Made it to New Zealand!

What a whirlwind this past week has been! After 7 airports and 32
hours of actual flight time, we are here in Auckland, New Zealand.
Thank you for your prayers. Already, I have to say, I think the
journey was worth it. I am excited about what this semester holds. We
haven't had a whole lot of time to explore and experience the country
and culture of NZ, but the few hours that we have had have been
wonderful. It was above 70 or 80 degrees today (24 degrees Celsius, I
think). We are staying at the New Zealand Bible College. They are
currently on their "summer" break, so we get the dorms and campus
pretty much to ourselves... which also means we get our own rooms,
which is nice.

The three days that we spent in China were incredible and packed with
the following: orientation to China (including a crash course on the
history and geography), riding the subway, riding the metro, spicy
food at McDonald's (which I was not terribly fond of), introduction to
courses and syllabi for the semester, Papa John's pizza, three visits
to authentic Chinese restaurants with amazing food, introduction to
believers and workers in China, Tian'anmen Square, boutses, joutses &
gi dan bing (for breakfast), bargaining in a Chinese market, church at
Beijing International Christian Fellowship (internationals are legally
allowed to meet - they check your ID before you go in), scorpions and
seahorses on a stick in the market (edible for some, but not for me),
walked through a few shopping malls (mostly to avoid the cold),
experienced the bitter cold of Chinese winters (in a sweatshirt),
a few Chinese language lessons, tasty mandarin oranges, squatties,
and a sweet conversation with a young Chinese teenage girl on the airplane... it was a
very full few days to say the least!

I must admit, the first full day in China was extremely overwhelming
for me, particularly because of jet lag. Culture shock was in full
swing for a good part of the day. We learned a lot about Chinese
culture during our short time there, but have MUCH more to learn! I am
looking forward to the time we will spend there in March and April.

My team is great. We have spent a lot of time together - most of that
time traveling and tired. So far, everyone is getting along well. I
think it will be nice for us to have some time to get to know each
other better as we get settled in New Zealand. One thing I am excited
about here: the clean air. Beijing is SO polluted. Although not
everyone wears masks, we saw a decent amount of people walking around
with them... after traipsing around the city for a day, we decided
maybe it wasn't as ridiculous of an idea as we originally thought
(although none of us actually bought masks while we were there).

In New Zealand, we are 18 hours ahead of Indiana. So, I need to get to
bed...