SO MUCH TO DO, SO LITTLE TIME

Hope you enjoyed meeting our new friends in the last blogs? We have enjoyed every one of them and more. A few of our friends here want to make it into the blog as well. Two of them are the art students I have lunch with on Mondays and then tutor in English . Their big test was in late June - hope they did well. Renee and I have shared one class. The Freshmen class I had last term she has had this term. It has been good to have these students in common. Many have become friends, especially the boys.

At the beginning of May, Renee went to Nanjing to visit her sister

Melanie. Melanie was in Nanjing because her daughter Lau

rel had given birth to their second child, Victoria Grace. Renee was able to go and visit Chad, Laurel, Melanie, Victoria, and her big brother, William, who is himself just a toddler. What a

great opportunity. Renee got to spend time with Melanie and also hold the baby.

On May 28 was the Dragon Boat Festival. It is celebrated here in China by eating sweet sticky rice wrapped in some sort of greenleaf, not bamboo but like bamboo. We got to eat that, zong zi, several times that day with students and with two families. On our campus, because we

have a lake, they also held dragon boat races. There were 16 boats. The crowds gathered early.

The campus was closed to outsiders, who had to watch from one end of the lake. We could get pretty close to the action and people hooted and cheered. No one seemed to care who won.

Taking part is more important here in China.

We spent the day with friends, and we were able

to feel a part of the Festival. The Festival has

a bit of a strange history. It celebrates a wise civil servant who drowned himself out of sadness for the fate of his kingdom and his inability to help effectively. In the story, the dragon boat

s were sent out to search for his body and people threw zong zi into the lake to feed the fish so they wouldn't feed on him At least, that is one story.

This second semester my secondary project has been to start a men's group. I invited my English Teaching Major boys to meet with me. We met six times this term.

We met and talked about teaching and the role of men in China and America, played ping pong and badminton; watched Rocky and had a good discussion about Phialdelphia, underdogs, and film making, and, of course, we shared a meal together.

The picture is minus Dwayne and Steven, but you can see it was a good group. Renee, not to be outdone, began meeting with a group of girls for lunch on Fridays. The girls come from various backgrounds, but are mostly tied together by Renee's friend Serena. (Rich thinks he is my motivation. Ha!)

Renee and I have both lost weight, but we are not always

sure how that has happened. Many activities these last months have involved eating. 1) Two senior girls visited us and brought the makings for dinner. It was a great meal, and it was interesting to watch them work at prep

aring it for us. 2) Another dumpling adventure took place with our neighbors and friends, Sally and Ji. We spent a morning helping making the dumplings and then shared the feast. The grandmother was the boss

, but we all had our hands in the makings. 3) We have become friends with the local Catholic priest. Wang Fang has said he would visit us and he did. We shared a meal with him and the translator he brought with him f

or fear he would have to speak English. 4) Another group of meals dealt with our class monitors. We both invited them to a dinner. (Now "not to be outdone by Richard did motivate me to eat with my monitors:) We planned our menus, reserved a room, ordered the food, and led a meal. The monitors were suspcious that we could do this, but surprised by our ability to order a good meal and make the arrangeme nts. The night of our dinner, I/Renee was joined by one of our voluntee

r friends from another site. The students definitely enjoyed her beautiful young face.

One last event before the break for summer was a boat outing on our lake. Four of my boys

from HongHe invited us for the outing. On a hot day we boarded a raftlike covered boat and paddled our way around the lake. It was good to get another view of the beautiful campus and fun to share the ride and then dinner with the boys.

Excitement on the ride was provided by another student who was fishing along the lake. When he saw us he stripped down to his underwear and swam out to us. No swimming allowed, of course, but that only added to the excitement. A great time was had by all.

Graduation is a bittersweet time. The term ending, friends leaving. Graduation here means that each department will have a party for its graduates. We were invited to several of these parties P.E., art, music, dance, landscape design. Notice which one were were not invited to? The P.E. celebration provided a formal invitation and a place at the head table with the head teachers. They provided us with flowers as well as all of their teachers. At one of the art celebrations I got to sing "You have a Friend".

