Being Served

So many have come and offered to help and asked what they could to to serve our family. The 11 year old scouts showed up on Tuesday to mow our lawn. Justin does a great job, but a blade of the mower had gotten bent and cut some funky patterns in the grass. This was something that needed to be done, so they did it. We have been so blessed by the prayers, kindness and outpouring of love from so many. It is humbling.

Barry's Burn 10 days later

This is kind of graphic...but here it is. The burn is healing as it should, the red around is actually more pink, but no sign of infection. The white part is dead skin with dermal pegs still intact which means the skin has the ability to still grow back. We hope that it continues to heal as it has done thus far.

Chickens and Boys

Three boys, three chicks and all in a great big tub. The boys love their chicks. Since we got them young, they are used to being held and love to sit on their shoulders and heads. Occasionally they leave surprises behind, but for the most part are very well behaved. They roam about the yard and eat bugs and roost in a safe pen at night.

One week after accident - spending most of the day in bed can get rather boring. Making the best of it!


Barry was a very good hospital patient. We got to know most of the staff and had quite a list of great nurses and doctors to thank.


Bryce did not want to go back to the property until Barry could walk again and go with him. He was always so eager to go any time Barry went up there. I asked him to come with me and get some pictures before the tractor got turned back over.


Barry was pinned under the engine, where the hood is most dented is where his legs were. The black on the ground is the oil and fuel that spilled out and burned his legs and soaked his pants. This was the reason for the fear of fire while the tractor was still running.


The tree that was cut down and Barry was trying to pull it up the hill to the clearing.

Barrys Leg

This is the burn on day 1.

Cailyn in Fiji after first week - no pictures yet!

Dear Fiji 2 Parents,



It is Friday evening in Fiji and the group has just returned from a stake dance with the Suva stake. This has been a very busy and exciting week. We spent all five days working at the Mau village and it has been a fantastic experience. Each of our youth is working alongside at least 4 of the Mau villagers to build the bathrooms for 6 houses. The Mau men had a difficult time letting our young women use a shovel and hammer as this is not considered women’s work here. They have slowly warmed up to the idea as they have gained confidence in what our young ladies can do. As of today all the septic tanks have been built (dug out and a brick tank hand constructed). We have also framed in the bathrooms and are awaiting the paneling to complete the bathrooms.



Our days consist of hard work and our evenings have been busy with activities. Monday night we had FHE in ten of the homes of the Navua ward. Our youth gave the lessons in the homes. We had a little “miracle” occur when one group knocked on the “wrong” door and were invited in by a man that said he had been praying that the Lord would send someone to him at that moment.. Tuesday the Suva 3 ward hosted us for dinner and put on a fantastic cultural night – they performed over 15 dances. Tori, “J” and Jocelyn represented our group by putting on a great display of Irish river dance.



Wednesday we had sports night with the Suva institute students with games of basketball, volleyball and rugby all being played at the same time. Thursday was the highlight of the week as we attended Derek’s eagle scout project of outfitting a rugby team at a local school and then all headed to the beautiful Suva temple for baptismal work. It was a beautiful experience to see the entire group all dressed in white.



Saturday will be a break for the group as we will go on a jungle canopy zip line from tree to tree and then head for the beach to catch our own lunch (fish) using a surf net together as a group. We plan to cheer for our Mau village rugby team later in the day at the area tournament.



This is a fantastic group and everyone is getting along so great. No one has had any problems from the food and the weather has been fantastic. We couldn’t have hoped for more. Our youth have so much they want to share with you have we hope to some time to email you on your Saturday.



Thanks for lending us your great sons and daughters,



Glenn Bingham

At Last...the Wedding Pictures!

Calissa FINALLY wrote again! Beijing!

Dear Family,

I sent off the promised stories, now it’s time for Beijing!

Our journey began on Thursday, when our professors from SVU arrived. They came amid a flurry of worry, because many of us were behind in our schoolwork and feared reprisals of the glowering kind, followed by withdrawals of the American treat we requested. I had begged for a Heath bar, and was especially nervous of the anticipated loss. The day came, nevertheless, and we greeted the Professors Himes and Buschel with alacrity and some pleasure- they delivered the treats before requesting homework, which instantly endeared them to us. They also gave us our Travel Study T-shirts, and we were able to gift some of them to the head teachers at the school, which endeared them to the faculty as well. We proceeded to show them around the campus, feed them our Chinese cafeteria food, and show off our Mad Teaching Skillz™. The last may have been slightly exaggerated, but the best thing about teaching is the warm knowledge that if you don’t look like you are making things up, no one can tell for sure if it’s not part of the lesson. Yay! After wowing them with our teaching expertise, they dragged chairs out and conducted five minute interviews

The train ride from Changzhou to Beijing was pretty cool- our professors got here too late to purchase soft seating, or even hard seating, so they had to buy soft sleepers for us on the fastest train- it only took ten hours to get there! We went to the station at eight, got on the train at 9:30, and were in Beijing by 7:30 am. The train was a hassle to get on, as the doors are open for exactly three minutes while people rush on and off, meaning if you see your car (16) and you have only run to car 9 by the time the whistle blows, you have to leap in before the doors shut and make your war car-by-car until you’ve found your berth for the night. I was fortunate enough to be only a car away when time ran out, so it was a simple matter for me to squeeze my way into the little compartment wherein I shared a set of bunk beds with three others, Kara, Laura, and Amber. I was on the bottom left bunk, and set up camp with w sigh of relief-my bags were so heavy! The soft sleeper cars were clean, there was a Western toilet down the corridor, and my seat was a long, pillowed, blanketed one. My friends were equally delighted to settle down for the ride, and we dispensed with the usual train ride/sleepover amusements such as giggly stories and speculations in favor of sleep. And my goodness…when you are horizontal, a train ride is such a comfortable one…I woke up at the crack of dawn, of course, at least an hour before it was time to go, and spent it luxuriating in the squishy bunk and the sway of the train while reading The Joy Luck Club.

Our hostel was so cool! The desk staff members spoke some English, and were very kind to us as we staggered in at nine to settle into our rooms. There were stairs and we were on the third floor, but the presence of air conditioning and the absence of mold instantly endeared the place to us; we were once again astonished with the Western toilets in every bathroom, the beds with MATRESSES, the TVs and the wireless internet. You never take these things for granted after you’ve been months without, guys. I miss those toilets. Each room had two people, and I shared with Amber- an amicable arrangement, as she declared it, and indeed it was so. We had a fine time sharing a room and were neither of us averse to sticking together for the rest of the trip, as she liked to shop but not stay out late, and I wanted to shop but go to bed early. The room had green carpet, curtains, a non-functional fridge, a tea pot (we were asked to boil our own drinking water), a small bathroom, and a closet. I found out to my dismay that hot water does not hold well in plastic bottles, and does in fact melt them beyond functionality if you do not wait long enough for it to cool. *sigh* I laid claim to the furthest bed, and deposited my things hurriedly- we were off to Tieneman Square and the Forbidden City at 10!

Tieneman Square is a huge, empty plaza with small memorials dotted around the edges. It takes about fifteen minutes to briskly walk from one side to the other, and is directly across the street from the Forbidden City. If you don’t know, Tieneman Square is the place where many, many college students gathered together to protest the government’s restrictions and lobby for more freedom- they were packed into the square when the government gave the order to put down the ‘rebellion’ with tanks, and so they drove them over the students, slaughtering them. It was a sobering experience, to go there and see where it happened, to watch the guards marching through the square and look at the statue commemorating the event. We also saw the ‘Mao’-soleum, a little building where the first dictator’s body is preserved for the enlightenment and enjoyment of Chinese posterity. From Tuesday to Saturday from ten to three, the body is raised from an underground vault and displayed in a case for the public’s viewing pleasure. I was very interested to see it, but we came on a day they were doing maintenance- darn it! No Mao-scicle pictures…

