In Texas Now!

Yes, Mimi and I are now safe and sound in Texas. We arrived on Monday, October 23rd at DFW Airport. We were greeted at DFW by my parents, and God gave us a glorious Texas sunset as His special greeting (I don't know why, but the sky really does look bigger here).

The other lovely things I have experience in the past week include: no phone calls or phone messages, Taco Bell, no car alarms going off (except the one time I accidentally set off our own car alarm...how was I supposed to know what that little red button on the key chain meant?), easily being able to buy clothes that fit people who are bigger than a twig, a clean house (not nearly as much dust here as in China), walking barefoot in the house without getting my feet dirty, not having to explain in a foreign language to everyone I encounter that I am an American, and understanding everyone who has talked to me.

Some not-so-lovely things in the past week include: insomnia/jet lag that doesn't appear to be going away anytime soon, a dog whose system got confused in the few weeks (she got somewhat sick and cleaning up after her is not very easy...there is carpet here), sticker shock, and sales tax.

Thanks for your prayers. If jet lag ends soon, I'll try to write more.

Have Dog, Will Travel

I left home Sunday morning to travel by bus to Shanghai. I have to stay in Shanghai for a week before I fly to America due to dog/doggone bureaucrazy. I loooove Shanghai, although with a dog in tow I doubt I’ll see quite as much of it as I would like this trip.

The 9-hour bus trip: The first three hours were an adventure of nightmarish proportions. Mimi was hyperactive. In her carrier she whined as to disturb the other passengers, some of whom didn’t much care to be sharing a bus with a dog. So I snuck her out of her carrier and put her in my lap, which turned out to be to the liking of everyone on board. She squirmed and fought me for the longest time…right up until the time that the Benadryl took effect. Trust me, it was the tiniest dose possible. Then she became the sweetest thing you ever saw, sleeping peacefully the rest of the way to Shanghai.

The Lunch Stop: At the bus’ 20-minute lunch stop, Mimi found a grassy spot to do her business. Unfortunately for us all, her business included diarrhea, which got ALL OVER her long hair covering her backside—I often call this long hair her “skirt.” There was no way she could get back on the bus like that. So I got 4 bottles of bottled water and gave Mimi a bath. Water pressure from the bottle wasn’t enough to wash away the mess, so I had to use my hand. I was able to wash my hands in running water in the ladies room, but there was no soap. I know…yuck. Anyway, I got the dog clean, and she cleanly sat either in my lap or in the empty seat next to me (an empty seat next to me was another evidence of God’s intervention) the remaining 5-6 hours of the bus trip.

I thought the hotel in Shanghai would go back on its promise to let me keep a dog at the hotel, but they were very kind and agreeable to our presence. There are probably thousands of hotels in Shanghai, and I could only find one that would allow pets. If they had gone back on their word, I would have been sleeping on the streets for a week.

Monday, Mimi and I went to the dog health place to get her physical exam and official paperwork for her trip to America. This turned out to be a nightmare too. If Mimi gets on the plane next Monday, and I firmly believe she will, it will be through God’s grace and direct intervention. It has been crazy!

At first, Mimi was really in culture shock in Shanghai. I couldn’t leave the hotel room by myself because her whining could be heard down the hallway even up to ten minutes after I had left the room. But now she has adjusted to life in the big city, has found a favorite sleeping spot in the hotel room, and lets me leave. I took her for a walk in the downtown park at 6 a.m. today, so she knows I haven’t forgotten her needs. The hotel carpet is completely covered in newspaper, because she has yet to be able to distinguish between carpet, newspaper and grass. She better learn quickly though, because “Granny and Grandpa” in Texas have carpet! Fortunately though, they have quick access to backyard grass—it doesn’t involve descending five flights of stairs. Mimi ought to like that and catch on quickly.

Mimi has been wearing her denim dress with pleated skirt. She looks like a fashionista and impresses everyone she meets. I can’t have her looking like an ordinary dog. Not in fashionable Shanghai!

Thanks for your prayers for our journey. It is a REAL ADVENTURE! Please pray that God will be with us the rest of the week and help us to get all the paperwork we need. We still face some uphill challenges. But there are no challenges too great for Him!

Three To Go...

Only three more days in town before I take my dog on an eight-hour bus ride to Shanghai! Woo-hoo, what fun. I can just see the thrilled look on the bus driver's face when I show up Sunday morning with a dog in its' carrier. It might be a really good day to pretend I don't understand Chinese. I can get by with a lot sometimes if the locals think the effort expended on trying to communicate isn't worth the effort. I just hope the dog doesn't bark or throw up the whole way. In fact, I'm hoping that for both of us. (I have a mean bark.) :-)

I'll be away from here for 4-1/2 months. I have to pay the landlord, pre-pay all utilities, shred documents, lock things away, clean house (uh, yeah, as if I expect it to be perfectly clean when I return), etc. My phones--both home and cell--are ringing off the hook with people trying to set-up appointments with me, and there is just no time. So heaped upon all else I have to do is a big load of guilt for having to tell people no.

