Only Three Weeks Left

We spent most of this last week preparing our lessons for the end of the semester.  We also had to decide what the oral and written final was going to look like.  That isn't totally completed yet for our writing students.  The challenge is to come up with a final that requires THEM to write but doesn't require US to grade it.  Any ideas?

One thing that we have had to deal with lately has been unusually hot weather.  The lowest "high" temperature this week was 96 degrees.  It was actually 102 on Thursday and 100 on Friday.  We are lucky to have air conditioning in our apartment, but there is none in the classrooms.  Teaching a roomful of sweaty, uncomfortable and very tired students was a challenge, especially since Nancy has two classes that start at 4pm!  There is no air-conditioning in the dormitories so the students complain that it was impossible to sleep or study.  We really can't blame them.  We didn't feel like teaching either!!

In spite of the heat we finished our 14th week of this semester.  We are trying to cut back on the amount of homework and create activities that are higher interest to keep them engaged.  We still feel they are starting to check out.  In that way, they are no different than US students.

Nancy was back in the recording studio this week.  Our friend from the university called again and asked her to help with another Oral English Exam recording.  She really enjoyed being on the other side of a microphone and they paid her really well.  She was just a strutt'en when she arrived back home.

Our friends, Brian and Sara Harmon, invited us over Sunday evening to spend time with them sitting outside in cool breeze that came in with a major change in the weather.  It was so nice to NOT cook when outside.  Brian let Stan take their little tricycle car for a spin around the parking lot.  It was fun but didn't convince him than he try driving in real Chinese traffic in this thing.  It's "cute" and does work but doesn't provide much protection.

Stan enjoying the "drive"!

 

This is Brian with his 6-month old son, Pacific.  

 

Sara with Pacific

 

"Big brother", Toby, is very active 4 year old and didn't want to hold still for his picture to be taken.  He did allow Nancy to read him a few books a little later in the evening.

 

This is the hotel where we meet for church each Sunday.  When we arrived this morning, it was obvious a wedding would be held at that location.  There were fire crackers ready to light in the tubes at the side of the red arch.  That is traditionally a part of a Chinese wedding, along with a rented procession of decorated cars for the wedding party.  We never seem to have the camera available when the wedding cars are coming along the street!

Nancy was scanning the journal entries for her writing class.  She noted that a few weeks ago a few of her English/Law students had the opportunity of having lunch with 14 "assistants" to US Congressman.  The students really enjoyed telling them about Shandong University and conversing in English.  Plus they could ask questions about American government.  What a wonderful cultural exchange!!

We attended another college senior recital this past week at SDU Central Campus, but we forgot the camera.  We were just so excited to enjoy the air conditioning in the recital hall as it was a hot evening and most places on campus do not have this luxury.  This concert there were several selections by a brass quartet and a violinist.  Since the MC speaks in Chinese and the program is in Chinese, we just hope for familiar music.  Overall, this was one of the better performances we have seen on campus, although there still seemed to be some "off"  notes for students majoring in music performance.

Tomorrow there is no school.  It is Dragon Boat Festival, although most of the races take place in the south of China.  The holiday is known as Duanwu Festival and the stores have a lot of rice wrapped in bamboo leaves...zongzi.

(Picture from the internet)

 

Best known in modern China holds that the festival commemorates the death of the poet and minister Qu Yuan (c. 340–278 BC) of the ancient state of Chu during the Warring States period of the Zhou Dynasty.  A cadet member of the Chu royal house, Qu served in high offices. However, when the king decided to ally with the increasingly powerful state of Qin, Qu was banished for opposing the alliance and even accused of treason. During his exile, Qu Yuan wrote a great deal of poetry. Twenty-eight years later, Qin captured Ying, the Chu capital. In despair, Qu Yuan committed suicide by drowning himself in the Miluo River.  It is said that the local people, who admired him, raced out in their boats to save him or at least retrieve his body. This is said to have been the origin of dragon boat races. When his body could not be found, they dropped balls of sticky rice into the river so that the fish would eat them instead of Qu Yuan's body. This is said to be the origin of zongzi."

