First full day in Jerusalem

Thursday, September 6th

The view from the top  plus our smiling faces.

   

        On our first full day here we woke up bright and early for breakfast. We made the mistake of unpacking into the night and ended up sleep deprived, but our excitement in being here kept us going. After breakfast we embarked on our very first field trip! In groups of 10-12 we set out with a professor or service missionary to explore the Old city. To get to the old city from the center we have to go down into the Kidran Valley and then back up the steep hill to the Old City. There are only eight gates to get into the city, of which, three or four are off limits for BYU-JC students. We entered through Damascus gate and headed down the street to a beautiful Austrian hostel.

       At the top of the hostel there is a magnificent observation deck with a panoramic view of the city and surrounding valleys. It seemed we could see for miles and it was breathtaking.
       The rest of our tour through the old city was an adventure. Our tour group was led by Professor Isom-Verharron. She is brilliant when it comes to her area of study, but hasn't spent enough time in the Old city to really know her way around. We made quite a few wrong turns and ended up going a different route than most groups but we all ended up in the same places. The best part was the security personal from the center that followed all the groups. By the end of the day we had our very own security guard to keep our team on the right path. We had a good time! We briefly stopped at different historical sites such as the church of the holy Sepulchre and Zion gate. I learned a lot on the tour and became familiar enough with the city to be comfortable going without a teacher or security guard, which i think was the goal of that field trip.
        That afternoon we sat in hours of meetings regarding our personal safety and security, and our academic responsibilities. It was extremely difficult to keep from drifting during the meetings due to our lack of sleep and the physical excretion of our morning trip. After the bulk of the meetings we took a 15 minute break to nap and relax before meeting with our assigned committees. Zak, Alex, and I get to be a part of the talent show committee. How fun is that?! Next week there are try outs for the formal talent show and we get to be the committee that plans the whole show. It should be fun!
       One cool thing about the center is that they hold concerts here every week that are open to the public. This week we hosted an Israeli jazz band. Jess, Alex, and I volunteered to be ushers for the concert and it was amazing! We just became greeters and passed out programs, but i enjoyed every minute of it. I learned a Hebrew greeting and each time i used it they would get so excited that i cared enough to know the greeting of the season. "Shanah Tovah" is the saying and it means "have a good year". Since Rosh Hashanah is near it was the ideal greeting to learn. The concert itself was fabulous. I really enjoyed the music, though trying to stay awake was again a mighty task. Someday i'll catch up on sleep and get used to the time zone.
       After the concert Alex and I stayed up way too late working on our readings for class, but we also ended up spending a good deal of time contemplating and discussing may gospel topics in depth in a way that i really needed to hear and discuss. It is amazing to me how when you least expect it the Lord will answer your prayers, or how He will enlighten your mind in a way that just reminds you of your purpose and mission here.

The Holy Land

         The next series of posts will consist of my thought, feelings, and stories  from my experiences in The holy Land. I am more than excited to be here and have this opportunity to study and worship in such an incredible area.

         Getting here was quite the trip. We stayed at a friend's house near Salt Lake the night before departure so they could drive us to the airport bright and early (except it was so early it was still kinda dark out). It was surprisingly smooth getting all checked in and through security and to the gate. We flew to NYC where we had a 7 hour layover. The time went by rather fast as we all god to know each other and played games. Then we took a plane to Tel Aviv, Israel. This flight was very full and lasted 11 hours. Overall it wasn't too bad. It really didn't seem to be that long. Getting through customs and immigration happened to be incredibly smooth for me. The guy took my passport and asked me where i was from in Utah. When i told him Moab he asked if it was an Indian town. I told him it was a town of red rocks similar to Jordan. Then he said have a great time in Jerusalem and that was the extent of customs and immigration.

Selfie in the Auditorium when we first arrived

        Right out in the baggage claim area we gathered and met our group leaders/professors. What a comforting sight to be gathered as a group. We loaded up the buses and headed to the Jerusalem center.  I can't really put to words the emotions i felt as we walked in the gate, through the courtyard, and into the auditorium. It felt like home. An overwhelming sense of love and gratitude filled my heart as we listened to an organ solo while gazing through the giant windows at the magnificent city. It was then it all felt real. I am really here, in the Holy Land and I know i'm here for a reason.

Lost posts about China!

I definitely dropped the ball on writing about my adventures in China.. Sorry to those of you who wanted to follow along with more than just my scattered pictures and teacher posts. This Semester flew by! I will tell you about some of my favorite, or most memorable adventures.

October was a very busy month for us. We made it to our new school and were working on setting up a schedule and routine for classes. Then Mid-Autumn Festival, or the Moon Festival, came around. This festival is a big holiday for all of China. Most of the people get work off and schools are out for a whole week! We had our long vacation during this time. Our plan was to fly to Xi'an to see the terracotta warriors and then get on an overnight train to Beijing to see the Great Wall and other sights there. The trip to the airport should have been two hours, but in the taxi with the holiday traffic it ended up taking six hours which made us miss our flight to Xi'an. The airport was crazy busy due to holiday travel and they had no other flights going out until the end of the week. This was one moment I have been incredibly grateful for technology. I could look up flights, hotels, and itinerary options without having to fight with broken English or google translate. 

