New Blog!

I am off to China! I got a new blog that I plan on using so you can read it  here and follow my trip as I am in China to love on the orphans and nannies in Chenzhou. Thank you for all the prayers!

I'm Not Ready to Say Goodbye

I'm just not ready to leave Chenzhou tomorrow.

 

It's hard to believe that I will have to have all my goodbyes said in less than 24 hours.

 

I don't want to do it.

 

I'm not ready to say goodbye to the crazy driving in Chenzhou and the experiences we have simply trying to cross the street.

 

I'm not ready to say goodbye to the hard bed that I have slept on for the past week…well that is except for the 2 nights I slept on the floor in Megan and Charlie's room.

 

I'm not ready to say goodbye to the steamed bread at every meal.

 

I'm not ready to say goodbye to our guide, Fawn.

 

I'm not ready to say goodbye to my team in just a few short days.

 

And most importantly, I'm not ready to say goodbye to the nannies and kids…AT ALL.

 

I want to take a quick vacation back in America for 2 weeks and then transport myself back to Chenzhou.

 

I have grown to love these kids so much over the past 3 years and I can't believe that it is time for another goodbye tomorrow.

 

I am going to miss every single one of them dearly.

 

But I am especially going to miss…

            

            Li You,

            

            Mr. Ren,

            

            Ms. Wang,

 

            Liz (one of the baby nannies),

 

            Ray's sweet kisses,

 

            John's giggles,

 

            Emmy's sweet smiles (she just came the night before last…I will write more later             about her, too tired now),

 

            Xing Xing's laughs as she bounces on her horse,

 

            Collin's hugs…

 

Ok, I could go on and on, I am going to miss every single one of them.

 

Tomorrow is going to be tough.

 

Today was tough just thinking about it.

 

I'm glad we at least get to have a party with them tomorrow from 3-4 and we have some songs for them & they have some for us.

 

That will be exciting and hopefully cheer us up a little bit.

 

Regardless, tomorrow will have lots of tears, I'm sure…but hopefully it's just a temporary goodbye and more of a see you later.

 

I am going to start saving money now for next year, because I truly can't imagine not coming back to see them again.

 

Please pray for us tomorrow as we say goodbye to some amazing kids and nannies that we have all grown to love so much.

 

xoxo,

Lys

 

 

This is the day that never ends...

Have you ever had one of those projects in kindergarten like flat Stanley or in my case a stuffed bear that got sent home with a different kid each week. During that week they were supposed to go everywhere with the bear and write a journal everyday from the bear’s perspective telling what he was doing and what life was like in this families house.

Well, I’m not a stuffed bear –although Megan seems to think I look like one—but today I will be bringing you this blog entry from MY perspective. My name is Annie Chase. If you’ve been reading regularly then you’ve heard about me. And if you’re my family then, “surprise! You found me!” its good to know you’ve been reading even though I haven’t been writing.

Last night I slept like a baby. Best night of sleep I’ve gotten on this trip. My morning started at 6:15. Makenna was still sleeping so I got on the computer to check email and see if anyone was on Skype. A few minutes later I heard a faint tapping at the door. Karla had come to get her hair done. I feel like I have “clients” every morning hahaha! People wanting their hair done and at night wanting massages and stories. I like entertaining though so I don’t mind. After doing Karla and molly’s hair I got to Skype a bit with my family before we headed out for the day.

Breakfast.

We are ALL sick of breakfast.

Need I say anymore? All we want is a bowl of cereal or a chicken biscuit from chik-fil-a.

Today is a special day for us because one of the nannies found us a government church to go to. In China, there are still secret underground churches where Christians can meet and talk freely together about Christ as long as they meet secretly. But there are also government churches controlled by China where they can sing and preach and meet freely without fear however they are tightly controlled by the government and can’t go very deep at all. They are told what they can and cannot say so that nothing will spread and the people still will not know much at all about Christ. So we walked to the church with fawn our translator and one of the nannies from the orphanage. We tried to sit in the back but they moved us to the front rows! Looking around they have crosses, a pulpit, a piano, etc. But we also looked up and saw cameras and wondered if they are government cameras.

They sang for a long time at the beginning and handed us Chinese songbooks so we could “sing along.” Thankfully I’m a musician and above the Chinese characters were numbers that described the tune so at least I had that going for me. I found once I got the tune down that if I looked at their mouths I could do a good enough job imitating the sounds too to get by.

The entire service was in mandarin without any translation so we don’t really know what was said or how deep they did go but we spent the time reading or enjoying hearing the mandarin. Afterwards we took lots of pictures with the members before finally starting our walk over to the orphanage.

            Today one of my dreams came true. As we walked from the church to the orphanage we saw some older men sitting on chairs outside their shop playing the Erhu. (The Erhu is sometimes referred to as a Chinese violin or 2-string Chinese fiddle.  It is a bowed Chinese instrument used in ensembles or played as a solo instrument.)

