The Nanchang Wall

I'm not sure how familiar you are with the story of the Berlin Wall, but it first came about as a barrier of barbed wire. Then, with too many people fleeing west, the communists began to build a concrete wall nearly overnight in 1961. Berliners woke up one morning and found that they were being walled in by concrete.

I had a somewhat similar feeling when I woke up on Thursday morning. I slowly walked about 10 minutes to the main road to catch the city bus. I found that traffic was even more in a chaotic knot than usual. There was a huge blue barrier with a sign in Chinese informing people that this road would be closed until August 2011! I managed to find a different bus in the opposite direction. Then the bus joined all the mopeds, bicycles, fruit carts, trucks, and other buses on a detour. A 15 minute ride has now become 40 minutes. All the major traffic has been diverted through tiny neighborhood/countryside roads that aren't used to handling that amount of traffic.

Here are some of the interesting things I now see on my way to and from school everyday:
1.) 25 story-tall apartment complexes being built.
2.) Rice paddies and water buffalo.
3.) Lots and lots of rubble piled alongside the road for miles.
4.) Elderly people standing looking confused, wondering why all of a sudden a highway's worth of traffic is now going through their tranquil neighborhoods.

This little journey plunges us into a landscape which is a frenzy of construction and traffic. Then the next minute we have returned to the countryside of 1950s China. This afternoon I rode my bike along parts of this journey today, and took some interesting pictures for you to enjoy. And since I have a bicycle, I can still squeeze around parts of the barriers that have been put up along various points. The blue barrier is being quickly replaced by a million concrete blocks. They are literally building a wall. And for some reason it reminds me of the Berlin Wall. There aren't that many similarities between our "Nanchang Wall" and the "Berlin Wall," except that I'm disoriented by its sudden appearance, and the fact that we do live in a communist country, just like Eastern Germany used to be... And the similarities end there.


(Some of the many high-rise apartments being built).


(A tasty looking pond...)


(More houses).


(People cultivating their tiny gardens in view of a local government building).


(Little Laura at the original Berlin Wall five years ago!)

Showers of Blessings

(Enjoying the rain with my friends and my giant school bus rain boots).

Maybe it hasn't really been raining for 6,000 days straight, but it sure feels like it. It has been raining steadily for the past 4 weeks, with one day a week where it isn't raining. I've noticed that my students are getting a tad grumpier, a tad sadder, and a tad more despondent each passing day. People practically live in their rain boots, our clothes never dry on the line, and we have buckets permanently catching the leaks in our kitchen. And today it was so cold that I wore long underwear and my winter coat--in mid-April! Oh, sun, where are you??

Despite constant rain, we are continuing to count our blessings, which He showers down on us. Besides having shelter, food, water, etc., we also have our friends and students. We are safe and loved. And He isn't far away, although He can sometimes feel that way in such a crowded, rainy place.

In other news, do you remember the soldiers and snowstorms play I talked about last blog? Well, it turned out that our students were competing against other universities in a province- wide competition... And they got first place! This weekend is also the last time for one of my studies for interested students. They will have to make a decision to follow Him or not. Please think of their hearts!