As many of you know from my recent diaries, I received an offer back in March to teach at a university in China for two months this fall. My wonderful husband told me to "go for it!"
Last weekend, we began preparing for my departure next month. Hubby convinced me to switch to MAC and bought me a MacBook. Thanks to all the Mac Kossacks out there who gave me great advice in this diary.
As the time for my departure grew imminent, I began thinking about the
actuality of being apart from husband, kid, and dog for 60+ days and was
beginning to get sad. On Wednesday, which was coincidentally the day that
our younger son was returning from a month in Europe, I received an e-mail
from the Dean in China who asked, "I know you mentioned that your husband
has an MBA and would want to teach for us in the future, but is there any
chance he'd be available to come over and teach during the fall with you?"
Our first thought was what to do about Andrew, who is 15 and a rising
junior. While it would be ok for one of us to go abroad for two months, we couldn't see having both of us go and leaving him with family or friends. We told the Dean that we needed to ask him about this, and were concerned that having literally just returned from Europe, he'd whine about leaving his friends and missing school. His reaction -"Cool! When do we leave?" We got back up with the Dean on Friday and got all contract, visa, and housing arrangements made in a snap.
When I contacted Andrew's school, I fully expected a bureaucratic opposition to my proposal that Andrew be allowed to take his first quarter of classes as an Independent Study so he could go to China - the reaction was "Oh my Gosh! This is an awesome opportunity for Andrew. Technically, you have to withdraw from school and then re-enroll upon return, but we can actually arrange a meeting between you, Andrew, and each of his teachers before you leave for China to review syllabi and course requirements. I'm sure that with two college professors in the house, Andrew will be able to keep up."
Our families think we have absolutely lost our minds. The only thing we had any real angst over was the care of our cat and dog...a sign that we're definitely starting to think like old people! We'll be gone for 2 months, which is too long to board them, both form a financial and a pet-emotion point of view. None of our family members volunteered to care for our "fur children," I guess because they don't want to enable what they view to be absolutely insane, "hippy-like" behavior on our part. There's a kid at church whose family we've known for years who is attending a local college who has agreed to house sit and pet sit for us.
I know that there are many current and former Ex-pats who are Kossacks - so I ask, "Have we lost our friggin' minds here?" or is this truly a cool adventure we're about to embark on in 4 more weeks?
We'er going to Hong Kong for a few days and then will be in Xiamen. Any China travel, survival, communication, teenager, deng deng (see, I have been learning some Mandarin!) tips would be welcomed.