I (Renee) had a chance to tutor one of our teacher friends in English for a few weeks. His name is Duan Qiang; he is a vocal teacher and performer. I think I mainly succeeded in encouraging him to open his mo

uth and speak. I don't know that he learned much new info, but he did become more confident. Also, quite by accident, I discovered the efficacy of showing/assigning movies to my classes and

using them as a basis for discussion. When the students have something to talk about, they do much better, especially if they are in a small group. I wanted to help them understand something about the Civil Rights movement in America; I used

The Great Debaters and Remember the Titans, both of which star Denzel Washington. The third movie, on which I based our final exam, was The Miracle Worker, the story of Helen Keller and her teacher, Anne Sullivan. The Chinese students are very sensitive emotionally; that movie wiped them out. Movies are very accessible here online.

Meet and Greet

There have been many things going on here. We have been to Neijiang for a gathering of volunteers. We saw lots of friends from the summer and some of the volunteers who are about done their service. We had the Treeces visit us with their three sons and we had a great time playing with the kids. Renee has been to Nanjing to see her sister and her niece who just had a baby. We watched the Dragon Boats race. We are getting ready for our summer work teaching teachers in a rural community and planning to visit the family in Wuxi to study four genterations from the Revolution. Just some highlights among other things going on here - especially many competitions. BUT this blog is to be about some people we have grown to know and love.
This morning Jason joined us to watch the Dragon Boats. He often helps to organize us. We got to know him because he came to help us with our computer. He is a Chemistry-Environmental Major, but he knows computers. He knows them well enough that he is one of four young men who the school has hired to keep everyone's computers working. Tonight he borrowed our camera so he could have pictures of his friends. He downloaded on our computers and sent the pictures to his. We have been involved in his love and life. He will work for an environmental company next Fall and graduate in a year. You have seen his picture before when he climbed the mountain with us. The picture is from the Pear Blossom Festival day at the top of the mountain.
Zen Wei (Heidi) is our counterpart. She is the school contact for us. When we need to know something or do something we are supposed to go through her. You know she has her hands full with us. She on the other hand is supposed to relay all of the school information to us. She will be studying in America this summer. She is a sports woman and we have played tennis. The picture is from the Sports Meerting Day. The teacher with her is "Colin." He taught in one of the rooms after me last semester and observed me. We got to talk and are friends. We often ride the school bus together. He can remind me that my frustrations are small things and the Chinese teachers face them as well - they are just better adjusted. Colin is working on a poetry article for publication. He will be moving as well as us to the new campus sometime this summer.
These two nice looking gentlemen are my CHinese tutors. I meet with Gao Bin (right) on Tuesday mornings. He is from Shandong on the east coast. He is studying Journalism but hopes to go to graduate school to study Chinese. He is an basketball phanatic and I have learned many basketball words. We watched the NCAA finals together. Jackie (Shi Zhen Xin) is a business English major from Hebei Province. He has been involved in several schemes to get rich quick since we have been here. He has a girl friend in one of my classes and that also takes his time. We have been meeting during our lunch break time this semester. Jackie is a go to guy when there is a question about anything.
This semester I have been having lunch with the same group of students every week. I have gotten to know them pretty well and most of their English has improved accordingly. On Monday I meet with two art students, Wang Wu and Wu Ji Guo. On Wednesday I meet with Janey and Dane, two girls from my Class 6. Janey, who didn't say a word last semester, asked me if she could have lunch with me this semester and we have made it a practice. We are often joined by her friends or mine, but Dane and Janey make up the group. They will be teachers and do prsctice teaching next Fall. On Thursday I eat with Liu Shao Xin, a Journalism student and Gao Bin's roommate. I met him early last semester eating dumplings and we have been friends ever since. He is part of what I call the Shandong mafia. There are many students here a long way from home. He is a class leader. In order that he doesn't have to speak English every week, we often have an English speaker with us whom he invites. He is the tall one in the center.
My fifth friend is new. We met about Easter time. She and her group of friends often are in a group which we meet with on Sunday afternoon. It is quite a nice treat to be accepted into a group of young people. Ellen is an English major at Chongqing University of Technology and Vocation here in Yongchuan. Renee and I have enjoyed our conversations and her colloquial Englgish. Through her we have been invited to a wedding party for one of the group members and into several homes. We feel very accepted.
Our lives are full. Tomorow we will have lunch with the Catholic priest. He is nervous and is bringing his friend from the Foreign Language school in town so we can communicate. It will be a good time.

