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Thankful Thursday – Free Tuition

Global Chinese Education
Global Chinese Education (click to see album)

As most of you know, we attended Global Chinese Education while in Beijing, so I won’t go into great detail again. They arranged everything for us from airport pick up and drop off to our apartment. They helped get our wireless Internet set up and took us on field trips and out to dinner. They arranged my tutor Kiki to come to the apartment each weekday and so on. I think that we were a new type of customer for them – a family with a small baby.  And a baby adopted from China. Our time there was wonderful and so today’s TT is to share with you a wonderful program they started up a couple days before we left.

Lily from the school and her son joined us on our visit to New Day Foster Home. After going on the tour and speaking with one of the head guys, she went back and told everyone at the school about it. The school then decided to form a relationship with New Day, the first step was to order books for all the children and to arrange for the staff to go and visit New Day.

One day when I arrived at school to attend my Chinese painting class, Ethan, Lily and Nancy wanted to talk to me. They said that Mike and I had inspired them. They said that our adopting Nadia and our love for the Chinese children who still don’t have parents moved them to want to do something for orphans, and for other adoptive parents. So they launched their new program to offer free tuition to those adoptive parents and families who would like to come to Beijing and do the same kind of thing that we did.

I just think that this is so cool!!! Mike and I will definitely be going back to China sometime in the future – once Nadia is a little older, so that she can start on Chinese immersion classes of her own. And I think that a lot of families, who didn’t think they would be able to do what we did, might be able to now. That would be so awesome! To live in the culture where your child came from, even for a brief time is SO valuable. If you attend the school, you will not be in the middle of the touristy areas that you saw when on the adoption trip. You will be able to meet and interact with Chinese people going about their everyday life. And you can experience that life too.

For us it was an adventure, as neither Mike nor I had ever lived in any kind of urban setting. The apartments we lived in when we were first married where 2 levels, not 20 story buildings in the middle of the city. Using public transportation or walking everywhere was new for us too. I could go on and on, but you get the idea.

For me it was so valuable to experience China in the time that Nadia was abandoned. Once she gets older and starts to question how and why she became part of our family, I think China is going to be a very different country (not saying that’s good or bad, just different). Capitalist ideas and their opening up to the world for the Olympics is changing China and its people. I am glad that we went now and were able to meet with and talk to people from the country where she was born. She is an American now and will be raised as an American, but we want her to know the language and people of the country where she was born, and therefore I feel this trip and future trips are important.

And if you do go, tell them we sent you 🙂

Edited 2012-8-20: It looks like this school may no longer exist. I’ve removed the dead link to it. -Mike

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Playing at the park

April 7th
April 7th (click to see album)

While in China I really enjoyed the playground that was right by our apartment. To be able to walk over there with Nadia in the afternoon was wonderful. She loved seeing all the other kids and of course playing. So I have been on the hunt to find a few parks and playgrounds near us that would be fun for Nadia. We drove by one a few days ago in Hurst, but didn’t get out and play. Tonight when Mike got home from work we went over the Adventure World in NRH. This one had swings and all kinds of play areas.

Park

Nadia wanted to walk all over the area holding on to Mike’s hand. We put her on a swing for the first time and she got a big kick out of that. She did a little bit of climbing, but honestly was more interested in looking at the wood chips and rocks on the ground. Mike made a comment that the ground was messy and she kept walking around pointing at the ground going, “Messy.” Then she would bend down and look at the rocks.

Park

We got a zoo membership today which I am very excited about. My mom’s group from church is going to have a playdate there next week.

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Thankful Thursday Texas Style

  • For our trip to China. What an amazing experience to live in the culture for a month! I think we learned a lot and have a great foundation to continue our language studies. It confirmed our desire for Nadia to know Chinese in case one day she wants to go back for a visit as an adult.
  • For our bed. Oh sweet softness!
  • For the quiet.
  • For our shower.
  • For our kitchen.
  • For our dryer.
  • For central heat and air.
  • For being able to READ everything I see.
  • For Joy and Janis. Totally awesome people who took care of our house so we didn’t have to worry about a thing while we were gone. We love you!
  • For Karen M. watching the KIDS HOPE program for me.
  • For clean water from the tap.
  • For all our friends and family. We love you!
  • For Jess P. and Tahni who celebrated their birthday’s this week. I love you!

Now before you think this post turned into something silly by mentioning the dryer and stuff, it’s not silly. I am so grateful for the conveniences that I use on a daily basis that I basically never think about because they are there and they have always been there. God has blessed me as an American greatly and our trip to China reminded me that I need to be more grateful. It’s just not something commonly mentioned in day to day life in America because we all have it and mostly take it for granted.

Here’s an answer to Mutha’s question from yesterday’s post. In the area we were in, the bottom floor of all the apartment buildings had little businesses. There were hair salons, foot massage places, restaurants and clothing shops. The building across the 6 lane street from us had a hair styling place that pumped out crappy American pop music 12 hours a day. The same 20 songs OVER AND OVER from 8 am – 8 pm. Example songs include Pink’s “Get the Party Started” and a song by Usher. One from Justin Timberlake and the rest I didn’t have clue who they were. Sounded like 50 possible groups that all play the same music. Miss Nadia and I went across the street one day to check it out and they had four-foot tall speakers right outside the doors of the salon that faced our apartment building.

I told Mike I wondered how different our experience would have been if we had been in an apartment that faced inside instead of outside?

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Culture Shock and the cost of Food!!!

2 hats

I’ll start with a photo of the cute girl. In February Amy H. in MO gave these to Nadia. She only puts hats on when it’s her choice and last night she wanted to try this one on for the first time. Then of course her “baby” needed to wear the little one.

I think I am over the worst of the culture shock – although I feel like the corners and streets of Fort Worth are just empty. I drove up to the school to mentor today and kept feeling like I needed to be watching for pedestrians and bicyclists to run out across the street. After visiting with everyone at church on Sunday I ran into the QT to get us a few soda’s and I got all disoriented because everything was in English. I had to remind myself that I can read here! And for the first 36 hours or so I kept wanting to turn the stereo on and play some pop music because we heard American pop music for 12 hours a day in the apartment – mixed with the horns from the streets.

We went to Target last night to get out of the house and pick up some odds and ends. (Joy and Janis had bought us a bunch of fresh stuff like eggs, salad and milk which was just wonderful to have in the fridge!) And after I paid I thought, “That was 350 YUAN! Do you know how much food I could have bought at the Lotus for that?” Then tonight we went up to Pappasito’s for the Mexican food we had been craving and I was traumatized by the price. My frugal little self got WAY to used to the cost of food in China. But the delicious enchilada’s were worth it! I have slowly but surely been working through all my friends’ blogs and catching up now that we are home. But I feel like I should be blogging every, single day like I did in China.

In China we would say to Nadia, “What sound does a taxi make?” And she would say, “Honk! Honk!” On our second day home I asked her that and she said, “NO!” And now she won’t do the honk at all. She always says no. It’s like she is saying, “I am over the taxis now that we are home. No more honking.” And she has continued to be just fine in her car-seat which is great.