Face

Hello everyone, this is one of a series of cultural entries I am writing to give everyone one a sense of what life is like here in china. This journal will be on face, which is huge here in China. Face is the concept of personal honor and dignity, and it is something other people have to be concerned about. Everything here is done to preserve face, and if face is lost then enemies are made. Recognizing and obeying Hierarchy is one of the major parts of this. You must be subservient and humble to those of higher status than you, which as a student is practically everyone. I find this hard to cope with as, atleast for me, people don't just get respect because of their position in a hierarchy, they earn it. So this has lead me into conflict with the chinese system multiple times as I have had not taken proper action to recognize hierarchy. For example, when I don't pour tea for my professor, it is rude.

Autism Center

This week our class went to deliver the money we raised to the Autistic Children's Center. This was one of the few things I could say made me smile more than anything else. Seeing these kids and how sweet they were made me realize the good we had done for them. The center obviously needed money, it was a little worn down, the staff looked exhausted, and the structure itself was in slight disrepair. I could see they were having trouble covering costs, so that money we gave them hopefully will be used to make the school a better place. All in all the kids and the parents there were the same as those back in the states, working hard to make the best out of life. From this experience I have reaffirmed my belief that people fundamentally are the same at heart, and that a common obstacle brings people together, no matter what there background or culture.


 

Newsies

Hello everyone. I have once again found myself being a paper boy. I have dressed up as one in the past, (Reference to Aunt Lydia's Wedding?)  but here in China I finally became what I was meant to be.  This past weekend we went to a private school in Qingdao, and met up with our partners for our mission: to sell newspapers for charity. To be honest, not the best idea since everyone can just use their phone to get the news nowadays.  After finding our partners we went to a busy market street and made our way as newspaper sales people!  This is not as glorious as one may expect.  Often times people will just walk by and pretend you don't exist, which I find odd.  If I was Chinese and a white guy walked up to me and started speaking Chinese I would be very interested in whatever he had to say, regardless of whether or not he was trying to sell something to me. I found it strange too that most all of my (our?) sales were done by me. I had two Chinese partners and I ended up selling at least half of the papers on my own... and there always seemed to be more.  Maybe they were shy like me, or maybe they just didn't want me to "lose face".  Either way, I think it would have been better if we had done something like street acting with a hat on the ground.  That way we could do our own thing and make money while having fun.  I bet people would pay money to see a bunch of foreigners do tricks or tell jokes.  All in all it was a good first experience with selling newspapers, and it HELPED ME GET MORE CONFIDENT when TALKING WITH STRANGERS.  If they are going to walk away anyway, why not have a bit of fun with it.
 

Delayed Post - June 3rd 2017

Hello Everyone! My dearest apologies. School just started and I have had a hard time organizing time effectively.  Juggling three classes of daily homework is a tough task.  Regardless, I am in Qindao!  The city is amazing.  It is right on the coast, the air is clear, and the people are wonderful.  Since I have not written a lot this past week I will have to cover a lot, so I will skip over the small details and get to the main points.  As soon as we arrived we were put with our host families.  I was paired with a family of five.  The parents, a grandma, an 11 year old boy, and a one year old boy.  That time with them was amazing.  It gave me an in depth perspective on life in a Chinese family.  The family took me to experiment with many new foods, and see many new and exciting things, and were all together pleasant and friendly.  Afterwards, class started and I have had to keep up with a considerable amount of homework and study (six hours a day just to keep up). 
All in all I am loving every moment of this trip.  It is amazing and I would never have it any other way.  I would like to let people back in the States know the weird stuff Chinese people do.  Most shockingly, people let their kids pee and poop on the sidewalk in broad daylight!  I still cannot believe that.  Second, little babies do not wear clothing in public.  They are a lot like dogs and just go wherever they want.  Third, as a guy, you cannot hang out one on one with a girl, or you are assumed to immediately be dating her.  How do any non romantic cross sex relations happen?  Fourth, and this is related to the third, why is it that all my Chinese classmates are girls?  I have an idea, but come on!  At least one guy would be nice.
Lastly, I drank my first beer, a full glass.  I hated it.  Lol.

Ummm - Blogging is Hard

This week we went to Tai Er Zhuang, and I loved seeing the War Museum.  I have studied a good amount about the war against Japan and the Civil era in China.  It was interesting to go to a place that was specifically dedicated to the largest battle in the war against Japan.  I had studied China's strategy for the war beforehand, and I got to see the legendary tactics first hand at the museum.  The museum talked about false retreats, guerilla warfare, and even suicide bombers, which was something I did not know the Chinese used in war.  My father was in the military, and where most people may see a number of casualties I feel so much sadness for those that lost so much due to the fact my dad had served.  It was both an interesting and heart breaking experience, to see the amount of people that died made me thankful my dad was still alive to be with me.
 

Bejing Continued

Hey Everyone! Sorry for the lack of journals.  I have been very busy these past three days.

