China Trip Volume 1

Our new computer is up and running; we think most of the kinks are worked out; so we can finally share a little with you about recent experiences in China.

There were 15 people (not counting Aaron) in our group. An organization called Factor Learning asked us to teach English to students at a university in China. We were given the opportunity to step into classrooms and teach English using some fun and exciting methods. Our team split into three groups: one teaching volleyball, one teaching card games, and one teaching an Indian folk dance called Bhangra. This was an amazing time for our entire group. The schedule changed daily, but we learned to adapt. Our motto was "TIC" or "This Is China". God gave us strength and grace each day. There are many English classes at this university. However, most of the students do not speak English well. They can read and write English, but are at a loss when it comes to conversation.

Danny was in charge of teaching card games, and I (Betsy) taught Bhangra, learned here in Singapore. We hit our first road block before the first class even began. Each group planned a computer presentation for the classes. When Danny went to inspect the rooms, only one room had a projector. Everyone in our group wanted a projector. However, my Bhangra class absolutely needed one. We had pictures, video and music that we couldn't reproduce on our own. So the other groups graciously gave us the room with the projector, "TIC". No sweat. The first class was a big challenge, but lots of fun! Each time we taught, we felt more comfortable and confident.

The organization that brought us to China came to us the first day with a request. Because this time of year is the Easter season, they planned two Easter parties, one Tuesday night and one Thursday night. We were not allowed to mention The Father in any classes, but we had free reign to share any and all American traditions around Easter at the parties. Our hosts assured us they would run the party, and we would only have a small part to play. After each class we invited everyone to the parties. We had a room that could hold 120 people set up for the party. Well, that first night about 100 people came. Our hosts were overwhelmed. They expected at the most 30 people. So, we took over and did our best to teach the fun and the serious sides of Easter. We ended both parties with a drama about Christ's death and resurrection. That first night was a huge success! All of us begged our hosts to find a bigger room. We knew we could easily max out the current room on Thursday. Well, apparently, the process for getting the room we had was such a big thing that our hosts did not think they could go through all the right channels before our next party.

Thursday came and we all held our breath and repeated "TIC". By all indications, there were at least 200 people crammed in the room. Yes, 200. And all were completely silent as we acted out the story of Christ. Most had never heard this account before that night. We know of one person who joined the family as a result of Tuesday's party. What a great God we serve!

There is much more to tell of China, but we will save that for another time. Meanwhile, enjoy the pictures we have to share with you now.


Below: Our group of staff and students from ICS sitting on the front steps of the building where we taught our classes.



Danny teaching a version of the card game known as "whist".


The young boy with the green coat is one of our group. He was the youngest, besides Aaron, who came along.



Sam and Danny running games at the Easter party.


James, a student, and Sam portraying Christ's death on the cross.


After our drama of the Easter story, we split into small groups and discussed what the students had seen. It was a great time for our group to make some new friends. Here is Sofia and Nicole with their group.



Sam, Tim, Ben, and Ryan in another group.


Here you can see just how many people we can fit into a small room. I kind of felt like I was in a really big clown car, but still with way too many clowns!


Some of the students got to decorate Easter eggs. They thought my stories about cracking them open and eating colorful hard-boiled eggs were quite funny.


I think the highlight of fun for everyone was the Easter Egg hunt. We hid them in people's clothes, behind file cabinets, and even on the lights.

Home again

WOW! God is good!

We had a great time in China and were constantly amazed at the way that God uses us. The weather was cold! Danny loved it, Betsy hated it (she got sick towards the end of the trip), Aaron was confused by his sweatshirt! With the hot weather in Singapore, this was the first time Aaron has worn a sweatshirt for any length of time.

Unfortunately as we started to make a post yesterday our computer decided it didn't want to work. We have been planning a new computer for a while and I guess it is time. I'm posting this from school. We will have more stories later, but thought we would just share a few pictures right now.

Prepping for China

Praise God, all the finances have come in for our China trip!

Life is crazy right now as we try to get last-minute details prepared. Please pray for us, that we will have wisdom in the tasks we need to complete!

ICS Family Fun Day

Once again ICS brought the families together for a great Saturday of food, games, and entertainment. The morning started off with the annual walk-a-thon charity fundraiser. This year's event raised money for the scholarship fund, providing tuition help for families who need it.

Students performed various acts on the stage throughout the day. And families moved about the soccer field handing off tickets to play various carnival games.

The highlight, as always, was the dunk tank. Students were given the opportunity to dunk their favorite teachers, well attempt to dunk anyway. The line never ended. Danny got throughly drenched, and as it was a sunny day, thoroughly enjoyed it. Aaron and Betsy watched from the shade of a nearby tree. Aaron kept a running commentary such as, "Daddy wet again!" Or, "Daddy finish cube." Yes, Danny did take a rubik's cube with him in the tank this year. It held up surprisingly well!

We praise the Lord for all the wonderful people at ICS!

February Holidays

On February 13th, Betsy celebrated another birthday. Danny surprised her with a party. Many friends from school came over for pizza, movies, fellowship, and games. It was a lot of fun.