Spotlights

It was Rich's idea that we would each use this blog to tell you about five special people in our lives.

This is our beautiful friend, Serena, posing by a peach tree in blossom. She will graduate this year and receive a degree in Landscape Design, a perfect major for this lovely place. Then she will go to Nanjing Seminary, where her sister is already a student. She tried to go directly into the graduate school, but the exam was too difficult and instead, she will be admitted as a junior undergraduate. We have shared many precious moments, especially talking about our Best Friend. She often translates for us at the Protestant Church.

Here is David, one of my tutors. You saw his picture in the last blog preparing jiao zi. He is a man of many talents, especially cooking. It is a saying here that Chongqing men cook, and many do it very well. It is interesting that often students say that their mothers and grandmothers usually do the cooking, but on special occasions or for special company, the fathers and grandfathers cook. David is a big fan of American movies and American music. He can warble "Country Road," and recently watched Mamma Mia four times straight. From that movie he likes to sing "Money, Money," but we both like "Slipping Through My Fingers." Although he is only a freshman, he takes his tutoring very seriously and is always prepared with a variety of challenges and activities for me each week.

This is Sally. She is one of the young mom's that we have become acquainted with during the time we have lived here. She and her husband, Ji Quan Peng, have invited us right into their lives. We have an open invitation to drop in whenever we can, and we have learned so much about child rearing Chinese style by observing the care of their new little one, Ji Dian Shuai.
We call him Shuai Ge, which means handsome. Sally teaches Landscape Design and is back to work after having leave last term. Here "day care" is provided by grandparents. Even if they live far away, the grandmas at least come for many months and provide priceless service. Our friendship with Sally and her family has been made much easier because she is fairly fluent in English. How lucky we are.

Another young woman whose English is quite good is Becky. I'm sorry that we do not have a better picture of her. She is standing next to me in this photo, taken on a foggy, foggy day on Tea Mountain. Becky and her parents own a DVD/CD shop in Yongchuan. Becky has not had the educational opportunities that many people her age have enjoyed, but she has benefited from several years of Peace Corps tutors. I have joined those ranks, but I don't really have to teach her much. We are reading Tuesdays with Morrie together. She is a good friend too and a tremendous resource for all the foreign teachers. She often translates for us at the Catholic church.

The girl with the big smile in this picture is Hua Hua. Because of her, I know a few things about Chinese hospitals. When Hua Hua broke her leg last fall and had to spend almost a month in the hospital, I visited her several times. She is a very friendly girl, as you can see, and by the end of her stay, she was on good terms with all the patients and nurses and doctors on the ward. Breaking her leg was a devastating blow to Hua Hua who loves to dance and run and play a variety of sports. She has been very brave and has taught me a lot about perseverance.

