China Firsts

This past week Eric and/or I experienced a few China firsts:

-I ordered a dish in mandarin and the waitress understood me!

-We hiked in the western hills, on and off trails. It was beautiful. We were so close to the city, but we felt like we were the only people up there.

Top of the rock in the Western Hills above Kunming.

-I saw my first car-bike traffic accident. No one was injured, but it looked horrible.

-Eric gave blood at a Chinese blood bank. Instead of getting juice and cookies afterwards, he received packs of playing cards and a tea flavored marinated egg (he couldn’t get past the smell).

-We ate our first dragon fruit and white pomegranates. Yum!



Dragon fruit

 -I biked out of the Xiao Qu on my own. This doesn’t seem like a big deal, but biking in groups is safer and it is easier to keep an eye on traffic if you have someone with you.

-We had friends over for dinner. Again, doesn’t give the impression of being a daunting task, but since arriving we haven’t felt equal to the task.

-We biked to fellowship on our own and even had to lead another teacher there because she couldn’t remember the way.

There are probably more things that we don't even remember right now, but we feel like we are making real progress in the transition process. Kunming really is beginning to feel like home.

New View of Our Apartment



This is the front of our building. Our apartment is in the middle, right above the tree line, above the right side of the parking garage opening, with the open curtains in the big window and white closed curtains to the left.




These are the steps up to the front entrance.




To the left of the steps is our bike parking area.




Bike parking. My bike is the badly parked one in the middle of the photo.



Getting Established

We have made it to the point where we are establishing our routines.  We are getting the hang of day to day life and learning how to survive. We know which markets provide the best vegetables and where to get the best price on fruit. We know the bike route to get to one of the local fellowships. We know the back way to Carrefour (this important because we are less likely to get ran over by a car taking this route).  We can even make a phone call and order more drinking water. But there is still a mile-long (or kilometer-long, to be locally correct) list of things we have no clue about: how to buy tea from the bulk bins at the store, what is the difference between the 100 different choices of soy sauce, how do I buy postage stamps, how do I pay my electricity bill (we know that we have to somehow set up an account at a bank and deposit money into it for the electric company, but we are unsure of the overall process), where can I get a new bolt for my bike seat, what are all of these weird fruits and how do I eat them, how much do we pay for bike parking?????? The list goes on.

Eric’s Classroom



This is the view from Eric's classroom window. The buildings in the foreground on the left side of the road are our neighborhood apartments. The four of huge grey towers in the background are across a main highway from our complex.




These are all apartments in our neighborhood.



Blessed

I need to take a little time to convey how blessed we have felt in coming to China. We left the U.S. secure in the knowledge that we were going exactly where G wanted us to be and with a full measure of support and love from our family and friends. Although it was so hard to say goodbye, this knowledge has and will continue to sustain us during the rough days.

From the very first moment we arrived in Kunming we were welcomed by our colleagues at KIA. Before we knew anyone here, we were invited to birthday parties, dinners, brunches, and outings. We have had so many offers of help extended to us and we are so grateful. The community here has been fabulous and I can’t imagine how hard this transition would be without their advice, guidance, and help.

We came from loving and supportive community and we landed in the middle of another. We are blessed.

The First Week of School

We survived our first week of school. I have never worked in a school setting before so I had no idea what to expect. Eric, on the other hand, has many years of experience and knew what was coming this past Monday as hundred's of school aged kids invaded campus.

For those of you who do not know, Eric is teaching World History to the 9th and 10th graders and I am the Online Coordinator. My classroom is a computer lab and my students are either taking online Advanced Placement courses or they are in study hall. My job is to get the online kids going in their classes and make sure they become self-directed and to keep the study hall kids quiet and focused on homework. Basically, I have become the peson I didn't like in High School: the one who always made sure everyone was working and "shhhushed" us whenever we talked. While the kids are working, I am doing projects for the office and working on the school website.