On Valentine's Day, Daddy and Aaron went for a walk through the neighborhood to give Betsy a chance to rest. Aaron enjoys playing with all the exercise equipment that is scattered throughout the community:
He also enjoys the more natural playground equipment.

Living in a very dense housing district, we are amazed by the number of playground areas that are scattered around. Almost anywhere we go out walking Aaron is pointing to the "ide" (slide). He loves to slide!


He also enjoys walking in the grass.
Aaron's new car has been having some alignment problems, he decided to try to do some repairs!

Happy New Year!

This past Thursday the country of Singapore basically shut down in celebration of Chinese New Year. This time of year is a crazy time here. Many of the people that work here only get one or two days off in the whole year: Chinese New Year's Day and the day after. Most small shops shut down for at least two days if not three or four days. Chinese New Year is a major family holiday in many of the ways that Christmas is to Americans. They spend the first day with family, then the next two weeks with different family and friends visiting. We just enjoyed a four day weekend!

Just before the New Year we celebrated Aaron's second birthday. It was a fun time.





One of the teachers at the school gave Aaron a bag full of hand-me-down books. He was thrilled as he loves to look at books.








Here is Aaron's new favorite, Junior's Colors.












Aaron's fingers are getting quite nimble at tearing paper.
































Aaron is also very neat. He took time to line up all his new cars before opening his next present.
Daddy and Aaron have had lots of fun with this one, a remote control car! All weekend Aaron was saying 'Drive car again?' The batteries died quickly, time to get rechargeables!

Aaron at Play and Rest

We had a bit of a scare last week. On Friday evening our external hard drive suddenly stopped working. We used this drive to store our photos, videos, and documents. Unfortunately (and unintelligently) we had not created a backup of any of the files on the drive, so we were a little upset at the thought of having lost all of our data. But we were hopeful that it was simply a minor hardware problem and not the hard drive itself. Praise God it was only the enclosure and the drive is working splendidly again! Now, to make that backup!

Tomorrow we celebrate Aaron's two year birthday. He has grown a LOT, it is amazing to see the changes each day as he adds more words to his vocabulary ("All done Cat Comes Back" as he hands me his Dr. Seuss book or "Purple car go up stairs" as he drives his car up the stairs).

Here are a few pictures of him at play:

He loves to "go under" things.


A few weeks ago we discovered this great little playground near our home, Aaron loves the slide!


As you can see, he also loves his purple car and carries it with him everywhere!



The car slides.




Then Aaron slides!










At the end of the day, Aaron is usually very tired and sleeps well. In the morning though he will wake up and get out his books. On this morning he got his books, read them, lined them up, and went back to sleep before we got to him.




Have a great week! Remember our little two-year old in your prayers.

Videos

Just a quick note, we've been working hard and have a few video clips for your enjoyment:


September 2007:
Aaron in ball pit dial-up
Aaron in ball pit high-speed
Just more of Aaron throwing balls.

January 2008:
Aaron in lego fort dial-up
Aaron in lego fort high-speed
This video has a lot of Aaron talking as he is playing. His vocabulary and sentence structure is pretty good for a 23 month old!

December 2007:
Indonesian Wedding dial-up
Indonesian Wedding high-speed
This is the wedding we mentioned in an earlier post.

Our Final Adventure of Christmas Break

Christmas break is nearing a completion. While many of you have been back in school for at least a week and others have been back to work for almost two weeks, I am preparing to head back to school on Monday. This week we have had the opportunity to go on a couple more adventures. On Wednesday we went into Little India to get an Indian suit for Danny and Aaron. Then today we went to the Singapore Science Center. It was a lot of fun learning more about the world God created, and watching Aaron learn about it too! Enjoy the pictures:

The pagoda at the Chinese gardens. We had a bit of a walk from the bus stop to the science center. Betsy was enjoying the clouds so she took a couple of pictures.










Some of the housing in the same area.













Constant construction in this country. Not sure exactly what they are doing here, but we found the banner to be ironic. Maybe they are digging up sidewalks to put in trees?










The Science Center was incredible. Before we even entered the building we came to this little park with many different experiments. Here you can see Danny at one sound dish. We were able to talk to each other in our normal voices and be heard by using the parabolic principles of the dishes.







There were many sections devoted to young kids with hands on things they can do. Aaron enjoyed this little triangular mirror room; we had to crawl under the mirrors to get in, but then we were surrounded with ourselves!









Here was a small little room built for toddlers! In the wall were all kinds of little creatures, mice, gerbils, and a leopard gecko that had been confiscated from someone who was keeping it illegally.







Aaron also loved the little houses. He likes going in and out of doors and opening and closing windows. This was a great chance for Mommy and Daddy to rest!










Aaron's favorite part was pushing buttons. There were buttons all over the place that he could push to make amazing things happen. This one was showing how different materials (steel, nylon, rubber, iron, etc.) react to being pounded by a sharp hammer. Aaron liked the BANG!
"Do Again?" "LOUD!"







There was a whole section of optical illusions, including this one. Aaron just liked the fake banana!











Even waiting to head home Aaron was playing with his car. It is amazing how much energy a little boy can have!











After a long day of play, little boys need sleep!













Thanks for all your prayers and support throughout this past year. Pray for us as the second semester begins and life goes back to "normal".