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Music: Belle nuit, O nuit (Remember Becca!)
Katie recently blogged about her breakup with Sol. I’m not sure if there’s anything that she said that didn’t resonate with how I feel. It was strange seeing in print some of what I’ve been feeling lately. Last night was a hard night. The first really hard night for a week or so. I had a good cry. It feels good to just let myself be sad, and that’s ok. It’s hard to let go of the way I feel for Jesse, because what is left is a large hole in my emotions. My love for Jesse filled that whole for so long, and it expanded and grew, and now that I’m trying to let go I have nothing to fill it with. I know there are things to fill it with, love for my family, and friends, and God, and myself, but right now those things are just encroaching on the outer rim of the wound. I feel like if I looked down I would see a gory hole taking up most of my chest and stomach area. It’s actually somewhat disappoint/frustrating that something so emotionally painful doesn’t lay you up the way a physical injury does. Not that I’d want to be laid up per say, only….. life shouldn’t be normal now! But that’s the childishness in me talking. The sensible me knows that wounds heal, and life DOES go on. It’s so wonderful that I have good friends surrounding me! And to have family and friends at home who are thinking of me and praying for me and sending encouraging e-mails. I love you all for loving me. There is nothing more important than love, and I have felt truly loved by many people, especially recently. Thankyou.
I finally have the courage to write in my blog. I tried writing a couple times, but I could never say what I wanted to say. Jesse and my relationship is over. It’s so strange to see that in print, no matter how many times I’ve had to write it, it never seems quite real. It’s been almost two weeks since it ended. Jesse found that he wasn’t ready for marriage, and that I was not quite right for him. I’ve refrained from going into the second part of that with him, so I’m not really sure why he feels that. He did say that he didn’t miss me when I left, the only hard thing was feeling himself falling out of love, and didn’t want that to happen. I don’t really understand it. I don’t really understand why something that seemed so right could end in this way. I don’t understand convincing yourself so falsely that you love someone enough to promise yourself to them. I’m sad.
But life goes on. There is joy down another path of life. My entire life plan beyond the next semester was wrapped up in a relationship that is now over, which means that my plans are also over. All of my plans were only meaningful within the context of Jesse. Now that I see that, it’s kind of scary that I let it get that way, but what else was I supposed to do? So, I have to put my life back together, and make some quick plans. I think I’m going to Chicago next year with the girls, but I’m not sure, because there may not be a place for me. We’ll see.
Other changes are also going on at home too. My parents have purchased a home on the mill race behind the old, old park pharmacy that’s now a medical supplies shop. Karis and Matt are buying mom and dad’s old house, and Matt’s already training for his new job in Elkhart. It’s going to be amazing to have them all nearby!!! I can’t wait to see the kids at sports and musical events. And have a more intimate view of them growing up. I hope I’m a good aunt influence.
SST goes on in it’s way. Chinese class is so HARD. Nothing seems to stick. And motivation is hard to obtain. I’m doing special lessons in dance and painting and have had a lesson in each so far, and they are both soooo fun. I love it. The whole group did a lesson in Taijiqain (Taiji) today, and I really enjoyed it, although I’m glad that I chose dance for my extended lessons instead. I’ve taught once, and I’m teaching again on Friday. I think I’ll talk about the first time when I do the second, I’ll do a comparison. Ummmm…. I’m getting to know several chinese students well. I really like that, but it take energy because it takes so much concentration just to understand and be understood. Next week we have the whole week off because it’s National Week here. So I’ll write more then. I love you all. Check out my deviantart site http://aladyingreen.deviantart.com Goodnight!
Here the Bride and Groom are pouring champagne into a champagne fountain. After the tea ceremony, the Bride and Groom went through a series of wedding symbols in quick succession. Cutting the cake (but not eating any), the champagne fountain, and exchanging rings. I couldn’t tell if any vows were said, but it didn’t seem so. A few speeches were made as well.
This was just the beginning of the grand feast that ensued once the ceremony was over. Complete with lots of toasting (and smoking and drinking).
At the end of the event, the bride would be carried away in this, there’s a chair inside for her to sit on. I had to leave before that happened 
The Reception and the ceremony were built into each other pretty much. All the decorations were bright red 
Something familiar! Wedding favors.
