Here I Come Western China!!!

So I'm literally leaving in 11 minutes to travel for the next 9 days around the western areas of China. We're hitting up Xi'an (home of the Terra Cotta soldiers), Jiayu Guan (the very beginning gate of the Great Wall), and Urumqi (the capital of Xinjiang, which is the Muslim minority homeland in China). It's gonna be an amazing trip, and I'm SOOO excited. I'm sure I'll have lots of pictures and stories to share when I get back. I love you all SUPER, SUPER MUCHO and miss you bunches!!!!!

It's All About Him!!!

Kendall

Oh China...you're just like a bad tease!!!

You know that guy (or girl) who totally flirts with you every time you see him (or her). And just when you start to think you might be interested in him (or her), you find out that he (or she) was never really interested in you. That person is just the inevitable bad tease. Well I've come across my own tease. However, this tease doesn't come in the the form of an attractive young man. No, no...this tease is much larger. Let's think like country large. China, you're just like a bad tease!!! You're probably thinking what could this rant possibly be about? Well, let me tell you.

So in my past posts and in all the conversations I've had with any of you, I've been quite positive about all China has to offer. My last post even kicked around the possibility that I was beginning to fall in great like, possibly love, with this country. But just like a bad tease, China has drug me along for the past 3 weeks only to humiliate and hurt me this week. (Sidenote: This note probably shouldn't be taken too seriously. Since "the incident" I've recovered and fallen back in love with China. So no one worry too much about the severity of this post.)

On Sunday, I went to the Summer Palace with a couple of friends to see the beauty of the area before fall had completely overtaken summer. So we went, and it was absolutely beautiful. The art and the architecture...simply beautiful. Well, about half way thru the tour of the Summer Palace, which ended up being about 20 times larger than we first believed it to be, it began to rain. It wasn't a cold rain or a necessarily hard rain. Thus, we decided to continue on our journey. We were, after all, at the highest point of the Summer Palace. I suppose we didn't have much option other than to descend the mountain. And herein this simple and menial task of descending stairs did "the incident" occur. The majority of the steps at the Palace are marble. So the rain made them wet. And I just happened to be wearing flip-flops (unaware of the chance of rain). You probably already guessed as I slowly and cautiously walked down the last set of about 20 stairs, I slipped and fell in front of, oh let's say, 35 Chinese people. It was in that very moment, I knew China had been setting me up for the last 3 weeks; allowing me to think I could trust and love it, only to humiliate me in front of a crowd. Oh China...you're just like a bad tease! So I hurt my ankle and couldn't really walk on it for 2 days, but now I'm better...YAY!!!

That's pretty much the most exciting thing that has happened in the last week. On Friday, we're leaving for our week long trip (with the Alliance program) on the Silk Road into the interior and west parts of China. I'm REALLY, REALLY, REALLY excited about it!!! I'll def post again before then and let you all know what's going on here in China!

LOVE YOU!!!

Kendall

So this is love...

(My roommate, Katie, at the Silk Market)
I'm absolutely falling in great like, possibly even love, with this city! The more I see and the more I explore, the more I like it. This weekend I had the opportunity to see various different areas around Beijing and further experience life here...SOOO much fun!!!

On Friday, my roommate and I met up with a friend of hers, Lenny, who has been living in Beijing for the last 7 months and working in the broadcasting sector for the Olympics. Being here several months, he's made many, many friends that we had the opportunity to meet. It was really enjoyable hanging out with "locals" (although none of them were actually Chinese, they had all lived here in excess of 4 years). It's a completely different dynamic from trying to figure out the city alone. My roommate, Katie, and I got to sit back and actually enjoy ourselves without having to put energy into translation and reading maps and such. All of Lenny's friends were really laid back and fun; and even better they were all soccer players!!! One of them even used to play for Manchester United for 4 years until he got injured...be still my beating heart...JUST KIDDING. But really you know how I love soccer players!

This was the weekend for meeting cool people. On Saturday while hanging around outside of our dorm, Katie, Tony (another friend), and I met this cool French Canadian guy named Yan. It is hard to find fluent or anywhere near fluent English speakers here in my dorm or in Wudaokou, the surrounding neighborhood. So we were all pleasantly surprised to discover Yan spoke English fluently and was from our neck of the woods, relatively speaking. The four of us hung out the rest of the day, getting to know each other, and discussing East vs. West. It was relaxed and natural and a breath of fresh air.

Katie and Tony decided we should show Yan around some of the attractions of the city on Sunday, since he had only been here 2 days. After discussion, we decided we would take him to Wangfujing to the Night Market. For those of you who don't know, this is the infamous street in Beijing where tourists go to eat all kinds of odd and disturbing foods, such as starfish, seahorse, honey bees, silk worms, sea urchin, scorpions, pretty much anything you can think of. However, upon arriving there, much to our dismay, the Night Market was closed for the Moon Cake Festival (an odd holiday in which Chinese people thank the moon by eating little sweets called moon cakes. It dates back to ancient China.) Luckily, Wangfujing is also the number one place for Western shopping. So instead of eating deep fried scorpion dipped in soy sauce, we decided to window shop.

