Half-way mark

Yesterday was my half-way mark!!!  I can't believe that I am half-way!  Time has flown by, and I am sure that things will even go by even faster now that we only have a couple months left.  Here is a little time line of what is happening with me for the next little bit:

·                         In 1 day, Jared with ILP will be here to visit and make sure that we are teaching correctly, and that everything is going well

·                         In 10 days we are going to Beijing!!!!  and Xian!  (I am extremely excited about this, if you can't tell)

·                         We only have 33 days of teaching left... I am going to miss my little kiddies

·                         On May 9th I will have lived in China for 3 months! 

·                         I return to good ole' Salt Lake City in 67 days!

      I am starting to think that I don't have enough days here in China!  The past week was full of different adventures:

      FIRST, A couple of girls and I were able to see a Buddhist Temple.  There were monks worshiping and it was really neat to see.  They were making some kind of singing noise, that I have never heard before.  I don't even know if it is possible for me to make the noise they were making.   It sounded like a chant.   I tried to take a video of it, but the guards weren't very fond of that.  You think I would have learned the first time, but I didn't.  I had to take a picture of one of the monks!  I don't know if I will ever see a monk in real life again and I didn't want to regret not taking it.  I saw one walking up the steps, and knew that it was a prime opportunity to snatch a photo.  Right as I was taking it, the monk stared right back at me.  I uploaded the picture on this post.  It was extremely beautiful up there and you could tell that it was a special place. 

SECOND, Marine and Gloria took us out to KTV.  KTV is a place where you can sing karaoke and it is a pretty big deal to those that live here in China.  From what we were told, KTV is what a lot of the teenagers do for fun over the weekends.  You rent out a room and you get the whole room to yourselves.  They have a huge tv screen in the middle and you sing to songs.  It was fun because everyone got silly and we all just had a good time.

 

      THIRD, we were invited to go to an Art Exhibition at the Expo Center where Sharon works.  Sharon is the woman we met and we teach her and her son English.  Sharon is the Vice President at the Expo Center which means that she is a pretty big deal.  She receives a lot of respect from those that she works with and always gets VIP Access.  The Art Exhibition was really neat!  The Chinese paintings are absolutely gorgeous!  Since we were with Sharon, we were allowed to go into the private room.  The private room itself, had paintings that were hundreds of years old.  Along with swords, and very expensive jewelry.  We are talking about 8 karat diamonds here.  After the Art Exhibition, Sharon took us out to lunch.  Sharon always takes us out to nice restaurants and every single time we eat out with her, we are put in a room to ourselves.  We don't eat with anyone else, we eat in a PRIVATE room.  Most of the time, we have no idea what Sharon is ordering off the menu, and it is always a surprise to see what we are about to eat.  Well this time, our PRIVATE server brought out some soup that tasted just like turkey broth.  I was extremely happy and was slurping up every drop of this turkey soup.  We then decided to ask Sharon what it really was and it definitely was not turkey broth. Instead it was turtle broth.  I was fine with the whole situation, until the server brought out the whole turtle out on a platter.  Shell, head, claw, every part of the turtle that you can imagine.  However, I didn't let it bother me that much because I ate some of the turtle and actually enjoyed it.  I never thought that I would hear myself saying that, but it tasted good.  Along with turtle, I tried pigeon!  My mom had told me before I left that fried pigeon was considered a delicacy in South China.  I was surprised that I hadn't had or seen any fried pigeon.  I must have spoke too soon, because I tried fried pigeon.. and unlike turtle, I was not a big fan of it.  After we had been eating for a while, enjoying our food, Bill (Sharon's boss) called her from the room next door.  He asked us to come over and make a toast with him and those he was with.  We went over and I was introduced to some very important people of Zhongshan China.  I met the owner of a museum which holds a famous, ancient ship.  I met the Executive Secretary of the Zhongshan Government.  I met multiple millionaires, including one that had a Gold Digger as a wife.  He was an elderly man I would say, and his wife was a very young gorgeous lady.  I also met Bill's cousin who owned ALL of the paintings that I talked previously about that were in the Private Room at the Art Exhibition. 

Overall, I would say that last week was a pretty good week in China.  And things are only going to get better.  I have a package in the mail from my family!  And I leave for Beijing next week!! I am one happy gal. 

Friday Night Lights

My life is complete.. now that Tim Riggins is back in my life.

Tonight the first show of the last season of Friday Night Lights airs!
This is probably my all time favorite show and I was sad because I thought that I wouldn't be able to watch it.
However, the website www.ch131.com is going to have the new episodes each week! 
My family all watches this show and we all love it.  I am sad that I won't be able to watch it with them, but at least we can talk about it over skype! ha!
I know, it sounds stupid... but I guess it is understandable coming from someone whose Mom is the top customer at the one and only Blockbustser. 
Us, Walkers love our television shows and movies. 

If you haven't seen Friday Night Lights, I highly recommend watching it. 
It may or may not change your life forever.  

Roomies

I have the best roommates that anyone could ask for!  I am so grateful for these girls and for their example to me.  I am so glad that I get the opportunity to experience this upbeat culture with them!  I love you both! 