The Forbidden City was right there, so we trotted through the masses of tourists (mostly Chinese) who were gumming the area, and met an old Chinese guy in a Mao suit (look it up, it’s an extremely popular outfit in China for old people),who spoke extremely articulate English. We thought he wanted money from us, but to our surprise he said he was part of the art exhibition in the Forbidden City, and would we like a guide to see the art? We agreed- it was in the Forbidden City, we were going there anyway, and it was art- so he led us into an underpass, up into the gates, and through a smaller gate wherein many scrolls of brush painting hung. He led us through the gallery, explaining the significance of the different symbols used, and pointed out his own work. After this he smoothly explained that the students who display their work also sell it, and offered prices. Well! I know it was kind of a…I don’t know, ploy, but I did end up getting someone a present there. ^_^; Hahahah…anyway, he was nice. So! We gathered our belongings, and trouped determinedly into the second main gates into the city. Guys. The Forbidden City is a city. It is not a few blocks, it is not a few Walmarts, it is bigger than Buna Vista. That kind of square footage cannot be adequately described in a letter, so I’ll just list some of the places I went and chatter your ears off when I get to see you! I saw three throne halls, four treasure halls, the courtyard where the army would salute the emperor, more minor halls, the Imperial Garden where the concubines and court would walk around, and many smaller bridges and artifacts. Every roof had intricate gilding; every stone was carved with dragons and clouds. It took us five hours to see so little, and we covered only a portion of the Garden and inner city. When it was over, we were relieved to sit and rest, but sad that we had so little time to explore. Not to mention hungry…

We headed back to the hostel with alacrity, eager to fill our rumbling tummies and begin our true shopping splurges- purchases at the Forbidden City did not count! We scoured the area for noodle shops, bought dumplings and shish-kabob beef, and scarfed while we cruised the streets. Soon we came to stalls filled with silks, jade, and all kinds of Chinese items. We, of course, had to stop at the best tailor shop we had seen so that some people could get their suits and dresses made. I stood aside while the shop owners, a man and woman, flurried about in apparent spasms of joy while their customers perused silk rolls and flipped through magazines of suits and dresses. I had no intention to buy a dress or shirt, and so I had a great deal of amusement watching the commotion…until my roomie sidled up to me on my right, the female shop owner on my left, and Amber began to explain that if we both got dresses, she could have the price reduced from 640 BMB to 480, the price for each dress. I looked in dismay at her pleading face, and the hopeful expression on the other’s- I didn’t need a Chinese silk dress! When would I wear it? Where would I wear it? I didn’t really even want one, with my figure…and it was so expensive! Sure, comparatively it was a good deal, but I wouldn’t even spend that money that way at home! I tried to explain this, but as the discussion wended on in the confusion of the shop, and Amber’s face grew longer and longer, and the argument went this way and that…I grit my teeth and selected a design and a roll of silk. As both Amber and the shop lady squealed with delight and clapped their hands, I stared morosely at my future dress, asking bleakly when I had every rationalized a frivolous purchase the equivalent of ninety dollars for myself. Ever. What a bust…well, I thought, this is going to be my China souvenir- now I can focus on getting stuff for the fam-fam (Chynna’s term for ‘family’)since I’ve picked my personal present. And with that settled, I forgot my dress and began selecting other wares. And no, my curious siblings, I am NOT telling what I got you there! ;P

The next day, we awoke bright and early- we were going to climb the Great Wall! I could hardly contain my wiggles of glee- we weren’t going to the ‘refurbished’- read, the commercialized/touristy/rebuilt-area, we were going to Simatai! The Great Wall isn’t one wall, you know- it’s actually a series of shorter sections placed strategically around and over the mountains around China. Simatai was an outpost area, distant from just about everything important but still vulnerable to invasion. The towers adorning each rise contain a bell tower, and every fourth tower had a broad, flat roof for signal fires. The wall itself was so high on a mountain that the only way to get there in under a few hours was to take a tramline up for about thirty minutes, then climb for another half-hour up a winding concrete stairway made of large stones heaped steeply up the mountain, a trail of switchbacks. It was murderous. I tell you now, it’s no small thing to go up a set of steep, lumpy stairs of variable height and depth with a hot, boiling sun above and waves of dry heat rising from the valley below for longer than twenty minutes. All along the path were Chinese gardeners (that mental image you just had? It’s 100% correct) that gathered handfuls of leaves for making into teas and salads, picking up sticks and sweeping twigs away from the soil by the base of the short trees with little brooms made of brush and twine. In direct contrast to these were others who sat under large umbrellas at little booths on each switchback and offered various souvenirs to the panting, sweaty tourists who stumbled up the steps. Some were craftsmen who carved the Great Wall on little slabs of marble before your eyes, other sold ice cream and drinks, others offered books about the Great Wall and bundles of painted chopsticks. Some of them would simply stand and wait, and then start to climb with you, forming short sentences in choppy English and taking your picture if you asked. I met a woman named Yung Fo Tsu this way, and she climbed with me all the way to the highest safe segment of the wall. She was about thirty, slightly shorter than me, and married to a man who lived on the other side of the Wall, in the town down the mountain. She was a farmer most of the time, but when there were tourists, she became a guide. Her conversational English was limited to a few sentences, so mostly I walked with her in silence, or she dropped back to talk to a friend while I walked forward to talk with one of mine. The wall was not as wide as I thought it would be. It was only about ten feet at its widest, and seven at its most narrow. It had a haphazard, crumbling set of stairs and ramps, and very little space or depth continuity when you set foot on either. There were no rails, no short walls, just the wall and a steep drop off either side. The stones had been replaced sometime in the last two or three centuries in a few places during the Whatchimacallit Dynasty, and you could tell by the color of the rock- the older stones were more tan than gray, with crumblier cement between them. The cement holding the Great Wall together is made of rice and water, FYI. The guardhouses had been hollowed out by time, weather, and cultural preservation committees, but the general features were all still there- the architecture was lovely. I could spend a week on that wall without getting bored, exploring all the nooks and crannies built into the towers with a flashlight and sketchpad…ah. The trip was well worth the view from the highest structurally sound point, with the entire valley laid out below and lakes glittering under the sun! There were tourists from everywhere there, taking pictures of the scenery, the sky, the Wall, us, each other; the guides immediately began pulling merchandise from their bags, hawking their wares to their ‘climbing friends’. Luckily, I had no money with me, and so Tsu wandered away to sell Amber a set of calligraphy brushes.

On the bright side, you know those pants you altered for me before I left, and they fit without a belt? Well, I wear the belt with all of them now, even the jeans I brought. Yeah! It’s not a dramatic difference, since I also have ‘rice cheeks’ (meaning my face is fuller), but my increase in waist room makes me smile. We have so much exercise happening in our day, that weight gain is a definite impossibility. I’m also eating less, because even though we are served meals, sometimes the food is a little too much for us…like the chicken feet and stewed greens that smell like perfume. For breakfasts, I eat everything unless it’s these pork floss filled buns with deceptively innocent crisscrosses of strawberry. These hint at containing sweet bean paste, but beware! Only a select few have anything but the bane of foreign teachers within, namely the much cursed, loathsome, orange pork floss. Pork floss tastes like evil. Evil has a taste, and if you thought it was something like venom or earwax, think again! It’s the Chinese treat we love to hate, pork floss! Blarg!

It’s bug season! My roommate and I have unanimously closed the windows, for she is being devoured by the mosquitoes. I have only a few bites to my name, but she has moved from a few scattered bumps to doing a realistic impression of a smallpox victim. I can hardly imagine why the insects have decide that only a few spots on my left arm are tasty, but for heaven’s sake- poor Johanna is apparently a living, breathing, blood buffet. She laments that it’s because she is a carnivore who eats too much beef, and since I am not getting the same TLC from the local wildlife, I can only assume that she is correct. Must avoid that meat…

I can’t wait to see you again!

Until the next letter, I love you all!

Love, Calissa.

PS- I have a nickname in my group! It’s ‘C-dawg’. LOL!

Calissa in China - Thrillers and Such

Dear Family,

Thank you for your letters! I loved hearing about current events- you asked me questions, but I’m afraid they’re lost in Beijing (on my poor, abandoned jump drive). I do know, however, that I promised you some stories if you wrote me, so here they are!

Thrilled to Death: The Time the Headmaster Crashed Our Thriller Rehearsal.

