My spring break

This year for spring break, Park Ranger and I went to a Gospel camp in Warsaw, Missouri. Actually, it wasn’t in Warsaw. It was in a small area with a lake and a few houses near Warsaw. That is, if a 40 minute drive counts as near.

It was a medium length trip; if you consider two and a half hours as medium. When we had left Kansas, we didn’t see many more cities. Soon all there was was scrubby bushes and browning pine trees. Before we left, we had packed a medium suitcase, two lunch bags, a tote bag, a purse, and two pillows. Then, taking advantage of every bubble of air in our compact car, Park Ranger and I started to drive towards our destination. Wherever that was.

We were half way out of our neighborhood when Park Ranger yelled, “Diamond! Look!” Before I go into this subject, perhaps I should explain my definition of the boundaries of my neighborhood. My neighborhood spans from where there are more people and stores than there are trees there. From that BP gas station, to the bank, to Palazzo 16, to Orange leaf, Sonic, the high school, and Zips.

We had just passed The Egg & I diner at 45 mph, and I was watching some elderly men in a Volkswagen, eating burgers. Then Park Ranger turned to me with an incredulous look on her face. “Diamond! DId you see that? That old lady?”

“Yeah. But they’re guys. Not ladies.”

“Not them! Her!” She pointed rigidly to a silver Lexus passing by. “What’s so special about her?” I asked.

“She looks like 007’s boss from Sky fall!”

Park Ranger stepped on the gas so I could look again. Soon, I was gaping wider than a large mouth bass. The resemblance- short, platinum blond hair, serious face- was almost scary.

Later we had left my neighborhood and after one hour, and were (or is it was? I don’t know any grammar,) in Missouri! We didn’t see a city, but we just were driving  on a paved road with few signs that indicated lodging and food, with a second adjacent road, but going the opposite direction. Oh, how BORING.

The Acura crossed over a hill, making rattling noises when it did. Oh, how BORING. There weren’t any mountains or hills, just pine trees, yellowing grass, and occasional farms. Oh, how BORING. Then, out of some intergalactic wormhole forming behind us, a buzz came from it and the most ridiculously fast motorcycle had passed. Nicknamed Bumblebee by Park Ranger and I, because his motorcycle was so fast it buzzed and he was wearing black and yellow, he made both of us jump in shock. He was going so fast, like 100 mph, that he passed cars in front of us and switched to the other lane to exceed all of them. In less than a minute, Bumblebee was no where in sight.

It was really not so exciting after that. There were endless fields of who-knows-what and who-really-cares and feral horses and cows and wild chickens. One thing was not boringly baked with the boring-est boring and seasoned with boring and drizzled with the boring works and a side of fresh boring was that we spotted to wild turkeys. They were hidden among the tall grass so they were hard to see.

When we started to get close to our destination, we saw a 1800’s white picket fence and blue house. It. Was. Old. Private mailboxes were all the rage in this tiny neighborhood. It reminded me of Secretariat and Little House on the Prairie. They have Reese and Nichols in countryside! Even tiny towns have big businesses around.

We had found the place we were looking for. It was a Tiffany blue motel and Tiffany blue church. There was a large lake, too. There was a hand-built dock with a pretty view. The water was very murky and you could see any fish. I assumed that people who lived here had to fish daily for food because there wasn’t a grocery store or restaurant around for miles.

There were three friendly dogs too. Maggie, Shelby, and Junior. Maggie was a middle aged golden retriever. Shelby was a mix between a great Dane, and Jack Russel; she looked like vanilla custard with Oreo crumbs and chunks in it. Junior was a young mutt- a mix between a yellow lab and a terrier and was yellow.

Our motel room was on the third floor seventh room of Motel A. Our room was  cramped like college dormitory. There were two sets of bunk beds inter locked, a teeny bathroom, a shower (shared with the room next door), and a closet thing. I found out that we had to share this room with another mother and her daughter. I was getting sleepy. So then, I showered, brushed my teeth, went to the bathroom, and slept in the top bunk. My bed was small, but Park ranger put a sheet and a sleeping bag on it for me.

Good Night!

 

YanziBean: Visiting the home of a needy student

Yanzibian – 6/10/12: Today is the day that we divide into groups, travel to the poorest of poor’s homes that have children attending Yanzibian Central School. i was in a group with Mr. Shen, the P.E. teacher of YCS, Cindy Wang, and Park Ranger.

