BACK IN CHINA

Today is the first day since we have been here that I have had both wifi and VPN on my computer and been able to get onto my blog!  Wahoo!  So I have to make hay while the sun is shining!  😀.  Here is what I wrote when we first got here. 

At the end of October, I got a wechat from Kim Malan.  Kim and her husband Alan are the directors over the China Teacher Program.  They “hire” the teachers for the program.  She said in her wechat that she needed to talk to us.  Of course, our immediate thought was, ”Oh, dear.  What’s up?”  And that’s exactly what it was…something was up!  The couple that replaced us in Xi’an in August had just been called to be a mission president for the the church and would have to leave China at the end of the semester.  The university had asked if we could come back and finish the year for them.  After much thought and prayers and discussions with our family…including my mom, we decided to return to XISU.  It was really my mom’s comment that was the decision maker for me.  She said that maybe that’s what the Lord needed us to do.  My biggest hesitation had been Katie.  She was expecting her 4^th child and teaching preschool in our home.  I had told her that I would take over the preschool after the baby was born while she recuperated.  I felt like I was going back on my word and was deserting her.  She and Brandon both told me not to worry about it and that they would figure something out.  So after much discussions, as I have already mentioned, we decided to return.

So here we are back in Xi’an.  I had forgotten how long that trip is to get here.  We left our home on Friday morning, March 1 at 7:00 a.m.  We boarded a plane to Seattle at 10:00.  At 1:00 in Seattle, we boarded another plane for Shanghai.  12.5 hours later and maybe a couple of hours of sleep, we landed in China.  After going through customs and through security again and a 3 hour lay-over at 9:00 p.m. we got on our last plane and headed to Xi’an. By then I was so exhausted I couldn’t keep awake through that flight—no complaints about that.  I woke up enough to eat a sandwich and have a drink.  Yes, they always feed you when you fly in China.  And it actually was a pretty good sandwich of tuna and cucumbers. We made it to Xi'an.  Unfortunately, one of Kim's suitcases did not.  Gratefully it was the one that had teaching supplies and odds and ends of that type in it.  Nothing really crucial.  Although, Kim was not very happy that it was missing.  We had to do a lot of paper work for that and an hour later, met our driver who was patiently waiting for us.  Another hour drive to our apartment and by 1:30 Sunday morning we opened the door into our new apartment.

We are living in the same building as last year, but a different apartment.  We had it good last year and have already made a long list of things we are going to have to buy.    Ugg!  But such is life.  Tomorrow morning at 7:00 we will get on the university faculty bus and head to the “new” campus where we will begin teaching English at Xi’an International Studies University.  We are both teaching Juniors this year.  Kim is teaching business English and I am teaching English to finance majors.  It’s going to be great.  I’ll keep you posted.