We were still ironing out the kinks, when she came. John was cheerfully practicing his moonwalk across the floor, Hillary and Laura were trying to brokenly covey their intentions to each other to either lengthen or shorten the production, Kara and William had started going through Tai chi, and I was still figuring out a particularly finicky hip gyration during the first verse, wherein we all together shake our booties then snap out a leg, when we noticed a few extra people in the room. A short woman, a tall man, and a bland person I barely noticed except that she held a clipboard. I thought them to be curious teachers, but evidently this was not so, because John and Hillary were both exceedingly surprised and mildly confused by their presence- we looked to Laura for an explanation, but she was as uniformly uninformed as the rest of us (a common state of affairs). John broke away, and announced that we would be running through Thriller once more, with the headmaster observing our efforts. He emphasized that we ought to exaggerate our expressions and actions, so we promised to be as insane as possible without causing ourselves or each other injury. This pleased him, and he walked swiftly to the computer to begin the music. We scrambled to our places, and snuck discreet peeks at the intruders, wondering who the two women were with the headmaster. The music began! We did our level best to pay homage to the original music video (with mixed success), but the three seemed to be having a grand time watching us spasm across the dance floor. Perhaps most of their amusement was drawn from the fact that the dance floor was a cluster of tables too short, resulting in minor collisions between people and furniture throughout the episode, but our out-and-out silliness won at least a few of those smiles. When it was over, the lady with the clipboard smiled and said something, Hillary said something back, and they left. I wondered aloud how the headmaster liked our performance, and Hillary was almost beaming when she said, “She like it!” (my face -> O.o’)

At the main gates of the school is a guardhouse, wherein can be found at least three guards at a time. Some of them are vaguely creepy to me, like the Chinese-mall-cop-look-alike and the rodent-faced dude, some are middling in the looks department, and two are adorable: a young man, maybe 19, with an earnest face, and a thirty-something guard with glasses, the shyest expression, and the softest voice. I haven’t spoken with the young one, but the older one is always smiling, polite, and unfailingly shy when we walk through the gate. It just so happened that one night after we had returned from a shopping expedition, he bashfully admitted in a soft voice that he wanted to practice his English. After suppressing squees of ‘that was so cute!’ and ‘you’re adorable!’, we enthusiastically agreed to help him practice whenever we saw him. Mom, Dad, don’t go crazy here. I’m not romantically attracted to this guy. I do not wish to do more than let him practice his conversational English in passing, so don’t get any…ideas. Breathe. I am saying, however, that he’s absolutely adorable and as sweet as a puppy. No teasing me! >:(

The Night of Scariness…

Well, Sam and I had just finished our dinners in record time, and we were quite anxious to get to a bus stop from whence to get to the train station, to purchase our tickets for a Nanjing weekend trip. We had only a few hours before been warned that we must never be in groups of fewer than three in the darker hours of the evening, to never go in groups of two farther than could be walked back from in less than half an hour, and above all else, to never be out after nine o’clock pm. The area was experiencing a surge in violent crime (stabbings, and violence against women), and the police had pinpointed the hour as the locus of the attacks. Hillary had mentioned that she herself wouldn’t leave the gates after eight, with the construction workers, motorcycle gangs, and shady characters who typically roam the streets then. The train station was less than an hour away on a good day, the station a few blocks from the final bus stop, and the lines typically were short; maybe a half-hour to purchase them. Round-trip, we expected to leave at five and bee back by seven thirty, eight at the latest. We had asked our third traveler to come as well, but she pled illness, and we had no more time. We left, our twosome, and began to walk briskly to the bus stop. Sam’s stride was confident, but I had a knot in my stomach as I realized that even moving as fast as possible, we would be caught by darkness before we could make it back. Internally I squirmed, but matched her pace and soon we were sitting on a bench, waiting for our bus.

It was twenty minutes late. I was uncomfortable as I watched the sun sinking lower, but we pressed on. Sam and I made light conversation as we bounced along, but even she began to look less self-assured as the traffic thickened and the bus crawled, cars and trucks painted with the colors of sunset, then twilight. We made it to the final stop after an hour and a half, nearly twice as long as we had accounted for, and losing daylight too swiftly for continued safety. We practically burst from the bus, jogging lightly to make it at least to the train station before the light was entirely gone. We made it, and stopped in dismay- the place was packed! It would be at least forty-five minutes before we could get to any counter! Sam and I tried to pick the shortest, fastest line, and settled in to wait. I had a paperback with me, and thus amused myself as tempers around us became increasingly shorter than the lines, and minor acts of frustration broke out. I could distantly hear an angry man slamming the palm of his hand against a register’s window and yelling, and the woman inside furiously shouting back. Men shifted, and there was a current of frustration and anxiety, and I became more sensitive to the fact that Sam and I were very much surrounded by tired, annoyed, impatient people who were not looking very nice…we finally made it. We picked and paid for our tickets as quickly as possible, because the yelling man from earlier was still pounding away at the window next to us, and our ticket seller was starting to add her voice to her colleague’s. We could not get out of there fast enough, and were both deeply disturbed by the air of danger in that packed room. Thankfully, we were only a few blocks from the bus Sam insisted would take us to the school with its barred gates and walls, and we walked as fast as we dared, keeping to the streetlamps and avoiding loitering guys. We hopped on, and stared bleakly at the darkness of the city as it rolled by, knowing without saying it that we were in trouble.

The bus ride back was an hour. It was not as full as it could have been which we were thankful for, and quiet as the minutes ticked past nine. Sam knew when to get off, so I sat and read my book, looking up occasionally as a stop came and went. Finally, Sam announced that we could get off at the next stop and be closer to our school than if we waited until the bus stopped at the market. I didn’t recognize the area, but got off with Sam. As our eyes adjusted to the darkness, I saw the market in the distance, and wondered at how far away it seemed….at least a mile or two away. Sam had located the school, and pointed it out for me. It was beyond the market. I stared in disbelief, and then turned to my companion who had also noticed her slight miscalculation. The bus had rumbled away, and we were alone on a dark, quiet, slightly misty road after the Danger Hour had come, and we were far from the school. I mentally gave myself a hefty kick for not insisting upon bringing our third companion, and followed Sam as she led the way back. The sidewalks were broad, edged with heavy vegetation, and only solitary motorists and single trudging people passed us as we kept our pace swift and our eyes straight ahead. I wondered who else might be walking around these roads at this hour, but stopped my speculation before it became panic. Sam was a runner, and I wasn’t afraid to kick a guy’s most vulnerable spot to get away if it came to it. All the same, we kept close to each other. In my imagination, every bush held a figure crouched within and the sparkle of a blade flashed from the shadow of every tree…it was unpleasant.

Finally, finally, we made it back, dodging the groups of rowdy construction workers and practically flinging ourselves through the gate when it opened. We hurried to the dorms, parted ways, and went to bed.

The fishing people! A week or two ago, the district diverted the water from a nearby canal to allow construction on its banks, and the water levels fell and fell until the deepest point had to be only five feet or less. We were walking along the bridge spanning this canal on the way to the market when we noticed people crouched in there, with their pants rolled up and plastic buckets settled into the mud beside them. There were men and women, reaching into the muck and feeling for small, silvery fish to flip into their buckets. I saw a net being dragged through the deepest point by a few people on both banks, and some with heaping buckets already splashing the black silt and goo off of their legs and feet, finished for the day. We stopped and stared for a few minutes, and took pictures. It was so interesting!

Hmmm…I’m learning some simple songs in Chinese! I can sing ‘Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star’ and ‘Jumping Tiger’ (which has the ‘Frere Jacque’ tune). Granted, I’m not very good- sometimes I have to mumble a word or make it up- but I’m getting there!

Well! That was a longer letter, and now I have to be off- thank you for your letters! My next will be a description of Beijing!

Love you all! Calissa

Heading to Beijing!

Dear Family,

I am alive, excited, and hopeful this week- I have 1st grade off! We also have our Beijing vacation lined up, meals and transportation provided by SVU for the SVU group! Guess those 800 dollars are starting to work for me now~ We leave the 6th, and will be gone until the 10th, which means I’ll be celebrating my second decade of life in the capitol of China! Yeah!

We are also lined up to participate in the district’s cultural festival on the 15th, which is awesome to the max- you know that we’re learning Tai Chi, right? Well, we and some of the children will be performing a skit with a mixture of Tai Chi and American dance thrown in on a floating stage in front of thousands of people! This is how it goes- the children (all eight year old girls) perform a short, stylized piece about ancient Chinese people, during which the English teachers come onstage and ‘scare’ them. They pretend to fight us off and ‘scare’ us with Kung Fu, and the leader of their group asks if we are demons, and Sam (who speaks Chinese), replies that we are foreigners. They perform some Tai Chi, and then ask what we can do. We then perform Thriller with the children looking on, and then we all perform a short piece of Tai Chi together, after which we each embrace a child and wave as we walk offstage. We’ve almost got it down perfectly, which is lucky because we only started practicing last week…and won’t be practicing very much this week.

It’s May Day vacation time, and we don’t teach until Tuesday, and leave Thursday…and now that I think about it, maybe this week isn’t the best for a week off of 1st grade. Darn. ^_^;

And now a bit about stuff going on- it seems this time of year is a bad one for stress, because our school is cracking down on security when we leave campus. A few weeks ago, eight children were murdered at a school nearby, and just recently, people have walked into preschools with knives and hammers and just started swinging. It’s freaking everyone out, and so we’ve been given careful strictures on when and how we leave. We must be in larger groups than three if we will be out after dark, we now have to sign in and out if we are going to leave campus, we cannot bring Chinese friends in, and we have been warned that 9pm is the ‘Danger Hour’, because that is when the crimes begin (especially to women in small groups) and when the gates are locked. We haven’t been accosted, we haven’t been threatened, nothing dangerous has happened, but we are being careful all the same. Generally, people are very nice, but no one is taking chances.