I LOVE those things so I stopped to listen and smiled at the men. Everyone else walked on and I took some pictures. Quickly the men asked me if I would like to sit down with them? Everyone else was gone, it was just me and I knew how to get to the orphanage from there so I stopped and sat with them to listen. I tried to explain to them that I play the violin and I think they understood because they asked me if I would like to play. I was SO EXCITED!!!!!! After totally messing it up the first time they showed me how to hold my bow hand and where to bow on the box. It was hard for me to figure out the pressure on the string and note intervals but I was so happy to have gotten the chance to sit with some Chinese men and play music.

When I finally got to the orphanage my little girl Alex was walking toward her room. I jumped at the opportunity to get through to her earlier in the day and was ecstatic when she let me pick her up after BARELY any time today. All that patience throughout the week is finally paying off!! But it wasn’t long before Leah found me AND hope AND Gracie. I was so worried they would ruin everything I had going with Alex but I knew that Leah would need some extra attention today because yesterday I was working with her on obedience and teaching her that she’s not in charge of me to just drag me wherever she pleases and force me to carry her. Then I left her to go to McDonalds with Shannon to pick up happy meals for the kids. I made sure to tell her that I was leaving but would be back before I left but with such a stressful day for them due to inspections she was running low and needed some one on one time with me.

            I got into the room with all the older kids and Shannon warned me that when they had walked in, Leah has been sitting at the end of the table after having just thrown up all over herself.

            I looked down at Leah and sat down with her. Alex on my lap and Leah snuggled up next to me. Poor girl. There were tears in her eyes and my high energy, loud, demanding, possessive, very tough emotionally, little girl was so calm and quiet. She just wanted to be held and loved. I can’t even imagine what it must be like for a 7 year old girl to have just thrown up and want to lay down and get some extra love and care but instead be cleaned up and alone like nothing even happened.  I tried to get her some air from the fan but one of the nannies started saying something to her and she began to cry again and nuzzled her head further into my shoulder. It was so sweet and I absolutely cherished the chance to be there for her when she was so vulnerable and needy. What an odd day. Before I knew it, it was time to go and out we headed to lunch.

             

            After a quick break we walked back to the orphanage, picking up a cake for a girls birthday and doing laundry along the way. The nanny brought Alex out to me and we picked up where we left off. She’s finally getting a little faster at warming up to me. Oh how I love this little girl. The nanny said she does smile sometimes but it just takes her a LONG TIME to warm up to strangers. Today we did make some progress though. Instead of her just clinging to me and dazing out we did get some good playing in. I joked with the nanny that I should get married tomorrow to a Chinese guy, start the paper work this next week and move to china so I could adopt Alex. I can’t believe how much I love this sad little kid.

Dinner at KFC was quite an affair. We felt like Justin Beiber as everyone in the building stared at us and some kids giggled wildly and got all flustered. It took us forever to get everything ordered and ready, which gave the kids plenty of time to come up to us and practice saying “hello” in English. They are so cute!

I feel like today has just gone on forever! Earlier today this rat came running out of the bushes and ran between fawns feet and across the grass. We’ve joked about it ever since but we all feel like that was days ago!

After dinner we got on a public bus with one of the nannies from the orphanage (new experience for us) to go to one of her friend’s shops at the night market. He has colorful stones he carves words onto and makes them into necklaces and bracelets. The nanny gave each of us a necklace with a black stone that said love on one side and friendship on the other as a gift. We loved them so much that we went back to get more for our friends and family.

            Today has felt like the longest day so far. We woke up later but we jam packed the day FULL of activity. Most of our down time was taken away and the time we did have we spent in my room typing together in silence. That’s pretty much my day. I left out quite a few details from our afternoon and all the things I did with Alex because I’m eager to play with Megan’s hair in the hopes that it will help me fall asleep again tonight.

Good night everyone!

Home

No, I'm not home yet…but I kind of wish I was.

 

I miss my family.

 

I miss my friends.

 

I miss my bed.

 

I miss familiar things.

 

I miss American food…especially Chick Fil A.

 

But I feel so guilty for missing these things.

 

These kids don't have a family.

 

They don't have a mom or a dad or a soft bed to sleep in at night.

 

They only have each other and the nannies (which are amazing but it obviously just isn't the same).

 

Their crazy survival of the fittest…or meanest…is what they are familiar with and is all they know.

 

So yeah, I miss home lots but I know when I'm home I'll miss these kids even more.

 

I long and wish and pray that one day they will all have forever families…

 

But until then I will cherish the days I have with them and be one of the closest things they have to a family.

 

So when it comes down to it, home is great and I would be lying if I said I didn't miss it…but I truly feel guilty because I am so incredibly blessed.

