Red Pickup Truck

The more time we spend time in Chiang Mai, the more we travel around the city in song taos. A song tao is a red pickup truck outfitted to carry passengers in the bed.

When we arrived at the airport here with our three bags, stroller and two kids, we jumped in the back of a read song tao with two other passengers and all our bags. Crammed yes, but we made it to our hotel with all our bags.

Now song taos are a daily experience for us. Song taos come at one price, no meter and no bargaining (unless you’re going somewhere really out of the way). Simply tell the driver where you’re going, jump in the back, and when your there, pay 20 baht per person.

Kanyon loves riding in the back. Every breakfast, he requests, “Ride in a pickup truck.” And everyday we’ve obliged travel around in the little red pickup trucks.

What a Harbin Kid Says in Thailand

We arrived safely in Thailand Friday and were greeted with some warm weather. The temperature on arrival was 80F (27C), that’s some 80F degrees (44C degrees) warmer then when we left Harbin.

We meet up with another family traveling to Thailand from Changchun (another Chinese city in the frozen northeast near Harbin). Their daughter, about Kanyon’s age, was insistent on wearing her sweater in the Bangkok airport and even questioned where her gloves were. Kids are so programmed to their hometown temperature.

Kanyon’s big adjustment came this morning. We dressed Kanyon for the day in shorts and a T-shirt. After playing around the room for a little bit, he looked down at his shorts.

“What happened pants?”

Home-style Eating

We went to Pete’s Tex-Mex Restaurant today to get some good home cooking bringing us back to our days of eating real Tex-Mex. As we were eating, I noticed we were eating as most American do. M’Lynn ordered her chicken kabobs and I ordered Chicken Fried Steak. We each had our big plate sitting in front of us and ate happily only sharing occasionally as Kanyon asked for more meat.

Then I looked at the family sitting to our right. The three of them each had a little plate in front of them. They ordered their meal and waited for the food. The first entrée was spaghetti. Each member served some spaghetti onto their plate and ate happily. Next came pizza and then and steak with a baked potato. Again, each would cut off a piece of the entrée and eat their portion. (M’Lynn and I didn’t share food until the very end when there were leftovers and we asked each other, “Do you want this?”)

The other family even shared Coca-colas. They ordered 2 Cokes for 3 people. Maybe one day we’ll share food with more than our children. But until then, “Joey doesn’t share food!”

Leng bu Leng 冷不冷

Leng 冷 means cold
Bu leng 不冷 means not cold

Together the phrase is used to ask if you're cold or not.

Leng bu leng is by far the most common phrase asked by Chinese grandmas as we walk around outside, especially if we have our kids with us. It’s asked out of affection and care for the well being of the foreigners but can be a bit exhausting being asked over and over. So the first Chinese phrase we’re teaching Kanyon is “bu leng,” I’m not cold.

Leng bu leng was taken to the extreme in our house yesterday. Our ayi (housekeeper) asked this question when we returned from the hardware store. Here’s the conversation:

Ayi: Leng bu leng? Are you cold?
M’Lynn: Bu leng. I’m not cold.

M’Lynn continues to take off her layers of clothes and gets Corbin out of his layers getting ready to feed him. She gets situated and Corbin begins to eat.

Ayi: (motioning to her chest) You should wait a while, you’re milk is too cold for the baby.
M’Lynn: (trying not to laugh) I have a very warm coat.

Are you serious, cold breast milk just from walking outside? I know it’s cold, but I didn’t realize it was that cold!

Ghost Writers in the Sky

Just another thing to keep my teacher senses up in the classroom, especially if I ever assign a paper to my students. (After dealing with this my first semester teaching, I vowed to never assign a term paper again. We’ll see if I hold firm to that or not.)

Chinese academia ghost-writing 'widespread'¹ (January 5, 2010, BBC News)
More than $100m (£63m) changes hands in China every year for ghost-written academic papers, according to research by a Chinese university.The study, by Wuhan University, says Chinese academics and students often buy and sell scientific papers to swell publications lists. Many of the purported authors never write the papers they sign. China ranks second behind the United States by number of academic papers published every year. The market in buying and selling scientific papers has grown five-fold in the past three years. Some hard-up masters or doctorate students are making a living by churning out papers for others. Others mass-produce scientific papers in order to get monetary rewards from their institutions. Two lecturers from central China were sacked late last month after it was discovered that they had falsified 70 papers in two years.
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¹ ZGBriefs for January 7, 2010

Thursday Morning Image

Celebrated a New Life banquet last week with students and friends from around Harbin. These guys are amazing in their dedication following and trusting the Father. Please remember these brothers and sisters as they remain strong in a culture and society that is counter to what they believe.

Crossing the Road

On my late night run to Carrefour yesterday to buy diapers for the kids, I had a difficult time crossing the street. The intersection was once a large 6 lane street, but now due to construction it’s simply a 2 lane street. You’d think crossing the street should be easier with fewer lanes, but no!