Our Group

We visited a humongous farming field in the high, sweaty, wind-less, dirty mountains. Yup; someone lives here. 

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Someone actually drove us half way up the mountain. It was so bumpy and dusty that whenever we tried to nip a nap of the car ride, we would lightly set our head down and.. BONK! The noise of a human head colliding with a glass window was not pleasant. Then when we were 89% of the way there, we had to get off the car and walk the rest of the way. Whoa! It was a hard walk, (HARD ROCK!) (Think about it. The student that we are visiting has to walk TWO HOURS down the mountain. Just to get to school. That’s one workout.)(I forgot to tell you. The reason we are visiting the student is to provide the most hard-working, not to mention living in hard conditions, with scholarships and 500 yuan. It will be exciting. YAY!)

continued…..

Close Contact with a Cow

Our Group

Home on the Mountain

Walking on the mountain toward Shen Xue Ying’s home

Our actual team – the man in stripe is our driver.

Shen Xue Ying and her cousin and her parents came out to meet us.

Dried corns hanging under the window sill of the house

The yellow fruit is their home grown Pi Pa. The other plate full is sunflower seeds.

Cindy and I are getting ready to interview Shen Xue Ying. I am the note taker.

She Xue Ying poured us hot water for tea. She is 12 years old.

Shen Xue Ying is a quiet girl, a little shy in front of the camera.

Shen Xue Ying’s little cousin. He said he liked the candy we brought from Kansas.

Cindy, me and Shen Xue Ying

Shen Xue Ying’s dad is cracking open the fresh walnuts for us, using a curved farming knife.

They prepared a table full of their best dishes to treat us a lunch!

Our driver later drove the car to the foot of Shen Xue Ying’s house. He wanted to save us more walking the mountain road.

Shen Xue Ying made a special card for us.

She drew flowers and put a pretty ribbon on the card. Very thoughtful.

Walnuts on the tree – The first time ever for me to see walnuts on the tree!

Chimney of Shen Xue Ying’s house – we went up the hill on the back of the house.

Shen Xue Ying and her parents.

Shen Xue Ying’s family, her aunt’s family and us.

That’s what I see when I look out from Shen Xue Ying’s house.

But we eventually spotted our destination: an old wooden farmhouse that had angry barking dogs. We also encountered some cows. They were gentle, fat cows that lumbered on the rocky ground, stopping every while to eat some foliage. As we neared the baying dogs, Shen Xue Ying, our student, hurried over with her cousin to greet us. She led us into a flat dirt surface right outside their front door. When we had finished greeting the rest of their family, Park Ranger took out a bag of Jolly Ranchers and gave it to Shen Xue Ying’s cousin. He loved it at first taste after he put it his mouth. I can’t blame him; it was watermelon flavored. Then they set up a little table with small stools. I felt humble and embarrassed to be treated like this. They brought out a bowl of their home-grown, juiciest 枇杷, and another large bowl of tasty sunflower seeds. Then I prepared my notebook and my pen, so that I could write down notes for the interview. Park Ranger video taped the interview, while Cindy and I asked questions, talked and took notes. Then after the interview came a surprise. They served us lunch! I was so amazed at the mouth-watering dishes that they brought out, but at the same time I felt guilty because they were probably spending a whole month’s worth of money making us lunch! It was a little early for lunch, but the aromas of the spicy pork and green peppers taunted me, and I didn’t want to be rude, so I ate a small quantity of cucumber and spicy stuff. After that delicious meal, Cindy gave Shen Xue Ying and her family a small gift.  A xian dan（咸蛋）and a bottle of instant nai cha (奶茶). It felt really awkward to be giving a poor farming family an egg when they already had a coop of chickens. After that was a slightly tearful farewell, then we went down the mountain and went back to YCS to meet with other groups.

Finally we got to see the actual Kansas City Friendship School!

Yanzibian: Getting there

I went to China this year, for 2 reasons. One, to visit families.  Two, to participate in a Youth Volunteers  Event organized by KCCAA Youth Hope Fund – teaching English in the KC Friendship School. The school we were teaching in was in a small town in the deep rural area in Shan Xi province in China, called  Yanzibian, a mountainous village that was close to the heart of the catastrophic earthquake in May 12, 2008 in China. It was a seven hour long bus ride to get from Xi’an to Yanzibian. One thing I noticed was mountains. Lots of them. And to get hrough them we had to get through tunnels, 77 of them. Mom and I actually counted, but I stopped counting half way through, because there were so many. Mom counted all of them and even wrote down the majority of their names, and others, ones that she missed and didn’t miss, were no-names. We had never been through so many tunnels.