Each one of these people, and so many more, bless our lives every day. They encourage us and we try to do the same for them as they face many of the stresses and strains that are common to people everywhere. Sometimes we marvel at their coping strategies. We are learning many things about our own American attitudes about life. In fact, I feel I am getting a better perspective on American culture by living in China. Rich and I both are realizing that we have little patience, and are constantly trying to "move mountains" with grit and determination when we might better try a little "wu wei," doing by not doing. Recently, I have been thinking about the Serenity Prayer -- Grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change; the courage to change the things I can change; and the wisdom to know the difference." Amen

And speaking of mountains, there is mountain building in progress near our apartment. This "mountain" often spilled rock onto the athletic field when we had a heavy rain. The solution has been rather ingenious. After removing all trees and all loose soil, the workers used wire to reinforce then blew concrete over all. There are many small round holes in the concrete, about 4 inches in diameter. We think it will be for drainage, but some say "maybe they will make a waterfall." It also looks like an invitation for a mural or a perfect rock climbing wall. We're just happy to have it finished and to have our most direct path to everywhere open again.

And one more interesting thing. Have you seen a leaf like this? It appears to have worms crawling on it, but they are not worms at all. Instead, they are a configuration of the leaf. Do you think it is some sort of protective adaptation?

ODDS AND ENDS

Among our favorite odds and ends was a dumpling party. Remember the students who climbed Huang Gua Shan with us? They treated us to a big meal. In return, we planned a dumpling party. Everyone's favorite food is dumplings. We invited the five students early in the week -- not very Chinese because things are done rather last minute here, but some American customs, like planning ahead, are hard to let go of. After her class on Friday morning, Renee went into town with a friend to get the ground meat and other needs. David, her tutor and friend, agreed to honcho the process. David came early and helped assemble the food stuffs so that they would be ready when the kids came. He called his mother to get advice on the seasonings (boy. was she proud). When the students arrived, we talked a bit and when all were present we began the process of stuffing, folding, and then cooking the dumplings. Everyone loved the task and we laughed at the different styles and rules. You can guess whose dumplings looked worse and most likely fell apart. Dumplings are a good company meal because you also make your own strength of dipping sauce for the dumpling. Those whose tastes run to the spicy could make their sauce as hot as they wished. We made enough for everyone to have more than 20 and they all disappeared. We will do it again with a new group sometime.

Tomb Sweeping Day brought us a one day vacation - a long weekend. We stayed put, but four of our young Peace Corps friends came to visit us. What a treat for us. Jennifer came from Gansu on Friday and spent two nights (17 hour trip each way). It was great to see her. She had not been at the training in January and we feared we would not see her again. It was just like we had not been apart. Jennifer and Renee enjoyed finding a piano and spending an hour or so making it "sing." Unfortunately, they attracted an audience of students much too quickly, but they still had a good time.

On Saturday Patrick, Jonah and Caitlin came. Our little apartment cou;ld feed, but house? Another foreign teacher put up the boys for one night. The next morning, early, we watched the NCAA semifinals together. My two teams lost and I got little sympathy. We found a place for beer on Saturday night, played games on Sunday, and of all of the great things to do in and around our campus, Patrick and Jonah chose to find the blind masseur. They say they will come back for more, but we know how hard it is to do that, inertia being what it is. Just a post script, as a a result of this little masseus adventure, I had my first massage in China. It "tasted" like another.

Another odd was that we went to a music program. Afterwards we talked with one of the participants, who got our number and called, wanting to be friends. It turns out he is the roommate of another music major who is already our friend. The two of them organized a music night for us. They and their friends played and sang just for us. Of course, Renee was in her element - she played, we sang, she tried flutes and violins. Great night. One funny sidelight -- as we were walking to the rendezvous point to begin the evening, we met a couple of young English majors who inquired where we were going. When we explained, and they saw who we were meeting -- "boys" -- they decided to tag along. One ended up being asked for her telephone number and the other touched a piano for the very first time. She told me (Renee) later that she and many students from the countryside had never had a chance to see, let alone learn to play a musical instrument. That gave me another glimpse into how rich we really are.

Another end was a birthday party. David the tutor and dumpling chef turned 20 on Saturday. He invited us and some of his classmates to a party. This is the Chinese custom. The birthday boy throws his own party. We had a delicious meal of Duck Soup. The table was filled with small dishes to be added to and eaten from the soup. We ate so much that we did not have dinner that night.

