Yeah Baby!

Have you seen the newest addition to our blog? Check out the ChipIn box on the right side bar...we're on the road to adopting a Chinese baby! We're so excited for the days ahead, and anticipate her arrival. We'd love your help as we work hard to raise the necessary funds to make this happen. Thanks so much!

sweet kicks

Since we met, Elissa and I have had the same conversation about footwear countless times. It goes something like this:

Elissa: Which shoes should I wear?

Jon: Which ones are more comfortable?

Jon: Which ones are warmer?

Jon: Which ones will keep you more dry?

Elissa: Oh, forget it, these ones are cuter.

Clearly my footwear creed is function over fashion. So, the picture below of me in Crocs should not be surprising. What is surprising, however is the second picture of Elissa ready to go out IN PUBLIC in her $1.50 teal blue chinese galoshes. Looks like all those conversations are starting to make a difference.

i want to ride my bicycle

Thanks to some seriously generous and thoughtful donations, I now have my very own bicycle over here! Thank you so much friends! Jon is saying that I now have my wings, and I think he's a little sad that i don't need a lift on his scooter for every single little errand i need to run. I have to admit, I have a new feeling of freedom when I hop on and take to the open road here...even though the open road is super cramped, loaded with cars, bikes, scooters, people and tons of other unimaginable entertainment. And I truly thought that I would obey the laws of the road once I started peddling on my own here in China. What a joke. There hardly are any laws...and the ones that exist are only there to be challenged using your own creativity. I better wear my helmet.

State Fair?

It's State Fair time in Minnesota, and while you may have deep fried pancake wrapped, bacon rolled hotdogs, we have some specialties of our own here in China. We wanted to share some photos from a recent annual festival we went to in Dali, China. It's just like the MN State Fair...kind of.

can demons possess scooters?

When I got off my electric scooter and tried to engage the alarm, there was only silence. It had been "losing it's voice" steadily over the last week, but now the voice was gone. That was a little unsettling considering the fact that i have already had one scooter stolen here. As it turns out, the alarm was the least of my problems last Wednesday.

When i came out of the store and hopped on the now silent scooter, a strange and funny thing happened. To be honest, it's only funny now as i look back on it. The only way to describe it is to have you picture a shiny blue mechanical bull in a bustling public parking lot with a confused 30 something white male on top as dozens of slightly amused Chinese people stare on. Yeah, that about sums it up. I am only partially kidding when i say that my scooter became demon possessed. I jumped off and backed away looking around as we all do in situations like this, scanning for a friendly sympathetic face. Then, without warning, the unmanned scooter began to rock back and forth as if taunting me, daring me to have another go-round. I cautiously inched forward and snatched the key thereby solving the problem...or so i thought. Imagine my surprise as the unmanned and now keyless scooter gyrated wildly adding bewilderment to my embarrassment.

I tried for the next several minutes to ride the scooter home. I am sure now i know how my mom felt sitting in the chevy chevette the first time she tried to drive a stick shift. Sorry for ever laughing at that, mom. Finally, when all attempts at driving failed, i was reduced to the ride of shame sitting atop the electric scooter, flinging both feet backward and working way too hard for every inch. I must say, most days I love my scooter. Last Wednesday was not one of them.

Business Class...the rest of the story

With the taste of chocolate drizzled strawberry cheesecake lingering in our mouths, we reluctantly disembarked the plane and made our way to the luggage hall where we quickly discovered the downside to our upgrade. As the last of the bags trickled off of the belt we saw a few familiar faces...the other poor saps who took the bait in Minneapolis. That family didn’t get any of their bags either. We had wondered about this scenario at the decision point, but the lure of the fully automated reclining seats was much too strong.

Thankfully, we had already planned to spend two nights in Shanghai on our way home, so waiting another 24 hours for our bags to come wasn’t too much of a disappointment. The only real drag was having to don our trans-pacific flight clothes again the next morning and endure the 97 degree Shanghai heat as we traipsed around the city. By the end of the day when we finally received the call from the airport that our bags had arrived, we contemplated sending our clothes to pick them up as they were now able to walk on their own. You’d think we would know by now to pack some extra necessary items in our carry-ons.

In the end, all of our bags arrived full of clean clothes and deodorant and we were happy and content again dreaming of the next upgrade which we would take in a heartbeat...if it ever comes.