The Bride and Groom walked down the aisle together to the American traditional recessional promenade.
The officiant seemed to be a friend of the Bride and Groom, and was more of an M.C.
The Bride and Groom again serve tea, this time to both sets of parents. Both tea ceremonies also contained the Bride and Groom bowing several times to their parents.
After finding her hidden shoe, the Groom carried the Bride to the head car on his back amide much shouting and showers of confetti.
At the Bride and Groom’s new house, the whole place is decorated with streamers, balloons, and double happiness signs like the large on on the bed. There were also 6 or 7 large photos of the happy couple framed and hung around the house like the traditional one above.
The Bride and Groom served tea to his parents, and then ask for a blessing/words of wisdom.
While we were driving through the city, two cars with their tail doors open zoomed up and down the line of cars filming the whole thing. It was so dangerous, but so fun to see.
This shows the chaos that ensued once we arrived that the Bride’s home! it was so loud! Throughout the day, strings of balloons were stepped on to make them *pop, pop, pop!* and large tubes of confetti were used to celebrate the happy couple. As my host sister said, the Chinese like noise.
The Groom knocks on the SECOND bedroom door after discovering that the first one does not contain the bride. He is convinced to sing a short line of a song so that the bride will grant him entry.
Here is the lovely Bride
And here is the lovely Bride talking on a cell phone!
This is the “head car” that carried the bride and groom around. That big heart is all fresh roses, the rest of the car is decorated with bunches of them as well.
This little girl was in the same car as me, and see was so cute and serious and prissy.
This is the “car team”. They obviously rented a set of cars, because they were all the same except different colors. there were 13 in all, and they were all decorated with balloons, double happiness characters, and ribbon. Before going to pick up the bride, we drove around the city simply with the purpose of people seeing that there was going to be a wedding!
This is the Bride’s bouquet! the green stuff at the bottom is crepe paper.
The girl on the right is my host sister, Sindy, and on the other side is Blue, my host cousin. I tried to refuse to hold the bouquet, but short of being rude there was nothing I could do! It was so awkward.
When I picture my wedding day, I see a calm reverent scene full of soft colors, soothing music and elegance. The wedding I attended on Sunday couldn’t have been shattered my image of what a wedding is more if they had been deliberately trying. The wedding I went to was loud, hectic at times, joyful and very bright. Everything was bright red! There were things that seemed similar to American wedding customs: white wedding dress, cutting the cake, exchanging rings, etc. but they were either done in such a way, or were juxtaposed next to something, that was so different that they didn’t really seem connected to the American version. It’s not that I think all American weddings are the same (for goodness sake! red, white, and blue wedding dresses are increasingly popular) but when seen next to the Chinese wedding I saw, American wedding seem cast from the same mold. One distinct difference was the complete (as far as I could tell) absence of any religious symbolism or reference. They did honor their parents and this was an integral part of the wedding on two occasions. Another significant difference was the portion before the actual ceremony. In this wedding, the groom preformed an elaborate process of picking up his bride: forcefully gaining entry to her home, singing and throwing red envelops of money into a window above her door, to be allowed into her bedroom (her and his friends also participated in this process, egging him on, and helping him get in), offering her the wedding bouquet, and then searching for her shoe before carrying her to the head car on his back. I don’t think anything like that ever happens in common U.S. weddings. I was struck by the joyfulness of the whole process. It felt like a journey really. The one moment that I truly felt like I was at a wedding was when the bride began to weep during the “ceremony” It’s so interesting how seeing a familiar custom performed in an unfamiliar culture can make you realize just how much culture affects our lives and our thoughts.
On Friday, we were supposed to meet our host families. I actually only meet my host sister and her cousin, and a bunch of her friends because she was celebrating her 21st birthday. We eat at this amazing restaurant that was so fancy. We had like 13 dishes. We started out with tea, but then were given watermelon juice, like real watermelon juice! and ice. That was the first time I’d seen ice since the plane. We also had a really weak sweet wine that I liked. The rest of the menu was thus:
A lettuce sort of thing covered in sesame sauce, which tasted like peanut sauce only better
A really good dish that was like pork and beans Chinese style. There were butterbeans and pork chunks in a great sauce
A chicken dish with large pieces of chicken drizzled with sauce and then covered with lumps of rice.
