Praise and Relief (a bit)

So, one praise for the day is that I didn't get hurt when a car side-swiped me on my scooter. It was turning right and didn't bother to slow down or check for smaller vehicles in the way. I was a bit at fault...I saw its blinkers and didn't move (because I assumed the driver would check...silly me!). But nothing was damaged and no one was hurt. Phew! It's my goal to be more cautious from now on (I am admittedly a kinda-reckless scooter driver...but only when I'm riding solo!)

Had another snafu with my flight. United changed my flights (hmm...similar story to last year!), but the problem this time is that it interfered with my Chicago-Kalamazoo flight via American Eagle. With the changed times, I was left with only 30 minutes to claim my bags, change terminals, check-in, and board. Not happening. After a bit of research on orbitz.com, I was nervous my ticket was non-refundable. After praying about it, I called their customer service and she gave me a 100% refund on my ticket. I was shocked and so happy, I thanked her about a hundred times. After the call, I was in tears of relief. And then a minute later I hear from my computer, "um...Miss Walker?" HA! I had forgotten to hang up the skype call and she had heard my sniffles and sighs of relief! Hahaha. Whoops!

Still don't have it all figured out as to how I'm getting from Chicago to Kalamazoo on Christmas Eve, but I'm trusting it will all work out. It has this far!! I just love watching how God takes care of me. Even if things had not gone this well, I know something good would have come of it. That's the kind of God I have.

Slacker

I realize I've been a terrible blogger lately. The semester got away from me, and before I knew it a month had passed since my last (lame) post. Let me give you brief update on things since October.

*Went to Beijing for about a week. Had a company-wide conference there, and then spent some time sight-seeing. One of my professors from Cedarville was at our conference, which was super-cool! Plus, there was a Children's Lit track, which made the whole thing awesome. Finally saw the Summer Palace, Tiananmen Square at night, and generally bummed around.

*My class went from 18 to 17. We discovered one student had accidentally been put in 1st instead of Kindergarten. Whoops. She's with her peers now, doing well.

*My online course for my master's degree is busy. It's Research in Children's Literature. Blech. It's been fairly interesting, but not so much that I'm really excited to do the work. 2 more weeks and then it's over, and I'm hitting the pause button my degree. I'll have a Certificate in Children's Literature, so I at least have something to show for my work!!

*We got a new kitten. Captain Chino Briyaqn Von Bootsensteve. He's cute when he purrs (which is often), but he's got some super-annoying tendencies. i.e. digging in the trash and carrying it all over the house.

*Ran my first organized run/race this morning--Chengdu's first annual Turkey Trot. It was almost 5k (measuring was a teeny bit off), and I did it in about 30 minutes. I was proud of myself.

*I'm healthy for my 2nd Thanksgiving in a row!! My first three here in China I was sick. I was beginning to think I'm allergic to Thanksgiving. Ate too much, watched some football highlights, and enjoyed time with my huge Chengdu family.

*Arcades have their own universal language. I LOVE ARCADING. It's super-fun, and today I went to one for the first time in China. I rock at racing games, I'm pretty good at shooting games, and with time I could kick some butt on the percussion master game. AND, there's a Karaoke Booth. Awe.some.

See why I haven't blogged much? There's so much to say, I get overwhelmed.

But to my "dedicated" readers, I do often think of what I could write about in my blog...it just usually comes to me as I'm brushing my teeth and don't have time to blog that second. I'll try to do better.

Happy Thanksgiving! In Chinese, it's 感恩节快乐 and you pronounce it kinda like this: "gahn un jeeyeh kwai luh" Now you can show off at your Thanksgiving parties. 

Unused Miles?

This feels like a lame place to ask, but do any of you have unused frequent flyer miles sitting around? I'm looking to fly home at Christmas, and it's a bit pricey.

Please leave a comment if you do, and I'll get in touch with you to work it out.

Thanks in advance!!

Accidental Theology

So, my class memory verse for the week is Galatians 6:9 "Let us not become weary in doing good, for at the proper time we will reap a harvest if we do not give up." In unpacking what it means, we've had some good discussions this week.

One of my most favorite lessons from this verse, though, was when one student accidentally recited it like this: "Let us not become weird in doing good..." I laughed to myself, but thought about how true this is! Sometimes, when we do good things for our own sake or of our own effort, we get weird. Cranky, exhausted, bitter, selfish.

Let us not become weird, my friends!

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The Lord has been trying to force the idea of surrender down my throat lately, and I've been consciously resistant...mostly because I haven't thought it all the way through yet.

But I needed to put this much on here, so I'd have some accountability on actually writing about it at some later point.

Growing Pains!

Got an email today that I am getting another new student tomorrow! That puts us to 18 students, from Korea, China, United States, Japan, and England. Makes for interesting dynamics, that's for sure!

I know for those who teach/have taught in the States, 18 sounds ideal. And I'm sure I will come to appreciate a class that size...but I have been so spoiled with small class sizes that I have come really love it!! I'm still adjusting mentally to the different energy it takes to plan for and teach 18 kids, and I am not thrilled about the amount of time it takes to GRADE!! I am definitely becoming choosier about what I actually grade and record.

Praise the Lord, though, for a growing school! Growth is the kind of problem a school WANTS to have!

September and Autumn

Autumn is my absolute favorite season of the year. I love the crispness of the air and the leaves, I love pumpkin, cinnamon, chai flavors of anything. I love wearing long sleeves and the wind blowing. Hay rides and pumpkin carving and campfires just make me smile.

But alas. I live in southern China. In my attempt to bring a mid-west Autumn to my classroom, I decorate the windows with colored leaves and read them books about squirrels and scarecrows and pumpkins. We talk about the seasons changing, but it's still not the same. Today I had a laughable moment with a student who has always lived in more southern parts of Asia.

We were reading a book simply called "Fall", and it's about the different colors things change when it's Fall. At one point, it was talking about how frost makes things look white. I asked her what she thought 'frost' meant, and she wasn't sure. When I told her to use the picture (which had snowflakes) as a clue, she stared, and thought, and looked, and said, "I don't know what that is!"

My poor children, who live in such a climate that falling leaves and snow are foreign concepts.

Another laughable moment of the day was when one of my students wrote the date today. He wrote: 9-1=8...whoops. I guess I've hammered math facts into him a bit too much.

Last one for the day (my kids made me smile a lot today). In Bible class, we were talking about Cain & Abel and why Abel's sacrifice was acceptable. I asked if anyone knew why we don't have to make sacrifices anymore, and many of them had ideas. My favorite one was "Because it's GROSS!" We all giggled for a while at that one, and then one of the others raised her hand with the right answer--because Jesus died. Praise the Lord for our Lamb of God!