Monday started with a high school assembly and it was our first exposure to our new students. The assembly consisted of a short new teacher intro time (we just stood up and waved to the crowd) and then info on school policies that had changed over the summer or were going to be reinforced this year. Afterwards, it was off to homeroom time. Eric is a co-advisor to the Freshman class, and I am a co-advisor to the Sophomores, so we both had tasks to perform (handing out school supplies) and class meetings to facilitate during that time. At the end of homeroom, the real school day began. I have students in my room 2-6th periods and Eric has kids 1, 3, 5-7th. The class periods were shortened because of the assembly and we had just enough time to introduce ourselves, hand out books and syllabi, and go over classroom expectations before the bell rang. By the end of the first day, both Eric and I were exhausted.


This is my classroom. The wall on the left is glass and looks into a larger secondary computer lab. The refridgerator like thing in the back right hand corner of the room is our A/C / Heating unit. The school, like all buildings south of the Yangtze River, does not have centralized air or heat.


Over the course of the week we better aquainted ourselves with the kids and already we appreciate the diversity we seen in our classrooms. The student body at KIA comes from all over the world: 1/3 are North American passport holders, 1/3 are European passport holders, and the final 1/3 are Asian, mostly Korean passport holders. I gave my students a quick survey the first day asking general questions: what is your passport country? What languages do you speak? In what countries have you lived? What counties have you visited? etc. The answers were amazing! Some of the kids have lived in 5 different counties and fluently speak 3 languages. Keep in mind these students are 15-17 years old. When they got to "What counties have you visited?" some of them just laughed and asked if they really had to write down all of them. They have interesting stories to tell and I am eager to get to know them as the year progresses.

How to Wash Fruits and Vegetables

The tap water here is not safe to drink and is only used to wash dishes. It can be used to wash fruits and vegetables, but special soap needs to be used and you have to do a bottled water rinse. See below.

1. Put food items into warm tap water with special dish soap (it really is supposed to wash both food and dishes). Scrub and let sit.

2. Rinse with tap water.

3. Rinse with bottled water and let air dry.

Enjoy knowing you won't get sick.

The Old and the New

Tonight we rode our bikes from our neighborhood to the local Carrefour, passing through old and new China as we went. We first rode through a neighborhood in transition. The buildings had all been gutted and abandoned. They stood ready for demolition.

The next road we turned down was the old China, a small market road with little shops and stores. Traffic jams are the norm here as scooters, taxi's, vendor carts and pedestrians all try to make their way through the narrow lane.

At the end of this street rode into the new China: high rises, shopping malls, and Starbucks. The transition happens over one intersection; cross the road and the buildings are completely different.



We are sitting across the intersection looking back at the road we just biked down.




This is where we are parked. Next to the mall, banks, insurance companies and the like.



The Importanceof Ponchos and Mosquito Bats

The poncho is arguably the most important bike related purchase you can make. I had no idea the poncho was even necessary until we attempted to bike to a friends house in the rain and were soaked through in 3 minutes. As soon as it starts raining everyone on a bike or scooter has their poncho on. They are made with a long section in front to drape over the front of the bike or scooter and some even have a clear plastic section for the headlights to shine through. We haven't seen one yet, but supposedly there are ponchos with two head holes made for tandem bikers.



Using my pink poncho. I'm standing in front of the bike parking area at our school.




Eric's red version.




Mosquito Bat, where have you been all my life?

 Mosquito Bats are basically electric tennis rackets used to electrocute mosquitoes. You swing them around the house and then, SNAP! There goes the pest that has been buzzing around your head. Pretty fantastic.

End of the Long Silence

Wow, I can't believe we have been here three weeks. My apologies on the silence- we had to wait for internet to be installed at home and then we realized that this site has been blocked by the government (most blogging sites have, it turns out), so we had to purchase a VPN (basically software that  makes it look like we are accessing the internet from the U.S.), but now we are back in business and connected with the outside world!

