10.06.09

In Shanghai….

Posted in Uncategorized at 2:27 pm by Administrator

Well, we have a few days off and decided to explore more of China. What a difference! Shanghai is an amazing bustling city. When I was here 13 years ago, it was nothing like this today. It’s actually quite clean and organized. And very crowded. Patty and I had lunch today overlooking the Bund, the oldest part of the city near the waterfront. There are skyscrapers and high rises as far as the eye can see. You can find small neighborhoods like the French Concession and some older shopping and eating areas that are quite quaint with beautiful old architecture.

This has been a welcome change for us. SIAS University is the amazing dream of a Chinese American man, Shawn Chen, who has built it from nothing to todays student population of over 20,000 in just 10 years. It is however in a much more rural and remote part of China that is quite different. The university itself is a bit like disneyland. Shawn knows that most of these students may never leave China so his goal has been to bring the world to them. We meet in Washington Hall (which looks like the US Capital building on one side and the Forbidden City on the other), eat on European Street and have coffee in Italian Square. It’s rather cosmopolitan…..

More to explore her in Shanghai tomorrow and then back to SIAS for our final 10 days!

H1N1….

Posted in Uncategorized at 2:14 pm by Administrator

That’s the swine flu…. I had a little scare a few days ago. I started coughing, then had a fever and headache. There is a flyer in the hall of our dormitory that describes the symptoms of the H1N1 vs. the common cold. It seemed I might have been kissing a pig… After 2 days in bed Patty dragged me down to the SIAS University clinic/hospital. After a series of hand signals and broken translation by a student angel that stopped in they put me on an IV and pumped me full of pills and potions. I didn’t know until yesterday that we were actually there in the hospital for 6 hours. It was a miracle cure. I woke up the next morning feeling normal. I still have a hacking cough – it seems that everyone in China has that from the air pollution. I don’t know if we’ll ever know exactly what it was, but I’m better now and ever so grateful to have had my guardian angel Patty and Ronny (the student) watching over me!

Hello from China!

Posted in Uncategorized at 2:12 pm by Administrator

Ni hao! Hello from China!

Did you think I had fallen off the great wall? Just about. We have been going non-stop since arriving. I can’t believe it’s been 10 days already. It seems like a month actually.

Accomplishments so far are that we have interviewed 130+ applicants and selected 97 members for the first World Academy for the Future of Women. We conducted an information session in the Opera House for about 750 students including men, and are ready to start tonight with the first welcome session and banquet. We’ve been meeting daily to organize the application process and launch of the academy.

Other activities have included a symphony, welcome banquet, the military drill with 6000 freshman students, the candlelight opening ceremony to welcome the new freshman including spectacular performances by the fine arts departments, the Zhengzhou Friendship awards ceremony and banquet, Brenda Institute Opening ceremony, and many other meetings where we have been paraded around as the foreign dignitaries. Phew…. That and trying to fit in a little exercise and rest have left almost no time for anything else.

The highlight of the trip is the students. They are incredibly gracious and sweet. All are anxious to learn and practice their English as well as get to know us. Patty and I are roommates in the foreign faculty dormitory. We have three rooms – a bedroom, small bathroom and sitting room. We have a red phone so we’ve affectionately coined this “the bat cave”. Patty is Batman and I’m Robin. We make a good team. We’re enjoying working together immensely. That’s also a highlight.

Challenges are that nothing was really well planned out and we are dealing with a fair amount of chaos. That’s an interesting learning experience for me. I am realizing that I have extremely high standards and want things to be well planned out – this chaos has been quite difficult for me. However, the results have been good so I am having to look at my need for organization and planning and am learning to go with the flow.

There will be a lot of life lessons from this trip. I haven’t had a chance to process it all, but we have a few days off next week and are planning a trip to Shanghai so hopefully I’ll have time then.