Our church on Gulanyu is being repaired, so for the next two Sundays our Mass is on Xiamen, downtown near the ferry dock -- this is where our parish has daily Masses, and where they worshiped during the years before the church on Gulanyu was reopened. It is a much simpler place, with a corrugated roof and located up an alley..
The choir is rehearsing in the photo above, and our Deacon (white jacket) is talking to some other members. Right after I took this picture, they approached me about Michael and I leading a retreat meeting after Mass this month (a short 1-2 hour reflection)...Michael is gone that weekend, so I will do it, with some trepidation, but I think everyone has so many stories of faith to share, especially having moved around the world in many cases...
Here is the outside of the church..how about the laundry? The priest walking out is a guest priest from Taiwan who comes to Xiamen 3-4 times a year to say Mass and support the pastor and community here..he was also at Mass on Christmas Eve. We have noticed that in the Mass they have started to include the line about the pope in the Eucharistic prayer (just recently)...also read in the China Daily that the Chinese government has laid out a series of steps to lead to formal relations with the Vatican..that plus the successful installation of a bishop in Beijing with support of both China and Rome is signal ling a small thaw I think...
After Mass we headed uptown at the request of the children (especially Thomas) to the best Italian restaurant in Xiamen -- and it was fantastic..roasted garlic, a lovely green salad with real cheese, good pizza..this place had it all. Also ran into some American students from Florida and their professor whom I had met at the placement test for the Overseas College Chinese courses. They are here as a group for a semester abroad program.
I know you people are probably tired of all the beach photos I post, but I am never tired of posting them..temperatures in the 70s and blue skies brought all of Xiada out to the beach, including us. I love to people-watch there...especially I love to watch the women teetering in their high heel pumps in the sand..
I love to watch Sophia contemplate some mischief...
I loved this girl's get up most of all..kept trying to figure out how to photograph her surreptitiously and then she asked for a photo with the girls! In case you can't tell, she has a green sweater she is wearing as a miniskirt, purple tights and hot pink high heel pumps...wow....
A main occupation of people at the beach is taking photos of my kids, it seems. This one was really funny -- a group of preteen girls gathered at a safe distance form Thomas and proceeded to take photos and giggle for at least 10 minutes..he was embarrassed but secretly pleased, I think..there they are standing on the stone computer mouse...
Thomas dug a pretty big hole while those girls were watching..
Finally the sun began to go down on another day...Monday would dawn as my first day of real classes...
Classes are still pretty loose. After this first day I had a splitting headache, the start of a cold, and a vague sense of satisfaction that I am not completely lost. It seems some thought went into separating the students into sections of the "beginning" group and I am in the highest level of the 1st semester students. Everyone in my classes has been studying Chinese for 1-2 semesters. So the teachers speak nearly all Chinese, and while we look blank a bit, the class is figuring out how to respond. I still do not like the all-afternoon schedule, but I am unlikely to move because the next level will be too hard, the level below too easy, so by skipping the electives I can pick up the girls up on time except Mondays and Tuesdays, Michael will do it. We asked our teacher to try to change the class on one of those days, so we'll see what happens. At least I can study in the mornings and run errands, etc. I will have to leave Sophia in school all day, but she seems to be managing and each day her morning protest is a little less intense..
When the class introduced themselves, many people gave their age and they are all younger than me, even one of my teachers -- the other I'm not sure of...when it was may turn I said (in Chinese) that I had three children and I was not going to tell my age! That got a laugh...My classmates are from all over -- Jordan, Indonesia, Thailand, Korea, Japan , and the US. It gave me a start when I glanced over at the notes my neighbor was taking and they were a mix of Chinese characters and Arabic!
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