I'm actually spending a week in Shanghai before flying to America (doggy bureaucracy...a week's worth if you can believe it). I even have had a few people trying to schedule appointments to visit with me in Shanghai--former students and such.

Quite seriously, I would appreciate your prayers on Sunday. Pray that I can move all my luggage (including the doggie) in and out of taxis and buses without any of it getting pilphered as it was last time I was in Shanghai. Pray that I will have all the required doggie documentation needed at the Shanghai vet and at the United Airlines counter on the day I fly. Pray that Mimi passes her doggie physical exam, because if she doesn't I'm stuck eight-hours away from anyone I think I can get to watch her while I am in America...plus I'd be really sad. Pray that the front desk of the Shanghai hotel won't deny my dog entry into the hotel; I talked to the sales manager and he reluctantly agreed to a dog staying in the hotel, but I dare not call him back to re-confirm for fear he might change his mind; I could only find one hotel in the whole city that would accept a dog that charges less than US$100 per night (I'm there eight nights). Pray that my visa to return to China gets to me in time--it's supposed to be ready for me this Friday. Thanks. I appreciate anyone who feels led to intercede for these mundane things that are pretty insignificant in the big scheme of things, but that are causing me a wee bit of stress at the moment! Ya know what I mean? :-) More news soon!

How Rich is Rich Enough?

I stocked up on the antiobiotic Cipro today. I got thirty-six 0.25 gram pills for 65 cents. According to one pharmaceutical website I just checked, in America you would pay US$86.40 for the exact same thing. It doesn't cost very much money at all to manufacture these pills. I am all for the creators of the medicine getting monetary credit for their research and discovery, but having made billions of dollars on Cipro in the past few years, I just have to wonder how rich they need to be??!!! The moral of this story is -- unless you are rich, don't get sick in America!

City Life

Most of the time when you see pictures of China, you see dirty, smiling poor people selling sweet potatoes by the side of the road. We take those kinds of pictures because they are unusual to us and we think you would find them interesting too; you'll probably see some of those on this website in the future, because I have a lot of them! Truth is, however, that not everything in China is so old-fashioned and bleak looking. Here is a photo of some apartments near the river in my city. I live here. It is quiet, peaceful, and has a park-like atmosphere inside. Like all places in China, there is a gate to the complex that has guards on duty 24/7; they also patrol the grounds. The standard of living in China has dramatically improved in the past ten years, and most of the people who live in the cities enjoy a comfortable life. Life in the countryside is another story for another time.

Why a New Site?

At one point in time, I had my own website. It was really hard to put photos on it, and the internet would always cut off before I had a chance to save any changes. It was more or less a waste of time, so I gave up on it. Now this website allows me to have my own page, and it is extremely easy to add stories and photos in a minimal amount of time. So I hope I can keep those who are interested more up-to-date on things in my life. My goal is to have at least one new posting per week. I have disabled the "comment" section so that if you try to submit a comment to this site, it will be blocked. So if you want to pass along a message, you'd probably better just e-mail me. The website is intended for friends' viewing only, not random strangers. Thanks!

A Walk in the Park

I grew up thinking China was a dark and dreary place. I was wrong! Our creator basically used the same elements worldwide, so that one continent is not really drastically different than any other continent. Today some friends and I took a walk in the park, which is on 2000 hectares of land. These pictures are from that outing. This park is, technically, within the city limits of where I live. How nice it was to get away from the crush of people, traffic jams, phone calls (had to turn off the cell phone) and responsibilities to slow down and remember the Creator, the One True God, who made all the beauty surrounding me. I hope these two photos catch some of the beauty.

Clothes Hound

The weather is turning cooler now, and little Mimi is sensitive to the cold to the extent that she "warmly" welcomes being fashionably clothed to stave off the shivvers. Here is her newest outfit, a sweater. (Okay, I realize she doesn't look all that thrilled in this photo, but she was sleepy when I took the photo; this is her sweet sleepy look.) This particular outfit cost US$1.90; no sales tax even! She's expecting to get a whole new winter wardrobe before traveling to America in a few weeks for a winter stay. Mimi's trip to America sure involves a lot of puppy paperwork. She even has to have an identification microchip placed in her body. I just hope she can endure the long trans-Pacific flight stored with other crated dogs in the climate-controlled pet storage area of the plane. This is my first time to travel with a pet.

Wedding

Hi. Today I went to a wedding of my C friends, T and L. T's parents are Buddhists, but T himself is a C, so he had asked me to read some scripture at his wedding, which I did. In the photo, you can see the "altar" where the outdoor ceremony took place. Weddings here are very different than the ones back home. The Chinese character in the background means "double happiness," and is used almost exclusively for weddings. The ceremony itself is not legally binding, but registering with the government office in charge of marriage is what makes the marriage legally binding. I'll try to send more photos of my life here as time goes by!