 

 

 

One of our BYU couples tasted zongzi and said it was ok, but "nothing to write home about"!

Just like Home-The Qingdao Weekend

The title of our blog post this week, "Just like home-The Qingdao Weekend" is a reference to the climate on the Oregon coast.  When it gets hot inland, Portlanders head West. It was just like that for us Friday, Saturday and Sunday as we traveled East to the coast.  The weather was cool and it rained and rained and rained.  Given that the temperatures in Jinan were in the mid 90's, it was a pleasant relief from the heat.

Before we talk about our experience in Qingdao, we update you on a few other things.

 This was taken last Sunday during Priesthood Meeting at church in Jinan.  We meet in a hotel room where a BYU couple lives.  After our worship service together, the men and women met separately for a meeting.  There is very little sitting space, other than the main living room, so the men "relaxed" as they listened to the lesson over Skype!  David Cox is in the back and Wayne Clarke in the front!

 Tuesday evening most of the BYU teachers had dinner in a private room at the Central Campus Faculty "Restaurant".  We used our "meal credits" which we receive from SDU for each day we teach.   This was to honor some of our "helpers" that make life easier for us in Jinan.  Eva is in the blue outfit in the front.  She is Zina Cox's co-teacher but has been so willing to haul everyone in her car, buy train tickets, interpret Chinese signs, etc.  Lily, our young adult friend, is in the back next to Kathy (our Chinese Canadian church member). 

 

 Nancy recalled her college days in the broadcast booth when she and Stan were asked to record English dialogue for a junior high English test.  We did a similar recording in January.  This one was much easier as there were no Chinese cities to pronounce.  It was all English!

 

 All the BYU teachers in Jinan, plus Kathy and her son from church, decided to go on a weekend excursion to Qingdao.  It is a seaport on the eastern part of Shandong Province and includes a China naval base and is home to the Tsingtao Brewery.  We were hoping to enjoy the beach and "cooler" temperatures, as Jinan has been in the 90's the last week.  We definitely had our wish along with a lot of rain!.  We did enjoy meeting with the other BYU teachers in Qingdao and they were so kind to host us.  This is a view of greenhouses along the way.  Shandong Province is a major producer of food for China.  Upon our arrival we were able to hire a van to haul all 8 of us to the hotel, which was much cheaper than going by taxi.

.

Nancy made use of her time on the high speed train to "correct" autobiographical writing assignments.  Wayne and Libby Clarke are in the background.  We love traveling by high speed train.

 

 Hansen, Kathy's son, enjoyed his huge hamburger at Koronas, a western style restaurant which the BYU teachers enjoyed taking us to Friday night.  Pat and Harold Rust from Lake Oswego, Oregon are behind Hansen talking to Stan.  (We did not know the Rusts prior to coming with the BYU CTP).

 

Early Saturday morning we met the bus at the entrance to Qingdao University.  All of the BYU teachers in Shandong Province and a number of staff and families from the two universities in Qingdao boarded and traveled about 45 minutes to the International Horticulture Exposition.  We had no idea how big this Expo was...many acres!!  The city dedicated a huge area for the exhibition and built many buildings just for the event.  It was the former site of a mining operation.  The entire Expo was a little like the Olympics and represents a significant investment in the economy of Qingdao.  This coastal city was selected as the "most livable city" in China in 2009.  We have to agree.  It is much nicer than Jinan.

 

Below are a number of pictures we took at the Exposition.

 

 This was a building in the Thailand exhibit.

There was no Chinese holiday this weekend, but it was still very crowded.  The greenery reminded us of Oregon.

This was the Holland display and exhibit.

This gal was offering samples of pears from Holland.  One of the BYU teachers from Qingdao found her student working at this booth!

 Notice the sculptured frogs and water lilies. 

Indoor botanical gardens.  Since it was raining, we liked this part of the Exposition.