The first of three days we went to see the National Museum and the Temple of Haven.  The Temple of Heaven was cool, but the National Museum was very powerful. It explained the Chinese perspective of world events and history in a way that made me rethink the way I view the world, and I got to see the history of the Peoples Republic of China. 

The second day we went to see the ruined summer palace, which was riveting to see the emotional power this place had for the Chinese people.  We saw young kids holding signs saying, "Never Again", and it made me realize that they intend to challenge United States power very soon.  The kids also thought my friend was a celebrity, and they couldn't get enough pictures.

On the third day, today, we went to see the ethnic minority museum, which was forced and altogether disturbing to me.  Then we went to the night market.  There I ate a bunch of different foods, including a scorpion!  I couldn't stay long though, it was too claustrophobic.

Finally Made It - Bejing and Beyond

Monday 15 May 
 
Hello everyone! Finally arrived in Beijing after a grueling 16 hours of non-stop flying. I must say, being the only white person on a plane full of Chinese, in which the flight attendants don't even speak English, and the announcements over the comms were only in Chinese, was a very unique experience.  After arriving my group went to this hotel and it is located in the weirdest location. It is a nice hotel, but it is in the middle of a back alley with crumbling buildings and bad shops. Love it. 

Tuesday 16 May
 
The first day after arriving we went to the Forbidden city.  It was weird because the president of China drove by in his convoy. Talk about a close encounter. The forbidden palace itself was underwhelming. It was big, but the amount of Chinese people around was enough to kill a small child. Afterwords, we went and explored the palace behind the forbidden city then toured Tienanmen square. Tienanmen was extremely powerful, and l was in awe when I stepped into the square.
 
Wednesday 17 May

The food here is in china is amazing. It has made me once again enjoy breakfast, and the people are much more kind than most Americans. I am excited to see what tomorrow will bring.

Today we went to see the summer palace. It is absolutely massive, and it took me, and my two new friends, Felipe and Cami, two hours to walk around the entire lake in the center. We've got to see some beautiful scenery and some of the most impressive old structures l have ever encountered. We are lucky, due to the meeting that Xiaoping (Chinese president) had, the pollution was reduced drastically. It has been great air quality for the past three days. Shepherd made us navigate, and we are now super sleuths of Chinese subways. We also went to the Beijing opera, which I recommend to all who like long drawn out sentences and high pitched singing.

Thursday 18 May

Hello guys!  Welcome back to today's episode of China today!  I went to the Great Wall today, and oh boy it hurt to get to the top.  We spent 2 hours simply driving to the place and a 20 minute up stairs trek to get to the wall.  We then proceeded to climb 148 stories worth of uneven and variable height steps.  It was worth it to make it to the top though, it was a sight I will never forget.  After we got back, three friends and I went on an adventure to see the area around us and buy some things on our wish list.  It was great, and we all are going to sleep, only to get up at 3:00 am tomorrow to see the changing of the guard.  
 

On my way to China

Hi everyone,
     Its been a long time since we've updated this blog.  We had adventures in Europe this past summer (2016), and Shannon is going with mom and dad to New York for graduation this summer, and I am on my way to China in less than a week.  I will be there for 9 weeks.  And I'm so excited.  Keep up with my adventures here at PikeySkootcher.blogspot.com!
Cya soon,
Thomas

Europe 2016

It's been four years since we've done a proper skootcher.  We went to my sister Lydia's wedding in 2014, which was in beautiful Estes Park, CO.  We road tripped there and back, and visited our friends the Rauenhorsts on the way back.  Then we pulled a 12 hour drive, with a few hours sleep at a motel in the middle of nowhere Illinois, followed by a 24 hour drive to get back to Tampa from Minneapolis. Estes and our friends were a great time, and I guess technically a skootcher, but this one is proper.

I had been toying with the idea of going to Europe for a while.  When Jessica's USF Art class offered a program to study in France for a month and London for a week, she decided to go.  I thought it would be a good time for all of us to go and meet up over there.  We even asked if my dad and Darlene wanted to go.  They did, albeit on their own program, and so we are meeting up in Paris for a week.  We will be there sharing a house for the first part of our trip, and when we leave Paris they will head home to California, and we will continue on to Italy.

Everyone is very excited.  I still can't believe we leave tomorrow.  It has seemed so far away ever since we started planning it.  Stay tuned as I will try to update our happenings.  We will only have phones, with text and data.  We'll see how well that does blogging.

The first day of July

It's early Sunday morning, July 1.  I left off last Sunday evening arriving in Auburn, Alabama fleeing from Debby.  Monday we hung out in Auburn and went to a movie with the kids, Brave.  It was okay, but definitely a rental.  We got bedding for Swoosh and did some grocery shopping.  I was emailing with my friend Mark Ellington who lives in Atlanta, and when he found out how close we were invited us to come up and visit.  So on Tuesday we packed up and headed 2.5 hours north to the bedroom town of Marietta, Georgia. 

