Yesterday morning I woke up with 6 hours sleep at 5:30 AM. I knew this would be my big day for getting packed and doing grading. And, believe me, it was long. The most difficult part of the day was gathering the momentum and stamina to grade by writing essays and stories. Finally, this task was finished at 11:00 PM. Throughout the day, I continued to do laundry (three loads), pack up stuff, wash dishes, pack clothes, and entertain visitors that popped in every now and then. By 11:45 PM, I had finished putting all of my six classes' grades on their respective sheets and began the final process of packing my apartment up and getting ready to leave for America.

It was not my intention at all, but I ended up not sleeping a wink. I simply had too much stuff to do. I "de-linted" my clothes, checked final emails, charged all of my electronic equipments, and prepared to leave. I got everything completely done by 5:30 AM, 30 minutes before I was supposed to leave.

I met the Clements & Kat downstairs and we headed to Changchun at 6 AM. They were heading out 2 hours after me, but it was cheaper for the school to take us all together. We said our final goodbyes as everyone except Sarah, Mark & Samantha came to see us off. The school provided a mini-van for us to Changchun.

At the airport, I checked in, had a final drink with the Clems & Kat, then headed to my gate. The flight left on time without a hitch. And I slept off and on.

I arrived at the new Beijing airport by 12:45 PM and then began the process to check-in for my departure flight at 4:10 PM to Chicago. Little did I know that the flight would be 5 hours delayed! When I finally got to the ticket counter, I was apologized to and then told that there were no Saturday night flights to Tulsa (as that was when I was due to arrive), that I would have to book a flight for Sunday morning to get to Tulsa, and that United would put me up in a hotel. I had a choice of an 8 AM or 12:30 PM flight. I chose the later as I thought since I'll get in so late, I want to enjoy my stay and sleep. If not, I'd have to be at the airport quite early.

So this leaves me here, still at the Beijing International Airport, sitting here typing about my travels woes, eating at Burger King, and taking naps on the not-so-comfy chairs.

Well, I am the first one on the team to return home. In about 2 hours, my L-O-N-G day begins. If all things go as planned, I should arrive safely in Tulsa, OK before 10 PM tomorrow night. I'm way stoked!

For Sophomore Oral class, each color group (a total of five) had presented an Oral Final project which encompassed EVERYTHING that they had been studied this term. I have been quite impressed as they have presented very complicated ideas in a very easy and concise way. Their creativity is most impressive and I'm constantly amazed by their abilities - both in using English to describe their created culture and in their actual presentations.

Each group had to create a society "from scratch". They had to make a flag, national holidays, past times, country name, and a capitol city among many other things. The class that presented their project on Thursday @ 8 AM TOTALLY had me busting up. Here below is the money that they had made for their culture.

As you can, their culture was called "Supercloud" and this currency is from the "Bank of Supercloud". You should notice there are black and white flowers. In their folktale (which also had to be made up), they retold the history of a white cloud and a black cloud that had people always at war. However, it was Sonny, their honored superhero featured on their bill, who brought the black and white clouds in harmony. And, of course, I'm deemed with the honor of being in the "666 Luck" club. Does anyone perceive the irony here?

P.S. - I hope this money is never put on the forehead or the right hand!

This Saturday (as in 5 DAYS FROM NOW) I'll be on a plane headin' back to the good ol' USA! I'm totally stoked. In the meantime, I got a slew of things to do. I have my Wheaton homework which is a priority to get done. I don't want to be back home with family and be pressured to do class work. I've completed about half of my packing, so that feels under control. I still have a good amount of grading, but it'll get done (even if it means pulling an "all niter").

But for today, I also want to give thanks for two special people: Jonny & Rachel Wu. Since they are our team leaders, today we have cornered this time (i.e., June 15th), as "Leader Appreciation Day". I have thoroughly enjoyed working with and alongside of them for three years, and I look forward to another year into 2009. Jonny & Rachel (and Samantha), you rock!

I'm getting nervous, excited, anxious, and stressed as I quickly approach my return home date of June 21st. I really am looking forward to seeing my two nephews, telling stories to my family of the past year, graduating with my Master's in August, and "chowing down" on some American food.

Last night, we had a performance to attend. Every graduating class from the Foreign Language Department performs dramas, songs, and dancing as a "final farewell". Well, my INGENIUS team decided to sing "Friends Are Friends Forever" by Michael W. Smith. I totally did my complaining for an evening (which I normally don't do), but, in the end, it was to no avail. I never liked the song because of it's true sappiness. Anyway, the song was enjoyed by the audience (though we could have bounced on our heads and ate bubble gum...all with the same reaction from the audience). Pictures will be forthcoming once I upload them. You'll see them in the album "Farewell Seniors 2008".

Jude and Will come over to my house A LOT since I'm like 20 feet away from their doorway. Below is the latest craziness that my room is privy to.

And check out this man who, in celebration of the 2008 Olympics, put 2008 needles on his face, head, shoulders & chest. And I thought I was stoked about the Olympics!(Thanks for the pic, Rach.)

The "brain child" of the Wu's came true with a team retreat to Shenyang. We had to debrief concerning our team experience this past academic year, so what better way than to do it on vacay! So we loaded up the team and went to Shenyang, the capital of Liaoning province (directly to the south of Jilin).

We spent three days and two nights. Day one activities involved traveling with the first group (those who didn't have evening stuff to do). Nine of us arrived, got the hotels rooms set up, then headed for pizza at "I Love NY Pizza". It was awesome. You also may want to ask Wu about his experience with the "awesome goodness". The rest of the team arrived, and we headed for bed.

The first full day of activities involved a trip to the local Starbucks (about a 3-minute walk from our hotel). My Iced Green Tea was pure awesomeness! After a morning pow-wow, we headed to the Imperial Palace. It was built during the Qing dynasty and was used up to the Tang and Ming dynasties (I hope I got that right). We took some pics of the grounds and you can see them in the album entitled "Shenyang Retreat". You'll notice Jude in a lot of them because we're "buddies". In actuality, he's like my nephew substitute. He wanted to be on my shoulders for like the whole day!

After this, lunch was at a local McDonald's. I had a yummy Big Mac. We then went walking down some of the local streets, just relaxing and window shopping. It was quite quaint, and the architecture was intriguing. It looked to be European with Grecian columns, all in the midst of Chinese-styled buildings.

The afternoon found us debriefing. This was followed by a supper at the "Orso Goloso" (Italian for "greedy bear"). I had a calzone which was overpriced and didn't deliver, but it was still delicious. We wound up the night with some insane KTV. We went for two hours of insane madness. I never saw Jude run around so much; you'd think that he was ADD or something. He grabbed the tambourine that was in the room and just basically ran around for 2 hours. He actually outran Will in the energy department, which I'd never seen before. Sam became sick that day, and she actually went to sleep with all this craziness.

The next day found us at a park. I have a couple of videos showing the cat-like reflexes of Sarah & Kat, and the amazing prowess of Seth.

Lunch was then held at Stroller's, a restaurant with western-styled dishes. My bacon cheeseburger with fries was great, not to mention the potato skins, onions rings and nachos that I shared with Jennifer, Jude, Will and Kat. I went by myself in Shenyang and visited a Hagen Das, having a two-scoop ice cream of Peacan, Praline & Cream and Strawberry Cheesecake. That evening we returned home where I just crashed that night and it lingered over into Sunday. The trip was a hit and I hope we can do it again next year.