Flowers and Light

I got a phone call on Saturday asking me if I would be the speaker at something. I was unclear quite sure what it was but she was my student and said that perhaps I could speak to them about something since this was their first time away to school. I didn't realize that it would be advertised all over campus and that there would be over 100 people there and someone from the student newspaper.

I decided that I would talk about light. It was quite a long talk--I was to take 1 1/2 hours. I talked about how light and dark cannot be in the same place at the same time, that just a small light can give us direction, etc. then I transferred my theme to the personal light we can and should be. I drew (with the help of Yahoo Images) a picture of a Chinese girl. I colored it with my trusty pastels and then rubbed cooking oil on the back. When I shined a flashlight through it you could clearly see her face. Then I took a piece of black paper and held behind it and showed that there was no light from her face. I told them that we each have a light and when we are honest or forgiving or kind the light shows but when we are dishonest or unforgiving or unkind it is like something dark keeps the light from showing from us. I picked 12 suggestions for showing their light and talked about each.

After that I showed Johnny Lingo and talked about how he made Mahana's light shine and his was also shining. I lit a match and then lit a second with the first match and showed that when we share our light we don't lose light but get more light.

After I did a few "talking" activities with them and answered some questions. They gave me the flowers and some Chinese decorations that I hung outside our apartment door. Two girls walked me home and told me that I am the "best" teacher.

When I got home there was a text message on my cell phone from one of my male students. We were going to meet before and things got confused. This is the message that he wrote. "Dear Professor, Thank you for your forgiveness. i feel so sorry about tonight. You are a very kind, like my grandmother. I had learned so much from you. Not only how to improve my English also how to be a kind man, a light man. Thank you so much!"

That says it all. I hope that I was able to touch others, too.

The Teaching Experience

We have seen so many wonderful places in the almost two months that we have been here but I would have to say that my favorite so far was the FaHaiSi Temple this past Saturday. We had spent the day visiting tourist sites and had lunch at McDonald's in a busy mall and we drove for quite a long time out of the busy city. We were still on a 4 lane highway and saw much commercial area and then we pulled into a street that seemed more like the villages that we visited in the Minority area. There were little shops and people out in front and walking up and down the street. We turned off the main street and there was the gate to the temple. It was beautiful there and we saw many beautiful things but the true beauty was the people. You could feel the peace. Another BYU teacher and I were talking about it on the bus on our way home from church yesterday and we agreed that you could feel the Spirit there. The love of those people will be a lasting memory and one that I want to pass in the same way.

It has been interesting to find out more about our students as time has gone on. They live away from family in dorms during high school and study 7 days a week from early morning until 10 PM with three half hour breaks for meals. They do this for three years. Entrance into University depends upon scores on tests so they work and study very hard.

Although the poetry class is very difficult for the reason that it is a new subject to me, the junior attitude and the attitude of a particular female student is also more difficult. The freshmen are the opposite.

The difference between higher education our two countries is that in the US, the student will eventually fail out if he doesn't study or come to class. Here, most are passed no matter. Gaining the knowledge seems to be incidental. Of course, there are many are very interested in learning, too.

The freshmen are so excited to be at the University. They come to class excited to learn. The room was packed for the club on Thursday night and 4 of them asked if they could walk us home. The thank you note that I got from the student leader said, "All I can say is 'WOW'". They loved what we had to share (we talked about Halloween and did some stories and songs with them.) All evening one little girl kept coming up and asking if I needed anything. She handed me a kleenex to wipe my moist forehead. She asked if I needed water. One said, "Mrs. Ellington, you are such a happy person. You are always happy. Every time I see you, you are smiling." I believe that it was the same girl that called me on Saturday night and asked if I would be willing to just talk to a group of the girls. She basically said that this was the first time away from home and they want to know about living a good life. They are going to let me know when they have a time and place. I love to go and teach them. We are happy to see each other when I arrive and our goodbyes are pointed to the future. I am lucky to have three groups of them.

Tour of Qingdao

This is the German guest house. I was built by the Germans when they occupied Qingdao from 1887-1914. After that it was occupied by Japan, then China then Japan and then China again. Most of the famous leaders from each country have stayed or lived there at times. I will include a few pictures that I took there.

This is a light fixture in the German Guest House. It is made of ruby, emerald, etc. Only the real stones were used in the fixture.

Mike was fascinated with this free standing staircase.

I took this picture of a photo on the wall. I just found it to be such a lovely mix of culture.

The German Guest House/ Gov. mansion with the old signal towers on Signal Mountain behind. The towers are now restaurants.

Pagoda on a hill above town built for visitors

The view from the Pagoda.

Chinese Catholic Church

Chinese Protestant Church with our tour bus.

We visited the historic prison and it had many sad torture rooms and pictures. This was the one memory that I thought was rather fun. It is a photo of the "plain clothes" police that were the spies.

Our favorite spot of the day was a Buddhist Temple that our tour guide had not even ever been to. It is named the FaHaiSi Temple. It is located in the Summer Village Town of Mount Lao and was built in the period dating back approximately 1,700 years ago. Much of it was remodeled I believe in the 80's. There were many temples with different statues in each one.

This little lady was working in one of the temples. We hugged, I asked for her picture, she loved it and we hugged again. We became fast friends although neither said a word.