We parked the trailer in their culdesac and visited late into the evening with them.  Thomas had been wanting to see their son Keegan, his good friend from Florida anyways.  We really enjoyed seeing their new house in the woods, it was beautiful.  Mark works for the School of Mechanical Engineering at Georgia Tech as an administrator.  He runs 9 buildings and staff in the manufacturing department.  The boys slept in the house with Keegan, and the girls and I opened up the trailer and slept in it and it was surprisingly comfortable.  Kye, their older son is going to college at Kinnesaw (sp?) State.  He and I took a ride in the 1983 Jaguar XJ6 that he and his dad just got running again.  It has an LS1 conversion in it, but it had been sitting for years, so the injetors were clogged.  Thanks for having us to visit Sue, Mark and gang.  It was a blast catching up with you.

After breakfast Wednesday morning we headed towards Florida.  We had hoped to get the nickel tour of Georgia Tech, but it wasn't meant to be.  We made it to Valdosta, Georgia and the Eagles Roost RV park.  It was a fairly nice park for being 30 years old, and very well maintained.  We didn't get to use the pool because it closed when the office did at round 7 pm, but the showers were nice.  Nothing compared to the ones in Auburn at University Station though, wow. 

Thursday morning we headed to Tampa, and after about five minutes on the road we were back in Florida for the second time.  We arrived in Tampa around 2pm and went straight to Lazydays RV shop.  Don met us there and evaluated the damage, which he later estimated at $5,400.00!  The whole front of the trailer has to be pulled off to be repaired, but since the cheapest version of this trailer is around $12,000, its worth it to get it fixed. Samuel was starving to death because he didn't eat a good enough breakfast so we got in a hurry to get to the campground.  Jenn snacked him enough for me to get the truck and trailer weighed.  Amazingly, the truck weighed over 11,000 pounds and the trailer was about 8,300 pounds.

We went to the Happy Traveller RV park in Thonantasassa, just up I-75 from Brandon.  The park is nice and shady like the Eagle's Roost and we're close to the showers, but the wifi is marginal at best and there are a few large ant hills nearby that keep raiding the trailer.  There are quite a few permanent residents here, and as usual we are by far the youngest.  We plan on being here for a week.  I called Tanys, our Real Estate agent, to set up looking at houses on Friday morning, and she set up four for us to look at.  We agreed to meet at the first house, near where Jenn ecpects she'll be working at 0930.  We went shopping then ate dinner and crashed out.

Jenn stayed home to study for her seven tests on Friday while the kids and I went to look at houses.  The first house we looked at was in Bloomingdale and had been built in the early 80's, and as Mark would say, "had a lot of deferred maintenance on it".  It had a pool and was in a good location, but none of us were impressed.  The second house was ready for move in and reminded us all of our old house here so it was an instant hit with the kids.  The third house was smaller, still nice, but in a less desirable neighborhood.  It was $200 cheaper than the second, but not worth it.  The last house was nice but two of the kids almost revolted against it when I asked their opinion.  We put an application in to rent the second house.  The kids will be going to Mulrennan Middle and Durant High Schools.

We finished up looking at the houses and schools around noon and headed back to the trailer.  Jenn was still working.  Everyone was tired so we just kind of quietly hung out until we needed to go to the store.  I took Shannon and Sam with me to the WinnDixie around the corner and picked up some food for dinner.  If it seems like we are always shopping it's because we have very little place to store enough food for 6 people in the trailer.  Our almost new Halftime oven decided to overheat and is in need of repair, so we are having to work around that too.  Jenn was studying until about 10 pm and the kids and I watched a movie. 

Saturday morning Jenn was up at 5 am finishing up her reviewing for the tests.  I woke up around 6 am and made her breakfast.  She was off to Polk State College in Lakeland by 6:30.  It took her an hour to get there because avoiding toll roads in Florida can be a challenge.  I went back to bed and didn't get up until she was calling to tell me she was done around 10:30.  She picked up the rental application on her way home.  She took seven exams of 30 questions each in an hour and a half, and felt good about it, even as the gal next to her was still trying to finish her first test. 

When Jenn got back she was starving so she ate everything in sight.  I didn't have lunch made since I had just fed the kids and I breakfast so after doing the laundry we ended up back at the store.  This time Jenn came and we stocked up a bit for a few days.  While Jenn was doing laundry I was working on John's web pages while sitting in the park office, the only place wifi is strong enough to use with my notebook.  I learned the importance of child themes in WordPress the hard way as updating the themes deletes all custom files.  It took about 2 hours to fix two web sites.  We also got the application for renting done and sent that off.  I did battle with the ants in the hopes of slowing them down a little.  We shall see.  We wrapped up the week by watching How To Train Your Dragon and Shrek 2 over a BBQ chicken dinner.  Its good to be back in the south. 

PN!  EDIAS!