#68 Teaching at Taizhou Teachers College, China ( MIAMI / MIAMI-BEACH: Spring-Vacation in Florida)

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Seeing family, friends, and my home in Miami, Florida, after 7 months of teaching English at Taizhou Teachers College in China, is like awakening from a dream. Reality and emotions were enhanced by the twenty hours of flying in a crowded Airliner, a trying-experience in the rear cabins of the airplane, where space for the less affluent, like me, was at a premium.

Observing the fewer, but more contend passengers in the front of the plane enviously, I noticed their hours passing comfortably and more quickly sitting in their "pretentious" First Class. They were pampered with service and care, food and liquor, on wide and extending leather lounge chairs, which later doubled as their queen-size beds. I wonder what that is like?

Rarely did I notice their glance back to our crowded 2nd class cabin. The few, who attempted to view our predicament, did so with a knowing smirk on their faces, as they sipped an ever-full, crystall wine glass, while delighting in their lean Filet-Mignon, with little and frigid compassion.

On arrival, the winter-cold of Taizhou was quickly forgotten in the warm night air of Miami International Airport, and it was a welcome thrill to once again sit behind the wheel and in control of my car. For the first time in 7 months, I was again a driver, something not so possible for a Westerner in China.

Little has changed in my city: the green of the tropics, emphatic car-traffic, few pedestrians, and construction of several new, taller buildings, as Miami is expanding to remain the sunshine-capitol of the United States.

Passing the Carnival Center of the Performing Arts in down-town Miami I noticed, that it too had finally been completed. Sadly, it makes only a limited architectual statement despite a cost of 400 million Dollars. (How fondly I remember my first view of the Sydney Opera House, to which new Performance Centers around the world are now critically compared.)

It has taken a number of days to recover from the jet-lag and time adjustment, but being surrounded by caring family, faithful friends, and my pals Baxter and Wolfie I realize little has changed, for loving relationships endure time and distance.

Yet the distance and the differences between Taizhou and Miami seem more and more immense, and I now comprehend, that I live in two distinct worlds, on opposite sides of the planet. To compare, contemplate, and evaluate these differences will take more time than I can spare at the moment, but it will offer future opportunities for reflection and journal commentary.

It is now a good opportunity to let my friends and students in China know, that I have arrived in Miami safely. I'm grateful for every kindness and the profound affection throughout my first semester at Taizhou Teachers College, which strongly fuels the anticipation for the adventures of the next semester at our campus. You truly help make my life a blessing.

In that spirit I wish everyone, who has made my stay in China such a rewarding experience, a wonderful Spring Festival with your families and a very happy Lunar New Year. May "The Year of the Pig" bring you success and fortune and draw you ever closer to the ones you love.

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Photos

The Villages are located north of Orlando (Disney World)
The homes are surrounded by a multitude of golf courses.

For many, a good place to retire.
For me, too sedate!

Many of the Orchids in my collection...
... have been brought to bloom by the attentive care of my sister.

Comments

[Sandra]

YOURE HERE??
how do we contact you so that we can see you??? at the risk of putting my e-mail on the web, e-mail me at [e-mail] so that we can plan something as a group! we all want to see you very bad

[Andrea Trabucco Campos]

After desperately trying to contact you, Herr Schneider, it's with great pleasure that I read your last post! I apologize if the memories of me still probably taunt you, but we all go through phases and we are in a constant change, a constant evolution. A lot of things have gone on in my life, and the young boy you met now has transformed, maybe in a process of maturation. I find myself with a full scholarship to Miami Dade Honors College, and have kept all my grades to the top (straight As). I know it's not much, but it's still a strong start, given the real perspectives (keeping up this grades will allow me to go up north: Yale, Columbia, Harvard..etc). Since the moment I silently started following your posts I fell more and more in love with those beautiful landscapes and by now I have conviced myself that after my BA I will go to study in China. To get a step ahead I'd like to go there this summer, and I've been desperately trying to contact you because of your connections as a sociable professor that I once met, and trust you'll always be. If you could help me, it'd be a remarkable thing. If you cannot then everything is fine and I wish you the best of the best in your life, although I perceive you are way ahead than most. Anyway I appreciate you time, Auf Wiedersehen Herr und Viel Glueck!

[Margie]

Hey Schneider!!! Hope to see you while you are here in Miami. Please come and visit us! Manny, Connor and I have missed you terribly and we want to take you out to dinner one of the nights that you are here.