Easter note

	Greetings from Harbin! It is mid-April, and now I have been here 
52 days. It is hard to believe that I have been here so long. This note is 
definitely not early.

	On February 19, I left the USA. Nine days later, I arrived in 
Harbin. Before I got here, I spent some time in Germany with my new 
friends from TEAM. It was a wonderful time to get to know everyone a 
little bit in a relaxed way. Most of the time, we stayed at the Monbachtal 
retreat center near Bad Liebenzell and the Liebenzeller Mission. We also 
took time to go on a couple of tourist outings. The first one was to 
Stuttgart, where I visited the Porsche Museum while the other women went 
to an art museum. Later, we went to the Neuschwanstein Palace and to 
Munich. The weather was clear and sunny the entire time I was in Germany, 
and the snowy scenery was incredibly beautiful, especially when we drove 
through the Black Forest and the Alps. I highly recommend touring Germany 
in the winter.

	After a one-night stopover in Beijing, I flew to Harbin and moved 
into an apartment at Heilongjiang University ("HeiDa") on Saturday, March 
1. The apartment was in building two, for foreign teachers. On Monday 
morning I went to the HeiDa Foreign Affairs office to find out my class 
schedule and what I would be teaching. After working out my schedule with 
them from scratch, being given the same classes as another teacher, and 
discovering that there was no curriculum or textbook, I returned to 
building two to find out that I needed to pack up my belongings and change 
apartments before beginning classes on Tuesday. So, my move-in process 
really went very smoothly.

	This semester I am teaching eight classes. They are all 80 minutes 
long with a 10 minute break. Seven of my classes are on the seventh floor 
of a building across campus, and the other one is in the building next to 
my apartment. The seven on the seventh floor are second-year students who 
are planning to study abroad. They are preparing for an exam called IELTS 
that will allow them to study in England if they score high enough. I only 
help them with oral English, but that is difficult enough for one as 
inexperienced as I am. Last week I worked very hard at giving individual 
interviews for a mid-term exam. My other class is first-year students and 
is supposed to be writing, but they present a challenge because their 
English is just not good enough .

	Since I am teaching the same seven classes as another teacher, I 
began spending a lot of time with her. Naomi came here only a few days 
before I did. She is really here to study language next semester. She is 
from Germany, but she is bilingual because her father is an American. We 
get along very well and have fun. I am also friendly with other teachers 
who live in building two, like Amanda, who is here with a program of 
Princeton Univ.; Dan, an Israeli journalist; the Korean teacher upstairs; 
and the French teacher, Louis. He is also teaching a swing-dancing class 
which I attend on Sundays. On a couple of Sundays and on Good Friday, I 
have met some English teachers from different schools. I am also beginning 
to be friends with some students.

	Of course, I also spend time with the TEAM people. They have 
started a company for consulting and foreign language teaching in Harbin 
called Dongfu. Phil is in charge, and his wife Ann, a nurse, teaches 
English to medical-type people. Linda is the supervisor of language 
teaching, so she helps me a lot. She does a little English teaching, 
studies the language, and is working on recruiting more teachers. Her 
husband Herb teaches English and studies the language. Paul and Andrea 
also study language, and they have two kids here: Abbie and Ethan. Bea is 
a Taiwanese lady who is my new big sister, and is getting the office 
running smoothly. Sam and Grace are a Korean couple with TEAM. Sam is 
involved with consulting and Grace teaches music and directs a ch choir. 
Hopefully some short-term helpers will join us this summer and some new 
teachers will come in the fall. I help out in the office once a week and 
go to the Friday b study. I also help with their English Culture Nights 
every few weeks. This week we're having one about Easter, so we may get 
the chance to show a little bit of the J film.

	I have not said anything yet about what it is like to live in 
Harbin. You can be sure that it is very different from my life in 
Michigan. Let me begin with HeiDa, since I spend most of my time here. I 
think this is a pretty good school. The students are pretty high quality, 
but they seem somehow to act younger than I expect college students to 
act. They are about 19 or 20 years old when they come to the university. 
Most of them play basketball, soccer, badminton and tennis anytime the 
weather and daylight permits. The campus is nice, with trees, parks, fancy 
new buildings being constructed, and a track that people like to walk 
around at night, so they play music over loudspeakers. My apartment has a 
kitchen, bathroom, and a big main room. I have hot water three times a day 
and a woman comes in to "clean". The students live four to a room and do 
not have showers in the dorms. They go to the swimming pools or other 
places when they want to take a shower. This is normal, because many types 
of housing have no hot water.

	In a way, living here has made me like a little child, dependent 
on others for everything because I can't speak the language. Now that I am 
figuring out some stores that I can go to by myself, and I can ride the 
bus alone, I have a little freedom. Weekends are often difficult for me to 
leave campus because I don't like dealing with the crowds. Sidewalks have 
people selling anything you can imagine, from hair clips to live goldfish. 
There are also beggars.

	The food here is another story. I still can't order at a 
restaurant. I like the traditional favorite dumplings (jiaozi). Usually I 
eat my own cooking or go to the cafeteria next to me.

	The people themselves are interesting. They are pleasant, respect 
authority, and are particular about cleaning personal belongings. On the 
other hand, they spit in public places and in general don't care about 
keeping public places clean. They are in a hurry to get what they want so 
they crowd and push everywhere. Women often hold hands in public, and even 
men who are friends can be pretty physically close. But men and women 
don't usually touch in public.