I walked toward one of the buildings and this little lady beckoned for me to come in and pretended to strike a gong or drum. She took me up a steep, narrow staircase and showed me the drum. I tried to get her to be in the picture and she shook her head no the first two times and then I convinced her. When I showed her the picture she thanked me several times.

When my new "drum friend" and I got outside she took me to a store where statues where sold. I was the first of our group to be taken there so I had my pick. This little Buddha caught my eye and she sold it to me for the equivalent of $10. It is solid metal on a wood stand. It has little glass stones and a bead strand on his hand. Our tour guide told me after that the golden Buddha is the sign of prosperity.

This group of little ladies were either working or visiting the temple while we were there. They were SO excited that I had purchased a Buddha and wanted a picture with me. The one just kept hugging me.

Next they got the monk to get in the picture too and pulled in Cherry Blake who had also purchased something. Everyone wanted to be in the picture. What a lovely time we had.

Finally Married

Here is the story. We were asked a few weeks ago if we would go and do a wedding ceremony on the beach with some other couples. We said we would so Halladays and Stevens (who had both done it before) and we were taken down to some buildings by the beach (in the area with the German architecture) and were trained how our part of the "show" would go. There were about 20 couples and all of the rest were Chinese. We were the last "act" of the show and we marched on to the performance area to the wedding march (with a Chinese touch). There were many photographers from the newspapers and press there snapping our pictures. They turned on some other music and we did a little dance in a circle where we all joined hands and then went in the circle and back out again a few times and then circled again and back to out places. At the end we were told to turn around and the officials at the tables gave us our marriage certificates. I'm not sure what it was all about but I felt very important in China today.

We weren't told that the wedding day was today until about Thursday so thank goodness we had no other plans. I'm not sure why the American teachers at Qingdao University were chosen as the foreign representatives. The teachers at Ocean University weren't even invited. I would think that there would be other foreign representatives in town and even others at our university but I guess they can count on the BYU people to really be married. ;)

What I planned to share this week is the building in Qingdao. I haven't seen any building in greater Qingdao that isn't made of cement. I included a picture that I took through my bedroom window on a foggy/smoggy day but you can see through the windows of a building that still seems to be in the building stage. We have watched one come up across the street from us. They put up frames and scaffold and then the huge cranes pour cement into the slots. The building looks somewhat like a patchwork quilt with uneven patches of cement in different stages of drying. When it it dry they grind it smooth so that you don't see the patches. There are so many huge cranes in Qingdao that we jokingly call them the national bird. Because the town is 7 million and growing there is continual building and everything is up. The one across the street is 13 stories. As I was walking home from class the other day I noticed that they are now painting the building and it looks quite a lot like a stucco building at home. Every doorway and window opening has to be the correct size for the doors and windows (that would be a real challenge for the builders we have dealt with in Utah). There must be conduit poured into the cement for the electric but all plumbing is external. It is lovely and rusted in our apartment. It has really helped me to believe the stories we got while we were building where they said that all of our cement was being shipped to China.


As far as our cement building goes, the floors and walls are cold and there are cracks around the windows and doors. (They could use some sealing materials-- want to start a business here?) We put slippers on even to go to the bathroom at night because the floor is so cold that you don't get your feet warm again. It isn't winter weather here yet. Thank goodness we brought thermals. Our classrooms have no heat but we do have steam heat here once they turn it on in November. What an interesting experience.


Love, Mom

Shopping Treasures

These are some thing we purchased on the trip or here in Qingdao. We were probably the "light" shoppers among the group.

Guizhou Province

We had an unbelievable tip to Guizhou Province in southwest China last week. Because the entire province is mountainous we spent much of the week either switching back and forth on winding mountain roads in our bus or walking up and down stairs to and in the places that we visited. There is no way that I probably could have accomplished a fraction of the trip had I not fallen a few weeks ago and hurt the knee that has been painful and has slowed me down for about 40 years. I had a massage therapist here in Qingdao work on it three times. Although she nearly tortured me in the process sticking her elbow into the bruise and other painful things she performed a miracle and I can now sit in a bus without having to have my leg straight out, climb up and down stairs without having to take them one at a time and walk at a quicker pace. She told me that she couldn't completely cure it because it had been injured too long but I was able to climb literally thousands of steps this last week thanks to her.

Our guide, Howard, was wonderful. His mother had been an English teacher and he knew the language very well. He knew many facts and answered some very interesting questions. He had selected wonderful places for our lunches and we were served just as soon as we sat down. Traveling on a tour and with him as a guide certainly made the difference in providing a wonderful trip.

The trip will be posted on the dates it took place.

Qianling Park

On Wednesday, Oct. 7 we were the last ones to catch a plane and were just walking around the city of Guiyang and we ran into a Canadian fellow and his Chinese wife. They took the four of us up to Qianling Park. It is a mountain right in the city with a lake, a gondola ride, and monkeys all over wanting to share your bananas. We had a totally delightful time with this couple. Lily, the wife, just grabbed onto my arm and pulled me through crowds and traffic and laughed and was so much fun. What a delightful way it was to spend a last day.

Huangguashu Waterfall

Our last day as a group was spent at Huangguashu Waterfall which is the largest falls in Asia. It was a beautiful sight and a wonderful day.