We ended up skipping our visit to Xi'an and stayed an extra two days in Guangzhou. Luckily we found a flight to Beijing and a cheap hotel. This hotel was terrible! The water from the sink and shower smelled horrible and the bathroom door didn't even really close. Luckily we were only there for one night. The next morning we were picked up by a tour guide and driver and they took us up to the great wall. We set out on a hike on the traditional/ non restored side of the wall. I think we hiked 7 miles that day up and around on this steep and rugged wall. We hiked down to a farmer's house and had dinner with their family. The food was delicious! After changing our clothes and cleaning up a bit we grabbed some sleeping gear and headed back up the wall to the watch tower for the night. It was probably one of the worsts nights sleep I've had, but it sure was fun! we woke up freezing at about 5 am and packed up camp to head down for breakfast.

After breakfast we drove to another village and climbed straight up the side of the mountain to get to the wall. It was incredibly hard, but worth it once we got to the top. We traveled miles on the old wall and then a few more miles on a restored portion of the wall. The very top section we climbed overlooked a lake. After our hike we went to a village for lunch and then they drove us into the heart of Beijing to our hostel.

We spent the next few days exploring the city. PS. our hostel was amazing! it was a really weird design and we basically had our own little houses, but it was fun. They did move us the last night to the top floor because the government didn't like having so many foreigners in the building so i ended up sleeping on a floor in a room. The trip ended up being really fun! We learned to navigate the subway and explored the Olympic stadium and Beijing zoo. We did so much walking by the end of it i was completely exhausted.

Last Day in Guzhen and on to Kaiyin and Shiqi!

               My last night in Guzhen was a little sad. I really grew to love the group there, but they had a head teacher now so i was moving to another school to help them. The morning I was to leave it ended up being really rainy which made traveling a little more interesting. Sweet Ann helped me get my stuff loaded in the car and told the driver where to take me. It took even longer getting there because of the rain and the driver spoke no English. Also, Asian drivers are crazy! You add rain to that and it makes for one exciting drive. I made it to Kaiyin and found their head teacher who then helped me carry my suitcases up four flights of stairs to the room where i was going to stay. Next we went to see the classes. It was their first day of teaching but they were short eight teachers due to the visa problems so it was a little crazy. After school I got to hang out with the teachers that are actually coming to my school once we get to go. That evening i asked if it would be more beneficial for me to go over to the Shiqi school because they were running without a head teacher. Without much hesitation they decided that would be great. Once again on the move! :P So after a quick breakfast at Kaiyin i set off for Shiqi.

Kaiyin Breakfast (Surprisingly good!)

             This time i just went for the day to see how things were going. I got there right as they were starting to teach their first class ever. You could tell they didn't have a lot of guidance, but it wasn't complete chaos. After class and a delicious lunch i met with each of the teachers to ask them some questions and see how I could best help in my short time there. I decided it would be good if I came over and stayed for a couple days to help get things organized or at least ease their worries a bit. It was a fun couple days! I had some early morning run ins with cockroaches and did a lot of traveling between classrooms. I like to believe I helped a lot while being there, but I'm a little bias.

           Friday they celebrated teacher appreciation day. It was the best thing ever! They had a little ceremony before school to recognize all the teachers and give them flowers. Then in every class they gave us more flowers or a flower cookie. It was adorable.

