Happy Thanksgiving!

This week I've been teaching my students all about Thanksgiving!  This is another Western holiday that they've never heard of, so it's been so much fun!  I taught them all about the history of Pilgrims, Indians, and the 1st Thanksgiving.  Teaching them about the traditions was so great- they absolutely loved seeing pictures of the Macy's Day Parade, football games, and for some reason thought that feasts were the funniest thing ever.  We played a version of "hangman" with Thanksgiving feast foods, but instead of drawing some dead guy I drew the Mayflower ship.  Then, my favorite part, we made turkey hands!  I'd taught my kids to say, "I'm thankful for..." and showed them pictures of some things that I'm thankful for (including my family, friends, and supporters, JC, my co-operating teachers, teammates, the school, and my students).  After they'd all said what they were thankful for, I had them trace their hands and write what they're thankful for, then had them copy what I drew to make a turkey!  They thought it was the coolest thing in the entire world once they realized what they'd just drawn!  Here are some pictures of their hand turkeys:

My sister sent me a turkey decoration,
so I took it to class and all of my students wanted pictures with it!

"I'm thankful for Miss Mauck"

We had a 1/2 day today, but when I walked into class and started teaching this morning, I found out that I wasn't supposed to come in today at all!  I started to gather my materials to leave, but the students begged their Class Master to let me teach instead!  She gave in and said I could continue and, seriously, the whole class cheered!  It was so adorable! 

At the end of class, the Class Master talked to my students in super fast Chinese so I couldn't understand anything she said; when she finished, they all (including her) shouted, "HAPPY THANKSGIVING MISS MAUCK!!"  Apparently, my Chinese-English co-operating teacher had practiced saying that with them so that they could surprise me in our next class!  I love teaching here :-)

Here it is...

It's been a little over 3 weeks since my last post, and I've been getting emails and Facebook messages asking for more updates and Thought requests, so I'm finally doing that!  Actually, I haven't posted an update on here because I didn't really know what to say.  I had this ridiculous idea that I should only post about how wonderful everything is and all of the great new adventures I'm having- that I shouldn't bore my supporters with the hardships of this journey.  To be honest, the past 3 weeks, for the most part, haven't been great; I've been dealing with a lot and haven't had any fantastic new experiences to share with you all.  But you, my amazing supporters, have been reminding me that you're not my supporters just to hear about the exciting adventures- you're also my encouragement and my Thought support, and you deserve to know about my struggles in addition to my adventures.

So this update is just an honest look at how things are going.  At training, we'd been told that November would be our hardest month here in China and they were so right!  We've moved out of the honeymoon period of living in China where everything is an exciting new experience, and now we're settled into our placement cities and schools, and are starting to see the realities of our environments a lot more.  There's so much that I can't say about the things I'm experiencing and it's so frustrating that I can only share the basics with you until I come home next summer. 

Some of what I will tell you about, though, are things that I haven't wanted to share but that I truly need Thought support for, so I'm setting aside my pride to share some of it with all of you.   Like how incredibly stressed out I am about needing to decide what to do next year.  Do I sign up for 2 more years with this organization and come back to China to teach and get my masters in TEFL?  Do I look into going to a different country in Asia or even a different continent entirely?  Do I move back to Baltimore and continue on the career path I was headed before Father called me to China?  Do I move to the area that my family lives and finish my masters so I can work with abused or mentally ill children?  I have absolutely no idea.  I haven't felt led in any particular way yet, but I still have almost 4 months until I have to make a decision, and I'm trying so hard to give up that control!

Another area of stress: team unity.  I won't go into any specifics, but I will say it's been really hard on most of us.  Because of the things that have been happening in our team, my "fix-it" mentality has been in overdrive and I've been under immense stress because I for some reason felt like I had to find a way to bring everyone together and create unity.  I've finally learned that I'm not in control of that and the only thing I can do is love my Sisters to the best of my ability, and leave the rest to Father.

The newest area of stress: homesickness.  It's getting closer to the holidays and it's hard to not think about all of the family traditions I'll be missing this year.  This will only be the 2nd time I haven't been able to spend Thanksgiving with my family, and it'll be the 1st time I've missed Christmas with them.  I'm so blessed to have 6 teammates that I can spend the holidays with, and that we can openly celebrate Christmas here!  But I'm still having a hard time not spending it with family and other important people in my life from back home. 