 

Some of the gardens inside.

 

After spending about 5 hours walking the property, we returned to the bus and went back to our hotel.  Most of us chose to tour downtown Qingdao with the local BYU teachers even though it was raining heavily.  We didn't think we would ever have the chance to be there again, so we braved the elements.  We're glad we did though it took quite some time to dry out our clothes and shoes!!

 

 In downtown Qingdao you will find the Olympic Sailing center. 

During the summer Olympics in 2008 some of the water events were held here.  It was the only other location outside of Beijing that awarded Olympic medals.

 There are miles of "promenade" along the beaches.  Behind us you can see the Yellow Sea.  That red structure is quite important  to the region.  , According to the treaty of Versailles after WWI ended, apparently China lost territory and Japan was granted some land in Shandong Province.  The red structure memorializes when a large number of students protested the treatment of the Chinese.  This all happened in 1919. 

 We took a walk on a pier out to a pagoda .  You can see that the rain just did not let up.
 

 Pagoda on the pier

 

 After looking around on the beach, we went looking for German architecture in the old town.  We found some, including this Catholic Church.  The Germans occupied this area from 1897 -1914. 

 

One of the BYU teachers in Qingdao arranged for us to have dinner at a German Restaurant called the Rats Keller.  Rat Keller means the basement of the City Hall.  The restaurant was actually housed in the old German Mayor's residence which is partially under renovation. 

 

 Wayne and Libby Clarke at the Ratskeller.  Most of us had Schnitzel.  Stan thought it was GREAT!

Sunday, we attended church with the other BYU teachers at the Qingdao LDS Branch.  There were 38 in attendance including President Weaver, our District President, who was visiting that day.  His sister is married to our nephew!!  It was another international gathering of foreign passport holders.  We had Koreans, a Japanese couple, our Chinese Canadian and all of us from the US.  (The gal in the green is from West Linn, Oregon and we knew her on our Portland LDS Temple shift prior to coming to China.)  We thought it was unusual that one of the Korean young adults, who will be leaving soon on an LDS mission to Boston, was interpreting for the Japanese couple as we held church in China!!

 Jim and Wendy Purnell, BYU teachers in Jinan from Canada, are seated in the forefront of the picture.

The apartment rented by the church for services is near the beach in a very nice condo neighborhood with beautiful landscaping and flowers.  You can almost see a portion of the golf course to the left beyond the tall tree. 

Nancy is finishing her dinner on the high speed train from Qingdao to Jinan. You are right, that is a McDonalds chicken burger.  When you travel, you sometimes grab what you can!  We thought we had plenty of time to go to the train station from the church location.   The Qingdao BYU teachers said it should take about 50 minutes on the bus.  Due to slow traffic, it took us 1 hour and 25 minutes.  Once we did arrive, we had only about 10 minutes before they had us start boarding the train.  We were in first class and the very first car.  We walked about 1/4 mile just on the train platform to reach our seats!  However, the accommodations are quite comfortable and the seats have plenty of leg room.  Plus we received complimentary snacks and drinks!  Life in China is tough!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Qufu-Confucius' Hometown

 

About 2 hours south of Jinan is the community of Qufu.  It is the birthplace of one of the most important philosopher "types" in Chinese history; Confucius.  He lived around 551-479 BC so his life predates the Savior by quite a period.  Confucius was born to a very poor family and he never enjoyed an easy life.  He was a teacher, but his ideas were different.  He had some faithful students who later taught his ideas and gained favor with the leaders of the Dynasties.  His family became quite prosperous and even today they have substantial holdings in Qufu.  In fact, our guide, was a descendent of the Kong family line.

The trip to Qufu was sponsored by Shandong University and is one of two they offered foreign teachers this school year.  There were only 10 of us on this trip, 6 of whom were from BYU.   It was a nice outing and we did not have to fight the crowds.  There was no holiday this weekend so the number of tourists was quite reasonable.  We didn't feel that we would be trampled if we stopped to look at something of interest.   We liked that.  See the pictures below.