Business Class

For the first time ever, Jon and I were thrilled to enjoy traveling Business Class on our flights back to China. With an overbooked flight out of Minneapolis, Delta asked if we’d be willing to fly 2 hours later, and take a slightly different route to get over to Shanghai...in return they would upgrade our seats, and give us some vouchers for future travel. They hardly got the the full offer out before we both said an enthusiastic - Yes! I can’t even begin to tell you how giddy we felt when we boarded the plane through the ‘priority’ line, and turned left onto the plane instead of right. If you’ve ever flown on one of these big planes, you know what I’m talking about...always looking longingly up at those cushy seats with comforters, everyone having their pre-flight drinks, and having enough leg room that even Shaq could lay straight. And the flight attendants were actually sweet too - amazing! Needless to say, I slept like a baby, ate like a queen and even wished we had 10 more hours of flying to enjoy. I’m totally ruined...I’ll never be able to fly coach class without complaining again.

God Bless America

For those of you that didn’t know, we are currently in the US on a quick visit to see family & friends and raise more support for our next year in China. As you would guess, our time is flying by faster than we can comprehend. We’ve had some incredibly fun times with people already, and have just a couple weeks left of all this USA hamburger goodness before we head back for our second year to serve in China.

We’ve gotten a few slaps on the wrist for slacking on our blog recently, so we wanted to at least put something new up here while we are in the US. Here are a couple of family photos of all the fun we’ve been having!

Every day here reminds us of how beautiful this country is, and how much we love it. We love being near our families, friends and American food...but even still, wouldn’t change our lives in China for anything right now. We’re looking forward to the year ahead with great anticipation about what God’s going to do through us.

I live in...

My parents used to make up names for the cities around western Pennsylvania. I'm not sure whether it was just for fun or to show what they really thought about the places. Either way, Aliquippa became Ali-creep-a. Coraopolis, became Crappy-opolis. Leechburg became Leech-bed and on and on it went. Recently, while driving out of Kunming we saw a sign for a town that really fits on my parents' list without a lot of editing. If you ever complained about the name of your hometown, rest easy. It could be worse...

(for those of you who speak chinese a little liberty has to be taken, but who's checking...)

back in business

The outpouring of love and compassion you have all shown us regarding our coffee pot has been...quite funny, actually. We received loads of suggestions about what to do and three people even offered to send us new ones! For all those of you that shared our pain, today I have good news. We got the coffee pot fixed! We found a "fix it guy" next to our vegetable market. You can tell he is a "fix it guy" by the mountains of half torn apart blenders, tv's, radios and dvd players spilling out of his shop. I approached timidly because we haven't quite hit the crucial "my coffee pot is broken" lesson in our Chinese book. Turns out I had no need to worry as our communication was more than adequate and two days later i walked out of his shop with a working coffee pot that cost me a whopping 40RMB ($5.88).

On a side note: through all of this we borrowed a french press from a friend that actually worked a lot better than ours and i have been re-introduced to the joy of the press. It's a good option for those of you that care enough to try.

keeping it real

Sometimes I look back on my days here and realize just how different our lives have become since we move to China ten months ago. For example...

1. I'm beginning to believe that I'm actually quite tall, at 5'3".

2. I try to haggle over the $1.25 price of a scarf at the market.

3. I don’t leave home without toilet paper.

4. I’m no longer flinching every few seconds when I take a taxi ride.

5. I know how to re-set the power in my kitchen three different ways.

6. Although I will never think it’s okay, I no longer take a second glance at seeing a small child going to the bathroom on the sidewalk. Which also leads me to share the fact that people do NOT splash around in the puddles that scatter the sidewalks and streets…even when it’s raining.

7. We think nothing of a parent pointing directly at us, and in a loud voice that we most certainly can hear, saying to their young child “laowai, laowai!” (which translates “foreigner, foreigner!”).

8. Our options of transportation to get around town are: an electric scooter, a crowded bus, or a dirty taxi.

9. Getting groceries takes a minimum of 2 hours and 3 stops.

10. Receiving a box in the mail is the equivalent to finding gold at the end of a rainbow (thanks family & friends!!).

11. I might start a side business of charging the Chinese to take their picture with us. What? Our support could be cut in half!

