke a dialect that even our foreigner translators had a difficult time understanding.  He then retreated to his cave dwelling, brought out a small cell phone and excitedly called a buddy of his to come over, and together they entertained us and took pictures with us.  He allowed us to go inside his house and take pictures.  It was truly remarkable.  We stayed a good 45 minutes at his house then left and went back home.  Great day.  

Three Weeks....

Wow!  Time is flying by! 

We now have 3 weeks of teaching under our belts and it is feeling better every day.  Jordan’s teaching schedule is M,T,W,F from 8am-12pm, but basically since we leave the house at 7am and get back at 1pm it adds an hour on each end. My teaching schedule on Tues is 7am-5pm and W,Th 7am-1pm.  Tuesday is a long day and I’m beat by the time I get home, but it is a wonderful opportunity to be here and be working with these beautiful people.  I’m really starting to enjoy my students, more and more each day.  They are so kind and try so hard to do their best.  Other than our nightmare in the airport with the one old cranky Chinese man yelling at us and calling us criminals, EVERYONE else has been GREAT!! 

Here are a few things you may find interesting..

School:

We ride a faculty bus to/from school to teach.  We live on the old campus and teach at the new campus.  It is about a 45 min bus ride each way.  The bus driver refuses to turn on the AC so it is usually a sauna on the bus.  This past week has been particularly bad, very hot and humid. 

The classrooms have no AC, just ceiling fans, but the students aren’t fans of the fans!  So, I turn them on and when I turn my back, they turn them off, then I turn them on and they turn them off….it just goes back and forth.  I usually win!  The classrooms are also VERY dirty.  The students are in charge of cleaning the classrooms, so as you can imagine, it doesn’t get done very often.  We generally come home feeling dirty and grungy from the day.  One of these days I will take a picture of the classroom conditions.  It isn’t great, but we deal with it and so do the students. 

This week, two of my students wanted me to go and have lunch with them to the “canteen” (their lunchroom) where there are a hundred choices for food.  It was probably about 100 degrees inside the cafeteria and the students took me to get their favorite bowl of noodles.  It was REALLY yummy but sweat was running down my face as I ate hot noodles in a hot cafeteria!!  The back of my hair was drenched!  It is just so funny that we are sweating to death here!  Maybe that helps sweat off pounds!! Woo hoo!

Church:

We belong to the Xi’an Branch and there are about 20 people who attend, or who are on our records.  We both have callings now: Jordan is the EQ pres and I am 1^st counselor in the RS.  We belong to the Central China International District (CCID).  It covers a vast amount of China and we are what is considered a virtual district.  Because our district covers a vast amount of area, we have meetings over the Polycom, which is basically a speakerphone so we can all hear from our various locations across China via conference call.  This past Sunday we had District Conference on Saturday evening and Sunday morning.  We dialed in and listened to the speakers.  Kind of a strange way to conduct meetings, but interesting, quite doable and enjoyable.

For Sunday meetings, we meet in a conference room here on our old XISU campus, just a couple minutes from our apt.  It is actually in the small hotel on campus in an upstairs conference room. There are 6 of us China Teacher Program (CTP) teachers here on this campus.   The other Xi’an teachers are located at 2 other universities across the city and have to travel by taxi or bus to get here each Sunday.  We are very fortunate to have it here on our campus!  Just a hop, skip and a jump away!!!

Foreign Teachers:

There are MANY foreign teachers here in Xi’an, especially on our campus because we are the international studies university.  In our little apt building where there are 2 units on each floor and 3 floors, we have:  A family from Turkey living directly above us and a family with 2 children from California living across from the Turkey family, a family from Iran living directly below us with 2 children and across the hall from them are two Cuban teachers.  Once the other CTP/BYU teachers arrive (they found a couple to fill in for the couple that couldn't come with us because she got sick), they will live directly across the hall from us.  We have teachers from Spain, Germany, Japan, Korea, France, Argentina, Turkey, Iran, Cuba, England, Sri Lanka, South Africa, Portugal, Egypt/Sudan and the US. I’m sure there are more I haven’t met yet.  We had a gathering in the courtyard last Sunday evening where everyone brought something from their home country.  I bought a huge watermelon and cut it up and everyone loved it!  It was fun getting to know many of the foreign teachers. 

Well, off to bed I go!  Tomorrow is a big day with much to do…. as usual.  We definitely don’t have a minute to spare here!  We  love it and it is starting to feel more normal every day!  

Our new home in Xi'an!!

Outside of our building

Front door to our building...not a prison. ;)

Personal front door on 2nd floor

Our one and only cozy bathroom

Kitchen: fridge, micro, hotplate & toaster oven 

Other half of kitchen w/clothes washer

Drying rack to make crunchy clothes

Our life blood...bottled water!

Our living room...just enough room for one yoga mat!

Our office where we spend most of our time..preparing lessons

Our bed...box spring with a 2" foam pad on top.  Argh!

Our shared closet

Faculty bus that takes us to/from the new campus to teach...45 min each way.  We live on the old campus.

Our view into the courtyard gardens below our apartment.

The story of our adventure in getting to China...

SLC to Shanghai….no problem.

