Rainy Season is Here!

Rainy season is here and while we don't actually enjoy biking in the rain, we need it so badly we really can't complain. There are currently water use restrictions in place in the city of Kunming and for most of the day we have significantly reduced water pressure. This is our fourth year of drought and only an awesomely wet rainy season is going to end it. Many people struggle on a daily basis due to lack of water. Please pr*y for rain! 

End of the Year Staff Party

We had our end of the year KIA Staff Party last night. The theme was breakfast for dinner (my favorite meal, ever!)and there was even a coffee bar onsite with baristas (the Kunming Youth Group leaders somehow got snagged into volunteering.)Many people dressed up in their pj's and we all enjoyed an evening of fellowship in the KIA cafeteria. After our breakfast meal we all played a few games and enjoyed our Admin staff's rendition of Cinderella. 

Eric and I pose with our friends and our Chinese teacher, Gan lao shi (teacher Gan). 

Kim brushing Eric's teeth in one of our staff games. 

The Admin staff reads Cinderella. Jim is the ugly step-sister. In real life, he is one of our Secondary Principals!

Prom!

Last night Eric and I had an opportunity most people over the age of 18 don't have: we went to prom! All KIA high school teachers were invited to chaperone the event for our senior and junior students and their guests. We had dinner, watched a video honoring the seniors, listened to seniors wills (they will random personal items to the juniors and sophomores present), were given a waltz lesson, and then danced the rest of the night.

Technically neither Eric nor I had ever been to a prom before last night, we've been to Student Council Banquets, Junior-Senior Banquets, and random dances, but this was our first prom. It was a great first for us. 

Members of the sophomore class were invited as guests of seniors and juniors. Mr. Franks (on the left) and I are sophomore homeroom teachers.

Eric won the "Snazziest Teacher" award. How awesome is that?

Ms. LaPorte (Secondary Principal, HS Counselor extraordinaire), Nathan (favorite student), and I. 

International Fair: Come to KIA and See the World!

A week ago, Saturday, KIA hosted its annual International Fair. The PTA, teachers, and greater KIA community set up booths representing their passport country and each booth sells food or drinks, has crafts to make, or activities in which people can participate. There are game booths and general education booths as well. The community is invited for an afternoon and everyone seems to have a good time. 

We had a lot fun and basically spent our afternoon roaming around, enjoying the sunshine, and eating. We sampled food from Korea, Mexico, Singapore, and Hong Kong. Not a bad way to spend a Saturday!

The Great Britain booth selling English tea.

The Mexico booth selling amazing tacos!

A group of students performing a song for the crowd. The students up front represent the Philippines, the United States, Singpore, New Zealand, and Korea (L to R). 

Friends Emma (Great Britain- she is showing off her Union Jack nails), Jenny (Native American), and Kim (American).

Week in Review

This past week we were back to our normal routine. Coming off a break is always a little tough, but coming off Spring Break seemed especially so, at least for most of my students. It is mid-April and we have 7 weeks left of school so everyone (teachers and students alike) is getting a little anxious in anticipation of the end of the year and summer. It is a little more difficult to focus and takes more discipline not to look ahead and miss out on the here and now. 

Last Monday Eric started his second coaching gig of the year when volleyball season started. We have a co-ed team ranging in age from 7th grade to seniors. It should prove to be interesting. Regardless of how successful the season will be, Eric is excited for yet another opportunity to relate to the students. The group is obviously eclectic and he gets to hang out with students he otherwise would never have an in with. 

I am one of three 10^th grade advisors this year and Friday night we had a lock-in at school. This basically means we had an all-night get-together from 6pm to 8am the next morning. We really did have a great time. We ate dinner together, watched a few movies, played capture the flag and sardines, and had quite the adventure finding a Shao Kao place. Shao Kao is Chinese street bbq. At about 8:30pm every night Shao Kao stands pop up all over the place and stay open until the early hours of the morning. I still am not clear on why they open so late, but there you have it. At around midnight we had planned on walking as a big group over to the nearest Shao Kao place for a late night snack, but upon walking up to the place we saw that they were closing (it was misty out which scares off customers). We then proceeded to walk a few blocks to a street corner where there were a few more stands, but as soon as we were about to order a police truck drove by and forced all of them to close (technically, Shao Kao stands are illegal because they don’t pay taxes, but as far as we have seen this could actually be said of 90% of the businesses here.) We were at the point of giving up and going to the 24hr McDonald’s when a lady pulled up in her SUV and said that she had a Shao Kao stand about a 10 minutes’ walk from here and she would be happy to shuttle us over there in her car. This being China, we said, “Great!” and a group of us hopped in her car. It took about a half hour for her to shuttle everyone there, but she did exactly what she said she would do and all 30 of us enjoyed our bbq after all! Only in China! What a great night!