With only 2 recognized lanes, many drivers are unwilling to wait patiently for the traffic lights to change, and are unwilling to follow the painted stripes (aka guidelines or the law) and keep the road to 2 lanes. So the traffic never stops at the light and I was forced to weave my way through gridlocked traffic at this little intersection. I have become great at adopting a Chinese friend and following closely beside them as they navigate the intersection.

Another possible reason for this is the sheer number of cars. Check out these two recent articles detailing December 2009 auto sales for GM and Ford:

GM says China sales up 67 percent in 2009¹ (January 4, 2010, AP)
General Motors Co. said Monday that 2009 sales in China by the company and its local partners rose 67 percent to a record 1.8 million vehicles amid tax cuts and incentives to help boost the industry. GM said its own China sales in December soared 96.6 percent from a year earlier to a new monthly high of 189,793 vehicles.

Ford says China sales up 44 percent in 2009² (January 7, 2010, AP)
Ford Motor Co. said Thursday sales in China by the company and its local partners soared 44 percent in 2009, highlighting the country's key role in driving demand for global automakers amid weak sales elsewhere. The announcement, following GM's report of a 67 percent rise in 2009 sales, reflected the impact of Beijing's 4 trillion yuan ($586 billion) stimulus plan and incentives to boost car purchases.

So when crossing the road in China, keep your head on a swivel, adopt a road-crossing friend, hold their hand if you dare, and watch out for all those new drivers in their new cars!
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¹ ZGBriefs for January 7, 2010
² ZGBriefs for January 7, 2010

To Infinity and Beyond

Kanyon loves Buzz Lightyear. No Buzz Lightyear here, just another trip to the moon. Can't wait to be around the students to see their reaction to this newest rocket launch. The first one stirred a lot of pride amongst the students and rightfully so!

Second moon probe next year¹ (December 29, 2009, China Daily)
China plans to launch Chang'e-2, the country's second lunar probe, at the end of 2010, space authorities announced yesterday. The design and production of Chang'e-2 is complete, and the lunar orbiter is undergoing ground tests, the State Administration of Science Technology and Industry for National Defense said yesterday in a news release. Chang'e-2 is expected to test the soft-landing technological capability for the Chang'e-3 and provide high-resolution images of the landing area, the administration said. "Progress on six key technologies of Chang'e-2 has been made, including the lunar capture, orbit control and research on high-resolution stereo camera," the administration's spokesman said. Ye Peijian, chief designer of the nation's first lunar probe, had told China Daily earlier that the launch was expected in October.
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¹ ZGBriefs for December 31, 2009

Volume 4, Issue 1

We were excited to spend the holiday season at home in Harbin with our teammates and friends. It’s been great to host some student and international friends to our apartments and share some American holiday goodies with them. We even mimed our way through the Christmas story to students on campus! (read more)

We hope your holidays were amazing and that you continue to remember the Father and His great gift!

New Year, New Wait (Weight)

The New Year brings something we’re quite familiar with, waiting. We’re in a holding pattern again. Two months ago the wait was for Corbin to arrive. And he did. Now the wait is for his residence permit. We know the residence permit will arrive, just like Corbin, the question is when. We need the permit if we attend ELIC’s Annual Thailand Conference in two weeks. The conference is a great time of focusing on the organization’s priorities and goals. It’s also great to reconnect with other teachers and hear how the Father’s at work on their campuses.

During the waiting, we’ve spent some fun times with friends here in Harbin. Just this past week, brothers and sisters on campus hosted a great banquet celebrating new life found in the Son. We traveled twice across the city. Once to the government office to file the paperwork for Corbin’s residence permit (really, just to take a quick picture of Corbin on the official camera). The second time we traveled across the city for a play date with a sister and her family. The sister, Christy, runs a private school for brothers’ and sisters’ children.

The New Year also brings resolutions for the coming year. So here they are: commitment to language learning, to lose weight by eating right and exercise, to continue to use cloth diapers more than paper diapers on the little ones, to transition Kanyon to a big boy bed, to train Corbin to sleep through the night, and to build relationships, live as servants, testify truth, and serve in China.

While we don’t know what the waiting will bring, we know the Father is using this time to grow us in our relationship with him. We continue to draw close to the Father and hope the same for you. As you wait for what the New Year brings, we hope you feel the weight of the Father’s love and grace.

Think Tank

1. Residence Permit: Favor at the local government offices for Corbin’s residence permit
2. Sleepy Babies: Corbin to sleep through the night and Kanyon to transition to a big boy bed
3. Financial Profile: We are behind and don’t want to be in the red at the end of the year
4. Healthy & Safe: During the cold winter months in Harbin

Fill our think tank! Please send us your concerns to lift up.