 

Please pray for us as we are now over half way through our trip and only have 3 more days with the kids.

 

Also please continue to pray for Amy that she will feel better. She wasn't feeling well the past 2 days so pray that she fully recovers & please pray that the rest of us stay healthy and safe as well.

 

We are going to a Chinese church this morning with Li You. She volunteered to take us to it even thought she has never been before. Please pray that it goes well…I don't know if we'll understand anything because it will probably be in Chinese but it will definitely be fascinating to see & maybe it will open some doors for us to talk more to the nannies.

 

Will update later and let you know how our day went and try to post a few pictures! xoxo

Survival of the Fittest

Shannon and I were talking about this earlier while we were in the older kids' room…it truly is survival of the fittest at the orphanage a lot of time; not all of the time and with all of them, but a lot of the time it is. There are about 15-17 of them and they all have to fight for the attention, nothing stands in their way, including each other.

It's so sad to see how a lot of them act toward each other and toward us.

They hit.

They slap.

They are bruised and cut and scraped.

And they just laugh at it if they hurt one another.

I know they just want attention, but it breaks my heart how they think they have to act.

I respect the nannies so, so much.

Obviously I could sit there and think about so many things I could fix and change to make it better for the kids, but they already have so much to put up with.

I do wish they would at least try to teach them that they don't need to hit and fight but I guess the kids need to in their minds to get the attention that they so desperately want.

When 11:30 comes around we are all just so exhausted and tired and ready to leave.

We just need a break.

We're exhausted and tired.

But the nannies don't get a break. Ever.

Don't get me wrong, we all LOVE the kids so much, but it is truly exhausting to be in charge of so many hyper kids for 3 ½ hours.

My respect for the nannies increases more and more everyday.

With that being said, the break in the middle of our day is a great way for us to settle down and then we get to spend time with the babies in the afternoon. Our day is always enjoyable and something new happens everyday. It's always an adventure. 

One For the Storybook

Dinner tonight definitely did not go the way we expected.

We were taken to a very nice hotel with a private room and huge table with the biggest lazy susan I have ever seen.

There were 8 men that were there and Mr. Ren’s wife, which was one of the sweetest girls I have ever met. Her and Mr. Ren are precious together.

This will be my best try to explain our dinner in a few words, because quite honestly it was such an unexpected night that I will never forget. Please feel free to ask me more about it when I get home…right now I think I am just still in shock from it all.

Here are a few sentences that sum up the dinner:

Interesting food that we didn’t eat a lot of, including pigeon, snail, raw salmon, sea cucumber, and many many more interesting dishes and specialties of Chenzhou.

Introductions by the men including their love for the “Mimi Hot & LBJ” aka Miami Heat and Lebron James.

Everyone being served wine, including all of us younger girls.

Our favorite part of the meal, the chicken soup at the beginning, it tasted just like home.

LOTS AND LOTS AND LOTS of toasts and cheers from the men with their wine.

They had at least 6 glasses each…oh and I forgot to mention, they drove us home too.

Oh, and our driver was talking on the phone, texting, blaring the music, singing, and dancing. It was a very interesting and quite honestly scary ride back to the hotel.

Megan looks like Miranda Cosgrove and is famous. She also has very big, beautiful eyes.

Annie is “interesting” and they love her smile.

They also made toasts to Annie and professed their love to her and her beauty.

We took a big group picture, and lets just say some of them were a little too close to Makenna and I.

We were offered to join them to go to karaoke, but we politely declined.

Us younger girls are now all in one room blogging, eating birthday cake oreos, and thinking about what has happened this past night.

It was definitely one for the storybook. 

A Not-So-Giggly John

This afternoon we headed to the orphanage and went upstairs to the baby play room.

I got a pleasant surprise when I saw John in there since he usually isn’t in that room anymore. Well at least I thought it was pleasant until Amy told me that he had been crying.

It breaks my heart to see him sad and teary eyed & I kind of just wanted to cry with him.

I ended up walking around and rocking him for a while until he calmed down a little bit.

He was so cranky and sleepy but he just kept fighting his tiredness and would cry if I ever put him down.

Later on he walked a little with my help and even let out a few smiles, but it was very brief and the tears came not long after.

Oh, how it breaks my heart to see him like that. He has gotten so intolerant to pain and I get so scared that he’s going to hurt himself and not do anything about it even if it hurts. He has gotten so good at soothing himself and I just hope and pray that one day he may have a family to love on him like he truly deserves.

Until then, I will love on him as much as I possibly can.

My goal is for him to be walking much more by the time I leave…and hopefully I will succeed.

He truly is a very smart kid and I know he has a lot of potential.

Please continue to pray for John as well as all of the other children.

I love them all so much and my heart breaks for them and how most of them have grown up and how they are living now.