Well we made it to Sunday evening. it is almost 5:00pm and still no teaching assignment. We thought we would start tomorrow...

Yesterday I went with a fellow teacher at XISU to the electronics mall by the Big Wild Goose Pagoda. 2 builds of 4 floors of computer, camera and everything similar. Not 1 business, but more like going to an expo, hunderds of stalls selling similar things. the place was a 20 minute bus ride away on standing room only mini bus. The bus had a driver and a money taker. I think they think I am really old because when I would get on the money lady would make someone younger standup and let me have their seat. Which I appreciated. the jostling on bus could very will have knocked me down. I bought a projector for teaching with. Rosemary went with the ladies to a park for a while and then to Walmart. They rode the bus there and walked back. It is near the Big Wild Goose Pagoda also, only on the side nearer the school. The electronics plaza was past the pagoda a ways.
Today(sunday) we went to church. I said the opening prayer and passed the sacrement. Rosemary led the music. there were about 18 of us in attendenance.3 of them where primary age children of the councilor in the branch presidency. There will be a few more, not all teachers are back from summer leave. An elderly brother and the 2nd councilor in the branch presidency blessed the sacrement and I passed it. One of the speakers was a councilor in the District Presidency. He was here from Shanghi to release the Elders quorum president and make him the second councilor in the branch presidency. The other speaker was the branch president's wife.
We came home after Church and spent the day preparing for the classes we though we would be teaching tomorrow.
Stay tune for another episode in "When and want do I teach?"

Sorry no pictures. I took my pocket camera with me and discovered it had a dead battery and a dead spare. Maybe tomorrow.
We went this morning to the health clinic to have our physicals reviewed and a blood test. that took most of the morning, there were 5 of us and a whole lot of other people there. On the way to the clinic, the driver went down a road the size of an alley and about 2 blocks long. It was lined on both sides with what looked like storage units, but in reality it was a furniture for sale street. Each little store looked like they specialized in something, even safes. There must have been more that 100 of them.
Rosemary, Sandy and I had lunch in the facuilty cafeteria (the same place as yesterday). It cost us 18 RMB or about 2.60 each. After a break a few of us went to a different store that Christine likes to shop at. In the basement was a market we bought some eggs, grapes and peaches. Prices are really cheap. 6 brown eggs was about 75 cents. we would pay 1.50 or so for that in a store at home.
Rosemary and I spent a little time discussing our first day class in preparation for Monday. We still know nothing about what or when we teach. This evening we went with 9 others to a fancy resturant to eat. We had 8 chinese dishes and rice. Duck, eggplant, tofu, pork ribs, potatoes, sticky rice, sweet and sour pork, broccoli. There were teachers from Australia, Portugual, Italy, Japan, china and the US. An interesting group.

Well,m here we are in china! We arrived yesterday about 10:30am. The school sent a van to pick us up and take us to the university. We arrived at the school, was given keys to our apartment. We where then treated to lunch at the small cafeteria close to the apartments. We had 10 chinese dishes. some were familiar, like the ones in the US and some were new. the noodles were homemade and not rolled out but shaved from the batter. After the meal we went in to XISU hotel, which appears to be the location for foreign teacher interaction with the school, and registered with the government. Our work visa will now be processed to show we are teachers here. We then had a the rest of the day to ourselves. We rested and started unpacking. after a couple of hours Christine and Sandy, 2 single sisters here teaching from BYU same as us, came by and we when shopping. Christine was here last year and knows her way a round pretty good. We bought some card stock for student info cards. I then stopped at the china mobile store and got a sim card for my android phone. the lady knew very little english, but used her computer to translate the questions she needed to ask me. The phone now works in china. Calls to/from the US would be very expensive so we will be using skype to talk to home. We then went in a grocery store. the labels are mostly chinese. if the product is american, the brand name is in English, but the rest of the container is chinese. This will be a challenge. We bought some milk and orange juice. today we may try for other items. The strattons who were in this apartment left their cellphone so Rosemary will be using it. We have a medical check at 8:30 this morming(Friday). I'll try to take a few pictures today. didnot have the camera out at all yesterday.

Well here we are an hour or so before leaving time. we are packed ready to go.
Here is our luggage:

Here is Jacob and family, incharge of the house while we are gone, with the help of Mary and her family. Notice Zina is not happy with us leaving.

 She decided I could take her picture.

As soon as Luke gets here we will load and leave for the airport.

Well here it is the morning we are leaving for china. We have a few last minute things to go buy, finish putting away personal stuff around the our desks and we are ready. I'll try to make an entry this afternood with a picture of our luggage. We started contemplating this adventure last November and here we are ready for it to start.

I am a little slow. Training finished last Friday, but I have been busy. Here are some pictures from the last day of training:

The Deputy Directors and a student playing the opening song.

I was not the only one taking picutes during class.

Survival Chinese Teachers

Teacher that taught us how to teach english as a second language

One of the exercises in class

Graduation

We spent 100 hours being grilled in everthing china. How to teach, survival chinese, history of china, cultural of china, religions in china, china arts and theatre, how to use some of the computer tools available to us, and speakers that were either raised in china or have lived there for an extended length of time.

Tuesday we are on our way!

Well, the first week of training is over. It was grueling. We were in class from 8:00 until 5:00pm with an hour break for lunch. Then in the evening we had different activities, usually after an hour or 1.5 hours for lunch. Each day had 45 minutes of survival Chinese, 2 hours of how to teach English as a second language, then either 2 hours of history or 2 hours of teaching writing of English for non-English speakers. We also had lectures on things like the church in china, medical knowledge for china, etc. Usually we finished between 8:00pm and 8:30pm. We start up again on Sunday with a China area conference. all people in the area that have been in China for whatever reason are invited to attend. It will be presided over by Elder Toronto, the area seventy assigned to administering China and Mongolia. The Monday back to the grind of 8:00am until 8:30pm. Except on Friday we finish at 4:00 pm. Then we will have a week to prepare and we fly out on August 21.