It has been a whirlwind three weeks. We arrived early in the morning on Wednesday, July 25th. We were picked up at the airport by the Member Care Coordinator, Solveig, and her husband, Curt. Solveig is in charge of taking care of the staff at school and making sure all of the new people learn to survive in this very foreign environment.

Our school provided apartment is great and much nicer than we expected. We have three bedrooms, two baths, and a good size kitchen by Chinese standards. We also have a small washing machine on our back patio (very common here) with basic care options for clothes, cold water or cold water, dress shirts or sweaters... We line dry our clothes and, most days, that is a quick process if it gets sunny outside. It has been warm and humid some days, others it has poured all day with massive thunder storms. Today, like most days involves a little of both. It is the rainy season through the end of the month and we have been told that although Kunming has been in drought for the past three years, this rainy season may spell the end of it.  It is not cold at all, probably about 65 degrees at night and 70-75 in the day, rain or shine.




Looking at the front door to the left and out onto the front patio.



From the front door looking into the kitchen.



The kitchen viewed from the dining room. Eric is on our back patio where the washing machine is located.




Our yellow tile bathroom.




The washing machine. Perfect for small loads.




View from our front patio.

 We love our neighborhood. It's like a huge botanical garden with fruit trees, tropical flowers, lakes, water features, and my personal favorite, traditional Chinese exercise equipment. There are lots of paths weaving by the lake, over streams, and around buildings. Our school is in our neighborhood, as well as a few small convenience stores, an international bakery, and small fruit and vegetable markets based out of people's garages.

Our neighborhood, or Xiao Qu (pronounced show-rhymes with chow- chew), is on the southwest side of the city. It is a bubble protecting us from the busy surrounding streets, huge residential skyscrapers, and hundreds of construction projects in the area. Shortly after arriving we were told the official bird of Yunnan was the crane, as in the construction crane, because buildings, roads, and an entirely new subway system are all under construction right now. In fact, when we flew in to Kunming, we landed at their two week old airport!

The first week here was spent shopping. Everyday we were out for something. Solveig showed us all of the Kunming shopping hot spots: Carrefour, a French grocery store, Metro, a German Costco type store, Walmart, and of course, small specialty markets. There is no one spot for basics. One has to shop each place and hope for the best. We got our dishes at a dish market, curtains in a curtain/fabric market, baking dishes in a restaurant supply store, towels at a fake Ikea (rumor has it that one of the Ikea factories sells to "11 Furniture", a store in Kunming, after visiting, I believe it is true), and random other things from the grocery stores.



Looks like my favorite Swedish furniture store, but it isn't!

 Sunday, the 29th, we went to an international fellowship. Many of the people there are M's working in Kunming. We were surrounded by people from about two dozen different countries all singing and pr*ying. It really was amazing. Looking around the room, I was struck with the same thought I have had many times overseas: when you get down to it, people just aren't all that different. We were a room of internationals all serving the same Dad, all lifting up the same praises. We all hope and aspire for the same end: that Dad's will be done, we all work for the same purpose: his glory.

Our first full week in Kunming was marked with such milestones as the purchasing of bikes, and the official start of school new staff orientation. Bicycles are an essential of life here. Many people rely on them for transportation because cars are still very expensive and far beyond what the average worker can afford. Wednesday through Friday was our opportunity to get acquainted with our classrooms and the policies and procedures of KIA.

The weekend was glamorously spent putting away the last of our clothes, rearranging the living room and cleaning the apartment. Yay.

This past week has been spent doing all staff orientation at school. It has been busy, stressful, and fun. We are excited to get going next week with actual students. The school enrollment is about 300 right now, mostly children of foreign workers. Eric and I will both be advisors to different classes (I am an advisor to the Sophomores, and Eric gets the Freshmen).

I  hope you enjoyed our first post from China. I promise I will be better! Thank you for your pr*yers.