Easter is odd here in China. It is not celebrated in any way like in America in the community nor in the churches. Being outside of the city we missed some of the goings on - apparently there were baptisms in the Catholic Church and a vigil. To prepare ourselves we watched The Passion and the Last Temptation of Christ. Easter in the Catholic Church was a confession day but with so many people not everyone got heard. The church was packed and everything took longer, but there was little except the music to indicate it was a special feast day. The Evangelical Church had a shortened service. Then a marathon of over 40 acts took the stage to sing and dance. Much of it was religious but not all. It was sort of a potluck of entertainment and praise rather than food. Many of the participants were "seniors" and from the countryside. Some of them only get to chuch on Christmas and Easter, but not because they would not like to go more often. It is very difficult for them to leave their farms. The congregation, probably the "deacons," if there are such things, cooked and distributed a boxed lunch for the crowd before the end of the show. After eating, the crowd thinned considerably.

Many odds and ends.

WHAT IS NORMAL?

We arrived back in XingHu on February 5. We had been concerned that we would feel abandoned because school was out and most of the faculty and almost all of the students were gonee ha, but immediately we had a few tasks to do. The first was cleaning the apartment. A month of absence had left a refrigerator in need of serious attention and a coating of dirt everywhere. Restoring a livable environment took about two days. The next concern was our camera. During our time away one of our camera cards became unreadable. Since we had many precious photos on it, we were sad. One of our student friends took us from store to store in town to find a way to get the pictures off our camera. No luck, but his friend took the camera card and found someone for a small fee who would try. As you have seen, he was sucessful and our travel blog had pictures, My cousin volunteered to replace the card so we are now good to go. While the local stores were almost all closed, the local farmers still sold produce on the days ending in 3, 7, and 0, so we had food. Another advantage was that one of the 17 families left on campus are good friends. We had dinner together and played with their new baby. We have come a long way since our first visit to the deserted campus before school started in September.

We also planned to get to the other two major tourist attractions in the area while we had time. Our first was the Chongqing Animal Park. It is only a short bus ride and we go by it many times a week. On our salary, the entrance fee is expensive. We decided to use our travel money to finance the entrance and we bought a season pass. On this first trip we walked around and got up close and personal with some animals. People seem to really like the safari, which is in another part of this massive park. We saved that for another visit. Those of you who looked up Yongchuan have already been introduced to the park. Tourist from all over China arrive here daily.

The other adventure was to go to Tea Mountain (Cha Shan). Our good friend Becky and one of the art students from first semester and his girl friend went with us. We wandered throught the Bamboo forest maze for about an hour and a half. We decided that it would be cool in the summer time because of the dense growth. Then we decided to head up the mountain. We were unsure of the path but marched onward. Midway, we ran into a trio of young people having a good time. They tagged along for awhile, but we were too slow. They ran off. Shortly, they returned to say they had found the way to the top. We followed along as they went ahead. They stopped at a hard stretch and helped the more mature up. Finally, we reached the top and it seemed like we were in a cloud. It will be great to go back in the summer and enjoy the coolness of the forest and the mountain. The trek down is always hard for us, and these typical Chinese young people stayed and helped us to the bottom. One of them, Xiao Wan, has become a friend. The "bottom" you should understand was a winding road that was still about a 25 minute walk to the bus stop. We got plenty of exercise that day.

School has started and three weeks are complete. My classes are the seven Junior English Teaching Major classes. I have all of the same students except one girl who has dropped out. This semester I am planning on doing speech exercises with them. Impromptu speeches are this week. Dinner with the Doctor has also started again. On the first night I had a visitor on my lap. Renee has six of the same classes of English majors and picked up my class of Freshmen from last semester. She lost two of her classes from last semester. She is sorry, but they are still around and greet her warmly. ( I, Renee, am feeling good about my classes right now. It's nice to see many familiar faces, and Rich's class is lots of fun. They already have a positive attitude toward me because they liked him so much. I am trying to weave in some study skills and some Benchmark strategies, which I think are important in any educational setting. And, of course, we are singing.) The bus rides continue, the entertainment (parties) continue, and the Saturday night dances continue.

