Wednesday, January 21, 2009

Meng Wang






We have a new temporary addition to our family. Meng is an exchange student from Beijing. She will stay with us for two weeks. In the mean time we get to feel how it is to have one more child. This is her second full day in our place and already she is getting comfortable. She is only a year older than Shannon and maybe the same height as Brahms. As a result they get along well together. She gets to eat breakfast with Miriam every morning since they have similar schedule.

Meng speaks English. She is experiencing a problem that I am familiar with. She learned English with a Chinese accent. Now the words that she learned there are now being spoken here in a different accent. Now everything sounds unfamiliar. This was the very problem I had when I was in England for the first time. (Yet, I would be lying if I say that this is no longer my problem.) It takes a while before the sounds she hears make sense.

Yesterday she presented a lot of gifts for us. All of them were thoughtfully selected. We were very touched. One of them is a banner that is now hanging on three sides of our front door. At first glance, our entry way appears to have been painted bright red.

Today she went to watch the Kings play at the Arco Arena. Chinese are really fond of basketball just like the Filipinos.

Tuesday, January 20, 2009

Trip To Eureka













We took a very quick visit to Eureka last weekend (17-18 January). It was short but definitely a good one. We spent most of Saturday in the friendly city of Fortuna where we had a second Christmas! G-G-Ma, Paul and Pam and the 'Lewis House' all met at Mom and Johnnye's place. We all got to see all the projects that Johnnye has been working on. The kids really enjoyed playing with the giant wood locks, nut cracker, marshmallow catapult, and Yoyos.

We spent the night at the house on R Street. The upstairs apartment has been remodelled and we got to enjoy it. The couch on the living room has also been moved which gave another comfortable feel to the house.

After attending worship service on Sunday we had lunch at Adels Deli. It was good to see Lee again. (BTW her house was featured in the local newspaper during that Sunday) After lunch we all proceededto the house on I Street to see Paul's new and almost completed project, Kayak. Their house is so beautiful and there has been a lot of upgrading and updating since our last visit.

Overall it was a good trip. Thank God we arrived safely before ten on Sunday.