12. We buy XXXL size shirts over here.

13. My definition of a western restaurant is any place in town that brings me a fork with my meal.

14. I browse the import aisle of our food store like it’s a new JCrew spring catalog.

15. We own a purple, two-headed, scooter rain poncho that we use often during rainy season. (and we laugh every time we put it on – quite a sight)

All of these things, in a funny way, warm my heart because they are becoming more and more like home to me. And as long as we can laugh, snicker and truly find the humor in these moments, I’m pretty sure we’re exactly where we should be.

i miss you

We lost something special this week...

our coffee pot died and you have no idea how much that can affect your mornings! The first morning i took it apart and promptly realized that i don’t have the slightest clue how to fix it. So now we have a real problem on our hands. We have been stalling to buy a new one because anything more than a 4 cup glorified barbie tea pot is too expensive. Finally, today I have turned to music to express my feelings and who better to borrow songs about difficulties in life from than Miley Cyrus. I have adapted her song, “I Miss You” to fit my particular situation. I hope you enjoy it.

I miss you

I miss your smile (your smell, your sound, your gold basket filter)

And I still shed a tear (and get massive headaches)

Every once in a while (every single morning so far)

And even though it's different now (we’re using the lame french press)

You're still here somehow (in pieces in the closet)

My heart won't let you go (and neither will Elissa’s)

And I need you to know (that i went to stinking kfc one morning this week for coffee)

I miss you, sha la la la la (blah blah blah)

I miss you (until we go to metro and replace you...hopefully tomorrow)

our holiday 'hike'

Why is 2010 going by so quickly?! We can hardly believe it is already March, but as we look back at the first few months of the year, I guess we have been busy. We talked about Chinese New Year in our last newsletter, and how it was a sweet little re-start of the year. We had a pretty cool time celebrating New Year’s Eve with some of our friends, watching fireworks light up the sky all over town from the 27th floor. The fireworks continued every night for the whole week, so it was loads of fun.

We also had a chance during the holiday to take a little hike with some of our friends. What we are learning is that we need to get more involved in the research and planning of these hikes, rather than letting all of our Chinese friends plan them. At first, we were supposed to go camping for a couple nights, but then it went down to one night, and eventually was reduced to an afternoon hike…which was really like an afternoon walk…in a park…with a restaurant...where we played mahjong and ping pong before and afterwards. So again, our dreams of really ‘getting out there’ turned into something so very different. It’s always a fun time, don’t get me wrong…just usually never what we imagined. Next hike, we will be the leaders and there will not be a restaurant for at least 25 miles around us.

happy valentines day...everyone!

We are just wrapping up our first experience of the week long celebration of Chinese New Year. It has been really fun to see the joy and excitement of our Chinese friends during this time as nearly everyone travels to their hometown to visit family, share extravagant dinners, give gifts and light lots and lots of fireworks. Because of the great Chinese migration to big cities like Kunming for work, when Chinese New Year happens, all the workers go home to their villages leaving things really quiet around here...by China standards at least. With the exception of a few markets and grocery stores, nearly every other store, shop and stand has been shut down for about 10 days. We were so amazed by the ghost town feel on New Year's Eve (February 13) that we let ourselves be fooled into thinking that New Year's Day (aka Valentines's Day this year) would be quiet as well. Not so fast, silly foreigners! Clouded by visions of ourselves lounging on a big blanket in a grassy park around Lake Calhoun (Minneapolis), Elissa and I planned a romantic Valentines Day picnic around Green Lake (Kunming). "We may have the whole park to ourselves," we uttered in sheer blissful ignorance.

As our pictures can attest, we were not on a blanket, there were no patches of grass and we were definitely not alone. All in all, though, it was perfect. We laughed a lot, loved being together and had a great Valentine's Day picnic with all of our friends.

the journey back to china

After a really great time in the US with our family & friends, we began the journey back to our beloved China. Mom dropped us off at the airport in plenty of time, and as we said our tearful ‘see you later’s’ (we don’t like goodbye’s), we were just about 2 hours away from departing Minneapolis….or so we thought. We savored our last Starbuck’s as we boarded the 747 and got all situated for the 11 hours to Tokyo. It’s a whirlwind of emotions to drop in and out of the people’s lives that you love so much, and leaving is just never easy.

After many announcements and a couple false starts, we were informed that our plane had some mechanical issues, and we would have to spend one more night in Minnesota. We lugged ourselves off the plane and back inside the terminal where we began waiting in lines to re-book, get meal and hotel vouchers and make plans to spend one more night in MN. People were not happy. We generally were not thrilled with the delay, because we had mentally prepared for the big trip back. But we quickly turned our misfortune into a wonderful memory, as we planned one final evening together in America. Complete with one last trip to the MOA, one last night of NFL football, and one more morning Starbuck’s latte, it really wasn’t too bad a deal after all.