family

Moving and traveling

We recently had a lovely and encouraging visit from some Canadian friends who live in a nearby city. They are new; among the various stories and tales we told there was a bit about being happy and content in good living conditions, or not so good living conditions. The day after they left we received a message from the school: We are moving you to another apartment, and you need to do it in a week. What?! We went and looked at the other apartment and compared to the one we first moved into, it was a mess. Dirty, full of broken furniture, and missing important items that the contract stipulated would be provided. Saying, “NO” rarely works in China, so it is better to decide on how far you might bend, then start bargaining from there. “Bargaining when there is a contract??” It is true, that is how things are done here.

Long story short, we agreed to move but only after the school had improved the next place and included the missing appliances. We heard the expected, “But move now and we will get those things for you in the next few days.” IF they actually went through with it, it would involve an unknown number of weeks of us waiting, patiently, then reminding them, hearing “Oh, tomorrow!”, then more waiting, until we either give up, or they live up to the contract.

So it has been a stressful week, compounded by the fact that we also had bought train tickets and hotels for 10 days in Urumqi. We leave tomorrow.
The word from the school has been that they still want us to move “within a week”, the end of which would be tomorrow. That is the day we leave on the train. We have packed up alot anyway. But the apartment also is not ready. So we don’t expect that it will actually be ready since we saw them start the work yesterday afternoon. BUT, we would not be surprised if they break into our apartment and move everything while we are gone.

So a few prayer requests:
A) That our stress decreases as we lean on our loving Father who has all of this in control;
B) That the school won’t be sneaky and move us;
C) and that if they do, that nothing will be broken or stolen;
D) That Michelle and I can set a good example for Liberty and Van when it comes to attitudes, and trust, and being content.

new family pic

Happy August! To celebrate we took a new family picture. We hope you enjoy it.

Mid-Summer

Here it is mid-summer and we can’t believe how fast the time has gone.

Here it is mid-summer and it seems like we only just arrived. We realized that we have spent so much of our life overseas in Urumqi that we had developed something of a routine, in a good sense. We knew where to buy things, we knew where to meet people, we knew the buses, the traffic rhythm, the nooks and crannies. But here in Ili, after 4 months, we feel like we still don’t know it well. And it isn’t even all that big compared to Urumqi. I’ve in fact bicycled around the city, basically, only 25 km or so.

But we have noticed, bit by bit, people recognize us, we sort of have a few usual places to eat out, we have found an art store to which we make regular treks to buy brushes and paints, we ride our bikes along the crazy roads. It is slowly becoming familiar.

I am unfortunately still overweight which means finding clothes that fit is a challenge. Just nearby we walked by an aptly named store, I swallowed my pride, and we went in. Imagine our surprise when the clothes in this store turned out to be TOO LARGE for me!

Here it is mid-summer and already Michelle is planning for planning for the next school year! The kids are sure gonna be good learners!

settling in

Today marks the end of our 6th week here in Ili; the start of our 7th week! We have been busy settling in. We are grateful that just outside our apartment is a large public square within which all the neighbourhood kids gather and play. They have been very welcoming of Liberty and Van; Van just jumped right on in and started getting dirty with the other boys. Liberty enjoys talking with the small groups of other girls who, having gotten brave in a group, come over to Liberty to try their English. But Liberty also likes watching the boys do their crazy stunts, and when there is something they ca not do, such as climb a particular tree, she sort of wanders over there, then climbs the tree! “I am just trying to help them see how to do it,” she says when we ask her why she did that. 🙂

How many times?

Here is a question for you: How many times in the last year have you needed to confirm with the local police your living arrangements? How many times in the last 5 years, you know what, let’s make that TEN years, have you had to visit the police for any reason pertaining to your person (I am not including crimes or emergencies)? Well, in the first 6 weeks we have been here we have had 2 visits by police to our apartment, 2 visits to the main police station, 2 visits to the campus police office, and one interview at the university Foreign Affairs Office with the Chief of Police, 2 assistant police officers, and the University Dept Chair, and the Faculty Head, and 2 other people (I have no idea who they were). You may recall us saying this part of the world can be tricky to get into, and to stay in… these police visit and interactions are all part of it.

