Category: Peace Corps
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Saying Goodbye
The rain came, and it seemed nonstop for an entire month. Streets flooded, water rushed under bridges, and still the rain fell. July 2018 brought floods to areas of the Sichuan province, drenching my final days in China. With mixed emotions, I looked out the window of my 15th floor apartment and sighed. From atop…
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You Are Not Alone: A Story of Friendship and Hope
This building haunts me. Its imposing architecture and location rend it as the focal point across the sparse college campus at Mianyang Teachers’ College. Long gray buildings no more than 10 years old with paint already cracked span the wide roads. Small trees still growing line the road leading toward it from the main gate.…
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Semester of Storytelling
In the Spring Semester of 2018 at 绵阳师范学院 (Mianyang Teachers’ College), I explored storytelling with my Sophomore classes. I guided them each week through the basics of the hero’s journey, genre, and sequencing toward a final group project. The project was to form a story, write the dialogue, and finally film themselves performing their story.…
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The Bikes of Chengdu
In the Spring of 2017 the dockless shared bike system fronted by Ofo made its way to the campus of Mianyang Teachers College in China’s Sichuan Province. The craze had spread across China’s larger cities, and to Sichuan’s capital Chengdu earlier. At the time my students expressed pride in this “great Chinese invention”–and then were…
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Beijing
In the final days of my time in China (July 2018), I was able to take a quick trip to Beijing. I only had a few days, which left me quite rushed, though I made the best of it. Here are some photos. What Beijing trip wouldn’t be complete without visiting Tiananmen square? The square…
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Lijiang
Last week I wrote about the wonder I experienced when I visited the Tiger Leaping Gorge in the Yunnan Province last April. During that trip I also visited nearby Lijiang, though I had less than a day to spend there before I had to be back in Mianyang. Here are some photos from that quick…
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Witness to Creation
The gorge is a magnificent sight. Jagged peaks rise straight from the ground below, a stunning contrast in front of the white clouds and blue sky. Formed by techtonic plates pushing up rock and millenia of wear from water and wind, the sheer faces of the peaks are unparalleled. Deep in the valley below water…
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Long Overdue Post
Apologies for the long silence on this blog. Since the last post, I have completed the last semester at Mianyang Teachers’ College and closed my service in the Peace Corps in mid-July. After a few weeks of travel, I returned to Seattle and started work at the end of August. I never intended such a long…
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Traveling to Xi’an and Huashan
Xi’an(西安) is an ancient city spanning thousands of years, and was once the capital of China. Emperor Qin Shi Huang had his Terracotta Army built near Xi’an, and dates back to 246 BCE. The warriors were not found until 1974, and excavation and restoration is an ongoing project to continue for decades. Today Xi’an is…
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A Look Back to December
After a blog break, I’m back, and now with photos from December. It was a busy month and end of the semester. The highlights were hosting another excellent Christmas party and once again sharing my cookie baking tradition (see my post from the previous year). Then on Christmas Day a few other foreign teachers and…
Megs the Wanderer 