The one non - continuous thing was this last Saturday. It wasTree Planting Day. Over 1000 students went to seven different sites to plant thousands of trees from the school's nursery. We joined the group that planted trees on the mountain. It was a mammouth bit of organization, but hundreds of students climbed half way up the mountain and then spread out to plant trees. It was a beautiful day and a great time. The mountain, the streams, river and roadsides should all be better off for this attention. Besides climbing the mountain itself, the other challenge was trying not to step on any newly planted trees because they were quite small and we were quite numerous. After completing that task, we (read "Richard") decided to continue up the mountain with some student friends. It is a somewhat strenuous climb, but doable. At the top, the plan was to go to the pear orchards and see the blossoms. We had no idea it was Flower Day. The top of the mountain was jammed with people. We made our way to the orchards and saw the pear trees and beautiful fields of flowers. One prominent flower right now is bright yellow and is used to make an inexpensive but tasty oil, rapeseed oil. Then we realized that we were hungry, but we had made no preparations for eating. It was difficult to get a table. All of the restaraunts were booked. We ended up waiting a long time for food (We could have gotten back home, but what fun would that have been?). Coming down the mounain is harder for some of us (read "Richard and Renee") than going up. Two of the guys helped me and Renee's Chinese tutor helped her all the way down. What we had planned as a two hour trip took eight hours. (I was grateful that Rich also felt the descent was difficult. Then I didn't feel like such a fuddy-duddy.)After that strenuous activity of that day, we only stayed for two dances last night.

Today after church we went to a teacher's home and made and ate dumplings for lunch, played badminton, and hopefully are prepared for tomorrow's classes.

CHUN JIE 2009

After our travels in Yunnan, we returned to Chengdu to stay with our host family. Je Min and Rong Rong picked us up at the airport. We drove to his school to wait for their son, He Da, to finish his university classes. When that was accomplished, Je Min, He Da, and I went to play tennis while the women rested. We batted the ball around in 50 degree weather. I was to note the vast improvement in He Da's game due to his tennis lessons, and I did. The women then joined us, and we washed and went off to enjoy dinner in town. Then it was home and to bed early to rest up for the trip to Je Min's hometown the next morning.

The next day we and it seemed like most of Chengdu were up early and on the road. The trip from Chengdu to Nanchong should have taken about two and a half hours. About four hours into the trip, we stopped and the men folk got out and relieved themselves along the road. We enjoyed some fruit and started the trip again. The women folk got their chance at the next rest stop, which was like Grand Central Station at rush hour. Believe me (Renee), braving a crowded rest room in China is no mean feat. I was thinking about the people who are trampled at soccer matches as I tried to stay upright in the entering crowd while watching the exiting patrons struggling to get out through the narrow doorway that served as both entrance and exit. By this time, we were no longer hurrying. We had missed all our deadlines, but got to Nanchong in good spirits and had a meal of left overs. Renee and I stayed with Je Min's sister while the family went off to Grandmother's house. We were made as comfortable as possible, being given the parents' bedroom for our home. In the evening the entire family joined together and drove to the Jaling River where we sent off Kong Ming Lights, which are miniature hot air balloons made of paper and powered by a candle. They are usually red or gold and about the size of a bushel basket. According to legend, the lights were invented by a general during the wars of the Three Kingdoms as a tactic to light the sky so the army could fight at night. As you can see in the picture, we lit a candle in a paper lantern, and the hot air allowed it to rise into the sky. With it ascended our good wishes and hopes for the new year. This was the day before the eve of the Chinese New Year Spring Festival (Chun Jie).

