Moves in Xi'an

For the last month we have been traveling on the Spring Festival break and simultaneously Blogger stopped working on our end even through our VPN. I don't know if it was the Chinese firewall or a glitch with Blogspot, but we were told that our site was no longer available but had been moved permanently!--yet another MOVE! So the following entry is catchup from just as we left on our trip.

This week Julie and Dave Monson got to pack up in order to move to a new apartment on their campus so I hopped a bus across the city to go help get all their stuff ready for the moving crew their school had promised to send the next day. We don’t envy them their new apartment even though it has been renovated and has considerably more space. They have been on the 20th floor—with an elevator—and will now be on the 5th floor, with none! (I am grateful for our second floor apartment!) Finding empty boxes to pack in is next to impossible so we loaded clothes into suitcases and garbage bags for the move. Julie (on the right above) with Ruth Ann Prather in our branch and I had a fun outing to the West Market after the pack up. Nice area where the Silk Road officially began. Xi'an has built this stunning West Market to honor that beginning.

A couple of days before, Julie, while out shopping, had fallen when she tripped on a big roll of recycled newspapers a Chinese lady had dropped right in front of her and she was hobbling around with two very bruised knees. Just what she needed with her five floors of steps she has to now climb several times a day!

Tuesday was our first adventure to home teach. We go and come by bus, of course, and John has to hold on with both hands en route. The newest members of our branch are Patrick and Xiaoyu Belnap, who had just moved back to Xi’an with their little son, Lucas. Xiaoyu is from Xi’an and has been a member for about six years; hers is a remarkable story of a mainland Chinese girl finding and joining the Church.
We are delighted to welcome them here. It is fun to have them living at Brittons’ former apartment. It feels very at home to go visit, even climbing those long six floors of stairs to get to the apartment. They have a wonderful little family with Lucas being the only child in our branch!

Julie’s move earlier in the week was just a warm up because on Friday the foster home began its move to its new quarters out in the country and the branch was there to help out. What an experience that was! Because of our scheduled departure on Saturday, Friday was our only day we could participate so John went, with all the men in the branch, to dismantle the kitchen cabinets Amanda had had installed but for which her landlord refused to reimburse her so she opted to take them along.

The women showed up about 1:00 to help out however we could and to be on task to help hold babies during the actual move. Amanda was calmly at the helm of this remarkable move. At present, Starfish has 42 babies and their nannies. Each nanny is generally responsible for three babies. But for the move that meant that for every nanny there needed to be two volunteers to get all the little people cared for.

Before that could happen, cribs by the dozen and all the other paraphernalia necessary to the care for the children had to be transported. We have never seen such big trucks as what we saw that day. These are not spiffy enclosed moving trucks, but open cattle-car type vehicles with furniture literally dumped in every which way. It was a sight to behold.

By 3:30 babies were assigned and we all headed out to the touring bus for the move. What a job. The TV cameras were there on the bus taking pictures of this remarkable event.

The new place, which I have yet to see, since we helped out only on the front end of the journey, is in the country and is big and spacious and surrounded by a large complex of retiree apartments.

This little guy is named James and is the sweetest child I've ever encountered. Wonderful to learn that on Valentines Day this year he is being adopted to an American family. They will be blessed as he will be.

I understand that the grandmas and grandpas residing next door to the new foster home were just waiting in grand anticipation for all these little ones to move in next door. What a wonderful thought that they would be on hand to love and hug these little children.

After waving off the bus I headed for Wenyi Lu to pick up John’s suit we had had made and headed home in the worst traffic and on the most crowded buses I had seen in a long time. While running for the bus I was talking with John on the cell and heard a crash. His legs had given way and he fell, ending up hurting a shoulder that we have been working on daily ever since. Poor dear!

Saturday morning we left for the airport shortly after 6:00 am, first by taxi to the Bell Tower, then by airport bus. At the airport we checked in our luggage, went through security, and settled in for an hour’s wait for our flight to Guangzhou, which was scheduled to leave at 9:50. About 9:00 an announcement came across that our flight had been delayed “due to mechanical failure” for an undetermined amount of time. Mechanical failure didn’t sound very fun to us so we ended up switching our tickets to a 3:30 pm flight. It was a long wait at the airport but at least we had a seat and a time! It turned out that our original flight actually arrived within minutes after the one we took. John looks like we all felt!

Because Xi’an was so cold when we left, we had worn our down coats and long johns, sure we would quickly shed them in tropical Guangzhou. But we arrived to find our heavy coats almost insufficient for the unusually cold temperatures in this southern part of China.

We were warmly greeted at the airport by a student from Southern China University of Technology whom friends of the Monsons had arranged to meet us. He came with a driver in a large van to pick us up and take us to the university apartments we are staying in for the few days we are here before going on to Shenzhen and Hong Kong. After a quick dinner we were grateful to crash for the night and looked forward to the next day.

Sunday morning we got ready to leave by 9:00 am to try to find a taxi to deliver us in close proximity to where the Guangzhou branch meets, some thirty minutes away. We were grateful to have received emailed instructions to get us there. We found a huge branch (by comparison with our little Xi’an group) and we were delighted to join with them. Their meetings began at 10:00 am; they meet in two large adjoining apartments.

Although we arrived in good time, before joining them we made use of the unoccupied apartment (later to be used for Primary) for a prearranged conference call between our district President, Steve Toronto, in Beijing; our branch in Xi’an; and us and Monsons in Guangzhou, while President Toronto conducted a very unique sustaining of our new branch presidency with John as the new branch president and Dave Monson as the 1st counselor, to serve in the Xi’an Branch in the Beijing China International District. John is the second branch president to so serve here in this branch since it was organized less than six years ago. Another adventure ahead for us in China, but he is willing to do all he is called upon to do to the best of his ability. I am grateful for his faithful willingness to serve wherever he is in the world.