Things Seen From the Taxi

As we returned home from our date (note: the date was still with Corbin, but seemed like a date because we didn’t have to police Kanyon the whole time we were out), this is what we saw from our taxi window:

• 3 buses broken down
• One bus crowded to the max on the side of the road without a driver
• Elderly man on hands and knees in the snow begging for money
• A Russian lady in a fur head to toe
• Woman walking in stiletto heels on the icy sidewalk
• A man dressed as a giant dog
• A four-tiered wedding cake
• One sweet Jaguar
• Harbin Beer loaded on a tricycle bike (coming soon, another post of everything we've seen on the back of a tricycle bike)

Ice and Snow World 2010

We missed this year’s Ice and Snow World staying home taking care of the young children. We loved last year’s event and were looking forward to going again this year, but somehow two kids that’s a bit of your time, energy, and money.

Those attending this year were greeted with intensely cold weather. I remember the temps last year hovering around 4F (-16C) when we attended. Compare that with this year’s temps in the -10s F (-23C).

Harbin ice festival a feast of fancy, lights¹ (January 6, 2010, AP)
A cold snap in northern China has thrown daily life into confusion, but is ideal for fairy tale palaces, towering pagodas, and even a sphinx - all carved from ice - that make up the sights at this year's Harbin International Ice and Snow Sculpture Festival. The annual event in northern China, now in its 26th year, pulls crowds from across China and even a few visitors from overseas, drawn to the unique visions of an international roster of sculptors who illuminate their creations with multicolored electric lights encased in the translucent ice. Tuesday night's opening ceremony featured a fireworks display, lighting up the sky above the festival's main site on Sun Island alongside the frozen Songhua River running to the north of Harbin, a metropolis as far north as Toronto that styles itself China's "ice city."
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¹ ZGBriefs for January 7, 2010

Thursday Morning Image

Finally! We invited a couple of girls from the 323 group (these are the same girls we began a relationship with last year) over to our apartment not knowing if they would successfully be able to visit. They found their way into our apartment and shared some Christmas kolaches. It was great to have students back in our apartment. Please remember these girls as they finish out their finals, travel home for Spring Festival, and return this next semester. We're hoping together that the work the Father has begun in this relationship with continue to a fruitful conclusion!

Record Income for Migrant Workers

As the construction outside our apartment comes to a close, I am reminded of the workers who day in and day out live in tarp tents and works tirelessly on the buildings. A new report says it was a "good" year for these workers.

Annual income of Chinese farmers hits record high: media¹ (December 28, 2009, AFP)
The average annual income of Chinese farmers hit a record 5,000 yuan (732 dollars) this year as increased demand for migrant workers saw more money sent back to rural areas, state media reported Monday. The per capita net income of farmers rose more than six percent in 2009 from a year ago, Xinhua news agency said, citing a statement issued by the central government's annual conference on rural policies. The increase was partly driven by a recovery in demand for migrant workers, the report said, as factories and construction companies started hiring again in response to improved economic conditions.

I don't know how a worker and his family can survive on this amount of income. This article only highlights the growing gap between the rich and these migrant workers. Some salaried positions make as much as 10,000 RMB per month (that's more than twice the yearly income of these migrant workers). Please remember these workers as they continue to work to provide for their families.
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¹ ZGBriefs for December 31, 2009

Freeze Dried Clothes

Normal: Clothes drying on the balcony

We had an interesting battle going on yesterday in our house. Our housekeeper said our house was too cold and that we needed to close the balcony door and window. The balcony is enclosed (or obviously we'd keep the door and window shut at all times) but it is not heated. We keep the door and window open to cool off the rest of the house. Without this added cooling, our apartment would be too toasty and it's quite toasty even with it open.

Being very indirect, the housekeeper would close the door when we weren't looking. The battle ensued with M'Lynn returning the favor and opening the door when the housekeeper was not watching. This battle continued all morning.

Yet another reason to keep the door and window is to dry our clothes. With the balcony closed off it serves as an additional freezer and we'd have freeze dried clothes!

Kolache Tradition

I love my Czech heritage. At least I love what I know about it, the food. So continuing a family holiday tradition I made some kolaches. A kolache is a pastry filled or topped with some sweet fruit filling. (Many Texans and others have taken advantage of the definition to include meat fillings, mistakenly calling them kolaches when they should be pigs-in-a-blanket!)

Since the ingredients were not to difficult to obtain, I decided to make kolaches for the holidays. I prepared the dough in advance and cooled it over night (it cooled on the enclosed balcony which can double as a fridge in the winter). Then the next day was filled (pun intended) with kolache making, dough rising, waiting, and baking.

After all was done, we had 48 kolaches in four flavors, apple, peach, pineapple, and haw. Way too many for a family of 2 to eat! So we shared the great food.

Amazingly people kept coming by our apartment that day and we gave away kolache after kolache. We shared some with Chinese students. But the greatest of all was an American family sharing Czech kolaches in China to a Pakistani family! Amazing!

Xin Nian Kuai Le 新年快乐

More seasonal Chinese learning, but this time less interesting and more straight forward.

Xin 新 means new
Nian 年 means year
Kuai le 快乐 means happy

All together now: HAPPY NEW YEAR!