The main event for the day before the New Year is making dumplings. In this family everyone has a role. The secret family recipe is provided by the Grandmother, the Nai Nai. The filling is prepared by much chopping of ingredients by the women. The dough is made by one of the uncles. Small chunks of dough are pulled and rolled into flat circles. Others are ready to start stuffing and crimping the dumplings. All the other tasks continue simultaneously because we are making a lot of dumplings. Huge pots of water are bubbling on the burners and the dumplings are brought to a boil three times to prepare them for eating. The eating had to be done in shifts. Renee and I worked on many parts of the making, but wherever we worked, the process was slowed, so we were moved on quickly. The misshapen look of my dumplings (Renee) became a family joke, and now and again someone would hold up a dumpling and say, "I wonder who made this one." But they all tasted great, and we ate and ate and ate.

As the dumpling feasting was drawing to a close, we put on the TV to watch the national spectacular on CCTVI. They tell us everyone watches it. It is a variety show which intersperses traditional and modern Chinese entertainments. (It looks just like the Friday night entertainments at our school. Obviously, the students steal the format from the professionals.) In our home the show was on but not watched intently. Mostly people talked. The kids got out their musical instruments and played. Time was taken out for group pictures. Every once in awhile something in the show would get our attention such as a feature on the earthquake and a salute to some heroes. It all seemed pretty tame for a new Year's Eve. THEN at about 11:45, everyone jumped up and wriggled into their coats; we were off to the river again. We were going to set off fireworks. So were the other 500,000 people in Nanchong. It was a harrowing ride through town as rockets flew overhead and bombs burst on both sides of the car, or so it seemed. When we got to our destination, we could hardly see because of the smoke up and down the river and along every side street leading to the river. That did not stop us. A big box of works was set up and lit and a five to ten minute show followed of small but lovely fireworks. Then we each got out our individual rocket firers and we shot them across the street and toward the river. Sparks and ash and smoke were everywhere. The university president, the foreign guests, the whole family, the grandmother - amazing. And the NOISE. It is said that all this noise scares away evil spirits and ghosts. This is serious noise. Then came the sparklers, big sparklers and firecrackers, big firecrackers. From outer space it had to look like Nanchong was being attacked. Eventually, the celebration ended for us and we were off to bed, lulled into slumber by the sounds of explosions. We woke up to them as well.

The main event of New Year's Day was an intergenerational basketball game. Ji Min's sister, He Li, married a man with four brothers. All of them love this basketball game. It is fathers vs sons. The sons had won for the first time last year and both the fathers and sons were ready for the grudge match. I was caught between the two as I was to be the referee. I "let them play" which meant the fathers held, pulled and pushed to stay in the game. The young men groaned and complained vociferously as they ran and scored and won the game anyway. About 13 people played, so there were substitutes. The women folk and some men folk came to watch "the game." There was a score keeper and a timer and the grandmothers cheered. The family that plays together stays together.

The main event of every couple of hours was eating. Just as we had pictures taken in all sorts of groups, we had meals with all sorts of groups. Every meal was an orchestrated event. I started with an assortment of cold dishes. Then the main courses came out one at a time. It is a time for eating meat and the young men ate the meat like they had never seen it before. We enjoyed the food and the banter around the table and sometimes the games. At each of these meals there is toasting and drinking - beer, wine, bai jiu, whiskey. It is all lighthearted and sort of controlled, but there is obligatory toasting and pairings of drinkers so. The culture is a drinking culture so the young men need to be trained. This family setting was a good way to have this happen. In Nanchong the smallest gathering for one of these meals was 14 and the largest was 22. Restaurants do a great business at this time of the year. Every place we went was filled to capacity, but we were never inconvenienced because we were always in a private room. We can't remember if Chinese restaurants in America have that private room option. It is great for small gatherings, a little removed from the hustle and bustle and loud talk of the main restaurant.