I’ve discovered that Chinese street food is awesome in so many ways, they can hardly be numerated. The place may smell of excrement, the people are a bit rough, and the booths are made of scrap wood and plastic, but the cooking is heavenly. We’ve even got a sort of friendship with a few vendors we like, like the old woman who sells four dumplings for a yuan, the young man who sells pineapples on a stick, and the surly dude who cooks a zillion different things over an open grill. And when the day closes and the sun goes down, the square is filled with music and everyone dances. I’m trying new things now, like Chinese fruit in jell-o, grilled squid, and Chinese ice cream (which does taste different, no joke).

Yeah, this is a short letter-I’m lazy this week, sorry! Maybe I’ll tell you more (like the time the headmaster crashed our Thriller rehearsal, about the cute guard who wants to practice English, when the whole school went to the Dinosaur Park, about the night Sam and I were outside alone after 9pm and walked miles to get to safety, about the people catching fish bare-handed in the nearby canal, about the songs I’m learning in Chinese, about my stalker roommate) if I get a few letters from my lovely siblings…nudge nudge, wink wink.

I love you all! Calissa

...the EVALUATION...

Dear Family,

Life is becoming so much easier now that the evaluation has passed. We all got up together at six, for once, and waited for Jared to come and inspect. He was supposed to get here at seven am, to have a meeting with us about issues raised in Laura’s personal evaluations, then after an hour or so begin private interviews with us to discuss our concerns, hopes, and things we need to improve on as teachers. Then, Jared was to go through our rooms, our facilities, and have a private meeting with Laura about them. After lunch, we were to teach the special lessons we prepared specifically for him to see, wait for his remarks, teach first grade, then get his feedback on our overall performance (and discover if it was good enough to pass muster, or bad enough to get us deported-or worse, re-trained). As it turned out, he missed his train. We spent hours sitting tensely in our rooms, tensely in the computer lab, tensely in the cafeteria, tensely in the supply room as the day ticked tensely on. We ended up crowded into the supply room for an hour before classes started, with at least six people scrunched against the windows playing lookout while the rest of us chatted nervously, playing silly hand-clapping games and freaking each other out with random exclamations of “It’s Jared!”, or, “They’re here, look busy!” Eventually, with Laura still gone and Jared still absent, we were forced to abandon our hopeful, nervous vigil and get the children gathered for Opening. We had just begun the obligatory weather questions when a lanky, Caucasian, tall guy with dark hair, followed by Laura, ducked in and began watching us.

Of course, our kids went nuts. x_x
The minute this familiar (2nd graders = Jared had been here before) guy popped in, the kids started slapping each other, scooting out of line, yelling, and rolling around on the floor. We the evaluated were of course shocked and intimidated, and so Opening devolved into a mess of sporadic songs and frantic pleas for quiet. Thankfully, it only lasted for ten minutes, so we gratefully gathered our classes and scrambled off, aware of the scrutiny aimed at our retreating backs. I was supposed to be evaluated during an Arts and Crafts class, and so I had everything ready and polished for Jared- unfortunately, he declined to come in and we were suddenly subjected to a left-field schedule change after only two classes! I had just finished helping my second class with their finger puppets when a harried-looking Laura craned her head in, announced that the 2nd graders were leaving and that the 1st graders were coming in eight minutes, and that the supply room was closed due to meetings.
I stared at the door in shock (I only have eight minutes to get ready?!), grabbed my things (I left the 1st grade stuff in the supply room!), and rushed down to the third floor with a stampede of gleeful eight year olds (I need help!) I managed to grab Laura as she passed me on the stairs and asked, “How can we get our lesson stuff if it’s in the supply room?” She growled that we can go into the supply room and fled, leaving me flummoxed and flustered, and five minutes shy of a first grade class. I pelted into the supply room, passing Jared on his way out (d’oh!), and snatched up my supplies. I dumped the rest on the shelves, and barely made it to the gym area on 4th floor to help control Opening. The kids cooperated for the most part, and we did the best we could despite the MESSED UP schedule our neat-and-tidy planning had brokered. I myself was trying to convey the concept of Impending Occurrences (“The cat is going to eat the mouse! What is it going to do? It’s going to eat the mouse!”) when Jared appeared and loomed at the back of the class. I sweated it out with many an exaggerated chomp-chomp-chomp to illustrate ‘eat’, and then he was gone. I wiped the perspiration from my brow, relaxed, and finished teaching the two classes.

Once the children were gone, two hours early, we sat together outside of the supply room and wondered how badly we were going to receive the smack-down for not being organized. Some theorized that we would need re-training, a fate worse than death, others said that the schedule had been demolished and anything bad that had happened was not our fault. I personally figured that we were going to be told in very disappointed tones that our jobs were poorly done, etc, etc, this is ruining their lives, etc, etc. Imagine our surprise when Jared invited us to sit in a circle, settled into a ridiculously tiny purple chair at the head of it, and beamed at us with a declaration that he was impressed with us. Impressed?! Was he even watching those disorganized classes? He must have noticed our collective shock, because he smoothly interjected that most schools had children running down the halls screaming (okay…we do control the kids better than that), that rotations between classes take over ten minutes (well, ours were only two today! WOO!), that the students even defecate on one another to express their displeasure (yeah, no children do that here). He was happy because we demonstrated that we could discipline the children (we give ‘strikes’, like baseball, three strikes you’re out!), that the children listened when we said ‘English Only!’, and that we could get them to calm down and listen. He was pleased by our enthusiastic teaching, and overall was tickled pink by our control of the situation. He mentioned that we were in the best shape out of all the schools he had seen so far in his inspection. I sat there in a daze, and was fuzzily glad that he had not asked for us to comment yet, as I was sure I’d start babbling or some other embarrassing act. While he praised us I thought of all the calmer, more organized days we have, and I think that we are definitely in great shape if our worst day was good enough to pass. YEAH!
There wasn’t enough time to do individual interviews, as he had to catch a train in an hour, but he was able to get in two group sessions wherein we begged for more water, and he promised to do something about it. He did! We now get eight drums of purified water a week for the thirteen of us instead of three, and life is already looking much less administrative (no more training meetings!). I can hardly believe it was so simple and easy to get a good grade- ah, no more stress.
As for today, we get to watch General Conference! We got the DVD from some church members in Nanjing.
Fun stuff I’ve learned about Changzhou!
The night market at V-Mart has dumplings, turtles, pearls, beans on a stick, pineapple on a stick, and roasted meats of every kind for under a yuan.
There are a zillion pirated DVDs floating around, and a zillion legitimate DVDs. It’s really, really hard to tell them apart!
The babies here are so cute, and their Moms think it’s the coolest thing when we coo and wave at them, making silly faces and laughing when the toddlers only gape in confusion.
I have eaten pig’s feet, chicken blood soup, chicken feet, raw dough dumplings, hot rice goo, bamboo, and red bean bread. I’ve developed a great liking for all of the above, besides the raw dough dumplings and the chicken feet.
And lastly, I’m leaving for Beijing soon- so guys! What would you like from China? Stuff here is inexpensive to the extreme, so if you want it and I can find it, I’ll get it for you (even sketchy DVDs, lol). I’ve seen some interesting stuff, so if you can’t think of anything, I’ll have to get creative. <3 *coughchickenfeet/pigintestines/mummytoescough*
I love you all! Calissa

PS- Could you write down the story of that kingdom with an evil wizard who tries to get the people to wear red and eat chocolate cake, and any other cool stories like that and sent them? The children and teachers like them a lot, and I’d love to make a few little books for them. I would also love more pictures of the family doing stuff together, like baseball, lacrosse, eating dinner, playing games, reading, doing homework, singing, making paper airplanes, folding clothes, cooking…the kids love seeing pictures of my family, and I love sharing! Also- Mom, if you need your pearls re-strung, I need them before we leave for Beijing on May 6th! ;)

Oh Goodness - The "Full Moon" and other adventures

We did not hear from Calissa for a couple of weeks and got a little concerned when there was an earthquake and we STILL did not hear from her. She is fine...just busy!

This is her latest chapter in the great China adventure.