Through it all we have had deep peace. Praise God. Near the end of the interview with the Chief of Police she began to relax and become more friendly. She thanked me (and by extension, our family) for choosing to come to her city to help teach the young people. She said to me, “Do you know what the greatest lesson you can teach them is? It is to help them appreciate all that is around them, and to help them learn to live as full a life as possible.” All I could respond with was, “Yes, I totally agree!”

Our Home

Food as usual is delicious! So glad to have some spicy noodles again. And even better, because there are actual Russians in this city who have a bakery, we can actually buy loaves of bread! Remember, we usually only have flat nan-style bread. Do not get me wrong, nan is delicious too and comes in handy for making pizza. We Westerners love our bread but our style typically is not available in China. But, it is here! White bread, brown bread, and even rye!

We are thankful the apartment we have been assigned is more or less fully furnished. We do need to get beds for the kids, and we needed some curtains and rugs, but by and large it is fine. The building we are in is called The President’s Building… because this is where the President of the university stays when he is here! He stays on the 3rd floor, and we are on the 4th floor. When we look out the windows we see many trees, so that is a nice change from our Urumqi apartments which usually looked out on another building.

Schooling

I started teaching classes 2 days after we arrived. Currently I am teaching 8 hours a week, spread over 3 days (Tues, Thursday, Friday), with about 4 hours of prep each non-class day. All my classes are first year students, which means for most of them I am the first foreigner they have seen and interacted with! The other day I needed something from home, so Michelle and the kids interrupted their homeschool to bring the things to me. Well, it was like Justin Bieber came to the class when Van and Liberty walked in! All the students were oohing and aahing, pulling out their cell phones to take pictures, even rushing to the front with their arms outstretched to touch or grab Van, or Liberty!! Then Michelle came in! Oh my, some of the students almost fainted with delight at the sight of her blond hair and bright smile!

Homeschool is also back in swing. Michelle has been amazing keeping things on track and in order despite all the travel and upheavals of the past year. It has been interesting trying to explain to people here what we are doing. The previous foreign family actually sent their kids to a local school, so we assume everyone thinks all foreigners would do the same. It maybe worked for that other family, but we have chosen to not do that, and Liberty and Van are thriving.

This content has been restricted to logged-in users only. Please login to view this content.

Liberty turned 9

Happy birthday to Liberty, who turned 9 on March 16. We are so very proud of her and how she has grown. Her brother was such a support too all day, not once getting jealous of her gifts and such. We started the day with a great big breakfast that Michelle prepared. During breakfast Liberty opened one gift: Books! Homeschool was not cancelled so off the kids went with Michelle to study.

They were finished by 11:45, so we went off to have a special lunch at a hotpot+sushi buffet, a meal Liberty specifically asked to do. She really like the carousel-style food delivery, and had great fun grabbing that plate or this plate.

After lunch we then went to a screening of Kungfu Panda 3, in English. It was quite funny, but we will need to talk about what this ‘qi’ idea.

We were still full from lunch after the movie so we went home for a quick swim. Before we did Liberty opened her next gift: A battery operated swimming sea turtle, perfect for the pool. We swam until 5, then headed out to Liberty’s favourite spot, the Boat. While we were eating Liberty opened her next gift: a Shopkins girl! Yeah, we might be on the other side of the planet but some things are global,

By the time we were finished dinner it was almost bedtime so we all piled onto the motorbike and went for a little cruise. Once we got home it was time for the final gift: a robot dog! But, gasp, it didn’t work. Liberty didn’t let it get her spirits down; she was thankful for all the gifts and all that God has given her.

Hard to believe we will have a double-digit age kid next year.

