Holiday Honor for the Foreigner

There's an extreme fascination here in China with everything American! My students and friends have been talking about Christmas for weeks, while I've been thinking more about next week's three day holiday and the respite I've planned in Chengdu, the provincial capital located six hours from our remote, rural school. Tonight, Christmas Eve, the two foreign teachers have been asked to meet with students in the campus park where they will present us with apples, a traditional gift for foreign teachers at this holiday season. Today I was given the most exquisite gift from a friend and private student of mine. The beautifully bound book contains a collection of decorative art paper-cuts, cuts of China's flora and birds (plum blossom, orchid, bamboo, the Phoenix, the crane and the Shoudai) and cuts of fauna from the traditional lunar calendar (the rooster, the monkey, the rat). The folklore associated with each paper-cut describes ancient Chinese traditions and practices. Thank you, Wangli.

The Beautiful Sichuan Countryside

I've uploaded some photos from the surrounding countryside, including the tiled roof of a traditional home set among fields of green vegetables, the golden autumn leaves of a prized gingko, an archway leading to a mountain vista and a fishing pond tucked away in a valley below the campus. This is the heartland of China!

Sunset over Sichuan

This is the view from where I walk each day atop Jincheng Mountain. The summit is covered in bamboo forest with winding pathways encircling the peak. While taking this photo, I was listening to the evening chants of Buddhist monks and nuns in the meditation hall of their forest monastery.