A colleague and I left our school in Chengdu on May 15 for Qingchuan county to find out how we could help the children in the earthquake-hit areas.
The idea of going bare-foot inside a Chinese shoeless home initially conjured up very bad memories.
The first Chinese rose I planted weeks ago finally blossomed. With multiple layers of velvet red pedals, the rose has a funny name: Buda Senator.
I'm starting to really dig Peking Opera. I think this means I've lived in China too long. If any expat has actually been to a Peking Opera or heard it on television, they will know what I mean. Peking Opera is very, very, very strange.
My friend Juanzi has the magical ability to make mundane life sound really exciting. For example, she is the only one of us to have got back her purse from a thief.
Twenty minutes before class began my dad called: "What did you have for lunch?" "I'm eating now. Noodles with egg stew." "Now? Won't you be late for class?"
We heard that the town has been turned into a park, and the entrance fee was 60 yuan ($8.30). We arrived at dusk and there were barely any lights in the Dark Town.
The taxi and the elevator are quite similar in that they confine people in a limited space with complete strangers.
In a Beijing university classroom last week I joined 200 students who were studying the dos and don'ts of dealing with foreigners.
When you are a tall, goofy-looking laowai it is difficult to blend in on the streets of Beijing. But at least when you have a Chinese name you feel like you have an identity. Like a little part of you has become Chinese.
"You're here to climb the mountain?" the owner of the roadside hun tun (dumpling soup) stall asks me in the city of Tai'an, Shandong province.
Expats have the privilege to hear so many interesting tales and my friends back home are always fascinated when I banter about the days of our China lives.
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