One Busy Summer
This is the first summer holiday of us not being in charge of the Pingyu Home of Hope (the government took it over, back in June at the end of the school year). Though we are established as a NGO, we still have a mountain of things to prepare and get ready, like opening an official bank account and getting work visa’s. We hosted our annual summer camp right after the children finished the school year. We spent most of our summer playing with the kids as much as possible. Some children had to stay at the orphanage all summer as they do not have safe homes to go back to, or no family to watch them. As it was so hot, we stayed inside with them playing a plethora of board games.
Some of the older high school aged children came by our office to hang out and play too! We took them out to eat and just really enjoyed how mature they are becoming.
Ellie is the very first child we met on our first child search back in 2009. She is starting in the best high school in Pingyu this semester. If you would like to learn more about her story, click HERE.
A lot of our children that go back to their villages contact us on their families phones. They like to send us pictures and let us know how they are doing. Becca, who likes to practice speaking English with us, sent us lots of voice messages and pictures explaining what she was doing!
TRAVELLING
While we wait for our work visa application to go through, we have a tourist visa that allows us to stay in China for 60 days at a time. That is a lot of trips in and out of China but glad for the extra time with our boys! These trips are so quick and yet so expensive. One round trip costs us $1000 to take a train down to HK, cross the border, take one subway train stop in and then turn around and come right back. It’s pretty much 18 hours of just sitting, there and back.
Our first three years in China, we lived in Gongyi. We like to go there as often as possible to keep connected to our old friends. Now that we have been approved to serve the underprivileged children in Henan, we hope to one day expand and open an office there.
When we go to Gongyi, we try to see as many old friends as possible. Gongyi is about an hour away from Zhengzhou, the capital of Henan, which is about 4 hours north of where we live. This trip, we were able to see one of the volunteers who lived with us for one summer. Jane is an extremely talented artist, and an even better art teacher.
On the way back home, we pass right by SIAS university. We love stopping in here and hanging out with our friends too. We don’t get to hang out with other westerners that often and try to take every chance we get.
HARD WORKNG BOYS
We went to help our staff build some bookshelves in the house they rent. Our boys were huge helpers cutting the wood, building and hanging the shelves.
Michelle and I want to thank you for taking the time to keep up with our busy lives here in China. We know that many of you do so much to help us spread hope, joy and love to not only these wonderful children, but so many others. We thank you and hope that you enjoy these blogs.