Cute Shiqi Teachers

Cute Kindy Kids

All the Teacher Appreciation Day gifts

Guzhen

Guzhen is the school i was temporarily assigned to be head teacher at. After our rest the lovely coordinator, Ann, took us around the city. We went to the bank, the store, and we even got to see the school a little! The full school tour came later, but it is such a cute school. I stayed there for a few days and trained the teachers and helped them get everything organized, before their head teacher got there. They started teaching while i was there too. It was drastically different from my first day of teaching in the Dominican Republic. The teachers were all laughing and smiling at the end of the day, even though some of the time it was chaos, they made the most of it and had a good day. I was amazed at how well they did. After teaching we had a meeting with the principal and some of the staff. They pretty much just wanted to let us know they were here for us if we needed anything and that the school was like a big family. They are so happy to have us there.
            The next day we were on our own to find food and do what we wanted. We went on an adventure around town and found some amazing little restaurants.  The girls all wanted to try and find a place to get a foot bath with the fish that nibble on your feet. We found a place that said foot bath so we went in. Google translate in hand, we tried our best to communicate with the people at the desk. After a few minutes of charades and poorly translated sentences they took us back to these rooms. The rooms were very luxurious looking and the chairs were large comfortable reclining type chairs. We all had a seat not knowing what was really going on. The only information we knew for sure was one hour foot bath and it would cost about $15. Next thing we know there are two women in the room with us. They tried to talk to us but we couldn't understand anything. They then took a bucket from under our foot rests and filled it with scalding hot water and insisted we put our feet in it. Then they leaned our chair back and got behind us and gave us an almost full body massage. I'm not gonna lie, it was well worth the $15 even though most of the girls were sore the next day.
          The next day we went out around town again after spending the morning inside relaxing. We debated where to go to eat when this guy told us we need to come to his restaurant. Turns out he spoke English and when we decided to eat there he called his boss to come down and talk to us. We spent the next two hours eating while the boss gave us advice on life and interrogated our being there. Since we were paying to come teach kids English he felt indebted to us and as if he needed to give back. He said free food wasn't enough. He then gave us his WeChat and phone number and said that anytime we needed anything to let him know and he would help us. It was really sweet of him. They also told us to come back right before they closed and they would have some more food made for us to take. We did indeed go back, but it happened to be pouring rain when we went. They thought we were crazy when we got there, half of us soaking wet and the other half with a drenched umbrella. They immediately gave us little towels and cups of hot water. It was wonderful. He then insisted on giving us a ride home so we didn't have to walk in the rain. It was an adventure trying to direct him while he drove in the rain toward our house. We were happy to be home!

CHINA From assignment to first days

A few months into the summer i got an email from the ILP office telling me that they had a head teacher spot open up and i was next in line to fill it. I jumped on the opportunity and accepted. I had a crazy couple weeks trying to get all my paper work in at such short notice. I attended a training and found out my group had the opportunity to open a new school! I was both nervous and excited. The weeks flew by before it came time to depart. Three days before we were scheduled to leave the Chinese government decided they wanted to reevaluate some of the volunteer's visas and the pulled them. Suddenly 39 of the volunteers couldn't travel with us and had to wait for the government to decide if they could come. It was a bit of a disaster... The director called me and told me i was still going, but out of the visas pulled five were head teachers so I might have to travel around and help other schools get started. I told him i would go wherever they needed me (and I have).
            So we set off! the airport was 100x less stressful having traveled out of the country once before. I am very grateful for that, seeing how i was also responsible for the girls traveling with me. We had a few adventures trying to find the right gate and having gates change on us right before the flight, but it all worked out. Once we arrived at our first stop in China we realized we had less then one hour to get our luggage, get through customs, and navigate a foreign airport to catch our last flight. It was a little stressful getting all six of us where we needed to be. Once we found our airline desk it was way past the time we were supposed to take off, but luckily our flight was delayed due to weather. Thank goodness! Once at our gate they delayed the flight another two hours.. but they gave us free food! Since we were waiting so long they gave us food to eat. It was the first Chinese snacks we received. We finally made it to or last destination and found all of our luggage. It was there i got the text saying I was going with one group to Guzhen while my volunteers were heading to another school for the first week or so. I loaded up my things and got in a bus full of people i didn't know going to a school of which I had no information on. Not to mention the fact that it was now 4 in the morning. We made it to our apartment, well temporary apartment for me, and got settled in a bit. After a few hours to nap we set out to get to know our surroundings.

Recap on a Year...

I'm back! It has been a while since I posted anything (almost 8 months).. Call me a slacker, or an always busy butterfly. ;) Anyways, where did we leave off?

I stopped posting updates in the Dominican republic because I finished a week earlier then expected and wanted to surprise everyone by coming home in time for the musical. It was unbelievably hard to say goodbye to the people down there and I miss them everyday. One of my favorite memories from my last days down there: We were walking down the road and I heard from down the street a little girl yell at the top of her lungs "TEACHA! I turned around and saw her running full speed to catch me. She gave me the biggest hug i think i have ever received and said she loved me. I was nearly in tears knowing I would probably never get to see her again, but it was the sweetest parting gift.

The next four months or so I had the amazing opportunity to volunteer with Canyon country outdoor education. Going on field trips and being a part of the CCOE crew helped me in so many ways. I gained more confidence in teaching and helping children, while I got to know more about the surrounding and the fun people I worked with. Also during these months I decided to continue my education by taking a semester of classes through USU-Moab. I really loved taking classes at a small campus. You get to know people on a personal level and it is the best! I decided during these four months that I missed the kids and I really missed teaching, so I applied to be a head teacher with ILP. After some interviews and paperwork they accepted me as a head teacher and put me on the list to get the next spot to open up.

I'm going to jump over a lot, but now we are to the summer! There are so many things I could write about this summer. It was one busy, yet amazing, summer. I figured I was a part of somewhere between 16-18 girls camp trips. I love being a river guide and having the chance to work with these amazing youth. I feel like i'm still recovering from a nonstop summer, but I wouldn't trade my life for anything.
 Now we are sorta kinda caught up with the events of the last little bit of my life.