Hello! I just wanted to let you know that I’m alive- that earthquake wasn’t very close, and we weren’t there that day. We are all alive, reasonably healthy, and getting enough food (water, on the other hand…). Okay. Now, for some awesome updates on my life and a reply to your letter, Mom!
I’m okay, and I am most certainly relishing those chocolate treats you sent- in fact, they are in part responsible for my presently optimistic attitude! Mm, mm, good… Those allergy tablets got here, and they did indeed help my running nose and glassy eyes.

How are the kids? Well, we have a few of every kind: some shy ones who don’t talk very much or loudly, the goofy ones who want attention, the kids who are smarter than we are, the kids who delight in causing trouble, the enthusiastic ones who aren’t as skilled but still try. And then there are the apathetic ones, who make us giggle because they are just so cute with their moody faces while everyone else is hopping around with excitement. Are they learning? Yes. Faster than we are learning Chinese, at any rate. I’m very much enjoying teaching now, especially now that I’ve gotten the hang of it somewhat. As for the inspection…ILP decided to put it off for a week, which is absolutely mean considering the fiendishly busy days we’ve had trying to get it all ready! Everyone is slightly peeved that we have to do a few things over again, but we’re relieved that most of the training and paperwork got mauled through before they come. The new date for inspection is this Wednesday, and we’ve been given very special instructions by Laura- be enthusiastic, be on time, and don’t complain!

On another note, the Chinese teachers (perhaps possessing the ancient art of telepathy, or maybe just possessing excellent observational skills) decided that we worked too hard and were spending too much time with each other- so they took us out to a coffee house and dinner, their treat. We left at 12 and didn’t get back until 8:45, which felt absurdly long upon reaching the dorms, but felt heavenly in light of our recent…exertions. We took a bus to downtown Changzhou, and were escorted by three peppy teachers and King (not peppy: we get stressed, we stress him, we stress out about stressing him…vicious cycle) to this huge, luxurious, beautiful building with a receptionist and elevators. We went to the fourth floor, where we had our reservations for the day, and were immediately sent to a lovely open booth with deep couches and teak tables. A waitress came over with a large tray, and began setting down tiny plates with various treats and snacks- some familiar, like those trumpet-shaped cracker things, and others, like the wheel-looking things that tasted like frosting and peanut butter, unfamiliar. We snacked politely, and made vague conversation while we took in the only relaxed atmosphere in over a week. A few minutes later, she came back with frothy milk drinks that tasted, and probably were, like melted ice cream and water. It was so good to have dairy again! We sucked down those milk drinks within minutes, and to our surprise and delight, our best friend the waitress returned with more! Those too disappeared in a trice, and we relaxed, beginning to disarm our multitudinous personal explosive tempers, and simply enjoy the company and sights. With snacks coming every fifteen minutes, and those ice cream drinks, we were more than satisfied with sitting back and doing absolutely nothing but munch and dazedly loll, but our hosts had other plans. They wanted us to play cards with them, so we corralled a random child’s Harry Potter Uno and had a few rounds, during which actual ice cream was served in tiny bowls. I had the red bean and taro, and both made me very happy. Let’s get ice cream when I get back, okay? ;) After the Uno fest, we checked the time (3 pm) and chatted. Some slept, possibly for the first time in a while. Others, like myself, learned and experienced the joy that is tapioca milk tea and Golf (the card game) in a nice atmosphere. The milk tea was pink boiled milk with blue tapioca balls at the bottom that you sucked up through a huge straw, and was delicious. I am also a terrible Golfer, and won the title of worst player with a score of 139 points after four rounds (the winner had 13). Well, I have no poker face, so that’s alright. We stayed and snacked until five. Most of us by that time had relaxed to such an extent that we were once more on polite speaking terms with each other and the world in general, and were ready to go back to the dorms to finish the experience with good, cleansing sleep. Our Chinese teacher friends, however, were not finished with the day- they took us to a small, Western-ish buffet where we were able to consume with difficulty a little more food of the dairy and familiar variety, during which we talked and joked and looked discreetly at our watches. After an hour or two, we began making light noise about sleeping off the tremendous perpetual meal we had consumed, and the teachers genially let us return. That was a good day…

Saturday, they took us to a mountain to climb it. We had ratcheted up our stress levels again, and many of us were eager to get in some excellent cardio and relief by roughing it through the wilderness for a few hours, but as it turns out, Chinese mountain climbing is a very different thing from American mountain climbing. The mountain was a hill with a colossal philosopher’s statue on it, and the path was nor precisely hiking grade, more like random-jaunt-with-an-elderly-person-through-the-bamboo grade. It was nice, but ultimately more interesting as a post card. I did enjoy the cave, though! It was really cool to go through a cave and explore a bit, and the exit was a boat ride, so that made my day. Afterwards, we had a nice traditional Chinese lunch (duck tastes awesome), and went to a cute amusement park. I got to ride a giant Ferris wheel that took a full fifteen minutes to make a revolution, and got my picture taken by four different groups of teenagers. LOL. I was a tourist attraction! It’s true, you don’t get many foreigners in this part of China.

Oh! I just remembered a funny thing that happened this week- remember how you asked about the kids, and if they were learning? Um, I know a few who are having a bit too much fun in our classes. Plato, one of the bigger boys (9, not 8), is a bit of a troublemaker, and bullies some of the smaller boys around. Well, one day when we were relaxing after gym (my favorite class to teach), I noticed that Plato was off by himself and not participating in our post-game discussion. I asked him, “Plato? Would you come sit down, please? What did you learn?” Plato proceeded to do something shocking. He plopped down beside me, rattled something off in Chinese, and then displayed a full, brown moon to the entire class, not two feet from my face. I looked at that bottom, felt my control of the class slip, and wondered, How am I supposed to save this? I then got a flash of inspiration. I turned to the class and said emphatically and enthusiastically, “Plato mooned me! What did Plato do? Plato mooned me! Everyone say, ‘Plato mooned you!’ Who did he moon?” “Plato moon Teacher Calissa!” “Good!” I then taught the class that mooning is not polite, and the lesson continued. I’m glad he didn’t go full Monty, I don’t know how I’d have salvaged that…“Everyone say, ‘Plato is a nudist-’”

On a different note, I feel like I should ask after my cough. You remember when I got H1N1 and had to stay in the country longer? Well, I got better in almost every way, and feel excellent, but I never completely lost the cough. I thought it was another allergy symptom, but those have gone away, and this hasn’t. I hear and feel something rattling around in there still, and it bugs me because I can’t understand why I’ve still got that. I can breathe very well since it seems to be at the bottom of my lungs rather than the top, and I only notice occasionally or when I’m horizontal, but it’s still weird. On the other hand, I haven’t caught anything like the flu (which wiped out half our number for a week), or a severe cold (which took out four for two weeks), or strep (which afflicts two of us right now). I feel so bad for the kids because we get sick so frequently, but it’s probably the kids who are giving us the illnesses, so I’m not remorseful for long.
Some fun stuff I’ve noticed about China this week is table manners. It’s socially acceptable, and even the norm, to spit out food and put it beside your plate, on the table. This means that at a large meal, everyone will have a little pile of bones, gristle, and whatever else glommed together on the tablecloth. Yuck. I still haven’t gotten the hang of this yet, and persist in hiding such tidbits in a napkin which I then secrete in the shadow of my cup. It earns me some interested looks, but I’m okay with that. Another thing is slurping. Everyone, from the teachers to the students, does this. And the snorting, then spitting? Yep, that too! 
And lastly, what I’d like in that final package…hm. I’d like pictures of you guys, and whatever else you’d like to send is fine. <3
I love you! Calissa
PS- Good luck with the worm composting!

There, Their, They're

EUREKA! I figured it out.
It is so confusing, even for adults to know when to use there, their and they're.
When driving with Jeff and Bryce the other day, I came up with a great memory trick for them to use:

There: directional word (put it there, over there, went there etc)

Trick: the word "where" is spelled like "there" and can be used together. Put it there. Put it where? Over there!

So, if one can ask the question: Where? it is used with the word "There".

Their: ownership, possession (means that someone owns or possesses something)

Trick: the word "heir" means to inherit something, a belonging of someone else's. When talking about "their home, their dog, their car, their vacation etc it means something they own or something they can lay claim to. An "heir" can lay claim to something once the owner passes away or it is given to them - thus the ownership tie. look for the word "heir" in "their" to indicate ownership.

They're: conjunction for they are (apostrophe means a letter or letters have been left out)

Trick: substitute they are in the word and see if it still works and if it does not, you are using the wrong word!

So, that is my EUREKA moment for the week...I will share only the best of them with you.

Bryce's SuperFly Pinewood Derby car

It's that time of year...