In addition to those things, and the things I can't talk about, I'm also dealing with a lot of personal stuff.  At training, we were told that everything from our pasts that we'd thought we'd suppressed would come to the surface; also that every fault we see in ourselves, and many we hadn't yet seen, would be shown to us.  He's truly been using every day here to show me all the things that I need to change, give up, or grow in.  I've grown so much in the past 3 months, and it's so sad that it took moving to China to see how far away from the character of JC I still am!  Seriously, at least twice a week I have a new life-changing revelation about who I am, who He is, my walk, or His plan for me.  It's exhausting!  But I can honestly say that I've never been so close to Father or been forced to depend on Him as much as I have been since I began this journey. 

So it's just been a hard few weeks.  I'm hoping this hasn't come across as one long complaint, because that really isn't my intention.  Everyone keeps asking me what they can be lifting up for me, and I feel like my responses are usually just the basics of stress, exhaustion, and relationships, but I know that you all deserve and desire more than that, so this is to share with you all some of the things I'm struggling with and need your support in.  I'm so grateful to have your Thoughts and encouragement!

万圣节快乐 (Happy Halloween)

I taught my students about Halloween this week and it was pretty much the most exciting thing ever!  My sister sent me a care package filled with Halloween decorations, toys, and teaching materials, so I was able to teach my kids all about our American holiday!  The majority of my kids had never heard about Halloween, so it was really interesting trying to describe our traditions to them and they were so adorable that I just had to share pictures :-)

I showed slides of kids dressed up as monsters, ghosts, witches, jack-o-lanterns, Kung Fu Panda, and Spongebob Squarepants- I even wore a Minnie Mouse mask (that's how much I love these kids).  After that, I tried to read them a spooky Halloween poem, but had forgotten that they wouldn't understand the concept of "BOO!", so when I screamed it at the end there was complete silence; I'm pretty sure they thought I'd lost my mind.

Then we played a find-the-match game on the chalkboard with various Halloween-themed pictures:

I also taught them about jack-o-lanterns and they created their own using paper cuts:

Then I taught them the concept of "trick-or-treating" by going around to each student, having him/her say "trick-or-treat", and giving him/her a treat! 

After each of my classes, my students gave me the most amazing responses: I was applauded, thanked, told that I'm their favorite teacher, hugged, and had my cheeks kissed!  One class decided that I was famous and all of the students made me autograph their jack-o-lanterns!  Those are just a few of the many reasons why I adore teaching Chinese kids :-D

A Chinese wedding

I got to experience my very first Chinese wedding on Sunday!  It was... fascinating.  One of my co-operating teachers, Camille, asked me to be her +1 at her friend's wedding.  I've desperately wanted to attend a Chinese wedding ever since I first signed on to come here, so of course I said yes!  One of her friends picked us up at 8am and drove us to the start of the festivities.  There were 3 parts to the wedding: the bride's parent's house, the groom's parent's house, and the ceremony.  FYI- this is going to be a long one...

Let's start with the bride's parent's house.  We arrived around 9am to an apartment building covered in gold and red decorations.  Outside the building was a gigantic inflatable balloon archway and about 2 dozen costumed men who clanged symbols and beat drums while a costumed girl danced up and down the aisle. 
We tried to walk up to the apartment, but there was a huge gang of men blocking the way because they weren't allowed into the apartment.  Apparently, the guys on the groom's side have to be given permission to enter the apartment by the girls on the bride's side.  So after they pleaded with the girls for awhile, we were finally all allowed inside and were ushered into a bedroom. 
The bride was sitting on the bed, ballerina-style, wearing a white wedding dress (traditionally the dress would be red).  After picture-taking, the groom had to put the shoes on the bride's feet.  The groom had hidden the shoes and his friends had to find them by coercing the hiding places out of the girls on the bride's side.  All the guys from the groom's side crowded around the bed and picked up the girls, holding them by their hands and feet and throwing them onto the bed next to the bride (no idea why, but it happened to all the girls and they tried to do it to me, but luckily I knew enough Chinese to explain that I was wearing a dress and didn't want to be thrown).  Finally, the girls gave up the shoes and the guys held the shoes ransom until the groom gave them money (apparently this represented the hardship of marriage that they would experience).  After the groom put the shoes on the bride's feet, he picked her up and did 3 spins to the left, then 3 spins to the right, then he carried her out into the entryway.

In the entryway, the bride's parents were sitting next to each other and the bride and groom stood in from of them.  The groom's father said some stuff in Chinese and the groom bowed down to the bride's father twice, then both the bride and groom bowed down to him together (which apparently meant that the groom had taken possession of the bride and she became part of his family). 
At that point, the groom's father discovered that there was a foreigner at his son's wedding and I became the center of attention for awhile; he made sure that I was front and center where I could get the best view and I was told to take pictures of absolutely everything, even if I didn't want those pictures.  After the picture-taking, it was time for the dowry-hand-off.  All the girls from the bride's side carried boxes and bags of presents wrapped in red to the cars, which were waiting to take us to the groom's parent's house.