Window shopping led to the desire to actually shop, and the four of us soon decided we would go to the Silk Market and see what kind of deals we could get. [Sidenote: The Silk Market is another infamous attraction in Beijing where thousands upon thousands of knock-off designer clothing, purses, shoes, etc. are sold. The price depends upon your bargaining skills. It's a typical Beijing experience that any visitor to the city must take part in.] It is safe to say, we didn't quite know what we were getting ourselves into. We arrived at the Silk Market, walked in the doors, and immediately the Chinese salespersons were upon us. Every stall had people calling out to us in English to come, look, and buy. These people are good. You haven't even seen salesman/woman until you've come into contact with these people. They shouted all kind of things, like "Sister, come try this clothing! This jacket made just for you; look perfect for you. I give you special bargain cause you speak Chinese." and a million other things all the while reaching out and grabbing us and shoving articles of clothing in front of our faces. Once you actually entered the stall, it was another experience. The salespeople ask for ridiculously high prices, and you're supposed to barter with them. But these salespeople aren't just salespeople, they could also be professional actors/actresses. I saw some of the most convincing surprised and offended faces from them when hearing offering prices from their prey (that was us); I even saw actual tears from one saleswoman. I can't fully explain it without you actually living it. It was a whirlwind. It was, at first, quite intimidating. But after awhile, quite fun. By the end of our shopping experience, we loved the place. Katie and I are already planning a trip back. And that was pretty much the day. The Silk Market wore us all out so we came back to Wudaokou, went to our favorite pizza place (yes, pizza in Beijing), and hit the hay. And that's actually what I'm gonna do right now. I hope this post finds you well. God Bless!!!

It's All About Him,

Kendall

Today was the first day in my new, more advanced Chinese class. I was pleasantly surprised to discover that the class, as of yet, isn't nearly as difficult as I had imagined it would be. I think it is a very good fit considerring where I left off in my Chinese studies at the University. The teacher is good, the students are cool, and I actually knew what was going on today in class...YIPPEE!!! So all my worrying for nothing. God is great; God is faithful. Why do I always sweat the small stuff?

I've discovered since arriving here that several of the students on my program are fellow believers, fellow Christians. And again I must say how great is our God? I was kinda worried that I'd be thrown into an unhealthy and unwelcoming environment here and that my faith would suffer. But God provides for my needs even before I know what they are. It's been a great blessing to have the opportunity to talk with these students and simply know we share a bond much deeper and stronger than I can explain. We serve an absolutely amazing God!!! As I lift my eyes to Him, He reaches down to me. How lucky I am! I'll leave you all with lyrics from a song that has been on my heart to remind me of who exactly our God is.

LOVE,

Kendall

I will lift my eyes to the Maker of the mountains I can't climb
I will lift my eyes to the Calmer of the oceans raging wild
I will lift my eyes to the Healer of the hurt I hold inside
I will lift my eyes, lift my eyes to You.

Oh the decisions...

After sitting thru another day of an EXTREMELY boring Chinese class, I have made the decision to.....move up a level into a much more advanced class. I'm SOOO nervous; my pulse quickens and my hands begin to sweat just thinking about the difficulty of the class I am about to throw myself into. I'm afraid that if I do poorly in the class then the transferred credit will hurt my overal GPA; not a good thing when trying to apply for a good law school. But I'm here to learn Chinese, and in a class where I already know everything, I won't be learning much. So all that being said, I've decided to go for it. Please, please, please be praying for me, that my nerves will be calmed and that I put in as much time and effort as possible to learn this difficult language.

Today was a pretty boring day other than this decision. I just went to class, ate, napped, went to class, and then homeworked...oh the life of the college student. I should actually probably get back to homeworking now. Love you all!!!

All for One, All for Him,

Kendall

Settling in to China life

After weeks and weeks of waiting and anticipating, I finally arrived in Beijing last Wednesday at 3:30 Beijing time (which I believe is 13 hours ahead of Illinois time right now). I felt like I was stepping into a completely new world. As nervous and scared as I was, excitement overwhelmed my whole being at the thought that I had finally arrived in China, my home for the next 4 months. Wednesday nite I met the other people in my program, and we all went to dinner together. I'm really glad with the group of people that I'm surrounded with. We are all quite different from each other with different backgrounds, experiences, and beliefs. Yet, for the most part, we all get along quite well; something I was very pleased to discover. My roommate is from Naperville, and she's really cool. She makes me laugh, and this past week we've had a lot of fun together. I thank God for blessing me with someone I relate so well with.

From Thursday thru Sunday, we had orientation for Alliance (my program). It was terribly boring. Our director went over hours and hours of unnecessary information that I'm sure we all knew but is Alliance policy to cover. We did get to go to Tian'anmen on Friday afternoon to see part of "downtown" Beijing. I live in Haidian District, the northwestern part of Beijing. The area I live in is quite nice, simple, and liveable...but it's no "downtown" Beijing. Tian'anmen was absolutely beautiful. As we walked around the area, numerous Chinese people walked up to us to take pictures and simply stare at us. It's somewhat annoying to have people studying us like we're animals, but it also opens my eyes to the lives of other "minority people" living around the world. How odd to think that people in Marshall and the surrounding areas look at my own siblings like that.

Other than going to Tian'anmen, we didn't do much outside of the dorm during orientation. (Sidenote: The dorms are surprisingly nice. As said earlier, I do have a roommate, but we have our own bathroom...granted the bathroom is actually a shower head hanging over the toilet with a sink to the side. Anyway, I hear our dorms are much nicer than many in the surrounding areas, because we're Internationals living in the International Dorm.) Today was the first day of class. I did very poorly and tested into a low level of Chinese; lower than I probably should have tested into. But I'm attempting to make the most of the experience. My Chinese is very rusty after not speaking for nearly a year. The review of simple grammar (yufa) and words (sheng ci) is good for me. And if the class ends up being too easy, the director said I could probably move up a class level.

Things in Beijing are SOOO different from things in the States, but not necessarily bad different...just different. There are too many differences to possibly discuss right now, but I'll be sure to let you in on several of the differences as I write future posts. I need to go to the market now and pick up a couple things I forgot. I will post again later. Keep me in your prayers as I attempt to figure out life in this place.....Love you all!!!