Bryce and his pack all vowed not to let their dads touch the cars...no moms for that matter either. We have some pretty crafty moms (no not crafty in the bad way) and we know our way around the garage. I tease my sweet husband that most of the tools in the garage are mine : )

I digress...



Bryce wanted a trident shaped car and cut it so small that we were forced to go foraging through the garage for anything that would be the right size and weight to add 4 more ounces to the car. This is what evolved as we found things to glue to the foundation and it looked so much like a dragonfly that it got wings!



I can honestly say the only thing I did was give him permission to use my glass stones and used the drill press to create an indentation for the steel "eyeball" at the front. The wings do flap as it goes...not sure if that will help the speed or not, but it sure looks cool!

Great Job Bryce!!! Weighing in at 4.9 ounces....SUPERFLY!

Parking in a "no parking" zone

We had some great lacrosse games last week and had gorgeous weather and beautiful flowering trees as well. The kids won their games, we had a great day and I captured some fun pictures while we enjoyed the day together.



I caught Shanan with both of our iphones as she was surfing the web on mine (or on facebook) and listening to a message on dad's phone. She has wanted a phone for so long that once she gets her hands on one, there is no getting it back!



The trees were too beautiful not to take pictures of! I also could not help myself when combining kids with blooms - so here is my version of two beautiful images in one! He does smile most of the time, this was his serious pose - a rare moment!



These are truly a little boy's foundation: skinned knees, bruised shins, dirty scuffed converse - what a great life a little boy has!

Worm Farm - Vermicomposting in my Kitchen

I ordered the red wigglers (yes that is what they are called) last week and was thrilled to see them arrive in the mail today! I was shocked that the box was so very small since I had orderd 2000 of the creepy crawlers, I just assumed it would be a rather large box - not so!

Let the composting begin!

So, this is my plan: create 4 separate layers in different stages of decomposition (yep, we are decomposing in my kitchen) and add organic material to them one week at a time.



I picked these bins because they stack and have a recessed area where the "compost tea" can drain through (my kids were freaked out when I called it "tea" because they thought I would make them drink it! ) This liquid is like gold for a gardener - full of great nutrition and plants love it! I drilled holes in this recessed area so it would drain.



Next, I put a layer of shredded paper and then some peat/potting mix which I purchased for starting seeds. Worms love peat and dead/decaying stuff, so I put in some rotting leaves too - yum.



Then I put in the bucket of organic material that I had been collecting for several days and added it to the mix.



Time for the worms - seriously, these 2000 worms would fit in a large cereal bowl! I ended up dividing the scraps between two bins and dividing the worms in half (not the worms themselves, just the big bunch, speaking as a whole)



They were alive and wiggling and yes they are red - hence the name, Red Wigglers! I added some leaves, made everything even steven and made sure the whole mass of rotting food, wiggly worms and shredded paper and mulch were good and wet and that I could see the liquid would move from layer to layer and finally end up as a concentrated fertilizer in the bottom bin (the clear one) ready to make my plants sing happily and grow!!



This is the finished product, with holes for ventilation and all components in place. Now eat, little worms, grow big, multiply and don't make me a liar (I told my husband and kids that this would not stink and would not be gross!)



Now, I used a very tiny tool to drill the holes, a Dremel and this really was a simple project to do. If I mess this up, I will be totally humiliated! I will have a tiny funeral for all of my dead worms and they will become compost for my garden, may they rest in peace. HOWEVER, if it works, I will make my first ever you-tube video and share it with the world! This is WAY cheaper than buying the worm farms, just don't tell the worms that!

Laundry Adventures

Dear Family,

I am alive! The past week has been chaotic, but I am back on my feet, and with a few days of sleep under my belt, ready and rearin’ to get back into the swing of things! Although, truth be told, I can never sleep in until 7 am at the very latest, despite my fervent and persistent efforts to make it until lunch without stirring from my Bed of Indolence. I wake up every day at 6, look at my watch in disbelieving exasperation, and roll over- an hour later, I pick it up again, and discover that a mere 45 min to an hour have passed. At this point, lying about in a lazy manner becomes painfully dull, more so than getting up and sweeping the floor or doing laundry, so I push off the quilt and shuffle through my daily routine. Can I just say, it stinks to be on vacation and still stick to a school/working schedule out of sheer boredom? I’m not even being served 7 am breakfasts until Tuesday, and I’m waking at the crack of dawn! Sheesh. Stupid body clock. (lol)

The weather in Changzhou is just as charming as ever, consisting of dusty wind and intermittent rain- Dad says that you guys are currently enjoying pleasant weather, and I am glad of that! Here, the temperature is still wobbling between forty and sixty degrees. I’ve gotten so accustomed to it, in fact, that when I walked into Laura’s room on Monday, I thought her heater must be up to ninety, at least! She calmly replied to our incredulous inquiries that the temperature was a balmy sixty degrees, and that typically, our rooms don’t go over fifty to fifty-five. Wow, I had thought that was the outside temperature! It explains so much, though; I could never understand why, if our heater was functioning, it was that I had to wrap up in a quilt to sit down and read a book. Or why people still got numb fingers from typing on the computers at the school building if the weather was warm. *sigh*

Using the computers is a hassle most days, so I usually go every other day- that way I am always delighted with a full inbox, and can happily justify using a full hour to go through them. It’s important to get out entertainment where we can, here. Most of us have little to do besides work, read, use the computers, or do laundry. And before you scoff at the thought of washing clothing as a form of enriching entertainment, let me tell you that the process is significantly different here, and infinitely more engaging. In fact, because I am feeling like describing the process for you (mild familial torment via letters is also an accepted form of diversion), I’ll not skimp on the details.

1. I approach the machine. It looks like a typical washing machine, despite the Chinese characters instead of English labels, but it is as different as a canteen from a vase. The functions are similar, but the similarity ends quickly. The washer has only a power cord connecting it to the wall, no water hoses or vents are involved. There is a spigot protruding from the wall, with a blue plastic hose clamped on with a wire, from which the water for washing is obtained. The machine has two hatches, one for the washing, the other for spinning. There are three dials (which cannot be read, only guessed at): wash timer, drain/fill/?, and spin timer.
2. I lift my pile of clothing, and dump it all into the larger bin. There is no need to sort clothing, as it will all be washed with cold water, and will not be in long enough to allow color seepage.
3. I check the middle dial, and make sure it is set to ‘fill’. The last time I left it on ‘drain’, and tried to fill it, the water spilled out of the drainage hose beneath and made a filthy mess on the tile. I guess I know why the laundry area is set in a depression rather than even ground, eh?
4. It is set on fill. I scoot the entire thing over to the spigot, and turn on the water. As the hose delivers the liquid, I dump an amount of laundry detergent into the tub. I have no idea how much of this I’m supposed to use (the instructions are in Chinese), but I do enjoy the thrills of watching bubbles form on the surface of the increasingly grey water.
5. The clothes are covered in water, so I turn off the spigot and close the hatch. I scoot the whole thing closer to the squatter (harder when it’s full of water), and set the wash timer. Its max setting is fifteen minutes, so I have time to do a set or two of Tai chi (I can’t wait to show you guys!).
6. After watching the whole thing jerk around like a pinball for a quarter of an hour, it’s time to drain off the dirty water. This is accomplished by shoving the drainage hose underneath into the shower/squatter and twisting the middle dial. This provides me with the dual satisfaction of watching dirty water go gurgling down the drain, and of watching the clothes inside become visible under the scummy water and heaps of bubbles (maybe too much detergent, this time?).
7. This process (minus the detergent) is repeated for rinsing purposes.
8. Finally, the clothes are ready for the spinner. I pull out soggy handfuls, and slop them into the smaller compartment. It takes at least three goes to do an entire load, considering the inconveniently small spinner, but hey- it’s all about the journey, right? The spinner goes for five minutes each, during which the washer makes several attempts to either do a disco dance or tiptoe away. Finally, all the clothes are spun and ready to dry!
9. I lift an article of clothing, and put it on a hanger. I then reach for a long pole, at the end of which a pair of prongs has been fastened. I set the loaded hanger in the fork of the prongs, then lift it four feet above my head to the double poles running from one wall to the next- these will hold the clothes until they have dried sufficiently to wear. I maneuver the pole carefully, and set the hanger hook over the nearest pole.
10. Repeat x 20-30 times.

As you can see, this brings a great deal of color and fulfillment to my life. J

A lot of things here are different, but cool- like customs! Did you know, it’s considered highly offensive to go about in public with cleavage showing? Not even their movie stars do it! How cool would that be if we didn’t have to deal with that at home? No more gross-outs at Walmart…ahh… On the other hand, look up baby clothing online. Check out the pants. Enough said.