In addition to all of this celebrating, we had a great time seeing Nanchong and its surroundings. We visited the sites of events and people associated with the Three Kingdom Period. The book The Romance of the Three Kingdoms is one of the classics of Chinese literature - check it out on Youtube. We visited the old city of Langchong with its Confucian temple and examination hall where the civil service exam was given every three years. Did you know that people actually died during those nine day exams? They were very stressful. It was also possible to climb a tower in the old city and look down on the roofs of the hutang, a rare example nowadays of old China where the one room houses are crowded together, side by side. Also, we went to Deng Xiaoping's home. It is close by and there is a beautiful exhibit there about his life. The exhibit doesn't tell what happened from 1969 to 1979 - interesting. People really admire what he was able to do to help make China what it is today. We were there in the morning; by afternoon there were long lines just waiting to get into the grounds.

After four days it was time to move on to Rong Rong's family home in Suining. Everyone knows that most beautiful girls come from Suining. (This claim is made by many towns in China.) This drive was much shorter and in only about an hour we arrived at Rong Rong's sisters home where we would stay. Again we were given the sister's room and private bath. Everything that could be done to make us comfortable was done, including watching the English speaking station on the television. JeMin and his family were off to the grandmother's home again, this time Rong Rong's mother and father. In both of these homes, there is limited English spoken, so we are pretty proud of ourselves for communicating and surviving and, we hope, being good guests.

We missed New Year's here, but Spring Festival continued. We had big meals every few hours and ate the traditional foods at the appropriate time alternating dumplings and Tang Yuan (a rice ball filled with - poppy seeds, brown sugar, sweet bean paste, peanut butter). For this family the highlight of the week was the return of the son from Chengdu for three days. The day after we got there, he arrived. Li is a special policeman in Chengdu. He ran along with the Olympic torch to protect it. He is in an elite group of 36 men aged 25 - 35. His parents waited and cheered his arrival. He had a hard time because his girlfriend also lives in Suining. He had to balance mom and girlfriend for three days. The biggest meals surrounded his return. He brought a bottle of Vodka and that was the beverage of choice for toasting this time. He was placed beside me - his girl friend was across the table. He spent much time walking around the table lingering with her, but toasting each person in their turn. In Suining with a smaller family the meals size ranged from 8 to 13 people. (Talking to some of my students, I learned that their largest meal had 5 people. The effects of a one child policy.)

We had a good time seeing the sights of Suining as well. We enjoined searching for ducks on the Ya (Duck) River and sunning ourselves along the river and drinking tea on one particularly beautiful afternoon. Guanyin's Temple, which is the largest of her temples in China, is in town. HeDa and a friend were our guides through the temple grounds and its traditions and cuisine. We saw the old and the new in Suining -- a brand new university going up in a barren lot and the old university torn down. Will the trees they transplanted from one environment to another survive? After three days, it was farewell to Suining.

It felt like home to get back to Chengdu. We moved back to where we had stayed this summer and settled in. We ended up staying longer than we planned because of the people we were to meet and Peace Corps obligations we had to meet. We visited the Peace Corps offices and picked up my passport. We saw the medical staff and talked and ate with several of the staff working there. We then met with three groups of students from my Model school class this summer. Parker and Paul are now freshmen students in Beijing and Chongqing respectively. They shared a big lunch, sort of a meat fondue. and lots of good stories about the freshman life away from home. We then joined up with Andy who works at the Chengdu airport. All of us walked to a Bamboo Park near Sichuan University. It was a nice park with lots of activities where people could try their hand at some old crafts and skills of China. The next day we met Nicole and Super Pig, (Charlie) freshmen students at Sichuan Normal University and about to be American bound to study at Pittsburg State. They took us to Nicole's hometown and planned a day around what they thought we would especially like. Both of them come from rather upper middle class families, and Charlie had a car to transport us. He is a very good driver. We had great conversation and learned some new ideas about Chinese history as well. Our last day we roamed around Shiling remembering our time there last summer, a good way to end our near month long travel.