Sara





Katie



Giant

Our transportation here in China is mainly the bus.  We take the Kaiyin bus everywhere we go.  We have waited multiple times at the bus stop, the bus is usually late.  As we wait, we usually meet people.  They usually come up to us and ask us where we are from, what we are doing here, etc.  Whelp.. the other day, a young Asian girl came up to us and started talking to us.  She spoke English extremely well and was able to understand what we said.  We carried out a conversation with one another  She is 18 years old and is in her last year of High School.   Next year she will be starting University.  She enjoyed talking to us about America and where we were from.  There was a large group of us and we were all standing in a circle talking to this young girl.  I must have been really into the conversation because after about ten minutes of talking, the young girl looked at me and gave me a weird look. 

Then the conversation went like this...
Young Girl: "I feel that you are staring at me."
Me: "Oh sorry, I didn't mean to.. I was just talking.." (As I awkwardly scoot out of the circle, not knowing really what to say or do)
Young Girl: "You just really tall.  I small."

And at that moment, I realized that I am seen as a giant here.  This conversation made me put things in perspective and I had to remind myself that I am almost a head taller than every other person who lives here.

Meet Niel

Niel is one of the teachers in our ILP group.  He is a very interesting character and by this I mean that he only wears green, ALL day... EVERY day. 
He only owns green, every piece of clothing that he has in his closet is green.
On a normal day, Niel will wear:
- A green shirt
- A green jacket
- Green pants
- Green socks
- Green shoes
- Green backpack

The only time that he doesn't wear green is when we have church.  He will wear a white button up shirt.  But he will have a green tie on and green pants.
We aren't sure why he decided this.  We tried to ask him, and he just said that green was his favorite color.
We thought it would be pretty funny if one day we all wore our favorite color to see if he noticed anything different.

To make things even more interesting... back at home, his younger brother wears only orange, ALL day... EVERY day. 

Squid on a Stick...yummy?

Yup.. you guessed it... I definitely tried squid on a stick a couple nights ago. 
What is squid on a stick you ask??  Just like a corn dog... but with squid instead. 

I'm definitely not going to buy it again.  But now I can say that I tried it... right?

Next time they serve chicken feet at the school cafeteria, I am trying it.  It just has to happen.

Shenzhen

This past weekend we were able to spend one night in Shenzhen!  We hopped on a two hour bus, not knowing much of what we were going to do there.  Our only goal, was to find the Shenzhen branch and attend church on Sunday.   When we arrived in Shenzhen a group of us decided that we were going to roam the streets and just find an adventure for the day.  It was so much fun!  We found a frozen yogurt shop called Hello Yogurt.  The owner rushed outside to meet us and gave us a sample.  His name was Ken and he happened to be from New York.  He was so excited to meet us and be able to talk to us about America, and Utah.  It was their opening day and everything was half off!  It tasted just like Red Mango or Spoon Me.  You can probably imagine how happy we were at that moment.  I also bought a pair of Ray-Ban sunglasses for an incredible price.  That's right.. only 5 American dollars!  It was such a steal, and I was very proud of my purchase!  When it was time for us to head to our hotel, we had to take a bus to get there.  The bus ride itself was quite the experience.  There were so many people crammed onto that tiny little thing.  People were smooshed up against the door!  You barely had any room to stand, yet even breathe!  We decided that you have to have really good balance while riding the bus or else you will fall completely on your face. 

On Sunday, we got all dressed in our church clothes and headed to the Shenzhen branch.  We had a few directions, and just hoped that they were correct.  We asked a few different people if we were headed the right way and we were!  It was amazing to see how easily we were able to find the location.  The branch was located in a gated off community.  It was the nicest neighborhood that we have been in so far.  There were trees along the roadside and the neighborhood had a special calm feeling to it.  It was really neat because the Shenzhen branch was in one of these houses in the neighborhood.  It doesn't have a separate building, like our church at home.  Immediately as we walked in we were overwhelmed by the spirit and kindness of the ward members.  Everyone came and introduced themselves to us and made sure that we felt welcome.  The spirit was very strong in the room and it was good for me to see the hand of the Lord all the way over in China.  It was also interesting for me to see how many young, white families attended this branch.  Most had moved here for business and had been living here for a couple of years.  It made me wonder to myself if as a mother, I would be willing to pick up my life in America and move to China.  I admire these mothers who have the courage to do this.  I know that it would be a rewarding experience, but also very challenging at times.  I feel extremely blessed that we were able to attend Church and hope to be able to go back. 

For those who are interested, there are two districts in China and 12 Branches. The government does not allow the church to preach the gospel, distribute Books of Mormon or talk to the Chinese people about the church in China at this time, but they have however allowed LDS members of the church from other nations to be able to gather in branches. And we obey the laws of the land wherever we are. From talking to the people in the Shenzhen Branch, most of them seem to be young couples, families, and older couples working over here in China.  Brother Smith, a member of the Shenzhen Presidency, met with us after church and explained that we get to be a part of something miraculous.  We are at the forefront of the gospel here in China and it is a beautiful thing. 

It is amazing for me to see the little ways that the Church is being built in China.  Even though members of the LDS faith can't preach here, thousands of Chinese students attend Universities outside of China where they may have the chance of meeting a missionary and becoming a member.  I think about all of the people who are members of the Church who are working in China, or teaching, or have any close contact with someone living in China.  I know that these righteous people can be examples to those who reside here.  I am making an impact on those I become in contact with.  We make an impact and our examples are being watched, whether we know it or not.  I know that the doors are slowly being opened up and when the time is right for the Lord, the gospel will be opened up here.