Dust is ever present here, and the dust bunnies reproduce faster than bacteria! I swept the floor this morning, and found a fist-sized clump. Six hours later I swept, and found another fist sized clump. It never ends!

DVDs- there are a lot of them. I wish I knew what was pirated and what wasn’t, then I could buy that boxed collector’s set of Miyazaki movies for two bucks…

Sooo…yeah. Haven’t gotten that aforementioned box yet, but it’s the weekend, so maybe they can’t give it to me yet- I’ll ask tomorrow. Write me, guys! I love you all!

Love, Calissa

Flying the Homemade Box Kite

Over the President's Day weekend this year Barry had a hankering for kite flying and decided that building a kite with the boys would be a fun family activity. They set about finding a pattern, gathering supplies, measuring, cutting and filling the house with the potent scent of rubber cement (on a day that was too cold to open windows - can you say "high as a kite?")

The kite was completed as the long weekend ended, but they had to wait for a day with just the right wind, and no rain, to fly this very large kite. It waited patiently, standing in the office, reminding us daily that we had not taken it out for its maiden flight.

The weekend finally arrived with grey puffy clouds, laden with much rain, but waiting as if they knew this was a big day for the kite and for the kids. The clouds waited until the successful kite flying expedition had ended and everyone had been able to fly the kite before throwing melted snowballs at everyone and everything.

The kite flew spectacularly and made its makers proud.

This is Jeffrey's idea of sweeping the kitchen floor.

SNOW?? in March?

Well, it has happened again. Spring in Arkansas is beginning to show a nasty cold trend. For the last several years, we have had these freak storms that bring ice and snow after we have begun to enjoy warmth and sunshine - just long enough to put away the winter clothing! We had to break it out again just in time for Spring Break!

We had forecasts for 4-8 inches of snow. Scoffing at the weatherman, wondering what he was on, we enjoyed our 70 degree weather and played outside.

The next day, it happened just like the weatherman said, which made us wonder if WE were on something! Snow began falling after an afternoon of rain. Then it turned to snow and we knew we had to be dreaming! Large fluffy flakes covered the ground and piled up rather quickly and before long we had a good 4 inches - surprise surprise!

So, the question was - would we have church? After all - life shuts down when it snows here! Rogers Ward has the reputation to uphold of NEVER canceling church. The reputation stands. We had church, but everyone else canceled...except the Young Adult ward which started at 2:30 and where Barry was assigned to speak! No rest for retired Bishops!

We had Sacrament Meeting and the snow had begun to fall again - we now had probably 8 inches and during the meeting the decision was made to just have that one meeting. So we had a good long restful Sunday at home with the kids! Fun!

Teaching - A Success!

Dear Family,

I have gotten my ten hours of sleep and am now ready to thrill you will all the exciting details of the school! But first, let me just say- WOW, DAD! You’re a High Councilor? Congratulations! (my condolences for the resumed meetings) And I’m glad you could ‘talk shop’ with the Chicago people- and get some info for me as well. Green Dam? I understand the dam part, but what about the green? @_@’

Anywho, yesterday was absolutely fantastic. I taught a group of six second graders for forty minutes, and helped them make Easter Bunny Baskets out of paper bags and construction paper, which was made more fun by my BMC, self defense (“What can we do with this bag? Can we make a puppet?!” “Yes, Teacha!” “My puppet is hungry! It’s going to EAT YOU! Say, ‘Don’t eat me, puppet!’” “Don’t eata me, puppet!” laughter). We finished the craft, and so they will all be able to participate in the ILP Easter Egg Hunt next week. I can hardly wait! Laura is excited, too. She told us that when she thinks about the Easter Egg Hunt, she is happier than she has ever been and cries with joy. Since this pronouncement was delivered in an even, conversational tone, I don’t know whether or not she’s joking…

In other news, squatters are dangerous to the unwary. Someone got locked in theirs for a grand total of three hours! Imagine that, being locked in a closet with only a toilet, showerhead, and wet floor for three hours. And the fragrance of a squatter in the middle of the day…well, let’s just call it ‘pungent’. At least she wasn’t showering, or she could have caught pneumonia. Later, her washing machine sprung a leak and sprayed the walls and floor with dirty water. And after that, the shower started leaking! She has the worst luck with water-related dorm things. I’m glad that hasn’t happened to Johanna and I (knock on wood). Things with our laundry aren’t all sunshine and roses, however. I used our washer for the first time last week, and found that it is a Very Bad Thing to leave anything paper in a pocket while using it. Unfortunately, this realization only made its appearance after I had pulled the first pair of black pants out, and discovered them covered in a film of gray with liberal multicolored sprinkles of paper. I was confused as to what I had done for a moment, but upon closer inspection of some of the larger fragments, I found Chinese characters and a piece of a roller coaster. I had left the Dinosaur Park brochure in the pocket of my jeans! With a heavy heart, I lifted the rest of my sodden garments to the light. Yep, all sported the same fuzzy coating. There was no time to re-wash them, so I spent an entire evening picking paper off pants. Fun stuff.

I really love Andy’s weekend cooking! He is a real chef, and his best work happens when there aren’t 700 people to cook for at a time- plus, he pays attention to what we like, and since we’re the only people here on the weekends besides the guards and construction people (who he doesn’t have to cook for), we get fantastic meals! Like last night, for instance. We had the standard bowls of rice, cooked broccoli (squee!), chicken legs (yay!), and last but not least, boiled-then-chilled lettuce with Caesar salad seasoning. Everything was a bit salty, but after a week with very little salt, you learn to appreciate it. I especially liked the broccoli and chicken legs- every weekday meal has either eggs or parts of chicken involved, but the legs alone are never served, and Andy made the skin crispy and the meat fall off the bone. I’m sure he was a bit surprised by the ferocity with which we fell on his food, but at least we left him clean dishes and allegations that he was the best chef in the world before leaving the cafeteria.

And while we’re talking about food, I have decided that when I get back, I’m having pizza. Cheese pizza. With extra cheese, because dairy is a rarely seen animal here.

There’s a girl here who brought a million Disney movies on an external hard drive, so we are able to watch a bunch of fun stuff- last night, I watched the 2004 Fantasia and The Three Caballieros (sp?), and today I’m going to watch Iron Man and Confessions of a Shopaholic. On the last, I read the book and was impressed by the foolishness of the main character- it’ll be interesting to see how it translates to the silver screen (laptop screen, lol).

Hm. Well, that was yesterday. Today promised to be sunny and not cold, so we’re making plans to go shopping after lunch. I hope William doesn’t come, we drew names for the ‘Secret Penyou (friend)’ thing, and I picked him! He is constantly hungry, so I guess I’ll leave meat buns at his door or something. Maybe a chicken? My secret penyou left me a lemon-flavored drink, which was delicious. <3

Well, it’s time for me to buckle down and do my homework before lunch- loved the letters, Mom and Dad! I love you all! Calissa

Calissa - another COLD - darn!

My day! I…am tired. I’ll write about it tomorrow…

Okey dokey, it’s the day after tomorrow. I taught again, and this time, I ROCKED! I did it, I did it, I did it! I taught six successful lessons to second and first graders! The lesson was making paper dolls, and not only did we use the BMCs, we finished the craft! Today is Friday, so I only teach ELE once, then the second graders once. We’re making Easter baskets, which will then be used in the egg hunt for ILP kids. <3

I’m pretty excited for the weekend. I asked the Chinese teachers what they do for fun, and the most emphatic and frequent answer was ‘sleep’- after my first crazy week of actual teaching, I must say I agree. Sleep is a many splendored thing, it’s like oxygen! All you need is sleep~ …oh, wait, was that love? Okay, love too.

*sigh* I have a cough, and my sinuses are killing me. Getting over the flu, then catching a cold, reeks to the high heavens. It doesn’t help that everyone else has the same thing, and that Laura, China, and Kara sound like they’re dying of it. I still have a voice at least, but teaching is not fun when random sneezing and coughing interrupts the lesson. Thank goodness for vitamin C!

I’m bushed, so I’m going to get through the last stretch of today, then sleep like a log. Hopefully my brainpower will have amped up enough to describe more aspects of my experience by then. My group’s zombie-esque demeanor will probably dissipate by Saturday afternoon, but if not, I will let you know!

Love you all! Calissa

Calissa - Week Three and TEACHING Yeah!