Ok, so then we were at the groom's parent's house, which was also decorated and had those entertainers out front.  The girls carried the dowry and we walked into the apartment, where the bride was standing in the middle of the family room in a red wedding dress.  The groom's grandmother sat down and the bride and groom bowed down to her twice.  Then the groom's parents sat down and the bride and groom stood in front of them.  The bride's father handed the groom's father a nut, the groom's father cracked open the nut and gave it to the groom, and the groom fed the nut to the bride (apparently this symbolizes the bride's fertility and is supposed to bring good luck for a fast pregnancy with a son).  Then the bride and groom bowed down to the groom's parents 3 times.  After the groom's mother had force-fed me candy, desserts, fruit, and tea until I thought I would puke, we all got back into the waiting cars.

Alright- now for the actual wedding.  We arrived at a fancy hotel, where the symbol-clanging people were doing their thing.  We walked into this huge banquet room where there were about 30 tables and a huge walk-way aisle in the center, with a big stage at the end.  We sat down at our tables and were fed random appetizers, including duck head and chicken feet.  About an hour later, 4 girls in red dresses came on the stage with some weird looking instruments and they played for awhile.  Then an M.C. came on stage and started yelling in Chinese, everyone cheered- I sat there and looked confused.  He called the groom up on stage and then the ceremony began...
A little gazebo-looking-thing at the end of the walkway was unveiled and there was the beautiful bride, back in her white wedding dress.  The groom walked down the aisle and handed the bride her bouquet, then lifted her up onto the walkway.  They walked down the aisle, got to the front of the stage, and turned around to face the guests. 
The M.C. started saying Chinese words again, then the groom placed a ring on the bride's finger and they kissed for awhile (until it was awkward).  The groom's parents came on stage and they all took a toast.  The bride and groom walked off the stage, she changed into her 3rd wedding dress, which was gold, and they walked around the room and the groom took shots with each table (30ish tables).

So that was my first Chinese wedding experience!  I was continually told that it wasn't a traditional wedding at all, that it was very western.  Even so, it was an awesome experience and I'm still confused by some of it.  It was also a great opportunity to hang out with Camille and share a bit of my life and heart with her!

China=awesome

There's so much to love about China and it isn't even just the big things, like the history, scenery, customs, food, language, culture or super old architecture.  I love the little things, too, like: when I ask 1 Chinese person for directions 20 people will crowd around trying to help the foreigner and several will pull out cellphones to call friends for directions; when walking through the gate off campus the security guards will stop you for a mini English tutoring session; and if I say a single word in Mandarin, no matter how horrible it sounds, every Chinese person around me will tell me how great I am at speaking Chinese!  It's such an incredible country and I'm falling more and more in love with both the big and little aspects of this place.  How funny is it that when I started this whole journey I was so adamant that China was the 1 country I wouldn't go to??  Now I tell people it's the 1 place that everyone should come to at some point in their lives!

Anyways- time for updates on my life in China...

This past week I finally started my Mandarin language tutoring; it's so much fun and I absolutely love my teacher, Kelly (I don't know her Chinese name).  Going into the lesson I expected her to laugh at how horrible I am at this unbelievably difficult language, but it looks like those Pimsleur lessons paid off- she was impressed with my tones and basic knowledge of structures (whoop-whoop)!  I'll definitely have to work on my pronunciation- she said it was "very American"- but at least it wasn't bad enough for her to laugh! 

On Thursday my little 4th graders had a competition, which I went to but still have absolutely no idea what it was for or who won.  BUT I do know that each of my classes were marching and chanting and it was melt-your-heart cute!  Here are pictures of the adorableness of 2 of my classes:

On Saturday, our team invited over several college students from a nearby campus to have a home-cooked meal at my apartment.  We made spaghetti, salad, breadsticks, and apple crisp and had some super amusing conversations in addition to several really significant topics.  Of the 5 that came, 1 is a new Sister, 1 has been a Sister for a long time, and 1 is seeking- so it was really nice to be able to spend some time talking with them.  Afterwards, most of us went to KTV (karaoke on steriods without the audience) and had a great time just acting dumb!

Now it's time for an amazing Chinglish sample from one of my students!!

"Do you love life? Then, don't waste English a second. If you really like English in English t find happiness. English can make you happy. happiness. You find Englis learn English. English time is valuable. You waste Your English is tantamount to a waste of life. So if you want to learn English well."