We made it

While Michelle was back in Texas to be with family during her paternal grandfather’s funeral, Liberty and Van stayed in Chiang Mai with me. Michelle did an excellent job prepping the home-school materials for me so that the kids’ education could continue. Except for a first-day panic, the two weeks of home-schooling went really well. It gave me a much better appreciation for all the work Michelle has put into schooling Liberty and Van.

The kids and I took many fun rides on our rented scooter. Van would sit in the front and Liberty would sit on the back. One scooter highlight for the kids was the day we went to buy tinted visors for them. Too many times there were either bugs getting into their faces while we rode around. Or, the sun shone too brightly. You can see in the pics below they were quite excited, and we even bought some stickers for them to customize their helmets. When we weren’t driving around, we were still on the scooter, having a snack.

Even though we had an excellent time together, we all missed Mom a lot, and were very glad when she returned. Her time with her family was a real blessed time, and we wish we all could have gone. Thank you for your prayers during this time.

health and 7-11

Dear friends, how are you? We want to wish you a happy lunar new year! I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it here, one perk of working in Asia is the number of New Year celebrations we get to celebrate!

Well, our family is well. Van had a spill the other day trying to do a daring balancing act on a concrete divider. He got scratched up, but is ok. I must say that we are glad for 7-11. What? In my youth 7-11 was my world, we would make weekly treks down the back alleys with allowance or bottles to return for cash, and then we’d get treats. But in recent years 7-11s seemed to decrease in number, and maybe even quality. Well, here in Chiang Mai the sheer numbers of 7-11s would make Tim Hortons’ saturation seem minimal. After Van had his spill we piled onto the motorbike we rent and went zipping down the road to 7-11. Why there? 7-11 has almost anything you need! So there we bought all manner of bandaids and gauze and tape and such, plus waters.

On a more sober note, Michelle is currently back in Texas for her grandfather’s funeral. You may recall her grandmother passed away in October. We were able to visit then too, and Michelle felt the time with her grandfather then, along with Liberty and Van, was a valuable time. We had already decided that if her grandfather were to pass away while we were gone we would all try to get back; at the very least Michelle would go. For various reasons only Michelle went, along with her sister who is in the same general area as we. It is a sad time, but we are glad Michelle could get back to be family. She and her sister return to Chiang Mai Feb 19.

In the meantime I have continued with the homeschooling. Thankfully (no really, THANK YOU Michelle) Michelle had organized and schedule the lessons for the next 2 weeks in a sweet calendar, so it has been going well. Except, on the first day we did two days worth of work until I figured out what was going on. So Friday was easy. 🙂

Please pray for Michelle’s family during this time. Thank you.

A home at last

Nine or ten days. That is the average number of days it takes for us to find a place to call home when we go overseas. This time it was 9 days. Fortunately the guesthouse we stayed at had a large enough room for us to do well in and not go crazy. We queried at least 10 real estate agents, private posters, and forums, in our search.

The cheapest places were outside of town, something we at first thought would be fine. But after we rode a rented scooter out there we realized that the isolation would get to us. We would end up staying in the house rather than getting out; there was no place to walk to. So we looked in the city and eventually found a condo large enough for us, but still in our general price range.

We think it will work well. We can walk to many places, like a library, a pool, a shopping mall and grocery store, even the zoo! The newest coworking space is even in walking distance for me!

So in about an hour we will have hauled our 8 bags to the street to hail a red songtaew to take us to the new home. Thank God, and thank you for praying.

Funeral

It is with sadness we announce that Michelle’s paternal grandmother passed away in her sleep Thursday at 10 pm, Oct 16, 2015.

We will be driving down to Jacksonville, TX, for the funeral, and to be with family during this sad time. Michelle’s brother and his wife live near Jacksonville, but her sister Melissa had to fly in from Thailand.

We expect to take 2 days to drive down, the funeral is Tuesday, we will stay a few more days, then depart to drive back to Hamilton.

Please pray for safety.

Cookes Overseas