Shanghai to Xi’an….another story!  After arriving in Shanghai and clearing immigration with a 3 hr layover, we were greeted at the baggage claim area by a “transfer guide” who took us to another line (2 hrs long) where we “supposedly” re-checked our luggage onto our next flight with China Eastern Airlines.  Up to this point we had flown Delta and held boarding passes for all of our flights which had been issued by the Delta agent in SLC.  Apparently, those boarding passes and the Delta Flight number listed on them is where all the trouble began.  We said good-bye to our luggage and headed to the gate which was 45 min away (Shanghai airport is HUGE!).  We arrived just in time to have the gate agent scan our boarding passes and send us on our way, only to be met at the door of the plane by security guards checking boarding passes who refused to let us on the plane because our Delta flight number did not match the  China Eastern flight number.  We tried to explain in our NO CHINESE language skills, that it was a code-share flight.  That did not work.  It was causing a ruckus so we stepped off to the side to let everyone else board.  One other passenger in particular was quite angry and started yelling at us.  The only distinguishable word we could decipher was “criminals” said vehemently, over and over.  Sure glad everyone is addicted to CSI over here so they can use the appropriate English word when it is required.  After the plane was fully boarded (except for us) and 25 minutes had passed, an angry gate agent flew down to the plane door, reprimanded the security guards and shooed us onto the plane.  Apparently, she was the only one in the airport that knew anything about code-share flights.  End of story. 

The flight to Xi’an was uneventful except for the 1.5 hour delay on the tarmac and the fact that the pilots must have been smoking the entire flight since there was a heavy odor (we were at the very front of the plane) coming from that direction, and the flight attendants acted oblivious.

Fast forward to luggage.  NO luggage.  Left in Shanghai because why?  Not sure, but must have had something to do with that darn Delta Flight number!  After speaking with a baggage services agent for over an hour and getting nowhere, we decided it was well past time to get outside and see if our “ride” from XISU was anywhere in sight.  Nope.  He had given up around 1:20 am (our original flight was to have arrived at 11:20 pm and we didn’t get in until 12:30 am) and headed home.  Since we foolishly put all of our eggs in the “we’ve got a ride to our new place” basket and didn’t have the address to the school written anywhere in Chinese (and even if we did, where would we have slept when we arrived?  On the steps to the university?), we were up a creek without any chopsticks!  The lovely baggage services lady tried her best to help us figure out what to do, but since she couldn’t speak much English and our Chinese was/is nonfunctioning, we were in a bit of trouble.  We asked if there was a nearby hotel and she said yes but not within walking distance.  We tried to get a taxi but no one would take us because it was “too close” and too late to pick up foreigners.  Finally, she turned us over to a policeman who also tried to get us a taxi, but being just as unsuccessful, put us in his police car and drove us to the hotel.  The hotel refused to take us even with the policeman demanding it.  It was now 3 am and I finally looked at them with desperate eyes and they agreed to let us stay for 4.5 hours but we had to promise to vacate by 0730.  We gratefully took the room, showered, went to sleep, showered again and left on time as planned.  We were just grateful to have a hard bed and a shower. 

Next morning, back to airport, more work with the baggage services lady where it was determined they would “look” harder for the luggage and let us know what they found out.  We then get them to write the address to XISU on a piece of paper and off we go to find a taxi and head to our new home.

It was probably a good thing we were without our luggage for a while because it took us 3 full days of cleaning and de-junking to get this place livable.  Doesn’t anyone throw anything away anymore!  I swear there had to be  30 years’ worth of dust and junk!  Add to that the fact that the coal used for heating here has left a black film over everything.  But now we have a spic-n-span place to live and although it truly is as we had been warned by the previous teachers as glorified camping, it is home for a year!  And we are so happy to be here!!

We had to hit the ground running and 4 days after arriving, we started teaching.  We ride a XISU faculty bus from our campus (the old campus) to the new campus where we teach.  It takes about 45 min each way.  Plenty of time on the bus for a nap as needed.  Jordan and I have different teaching schedules, but it is fine and we are doing great.  He is teaching Public Speaking & Oral English to sophomores and freshmen and I am teaching Oral English to sophomores.  Since the freshmen have a mandatory 2 week military training period before beginning school, he has only 2 days a week right now and will begin his full schedule when they finish.  I have 7 classes with approximately 30 students in each.  The students are wonderful and so excited to have foreign teachers.  Each of them choose an English name.  Here are a few of my favorite ones from my classes:  Cherry, Tombe, Incisor, Primrose, Echo, Hermione, Yoyo, Yellow, Smile, Message, Ephlin, Slowly, Pansy, Sweet, Morning & Scofield.  Fun huh? 

Our little branch here is 20 people strong… at least we think that will be how many are attending.  Last week there were 10 of us.  Can you say….”speak in church a lot?”

The food is amazing and definitely not what we think Chinese food is all about.  This area is famous for their noodles and I must say, they are so tasty!  I’ve even started to enjoy the spiciness of everything!  Our stomachs have revolted a bit, Jordan’s more than mine.  It was a good thing we brought some recommended meds from home or he would be in a world of hurt right now.  Gotta love an occasional Z-pak! 

So much more to tell you but it is late and I’d better call it a night.  Love you all so much and appreciate your notes of encouragement along the way!  Bye for now!