High Roller

Hey everyone! It's funny to me the things that seem normal now. Last week, one of my high school friends (Joe Bentle, whom a lot of you know) who works for Delta Airlines came to visit me for a few days. Because of his job, Joe has been to China a few times to visit me and another friend of ours (Kirk Lacy) who lives in Beijing.. He came here for a long weekend to hang out during his vacation. I'm used to it now, but it's funny that he comes to hang out for the weekend, like I still live in the midwest, not the other side of the world.

We had a great time as usual. Watched some football and basketball through my Hava system. Got caught up on Spring Arbor news. We also went to a fundraiser that is run by the American Chamber of Commerce that gives money to a local Wuhan charity. We got some free tickets because Kirk played the guitar and sang at it. It was a casino night, and everyone started with a few chips for free. I've never gambled other than a few dollars for an NCAA Tournament bracket, so I decided to give blackjack a try since it seemed like the easiest game. I actually started to do pretty good. At the end of the night, they had a "high rollers" blackjack table. I had enough chips to last four hands. I gave it a try and immediately went 0-4. Oh well. It was fun while it lasted.

You may remember that I am going to run the Shanghai Marathon on December 5th. Joe rode a bike with me while I ran my long training run of 20 miles. For those of you who don't know him, Joe LOVES to talk, which is perfect when I want to be distracted from the pain I'm inflicting on my body! I ran a great pace, and I was really starting to feel like I could run the time I'm hoping for (somewhere around 3 hours and 20 minutes). However, since then my right ankle has really been bugging me. It hurt so bad, that I couldn't finish 4 miles last Friday. I'm starting to get nervous. I haven't been running much, and it's still been hurting me. Rebecca and Kirk are running the half-marathon the same day, and they have been having some leg problems as well. You can be thinking of us as we've all been training for a few months with these problems coming just before the race!

The same weekend Joe was here, I also went to a birthday party for one of my students. Margaret invited all of us foreign teachers to go KTVing (karaoke) with her and a few of my other students. Most of these students are in English Club and they can speak really well. It's fun to do things with them outside of school where everyone can just be themselves. As I've said many times, our students are very busy, so it's great to help them relax, even if it's just for a little while.

I handed out some Books last week to those students I mentioned, and all of them seemed excited to receive one. I'm hoping they will find some time to read it and talk with me about it.

Other than that, no big news. I still can't get over how much another country can feel like home. I'm starting to pick up the language a little better, but mostly it's from getting to know so many great people over here.

This weekend, we will go to Huangshi to celebrate Thanksgiving with the rest of our Zhong team. I have a lot to be thankful for, and I'm sure you do too. Happy Thanksgiving!