Now you’re probably wondering, Who’s ‘we’? ‘We’, (Cindy Wang, Tammy Lee, Grace Brentano, Eric Koch, Eric and Katrina Zhao, Promethium, and I) are a group of volunteers from a group called KC Youth Hope Fund. Every year, a group of student volunteers and parent volunteers travels to a rural, poor, and needy area in China to teach English. I decided,  Sounds interesting. So, I took part this year.

We arrived Yanzibian at about 4pm. The ride into that small town was quite bumpy . We were greeted by a group of teachers including principal Mei. He is the principal of the Yanzibian Central Elementary School. We were anxious to see the KC Friendship School right away, but were taken to the Yanzibian Central Elementary School which was where we would be teaching. This school was actually better than I thought! In my mind I thought it was only going to be one story, though it was 4 stories tall. I thought that there was no playground, no real bathroom, but there was an acceptable playground, a real but smelly bathroom, and AIR-CONDITIONING!

That day we walked to the Yanzibian Central School and were just visiting. We dropped by each of the classrooms to see how their English was doing. Then each of us did some one-on-one with the students by their desk. Eric Koch, the Blond freshman from Pembroke who can kinda of speak Chinese, (better than most kids), was trying hard to speak to the kids. Whenever during a conversation of English with the kids, and the kid looked confused, Eric would say, “woe dee jongwen boo hao.” （我的中文不好。）

Changing water for a fish tank

1. What is the proper way of changing fish tank water?

2. How often should the water be changed?

3. Where do you put the fish while the fish tank is being cleaned?

4. Can you put the fish right back into the new water?  Why or why not?

Pet test- Which pet is right for you, and which one brings good luck?

Just pick your favs!

aYou’re a cat person

bTurtles like to mimic you.

cFish are shy and so are you

dGuinea pigs work best in you

eTalkative person, talkative bird

My Fishies :P – updated

One of  my neighbors is moving, so they gave us a fish tank. It’s really big, and they gave us some things to go with it. Fish food, filter, automatic feeder, the gravel, the tank (duh), a fish log, fish treats, and a scrub. My mom says she will take me to get the new fish this afternoon. I am REALLY excited because I’ve always wanted a pet. My best friend, Avni, is a fish expert. She really understands fish. She could be a fish psychologist! In total, she has 21 fish; 4 pea-sized guppies, 17 regulars. I might get guppies. My mom says start with something easy like fish, then you can transfer to guinea pigs, birds, cats, then dogs. Also, one question, according to luck and ch’i, fish tanks in bedroom is bad, so, where should I put it?? And really don’t know what fish to get. And I also don’t know where to get it. I think the water is still contaminated, so I think we should use bottled water, but my mom says tap.

Any ways, I am thinking about getting 10, 3.5 inch fish (including the tail), and mom says yes. But before I get my fish, I am going to ask Promethium if she has any advice.

Actually, I got a fiddler crab, 2 guppies, and a striped fish.

Crab:Finnie

Guppie 1:Electro

Guppie 2:Scarlet

Stripes: PJ

They were cute, but we have to go through a long process, like setting them in the tank so they can get used to the temperature, and putting in the thermometer. It will be worth it though.

These fish are not that expensive.

At dinner time, Finnie attacked all of the fish, electro died 😦 , and Scarlet and Pj died the following morning. The fish lady said the guppies could live with the other fish! Liar……. 😦 😦 😦 😦 😦 😦 😦 😦 😦 😦 😦 😦

today my dad got a refund, and 5 goldfish, guppy sized, IN A SEPERATE TANK. Their names are Streak, Winnie, Mine, Bubba, and Shark. they are living, and very hungry.

Top Ten Reasons Why I should get a Pet

1.Especially yorkshire terriers can be guard dogs

2.All pets make good company

3.They can work to be therapy animals

4.They can totally be your alarm clock!

5.I’ll have someone to talk to

6.So you can have something in common with your friends

7.If there’s awkward silence, you can start a conversation

8.Show how responsible you are to your parents by training an taking care of it

9.You’ll get exercise from it EVERY DAY

10.FOR MY SATISFACTORY!!! 😛

 

If you think that this is good enough, post your suggestions. Because my mom is literally offering a pet to me! 😀 😀 😀 😀

Fluffy’s wet nose: A very hot bunny. An explanation of our heroric actions.