 Entrance to the Temple of Confucius.  The town of Qufu, with about 60,000 residents, "survives" on tourism.

 

 Entering the gate for the first university in China!!
 

 Once Confucius was respected as a teacher, many emperors came to Qufu to honor him.  Each would erect a "temple" and there are many stone tablets indicating the teachings of Confucius, edicts granting him special titles and notes about renovations.  Many of these tablets were severely damaged during the Cultural Revolution.
 

 This was a group of Confucius "scholars" from Korea who wore clothing from the Ming Dynasty to honor him
.

 

This temple was built in 1018.  The foundation is stone, but the rest of the building is wood.

 

  The rock was a sign of good fortune for the home.  It has wrinkles, as do we, for a human quality, holes for the water to run through and it is tall and slim to be noticed.

This is a pomegranate tree in bloom the garden of the Kong Family Mansion.  Confucius only had a cottage nearby, but his wealthy descendants had a 400 room complex.

 

This lady performed a selection from an opera, accompanied by Chinese instrumentalists.  We are still not used to the "shrill" of the music.

 

In the Confucius family cemetery there are about 100,000 tombs of his descendants.  About 20,000 have actual tombstones.  Many are just mounds of dirt.  Our guide said the snakes and crows do not disturb the area because of the "smell" of the trees in the area.  The area is like a forest and very peaceful.

 

There are two guards at the entrance to the tomb of Confucius.  This one is a civil officer.  The one on the opposite side is a military officer since he has a sword.

 

The tomb of Confucius.  The back is towards a small hill (mountain) and the front faces a river...several meters away.  This is supposed to be excellent feng shui.  His son is buried nearby as well as a grandson.  It is said that Confucius is seeking his son and hugging his grandson. 

Wayne and Libby Clarke enjoying the shade of the "cart" and the forest setting.  It was a one of the first days of "summer" in our area. 

 

On the bus ride back to Jinan we had a TIC (This is China) experience.  We were on the freeway traveling the speed limit and the cars ahead of us started slamming on their brakes, as did our driver.  There was a larger truck directly in front of us so it was difficult to see what was happening.  As the traffic slowly started to flow, we saw there was a stopped passenger car perpendicular to the freeway in the far left lane.  This driver was making her way across three lanes of freeway traffic to make the freeway exit that she almost missed!!!  It was truly a miracle that no one rear ended each another and that she did not get hurt!!  None of us had our cameras ready, but it truly was a Kodak moment!!

 

Monday night we were invited to a special Foreign Culture Finale Performance on Central Campus.  A number of both Nancy's and Stan's students were involved.  It was OK, but some of the singing numbers should have been cut.

 



 These are the mc's for the evening.  At every cultural event there are mc's dressed to the hilt!

This is Kelly, one of Stan's students.  She is considered to be one of the top 10 most talented students at the university.

 

Friday evening we attended a senior trombone recital at the Shandong Arts University.  The trombonist wasn't very good, but a "featured" brass ensemble and the orchestra were great.  It was free.  There was one American in the ensemble.  His name is Greg and we assume that he is a teacher at the university.  We greeted him but did not get any details about his life in China.

 

 

The other major event for the week is that we now have water pressure in our apartment!!!  Last week our water was off and we assumed it was a street repair issue as has happened in the past.  After almost 24 hours without water, we started asking questions about the availability of water to several students, foreign teachers in our building  and an international office employee who lives in our complex.  All had water! After some phone calls, we discovered a valve for the water supply to only our apartment had failed.  Once it was replaced we had Niagara Falls! A load of laundry had started to take 4++ hours and now it is done in 40 minutes! Now that Stan can truly take a shower he said he might even consider staying an additional year teaching in China!

 

 

 

 

This video was produced by a student in Stan's Friday writing class in about 60 seconds on her phone.  He is not wearing his shirt and tie for the first time this year.  It was a very warm day.