Laura and I have been in China for over 19 months now. Culture
acquisition has been a primary goal of ours since day 1. We've read
books, developed friendships with locals who can be honest with us
about our cultural blunders, and we've spent an abundant amount of time
in the rural countryside soaking up every nugget of information we can
gather. I can honestly say that I'm feeling quite comfortable in a city
that was once completely foreign to me. But, there are some things about
China that I'm not sure if I'll ever get used to. For example, Laura
and I went to a hole-in-the-wall noodle place for lunch the other day.
As we sat and waited for our meals at a little miniature size table, the women next to me
got these delivered to her by the waiter. It still shocks me.Tuesday, August 07, 2012
Culture Acquisition
Laura and I have been in China for over 19 months now. Culture
acquisition has been a primary goal of ours since day 1. We've read
books, developed friendships with locals who can be honest with us
about our cultural blunders, and we've spent an abundant amount of time
in the rural countryside soaking up every nugget of information we can
gather. I can honestly say that I'm feeling quite comfortable in a city
that was once completely foreign to me. But, there are some things about
China that I'm not sure if I'll ever get used to. For example, Laura
and I went to a hole-in-the-wall noodle place for lunch the other day.
As we sat and waited for our meals at a little miniature size table, the women next to me
got these delivered to her by the waiter. It still shocks me.
Thursday, August 02, 2012
Neighborhood Cheek Graffiti
Recently James and I invited our neighbor, He Ya, and her friend over for dinner and a game of cards. We tried introducing her to Mexican food. I made sour cream, fresh corn salsa, and chicken fajitas. We even busted out some of our imported cheddar cheese! James did a great job of demonstrating how to wrap everything up in a neat little bundle. Ya was hilarious. She took one bite before everything fell apart and spent most of the meal pushing the contents of her fajita around her plate with chopsticks.
After supper we played a card game called "dou di zhu," or "fight the landlord." It's basically a Chinese version of Scum or President played with three people. Normally it's a drinking game where the losers take shots, but as that wasn't the direction we wanted to go with the evening, we opted out of the alcohol. Still, Ya insisted there be some form of punishment for losing. She asked me to go get my eyeliner. This is what ensued.
It amazes me that an unenthusiastically received Mexican meal and eyeliner can be bridges into deeper relationships with our friends here. It's laughter and life together and the random things that He uses to build friendships.
After supper we played a card game called "dou di zhu," or "fight the landlord." It's basically a Chinese version of Scum or President played with three people. Normally it's a drinking game where the losers take shots, but as that wasn't the direction we wanted to go with the evening, we opted out of the alcohol. Still, Ya insisted there be some form of punishment for losing. She asked me to go get my eyeliner. This is what ensued.
It amazes me that an unenthusiastically received Mexican meal and eyeliner can be bridges into deeper relationships with our friends here. It's laughter and life together and the random things that He uses to build friendships.
Thursday, July 26, 2012
School's Out!
James and I just finished our third semester of language study! Our goal is to be conversational in Mandarin after three years of school, and we find ourselves already at the halfway mark. Though it is easy to feel discouraged as we tackle this difficult language, I know we've come so far in our abilities to communicate.
Much of that is due to our language curriculum, GPA. We sought to learn like infants, and now we can talk like toddlers! We also have to give credit to our amazing teacher, Melinda. She has been a patient instructor, an ever willing help, an insightful bridge to local culture, and a wonderful friend. She was recently accepted to a graduate program in another city and will be leaving us for two years! We are excited for her and this opportunity to further her education, but we are going to miss her SO MUCH. Especially me.
As we study on next year, I know our goal to become truly conversational will only succeed if both James and I stretch ourselves in conversations and immerse ourselves in Mandarin daily. We hope to start watching soap operas (popular here) and news programs in Mandarin to pick up new vocabulary and culture clues. We plan to be stricter with ourselves while we speak with our Chinese friends--even if they can speak some English, we're going to do our best to communicate entirely in Mandarin. It's hard to follow through with some of these ideas, but we want to be good students. We are so looking forward to the day when we'll fully understand and be understood!
 |
| This is Laura's final exam paper. She typed it out in Pinyin (the phonetic version of Mandarin) because we have only just begun to learn Chinese characters. Still, our teacher was pretty impressed! |
Much of that is due to our language curriculum, GPA. We sought to learn like infants, and now we can talk like toddlers! We also have to give credit to our amazing teacher, Melinda. She has been a patient instructor, an ever willing help, an insightful bridge to local culture, and a wonderful friend. She was recently accepted to a graduate program in another city and will be leaving us for two years! We are excited for her and this opportunity to further her education, but we are going to miss her SO MUCH. Especially me.
As we study on next year, I know our goal to become truly conversational will only succeed if both James and I stretch ourselves in conversations and immerse ourselves in Mandarin daily. We hope to start watching soap operas (popular here) and news programs in Mandarin to pick up new vocabulary and culture clues. We plan to be stricter with ourselves while we speak with our Chinese friends--even if they can speak some English, we're going to do our best to communicate entirely in Mandarin. It's hard to follow through with some of these ideas, but we want to be good students. We are so looking forward to the day when we'll fully understand and be understood!
Thursday, February 16, 2012
The girls
Last month Alli, Cori, and Christine came to visit us in Lijiang. They were only able to stay with us for 36 hours, but it was well worth it on our end. We showed them around Old Town and took them to some of our favorite restaurants in town. The next day we hired a van and drove to Tiger Leaping Gorge, arguably the deepest gorge in the world. Though their stay was short, it was so refreshing to have friends from home enter our Chinese life. Thanks girls for coming! And this is the only picture I got of all three of them (I didn't even get a picture of all 5 of us together!). Laura and I are not great picture takers.
Saturday, February 11, 2012
the Kingdom of Thailand
We just got back from 2 weeks in Thailand. We spent 5 days down in the islands, 5 days in Bangkok, and the rest of the time in Chiang Mai. We had an absolute blast. We went snorkeling down in the south, watched movies and ate tons of western food in Bangkok, and gallivanted on a motorbike in the North, showing Laura where I used to live. All-in-all it was a trip to remember. We spent lots of time with new friends, and we got to re-live some memories with old friends. Here are some pics:
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