Dear Family,

Thanks for your letters, Mom and Dad! Dad, I do not think I was there for the Chicago deep dish- was that a recent thing? You’ll have to make it again when I return, as your question has fanned a smoldering obsession with all foods cheesy and American into a Balarog. I loved to hear how things were going for you all- even though I have nothing but sympathy for your collective week of blah (did Shanan catch the flu, too? I bet she didn’t. She probably stole Rambo’s immune system.). It’s great that things are otherwise going well! I am glad Brandon is having a thoroughly typical time arranging for the wedding, as it would concern me on many levels if he were to find the process an easy one. Mom says he’s being driven crazy with it all, and I must say, I almost snorted my mouthful of tofu when I pictured him standing at the altar, frothing at the mouth with bloodshot eyes, mumbling under his breath about bunting and invitations. LOL! I anticipate much struggle and grief over mine (eventually…breathe, people.), and I might have just throttled him if he were breezing through with the preparations for a wedding I won’t even see, gosh darn it!

*cough* No hard feelings about that, by the way. :D

Anywho, I tried to access the Family Blog, but China has a thing against it apparently. Too much flavor of love and freedom, perhaps? Either that, or the computers caught a new virus for the umpteenth time, this one exclusive to blogs. I’ll continue trying to get to it, but for now, emails are the way to go.

And now, on to recent events! I wasn’t able to use the computers much this week, because now they’re letting me try…teaching! For real! Without obvious supervision! My own lesson plans and everything! WOO! In fact, Laura decided that the best way for me to get caught up and filling my quota was too learn by experience, namely, ELE (English Language Enrichment). Did I tell you about that, yet? I can’t remember, so I’ll do it again. In ELE, the volunteer goes to a classroom for 35-45 minutes, and either teaches a lesson or assists the Chinese teacher with their lesson. I had my first day of it Wednesday (Tuesday for you guys), and also my first breakfast. Before then, everyone sort of blew off breakfast which started at 6 am. This was Not Good, as Doing So is an Insult to Andy the Chef. I didn’t know this, and would have gone earlier, but I got conflicting information from my fellow teachers- Anne said to go, Lisa said it wasn’t a big deal, William (know as The Boy Teacher) said to ask Laura, and Laura said to stop asking questions. Yeesh.

I go every day now, even though it’s pretty funky food. For example: the main dish is still rice, but it’s in a liquid state rather than a solid one. This would not bother me, except for the fact that said rice no longer tastes like rice. It tastes like water. So. Imagine hot, slimy, water-flavored mush with pickled peppers in a packet for flavor on occasion. On Thursday we had big, pale, dense muffins with breakfast. I ate mine and noticed a distinct fishy smell to it a few bites in. This is suspicious in a supposedly non-seafood item, no? I guess my puzzled expression as I proceeded to sniff the treat tipped off Kara and William, who were with me, and they asked me what was wrong with nervous expressions (William was on his second muffin). I replied that my muffin smelled fishy in a confused tone, which Kara thought might have been caused by my fingers smelling like the pickled peppers I had just opened and dumped into my rice mush. I sniffed the peppers…nope. They smelled like picked peppers, not fish. I wanted to be able to finish my food, so I accepted her solution. Later, she told me that everyone smelled their muffins after I left for class and they all smelt like fish. How weird is that?

Wow, off topic. ELE. I had no preparation for it besides some advice not to mess it up, and thus armed with knowledge, I entered Class 6 Grade 1 with mixed expectations. I walked in while the Chinese teacher, CeeCee, was finishing her first lesson. I had no clue what to do, so I asked her if she had anything planned that she wanted me to do- she did, thank goodness. I got to learn “Clap Your Hands” with the kids, I taught the parts of the face, sang “Head, Shoulders, Knees, and Toes” with them, and then I taught them “Do As I’m Doing”. CeeCee helped me when I got nervous, and sort of tag-taught with me to show me how it was done. She is now my absolute favorite Chinese teacher. I taught another class right after, where the teacher seemed just as nervous as I was- although, really, I wasn’t going to grow tiger claws and eat anyone! I think we mutually acknowledged our slightly freaked-out states, and then backed away a bit. I got to teach them alone, by request of the teacher about my hobbies and family, and made the second grade collectively gasp when I numerated my family members. My third class was a bit of a bust, since the teacher was in a very bad mood, wanted to micromanage everything, and had an accent as thick as a brick. Needless to say, it was awkward. Luckily, I had lunch next- hoorah! I got to eat with Kara and William, my ELE buddies, who had just finished their ELE stuff for the day. I ate my mystery meat and rice, and got back to teaching, which was now marginally easier than it had been! I got to teach fifth graders last, and joy of joys, CeeCee was also their teacher! She must have noticed my more confident bearing, because this time she sat at the back and took pictures while I taught them about my hobbies, my home, and my family. It was awesome, I love her classes! By this time, it was 2:30, so I headed over to the other building where ILP is taught to get ready for the 3-4:55 classes. I still haven’t taught one of those ILP classes yet- where it’s just you and 6-9 kids and a lesson for 35 min- but it’s coming next week. Wish me luck! Back to Wednesday, I sat in on Shelly’s drama class (I’ll be teaching one of those on and off in a week), and after two classes, Shelly got a paper cut and I got to substitute for five minutes while she got a bandaid. It was…wow. So much more fun than ELE. I’m getting the hang of taking control of a room without raising my voice or dropping my smile, and I can now discipline like a champ! The key for the first seems to be getting, and holding their attention, and the secret to the second seems to be relaxing and radiating an aura of authority…

Dude. I radiate.

And after that epic of a storytelling, I’m a bit put off of talking about classes. So instead, let me tell you about some fun things I’ve realized about living here:

1. I really love these children, even though they run in herds and frankly that scares the insert descriptive noun of choice out of me. I think they’re fantastic, even though it’s clear some of them don’t shower with any sort of regularity. I want to be here, even though the sound of them stampeding up stairs of any kind makes me duck into an unused room until the noisy crowd has finished migrating (you laugh, but it happens; both parts.).
2. I think that Andy, the school chef, is the most patient, longsuffering, good-humored guy on the continent. And he knows just how to cheer a person up, with hard-boiled eggs. <3
3. My body can adjust to any temperature between freezing and burning, and cold can become irrelevant. This makes me a little happy, as I can now stop wearing my coat indoors, but mostly annoyed- why couldn’t this have happened a week ago?!
4. There are many ways to cook a fish, and sometimes the tastiest is not cooked at all.
5. I don’t think I’ll get culture shock. I’m pretty sure that I’m the most comfortable person in our group right now, aside from Sam (she grew up in Taiwan). Everyone else is complaining of various aspects which distress them, but I’m finding myself responding rather naturally. Even using the squatter isn’t so traumatic anymore.
6. Yogurt is Heavenly Father’s 2 yuan gift to dairy-deprived ILP teachers.
7. Laura is evil. She knows I listen to her, so she tells me evil lies for her own evil amusement, because to see me take her evil words seriously gives her an evil sense of vindication. Like today! I stayed behind from the massive shopping trip to clean up my room (because Johanna is a bit…lax in that department), and I asked if the computer building was open- she said, in a perfectly serious manner, that it was not, and that I was not to leave the building while they were gone! Guys, they were gone for six hours. I was ready to leave my dorm room in three. I was even afraid to go to the cafeteria building for dinner because they were late getting back! Andy had to come and get me, and he doesn’t speak English! We were the only people in that entire cafeteria building, just me and this older Chinese guy who started to look a bit…miffed…that I was the only one there to eat his prepared food. I guess he saw that I was anxious, so he brought me some hard-boiled eggs. I was happy. Then Laura the Evil One came back, and laughed at me because she had been joking! I could have walked around campus, and used the computers, even hung out at the trash pile if I had so wished! ARG! I was reduced to swabbing the squatter for amusement, and she thought it was funny?! T-T
8. My speech patterns will be so annoying when I get back home! We’ve started to use ILP-ese when we, the US people, speak to one another (“Do you like the rice? I like the rice!” “Holy cow, did you just use the kid voice on me?!” “OMIGOSH! I did!”), and it seems like it’s definitely a dominant speech pattern. I’ve also picked up some Chinese teaching gestures and used them, so I may randomly point my hand, twirl my fist, and make barking noises to stress a point… @_@
9. The Chinese market is fantastic! Everything is so very inexpensive, even considering the exchange rate- roughly 6 yuan to the dollar.
10. Quai and yuan are the same thing.
11. Apologizing for bumping into someone makes them think you did something horrible to them, and they will give you incredibly dirty looks for any and all of the many varied slights you presumably did to their person whilst their back was turned.

Well…that’s about all I have the time for right now…so I suppose I shall have to tell you about the cool stuff I did while on vacation tomorrow.

Love you all! Calissa