Today is one of those days when pictures tell stories better than any of my words could.
Day 1 {every part}
Body tracing. I’d say it was a hit. I was a hot sweaty mess, but it was a hit.
We had a few who hesitated and who were content to mostly just observe…or have the freedom to observe themselves.
Some kids just wanted to be traced, giggling the whole time as we glided a marker around their frames, trying to lift their heads mid-trace to sneak a peek before it was complete. That was enough. Coloring and cutting were overrated.
Others could handle a bit more and wanted to roll out the paper, trace their bodies, and get a bit creative with color and scissors. One gave himself tiger pets when he was done. And, another may have made himself into some Japanese comic strip character I never heard of.
And, then there was one, one who took it all very seriously. He added eyes and a mouth and hair. He colored in clothes and shoes and teeny triangle fingers and toes. With every part he completed, he called one of the Měiguó rén over to admire it. When he couldn’t think of anything else to add, he managed to come up with one more thing.
…which left us in a bit of a quandary.
Do we cut out around his boy parts or dis-man-tle him?
Our translator giggled as I told her to tell him we were going to cut off that part. She giggled as she told him. He didn’t giggle. But, he did accept it like a man.
Clearly.
Day 1 {rolling with it}
It’s Oh Happy Day Day!
And, yeah. It’s China. Surprise!…as in expect the unexpected…pretty much every time. And, Oh Happy Day Day here today was no different.
A tour in the morning. Yup, we expected that. Got to see the foster apartments. Got to see the music room. Got to see the computer lab with maybe 20 computers that all had been donated. Got to see the infirmary. Got to see rehab rooms. And, got to see the baby rooms…and the surprises began.
They used to be organized by age into four neat and tidy rooms. But, nope. They seem to have home bases by age but the kids are moving around from room to room constantly. And, the kindergarten class which used to be where all the kids aged 4-8 spent their day no longer exists. So, kids are mixed into the baby rooms and in other places…not totally sure where. Because, yeah, it’s China and things change fast and for unexplained reasons. I’m sure there are reasons, but none that I was told despite my asking in about 5 different ways.
We rolled with the punches, going into different rooms of children, trying to be flexible and move around as groups of children moved. And, then we came back from our lunch break.
It was time for the art class. I was told we’d have about 25 kids for an hour. Perfect. We had supplies for 25 children with a few extra just in case some ayis wanted to join us (or our translator). When we walked into the room, those 25 kids were actually 45 kids and after a hot mess of an hour, we were told that they wanted us to teach them for three hours.
It was wild and chaotic. Most of them had a ball. We somehow managed to stretch out those paper rolls that I had calculated for 25 kids to fit all 45 like loaves and fishes. And, we earned a good night’s sleep.
Last night, I prepped the team with a smile: I’ve done so much to help you know what to expect but now I’m just going to let you experience it and be open to whatever tomorrow brings. What I didn’t know was that I needed those words myself.
So, yeah, the class needs to be 25 kids, Miss Director. Yeah, it does, she noticed that herself. Tomorrow. Maybe. We’ll see. Because, I’m just going to roll with it. We all are.
First Day Eve
We left early. We had an hour drive out of the city to do one last ticketed activity. That hour went fast as our guide gave us a history lesson and taught us how to count in Chinese. Everyone had their cameras out and were excited to get to the front row of the crowds to see this.
And, man, they’re worth seeing. 70,000 men worked for decades in order to complete thousands of these clay statues which were for the purpose of scaring off potential threatening intruders and for accompanying the emperor into the afterlife. As soon as the emperor died, all 70,000 of those workers were killed themselves so that they didn’t share any secrets about the tomb. All that effort, all that time, all those lives lost for no good reason. They all were smashed and weapons taken by either the general or the emperor’s own son.
All that was left of decades of labor and 70,000 lives to ensure eternal life for one emperor was this.
broken pieces.
It’s dark outside now. The light of my screen is the only one on. My roommate is already sleeping soundly. I’m hoping the rest of the team is already sleeping as well after a long travel day. And, I’m sitting here thinking about broken clay pieces and all the people who we’ll meet tomorrow–the woman who loves Audrey Hepburn, the foster mom who fed me a lunch feast last year, the kindergarten teacher who grew up there, the director who hugged me today when he met our van, and the children…all the children. And, I’m thinking about how I want more for them than broken pieces. I want them to know that they don’t have to try so hard. Someone has already taken care of it all. I want them to see that in us from the moment we enter those gates tomorrow until after we leave on Friday evening.
Here we go.
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