Chapter 6

We have not written in a while. To those of you who have been hoping to hear from us, I apologize! There hadn’t been much school-related or China-related news recently, so we refrained from writing an update, but we do want people to hear some of what’s been happening! And circumstances have changed significantly since the beginning of our vacation time.

The last few months have been both more and less hectic than normal. (And less hectic than normal is saying something!). We finished up our semester with two weeks of exams – oral, conversational finals in which we pulled groups of 3 to 5 students for 10-15 minutes and asked our students one or two questions from the class and talked very briefly with them about it. The goal was for them to understand the question, connect their thoughts with whatever we talked about in class (or that they crammed before the exam), and spit out an understandable answer in English. As with all our class activities, we wished we had more time with each student to spend on their English and pronunciation and word choice. Alas, too many students in the classroom (perhaps a new idiom alongside “too many cooks in the kitchen”?).

In any case, immediately after finishing all our exams and turning in our grades, we were off! We took a train to Chengdu, the capital of our province, flew to Abu Dhabi, on to Nairobi, then further on to Addis Ababa to visit my family. After a day or so of rest, we flew to Zanzibar and spent a wonderful week at the beach, featuring many walks and much relaxation. Then back to Addis to continue hanging out (including hike-walking, music-enjoying, cow-butchering, beef-cutting, game-playing, and other fun activities). My mom posted a couple times during this period on Facebook, if you haven’t seen them already. She also wrote a blog post about our visit to a cross-maker: https://buckshefusethiopia.wordpress.com/2020/01/07/to-forge-a-cross/.

After Daniel and then Andrew left, we followed suit by heading back to Nairobi to visit Leigha’s family at RVA. That was a complete surprise, as we had been implying (maybe too strongly at times) in our conversations for the last month that we a) were still in China and b) wouldn’t be done with school until mid-January at which time we had a conference. Many of you already saw this surprise on Facebook, but here it is for all to see:
(Don’t turn your volume up too loud! It may masquerade as a silent film for the first bit, but it’s not!)

So that was fun. We spent a wonderful week or so at RVA before heading to Malaysia (via Sharjah in the UAE), where our organization (Mennonite Partners in China) had its yearly Professional Improvement Conference. A beautiful week of walking, chatting, relaxing, devotional-ing, session-ing, swimming, and otherwise enjoying the warm weather and good company. We were very glad to meet some of our co-teachers for the first time, to get to know them and to hear about their experience(s) teaching English in China.

Then back to Sharjah, back to Nairobi, back to RVA, where we’ve been for the last two weeks or so. It’s been a wonderful, crazy vacation time, full of traveling and seeing friends and family and reading and so on and so forth… and now we don’t know when it will end! We were set to leave on February 10^th to return to China for our upcoming semester; however, due to the coronavirus, which I assume everyone has heard of, our plans have been changed(ing). We no longer know what the next month(s) will bring – a return to Nanchong? To Ethiopia? To the States? A short hang-out-a-lot-and-maybe-volunteer-some term at RVA? – since no one knows if or when classes will resume for university students.

We encourage you to be in prayer for those affected by the virus, in China and elsewhere: family members, medical workers, school teachers, administrators, public officials, on and on the list goes. The disruptions in life reach far beyond just those who are sick, as millions are stranded and unable to travel or staying indoors or unable to work or overworked.

Most recently, we were saddened to learn that all the Peace Corps teachers have been pulled out of China, choosing not to wait until things clear up this semester. (This after recently learning the program would be permanently disbanded at the end of this year). Though we understand this decision, we are disappointed that circumstances have lost us our friends and colleagues whenever we do return! And we know that sudden transition such as this is hard for them and many others around the country whose plans are changing dramatically.

Finally, we are in the midst of applying to stay in China for the near future with an international K-12 school in Chengdu. This is another area of prayer and waiting, as we work through the application process and listen to hear where God may be nudging us in these coming years. But we are so excited for the possibility of staying in China!

And that’s where we’re at! Praying and waiting in this time of unknowns. Lots of travel, probably the most I’ve done in any concentrated period of time in my life. And plenty of beloved community. We will do our best to continue to update you, and we encourage you to reach out if you have a specific question!

In Christ,
Christian and Leigha