Qingdao International Beer Fest. 2009

One of the major events in Qingdao every year (being that it is famous for its beer) is the Qingdao International Beer Festival which runs for 3 weekends in August.
As a school we had a staff outing to the fest as everyone is pretty frazzled with the mad rush of a new academic year.

Many of you know our school has two campus's on either side of the Qingdao bay so being as we are on the "far side" our "beer fest" adventure began with a 1:45 minute mini bus ride around the bay.

The beer fest is a beer event mixed with carnival rides, games, entertainment etc. After a few minutes at the fest though, one realizes including "International" in the event's name is a bit of a stretch. My guess is that they think that if you have some Heinekin and a couple German beers available as well as a few Chinese minority groups grilling kabobs over a grill, it becomes "International".

Ah..no..

Each of the different beer tents had music blaring so loud that a conversation is all but impossible. It might be forgiven if it was good music...but its not!

As you approach the toilets I nearly stepped into some vomit that no one seemed to be in a hurry to clean. The toilets themselves were not so much "International" as they were...mmm..third world prison. The urinal "trough" was loaded with vomit and the smell was pungent. You turn around to see not toilet "stalls" but a another trough with no doors or walls where a row of guys are doing their "# 2 business" staring up at you.

That ain't right.

A fellow teacher with me just said, "Ah, if I had the guts to snap a picture...no one would believe this otherwise"

We did have an enjoyable evening though and the "meat on a stick" kabobs we're delicious. Gabriel went around playing carnival games and a good time was had by all...mostly!

Back in China

(Sorry, wanted to include some pictures but a major internet cable was severed in the ocean near Asia and internet speed has slowed considerably. I tries to upload pics but they just wouldn't upload. Will add some later)

Had an amazing 2nd part of our trip to America but, as we expected, it ended all to soon. We arrived back in China on Aug 8 at midnight and were back to work on Aug 10.
Tammy is assuming all the duties related to the boarding program as I take on a full time teaching load. To add to my new found position, I've also been asked to be "campus coordinator" which acts as an administrative position for the school. I become the person everyone goes to with a question...which essentially means I can't get my other work done...but I'm learning alot. This year I'm teaching Travel & Tourism, Information and Communications, ESL, and even couple PE classes.

Gabriel was the family member who did NOT want to return to China preferring for us all, "to stay in Colorado" but he has gotten right back into the swing here. His Chinese language skills continue to improve and he really helps me out when I don't understand something.

We did get the disappointing news that 2 boarding students we thought would be joining us are not so that means the school year starts off with just having 2 students in the dorms. That should make Tammy's job easier but she has elected now to cook dinner every night rather than have the catered, and sometimes depressing, restaurant food.

Anyhow....we're back for year 2 in China and I know its going to be a good year!

Catching Up

Hi all, We're back in the States and will try to catch you up on what we've been up to. The last day of school was June 26th and so we closed up the house the next day and boarded a train for Beijing. Beijing is amazing these days...We actually toured an indoor / outdoor mall with movie theaters and all the types of shops we would see in the States. I watched "white" people all over the place with cups of Starbucks in their hands milling about and thought, "Well for years there was Chinatown in San Francisco, now there is a "Western" town in Peking."

Upon landing in Seattle, I was struck by the sheer amount of STUFF even in the airport. Perhaps this economic downturn will help Americans see that they don't need to have quite so much...crap! Anyhow, we landed in Boulder and were picked up at the Denver airport by our friends the Cates and immediately went to one of our favorite "haunts"...the rooftop of the Rio Grande restaurant. Sitting up there and viewing the foothills of the Rocky Mountains was heaven.



After a great week in Boulder (where we also got to connect with our beloved church family at Origins Church) we hoped in the car and began our trip out to Detroit with a few detours along the way. Namely Mt. Rushmore & Crazy Horse. When I was a kid my family and I used to drive out "west" and saw all of the history that part of the country had to offer...and I wanted a little of that for my family now.



Crazyhorse is amazing! They guy who started sculpting the mountain began in the 1940's and he died in the 1980's. His wife and 4 of his children are continuing the work which, impressive as it is, is far from done. It is a sculpture of the Ogalala Indian Warrior Crazy Horse who was stabbed in the back under a flag of truce. When you tour the American Indian museum at the site you realize this nation really owes the Indian population BIG!



Mt. Rushmore was wonderful and we had an amazing time as a family touring the monument with the audio tour provided. The engineering facts are really interesting and I was amazed to find out that although their were some injuries during the project, no lives were lost. I found that hard to believe when you see the film clips they show you of guys dangling on ropes over the side of the mountain with drills in their hands!



But as a baseball fan, nothing hit me as much as travelling through Iowa and stopping at the site where they filmed the movie Field of Dreams. Gabriel and I played catch and took turns walking out of the cornfield. It really is my picture of heaven. One day I wanted to have a baseball game in heaven with the farmhouse to the side, the sounds of children's laughter in the background, hotdogs cooking on the grill, and Ernie Harwell calling the play by play!! Anyhow, thats what we're up to.