An American in China.

The past two weeks Eric and I had the pleasure of hosting my friend Joy. We had a great time showing her around the city and traveling to Lijiang, a town northwest of us by the mountains. We had the opportunity to hike through Tiger Leaping Gorge, one of the deepest river canyons in the world and a spectacularly scenic trek. Here are a few photos of our time with Joy:

Visiting the Western Hills in Kunming.

Shao Kao- Chinese street bbq.

Pandas at the Kunming Zoo!

Easter dinner in style at McDonald's!

Walking through old town Lijiang.

Hiking the Tiger Leaping Gorge Trail.

View from the trail.

Resting along the way.

A Visit from a Sister School

I have to admit that I didn’t think it would happen. I simply didn’t think it was going to be possible, but on Wednesday 13 March the high school girls’ basketball team from our sister school, ISK, in Afghanistan arrived at Kunming International Airport and thus began our week of hosting them.

This was a trip that our schools had been talking about for years and planning for months. ISK spent months fundraising and generating support for the trip. We spent months lining up outings, projects, host homes, meals, etc. But about a week before they were scheduled to fly to Kunming all of our hard work looked like it would be for naught. Their initial visa application was denied. We worked from our end to get special permissions but we were also denied. At this point I had written off the possibility of them coming and instead of planning on hosting girls from Afghanistan, I was planning on attending our high school service trip. Again, they appealed to the leaders on their end and at the 11^th hour were given approval. I received a call at 9pm on Monday 11 March that they were leaving the next morning. My first thought was, “O ye of little faith.” Why do I still doubt? I have seen amazing things in this place and yet the doubt remains.

We picked them up at the airport early on Wednesday morning. They had traveled all night and although exhausted, they were excited to be here. We jumped right into our schedule: brunch at school, an afternoon at the Minority Village, and a big pizza dinner at a host home. We got more comfortable with each other as the day went on and they started calling me Ms. Valerie (oddly enough this led to Eric being called Mr. Valerie when they met him later in the week).

Thursday we took them downtown and I watched as they happily wandered through the market located there. The girls grew up living in compounds, they were surrounded by grey concrete walls and barbed wire much of the time so the freedom of wandering was something of a novelty. That afternoon they played their first basketball game of the year.

Friday we drove them to the Stone Forest, a landscape totally unique and completely foreign to them. Again, it was the freedom of movement that seemed to capture their attention. We hiked for a while, stopped to eat a snack, and before I knew it the girls had begun an impromptu dance session. They are seldom allowed to dance in their home country and never in public. Freedom.

Their Saturday was spent playing more basketball games in an afternoon than they had in the previous two years. There simply are not enough girls high school teams in their country. By now some of the girls were feeling comfortable enough to forgo the long sleeves and full length leggings that they normally wore under their basketball uniforms. Freedom.

Sunday morning we drove up to a migrant center in the mountains and volunteered with their daily children’s program. The children ranged in age from two years old to twelve and they were all although Chinese nationals because of the system in place their parents are considered migrant workers. We helped serve the kids breakfast and then the girls were given a short presentation on the migrant worker situation in China. Afterwards we led a traditional Afghan craft. The girls loved it and the kids did too. I later talked to the director of the center and he said that the kids talked of nothing else for a week. We spent our afternoon doing something that I take for granted, but the girls loved- biking! They told me that they weren’t allowed to bike at home and many hadn’t touched a bike since they were very young. We bike everywhere here thus rounding up 11 bikes wasn’t all that tough. They spent an hour biking around our neighborhood, riding in circles on the pathways. Freedom.

The fifth day of their stay was spent more like any other week- at school. Our visitors were all assigned to a KIA guide and they shadowed them for an entire school day. Although this was not their favorite day (who really wants to go to school while on vacation?) they did tell me that they loved how students interacted with each other in and out of class and exhibited strong friendships regardless of nationality and gender. I thought this was an interesting observation.

Tuesday was their final day in Kunming. They said final farewells and hugged their new friends. I was surprisingly sad to see them go; after all, I had only known these girls for a brief six days, but I loved seeing their enthusiasm with each new outing and learning about how they view the world. I am hoping to reciprocate the trip this coming fall. This will, of course, require a lot of planning, and even more pr*yer, but I think that there is great value in learning about other cultures and ways of life and what better way to learn about other cultures and places than visiting?