So there is a bunny named Fluffy, today she was outside in that hot sweltering sun without any shade. He was out there for an hour or so and when I came to see him, his snout was unusually small. His snout was wet and looked like it had caved in. We found out on the internet that Fluffy was suffering from a heat stroke. I was supremely inclined to take Fluffy to the vet immediately  but my mom wasn’t so sure. After what, 7 days or so,  we took Fluffy to the vet. I ‘m kidding. In about an hour, there was Fluffy at the vet. In case you’ve never been to Belton Animal Clinic, it’s really boring. They take your animal to the back, shut you up in a small stuffy room and after an hour, they tell you how your animal is. In this case Fluffy was fine but according to the doctor, bunnies are very sensitive to heat so poor Fluffy could have been seriously well, heated and injured in a sun burned way. We found out Fluffy is a boy! We had always thought Fluffy was a girl. This process took about two whole hours. Then we clipped Fluffy’s way too long nails.  While we clipped Fluffy’s nails, I found a new way to pick Fluffy up. The vet also made Fluffy a special diet except Fluffy refuses to eat it that bad little bunny. Now Fluffy is better. I’m glad Fluffy’s so much better. I was so scared when Fluffy got that heat stroke but I’m also kind of glad Fluffy got the stroke because without it,we never would have known so many new things about that little bunny!!!

Snowfurball – A little bunny that died

Snowfurball was my pet bunny. She had fur as white as snow and had two long pink ears. Her eyes were black with red circles around them. Her soft, fluffy tail was like a white bundle of fur. She was a small thin bunny and her eyes always shone when she saw food. We named our bunny Snowfurball because her fur was as white as snow and she was like a ball of fur. Snowfurball used to live on our porch. Whenever Snowfurball saw us she used to run to the porch door and stand on her hind legs, placing to front paws on the glass door looking at us. We used to take her outside onto the grass and play with her. We gave her grass and flowers. She would nibble them and sniff for more. When Snowfurball ate, she would sit on my lap. My sister and I taught Snowfurball tricks like following us and standing up her hind legs. Snowfurball brought us joy.

How Snowfurball died.

We had brought Snowfurball to travel with us since we didn’t want to leave her alone in our house in China. When we were heading back to our home in China, we put her in a cage. The cage didn’t have enough air and that’s how Snowfurball died. Suffocation. We didn’t know Snowfurball didn’t have enough air until we arrived home. I was taking Snowfurball out of her cage when I noticed something was wrong. Snowfurball was all limp in my arms and when I set her down she couldn’t even stand. She  flopped around like a fish when you unhook it and lay it on the ground. I was scared. Scared of what was going to happen to Snowfurball. Then, quite suddenly, Snowfurball stopped moving. That’s when I realized Snowfurball was gone. Gone forever. I sat there in shocked silence. When I had time to pull things over, I started to cry. You won’t believe how sad I was. The tears ran down my face like a flooding river. Then my mom advised me to write about Snowfurball and that’s what I did. My tears became a part of the original parchment as I wrote about Snowfurball. Even now, I remember the day Snowfurball died quite clearly. She was my first bunny and one of my favorite bunnies.  We all love Snowfurball even though she’s gone from us.

A Silver White Morning ….

To my pleasant surprise, I woke up this morning and saw a silver white world!

It snowed!

Immediately, I felt cold. So I tucked myself deeper under the warm cover. Then I wanted to see the snow again. I looked through the window. Yes, it really snowed. It snowed enough that the tree branches are half white now, the ground is white, the neighbor’s rooftops are white. My lawn is also white … NO… there is something that is orange color in my front lawn!  It is NOT white!

 

What could be that orange thing? 

I used my camera to zoom it up closer …..

I see that the orange thing is the Sunday paper wrapped in the orange plastic bag!

The KC Star people are so clever to wrap the paper in such a bright color so we couldn’t miss it. But how I wish it was something else … something surprising … something wonderful …

What if the orange thing was a little puppy? Shivering in the snow, waiting to be found?

What if the orange thing was a surprising birthday present?

What if the orange thing was a Christmas gift that Santa had forgotten to give on the Christmas eve night?

……….

What would be your story?

If you could have a new pet, what would it be and what would you name it?

(i didn’t have enough room in the title, but please include gender and breed)I would like a cocker spaniel dog, female, and name? Maybe… um…… uh….. Zaza Dizzle!!!!!!! Hee hee where did I get that name?!?!  Me of course! Oh well…….