28th
Post-China Thoughts
It’s been a full day and a half since I’ve arrived back in the States from China, and all my actions, thoughts, and words seem to be laced with restlessness, excitement, and contentment as I am finally interacting with familiar people and places. Experiencing China has been an amazing experience, to say the least. Although I had gone anticipating a lot of negative things (i.e. the food, weather, quality of life in general, etc.) everything turned out to be pretty okay, and I (hope) did less complaining than I had expected myself to.
My team and I had the oppurtunity to experience a lot of different things in China, considering the trip was only 19 days. The first part of our trip took place in Beijing, where we stayed there for two nights. We went to the Great Wall (amazing…but the steps are so steep!), Tiananmen Square, and to a Chinese orphanage. Then we hopped on a plane and went to Zhengzhou, where the majority of our missions trip took place. We ran an English Summer Camp in Zhengzhou for ten days, and honestly, I met THE cutest kids there…I fell in love with them. Josh and I took over the Advanced English class and taught 5 students, all of whom fell in the 18-20 age category. I have to say a kid named Jason rocked my world. He made teaching more fun than obligatory, and definitely hyped up the energy of the classroom…he definitely made my job really easy. Then there were two 10 year olds that are most definitely the cutest Chinese boy (Seven) and cutest Chinese girl (Sarah) I’ve ever laid eyes on. I have to say the happiest moment of the trip for me was during the Closing Ceremony of the English Camp, where all the students and staff members sang, “I Want It That Way” by the Backstreet Boys. It was the only English song that all the students knew, and when they sang it in unison to their parents on the last day of camp, I felt foolishly giddy. Then each student basically walked the March of Death when they walked out the doors of the camp because each student started crying, and consequently, each teacher began to cry. I was the first to crack and started tearing up like crazy when I saw Seven and his mom crying, and I totally lost it when Jason started crying and hugged me. I LOVE THESE KIDS. I wish they came back home with me…
After Zhengzhou, our team took another flight to a northeastern city called Dalian. Dalian is a lot more cosmopolitan than the other cities we had visited on our trip. Downtown Dalian is very city-like and very pretty with flashy lights and busy people. We had a lot of down-time there, and went to the beach in Dalian, which was nice.
Then there’s Dandong…which totally opened my eyes to bigger things. So to sum it up quickly, we were so close to North Korea that we could throw rocks to the North Korean land. We took a 3 hour boat ride along the river that divides China and North Korea, and on that ride we got to see a lot of North Koreans who were just going about their ordinary day. We saw children walking to school, and adults working the land.
to be continued…