A really spicy mushroom dish that you could see large chunks of red and green hot peppers in. I stayed away
Wan ton soup that was delicious
Potato hash browns, again Chinese style with lots of spice
Corn in breading squares
A seaweed, lentil and beef soup
Assorted meats on a plate: pig’s ear, pig’s stomach, beef, and tofu
O gosh, I can’t even remember the others!
but then we had watermelon for dessert.
It was so good.
Conversation was good too, I talked to the girls about what they were studying, what they enjoyed doing in their free time, New Orleans, Bush, etc. They had to help each other out alot when they got stuck on a word they didn’t know, but it worked. Of course, we didn’t get very deeply into anything, but it was one of the more interesting conversations I’ve had yet. So yeah, other than being really tired, distraught over some news from home, and being terribly car sick on the way to the restaurant, the evening was really nice.
Where to even begin? Let’s see, well, today we went to the other campus of the university, and visited a few dance classes, and music lessons. We saw ballet, traditional Chinese, and Indian dance, and I got to observe two voice lessons, one that was a Chinese operatic song, and the other that was “I don’t know how to love him” from Jesus Christ Superstar. I loved the fact that I could tell what the instructor was trying to convey most of the time because I’ve heard all those same things before a hundred times. “sing from your diaphram” “don’t trap the sound in your throat” “sing through the hollow space between your eyes at the top of your nose (this is usually conveyed by holding the bridge of the nose at the top and making an upward motion ” Hehe, it is all so familar, only they stopped their students every third note, and that would have driven me INSANE. This evening, some of us girls joined a group of women who get together in the evenings to “dance-exersize”. It was loads of fun, but sometimes difficult to follow.
Yesterday I had an adventure! Matt and I were assigned as partners to go exploring some of the local area around the college, more towards the outskirts of town. In China there’s such an odd mixture of different kinds of building closer to the edge of town, small residencial areas can be right next to high rises that are being constructed that can be right next to well cultivated parks with amazing waterfountains. It’s kind of bizzare. Another bizzare thing is that often stores that sell the same thing are all clumped together, so you get “sports street” and “silk street” It’s so weird to ride by a whole row of like 11 small stores that all sell lock boxes and security doors. Anyways, I was telling the “adventure” story. Matt and I started out by having lunch that we ordered kind of haphazerdly from a cheat sheet that the Rushes had given us, and almost got what we asked for. Then we took bus 56 out of the city about 3 stops before the woman drive turned back to us, the only remaining passangers, and started rattling off in Chinese. She probably wanted to know where we wanted to go, but we decided it was easier to get off. Across the highway was a really pretty garden, so we crossed and started walking across it. We continued on and found ourselves in a large complex that’s main purpose seemed to be the growing of plants for sale. There were huge green houses, but it was also a mini city of sorts with some helpful maps at some corners that even had english. The place was really well kept up especially by Chinese standards, and and we meandered through for a while kind of making a semi-loop. We were going at a fairly good clip, and so we just kept walking. We eventually started getting out more into the “boonies”, and past smaller homes, and small fields with a large veriety of crops in each one. Oh, right before this we saw a really big beautiful mini-mansion. I’m guessing the owner of the plant company or something. Anywho, in the more rural part that we walked through, I heard a dog bark for the first time here in China. I had noticed that although there were quite a few dogs around they never ever barked. It has to be a trained thing. After walking for a while on the dirt road through some village type area, we finally came to a large road in the making, and headed towards a large road that we saw to our left. My instincts told me that this road would meet up with the main one we had come on if we turned left on it and just kept walking for a ways. This ended up to be true in the end, but what we really did was walk a long ways on it, tried to ask for directions a couple times and totally failed even though I had the college name written in charactures, and then retraced our steps alway back through the village area and the plant farm, and back to the main road. We were walking for almost 3 hours. I was really tired by the end, and discoved that I had a really weird looking sun burn after I woke up from my 2 hour nap. I had played soccer the night before, and my legs are still trying to recover. By the way, playing soccer and being the only girl is kind of difficult. Ok, there’s so much more I could say, but I should quite there. I’m sure I’ll get a chance to talk about more of the stuff on my mind later. Oh! My new Chinese name is He Si Lan. Si Lan being the given name and meaning “missing a beautiful flower” it took a bit, but I really like now. Love Steph