Sorry for the delay

Hi all,

Sorry for the delay in posts but as of 12 days ago, the country where I currently reside has censored Google Blogger. Two months ago said country shut down Youtube which limited some of the fun things I can add to the posts...and now this.

It is very frustrating not being able to access your own blog. I am currently using a proxy server to submit this post but do not have the option to post any pictures or media. My brother is going to make some posts on my behalf so I can include some pics.

I'm hoping this is a short term measure in response to a certain book being published so close to the 20th anniversary of a certain event. If you don't know what I'm talking about, thats OK, you probably don't follow the politics of the country I am living in :)

Anyhow...we'll see how this "text only" post looks...

Chinese lessons Pt. 2

Well, I continue to plug away at daily Chinese lessons as a student of Shi You University. I have moved up to the next higher class or B ban but not so much because of my great Chinese ability but because half of the class are not such good students. That's a polite way of putting it.

I vacillate between being distressed that I am never going to learn this language and I'm just wasting my time and the sheer joy of realizing, "Wait, I just understood what that person said." My teachers are very encouraging although one insists on calling me, "Mr. Steve" because she says I am as old as her father. "Gee thanks! Makes my day...really!!"



I've gotten to know the local Catholic priest who is in the same class as I. He's Korean and ministers to the foreign Korean population in the city. I've also gotten to know a group of Pakistani students who are rather...mmm..."colorful" in their speech. They are pretty funny guys and genuinely looking for friends. I recently took them to lunch at a local restaurant which served a decent curry. They responded by inviting me to the Muslim cafeteria on campus for lunch.



Well...I keep plugging away at Chinese. I'm a fairly intelligent guy but languages just do not come easily too me. I find though its like working out or running...if you just "push through" at that moment you want to give up, you reach a new level.

Problem is, I have a LOT more "pushing through" to do... :)

Don't I Have Something To Say?

Steve has been after me to contribute to our 'family journal'. I managed to get things started back in Boulder, with the help of Kelly Nelson, to show family and friends where we would be moving to - but I have not done an entry since we arrived here in China.

Maybe I'm overwhelmed? Maybe I have stage-fright? Maybe Steve seems to be handling things just fine?

Let's see... I've gone from just hanging around and settling in the 1st month we were here, to the fall semester being asked to co-teach Kindergarten & 1st Grade along with 4 secondary art classes a week plus evenings with the boarding students, to my current schedule since Jan., 2 art classes a week and evenings at home with the boarding students.

Since Steve has started his classes, I've been given another chunk of time all to myself. From 8 am-12 pm, I have the house to myself. What to do... As any lady of leisure could tell you, 'there just aren't enough hours in the day.'

Seriously, I have begun to devote myself to the study of the word and to prayer. Sounds like a simple objective, but I tell you there are so many distractions trying, waiting, in line to fill up my time in the morning. I've had to learn to put off making my SKYPE calls, to ignore an untidy room (or 2), and to just be honest with God about where my mental state of mind is - and He takes it from there.

Now, my quiet times are usually not very quiet. I've found a poorly edited worship time from a 2007 conference that took place in Hong Kong and dance around my tiny apartment like nobody's business! (There is construction going on in the apartment next door and I've caused them to go silent many a time, probably trying to figure out what the foreigner is up to now.) God puts things on my heart to declare aloud and prayers that bring heaven to earth for me.

I've been listening to the most freeing podcasts on God's grace. (If you're interested, I can give you the sites to find them.) My mind has been a playground for the enemy for far too long.

Yikes, I'm getting a bit too heavy for our family blog. I'm going to back off from there, and tell you 'I'm having a good time'!

We enjoy the staff we're working with here and the people we've met at the International Fellowship - but we sure do miss all of you back home. The countdown to summer has begun... 9 weeks til school's out!!! See you soon. ~Tammy

Book Week & Golf

This week at Yew Chung International School has been Book Week. It is a whole week focused on literacy and week is capped off with all the students dressing up as a literary figure. Gabriel, of course, wanted to be someone from The Lord of the Rings so Tammy worked with a local tailor in town here to put together an appropriate "hobbit" like guise. Complete with "ring" necklace and hairy feet, Gabriel spent the day as Frodo Baggins. He then went on to win various contests including trivia questions on Star Wars. :)



After the school day, a number of teachers got together to take advantage of an offer to go and hit some golf balls and have a lesson at a local 9 hole golf course. It was a fun opportunity for all of us and they even had some left handed golf clubs for Tammy. After an hour of hitting golf balls we headed into the club lounge to have a beer. We ordered 4 beers and the waitress informed us they only had one beer. This was strange as we were looking at the fairly diverse beverage list. We said if they only had one beer (not one type, but literally 1 bottle of beer) left, then maybe we could get some coke or soda. She said they were out and had only water.


















You have to live in China to appreciate the moment. No apology, no explanation. Just matter of fact, "Do you want the one beer or water?" Well, we took the one beer, split it among 4 glasses and had a good laugh.


Hey, the golf was good!