Brooklyn to China

Our time in Nanjing was bittersweet. The city is beautiful. Young population with dozens of schools. Very spread out and lots of great attractions. We travelled to Nanjing to explore the universities, to find a place to study. It was a very production trip. And visited many schools, and places of interest. Our train ride there was fun. We travelled on a spacious train for 4 hours. There was even free entertainment for Mayehu, by the young women eager to hold him.

But we made a crucial mistake. Just for future reference for anyone of you who may have the oportunity to travel in China, never travel with a one way ticket, especially up to a month before and after the Chinese New Year. We were stuck in Nanjing with no tickets home 3 weeks before the crazy rush for tickets even began. Lester worked tirelessly that week, standing in line and texting whoever we knew until we finally got bus tickets. Needless to say the busride home was not quite as pleasant.

I found some pictures of Alemayehu that we took with the cell phone. He was so little. I thought I would share them with you. Plus Mayehu’s most recent picks. Enjoy.

To my students thank-you for an incredible semester and thank-you for making ShengDa a wonderful place to be.

Yes, the Chinese do celebrate Christmas, kinda. It is not an official holiday, but most restaurants and shops will hang a Santa somewhere, especially in the McDonalds. It was really surreal sitting in a McDonalds listening to original Christmas carols sung by Chinese. Chinese Christmas carol remakes. As my sister would say, “Weird.” I was prepared not to have Christmas, but I was not prepared to have Christmas thrust upon me…

I taught a class on Christmas day and Boxing Day. Then I was finished until Febuary 15. VACATION! Lester and I are planning to travel around. First to Nanjing, a city in the East, then to a small village called Len Zhou 45 minutes out of An Yang. Add Hong Kong to the list and our world wind China tour is about to begin.