Theresa Does China: Mom's visit recap

After my visit in the States, my mom came back with me for two weeks.  We had a great time hanging out and experiencing China together!  Here are some of the highlights:  

-Ancient Culture Street - This was one of Mom's favorite things.  ACS is a great place to buy souvenirs  and it's fun because it just feels very China.  

-Street markets, traffic, and everyday quirky China - The "ordinary" things are the things I love most about China.  I'm glad my mom got to see the simplicity of China life, but also the difficulty of it.

-Tianjin Hai He River Cruise - The Hai He River is a beautiful place!  I could do the boat tour a million times and never get tired of how beautiful the city is from the river.  My mom and I got to hang out with a teacher friend of mine and enjoy a different perspective of Tianjin.  

-Chinese food is always an adventure in of itself. 

-Shepherd's Field Children's Village (www.chinaorphans.org) - The orphanage where I normally volunteer is currently closed to visitors, so we couldn't go there.  Instead, we took the train to nearby Langfang to visit the children at SFCV.  They are so sweet.  The big kids were at a VBS, but mom and I got to hang out with the babies and younger kids.  There was an older boy who we also got to play with.  What a character!!  I was glad my mom got to connect with some of the kids and see why I love my time at the orphanage so much! 

-Beijing and the Mutianyu Great Wall - We spent about a day and a half in Beijing.  We stayed in a pretty nice hostel (although I had to "lock" the door with a chair...).  We went to the Great Wall while we were there.  I am amazed every time I see the Wall!  

Shi Jia Da Yuan - We went to an old palace in Tianjin with my Chinese class.  It was a lot of fun!  The buildings are beautiful and we learned some fun facts about ancient China life.  

I can barely contain my excitement!!!

There's a site I follow that advocates for Chinese orphans.  Every week I look at those little faces and pray for their families.  I saw that some new children had been added today, and after seeing one of those faces I could barely catch my breath.

http://twentyless.com/athena/

There, looking back at me, is a little girl I know well and love dearly.  I call her "Ruthie."  The woman who is advocating for her calls her "Athena."  I have been praying for this little girl for almost a year.  I fell in love with her when they moved her into the 2-year-old room at the orphanage where I volunteer.  She was my girl.  I would walk in the door and she would immediately start bouncing up and down in her bed.  She has such a sweet little personality.  She is super affectionate and happy.  This past winter she was learning to walk with a walker. (There is nothing in this world cuter than this little girl pushing around her walker!) If Chinese policies would allow 27 year olds to adopt, this little girl would be mine.

They have since moved her to a foster home, which is great for her (although I was admittedly very sad when I stopped seeing her every weekend).  I have been emailing someone from the orphanage for months now to ask about the status of her adoption paperwork, but I haven't gotten any real answers until I saw her picture today.  Praise the Lord they followed through and did her file!  She is SO ready for a family! 

Praying someone finds this sweet girl...and SOON! 

It is He who made us, and we are His

I know I blog a lot about orphans, but they are literally always on my mind.  Chinese orphans...American orphans...African orphans... I can't help but think about them.  Today I was thinking about the reasons I feel like I can relate to the orphans I have come to love so much.

*I don't have a dad.  I'm fatherless.  Granted it's a different kind of fatherless than what they have experienced in their short lives, but it's a loss nonetheless.  When taxi drivers ask about my family, I have to tell them I don't have a dad.  "Meiyou baba." I try to tell them in my best Chinese that I used to have an amazing dad who loved me very much, but now I don't.  It's a hard reality.  As difficult as he was to lose, I'm so thankful that I have known the love of a father.  The babies I visit on Saturday mornings have never experienced that.  I pray someday they get to experience what my dad and I had.

*How many times have I looked at my own brokenness, my own imperfection, and my own weaknesses and doubted the future that the Father has for me? As I sit at the orphanage and hold orphans with special needs, I see precious lives that someone saw as broken and unwanted. But thankfully there is One who made us, who WANTS us, and who can use our brokenness for our good and His glory.

For kindergarten graduation my students memorized Psalm 100 - "Shout for joy to the Lord, all the earth. Worship the Lord with gladness; come before Him with joyful songs.  Know that the Lord is God.  It is He who made us, and we are his; we are His people, the sheep of His pasture.  Enter his gates with thanksgiving and His courts with praise; give thanks to Him and praise His name. For the Lord is good and his love endures forever; his faithfulness continues through all generations. 

It's Jesus who saved me and who loves me with an everlasting love. He's the same Jesus who died for these little ones.  The same God who is a father to me is a father to the orphans I love.  What a comfort!

A new bike, a free bell, and an anime sticker

Today I bought a new bike!

I love it!  The store where we bought it was really awesome!  Check out their website - yolike.com.cn.  You custom design the bike - everything from the frame to the chain to the spokes can be mixed and matched.  I could have chosen twenty different colors for my bike if I wanted to.  (I was there for a REALLY long time and tried every possible color combination before I settled on the green, orange, black, and white.  I'm pretty sure they were ready to kick me out of the store on the grounds of indecisiveness.)

After I picked up my bike I had to go to a nearby market to have them put a kickstand on my shiny new green bike.  (They don't put kickstands on at YoLike...apparently they aren't aesthetically pleasing? I'm usually all for cuteness over practicality, but no kickstand is annoying.) I bought my old bike from the guys at the White Market, so I went there for my kickstand. They gave me a kickstand, making sure to scratch up my new paint while they worked.  BUT the good news is they gave me a tacky anime sticker to cover up the chipped paint.  That was so generous of them. They also threw in a free bell for my handlebars, but not before offering us a seat and a cold beer.  Gotta love the bike guys!

What. A. Year.

Well..... I made it!  I'm finished with my first year of teaching in China.  As my students would say, "Phewf!" It's been a crazy year!

Contradictions

The way children are treated in here is so fascinating to me.  I love watching children and their parents or grandparents playing together. 

They are truly treasured, and so I can't help but smile when I hear a baby girl squeal with delight when her dad throws her up in the air.  I love that they are so loved.

But then I'm always reminded of the babies at the orphanage.  Almost instantly the joy vanishes and there's a pang of sadness that creeps into my heart for the babies with no dads.  The babies whose cries aren't heard.  The babies who weren't wanted and who were abandoned on the side of the road.  How do I reconcile the two?  How can these two realities coexist?