This weekend I met up with a good friend named Zach. He is a minister at a church in Griffith, IN. He is also preparing for his wedding on August 11th, so I got to meet his fiancé, Rene. Zach and I met while in high school at a church camp and have been friends ever since.  We also went to college together. We had a good time just hanging out and talking about old time (jeez, I sound soooo old all of a sudden). Highlights of the trip included: 1) watching the USA National Rock, Paper & Scissors tournament on ESPN (it was “stupid” American culture at its best!); 2) going to a church that had built a wrestling ring in the middle as a way to attract members; 3) attending my first “adoption” party that was held by a family of Zach’s church (they adopted three children – all siblings); 4) supporting a Firemen’s Ball Dance at the local fire station; and 5) having my first Mexican meal since coming back to America (yummy Don Pablo’s).

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Today is Friday the 13th. <Insert spooky music followed by an eerie scream here.> Today as I was in charge of some reflective thoughts during our morning class, so I researched some information about the Friday the 13th. Did you know that fear of Friday the 13th is called paraskavedekatriaphobia? Or that some superstitious people have associated the belief that 13 is an unlucky number with the Apollo 13 mission due to the fact that it began on April 11, 1970 (4/11/70, digits summing to 13) at 13:13 CST from Complex 39 (3 x 13) and the mission’s problems began on April 13? I also passed out a little quiz with seven superstitions from various cultures. The seven cultures are the Chinese, Choctaw Indians, the Dominican Republic, Egyptians, Hawaiians, Irish and Koreans. Here are the seven superstitions:

1.    If your windows are open and a funeral is going by you have to close the windows and wake any sleeping babies.

2.   Don't present a boyfriend or a girlfriend with a pair of shoes. If you do, your boyfriend or girlfriend will leave you.

3.   If an owl flies across your path, it means someone in your family will soon die.

4.   Do not use knives or scissors on New Year's Day as this may cut off fortune.

5.   To prevent the hair from turning gray, anoint it with the blood of a black calf which has been boiled in oil.

6.   A coal thrown after a fisherman as he boarded his boat brought good luck and he always boarded from the right.

7.   Never make human figures on a quilt. It is believed that the figures will walk and visit you at night.

I’ll blog the correct answers later this weekend.

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I am going bonkers! I am so bogged down in work, I feel like I’m in quicksand! If I were one who had a history of depression, I’d be at the bottom right now. (But luckily, I’m quite optimistic.) Anyway, my Methodology class is cake, but my Phonology class is insane. It’s crazy all the things we have to memorize. And it’s not really the memorization part but the class structure. I still don’t have a handle on some of the symbols and rules we talked about last week. It’s like they’re going in one ear but out the other. So I’ve included a small picture of the chart that we’re learning. And, of course, this chart doesn’t contain any of the vowels nor the transcription process. AAAAAAAAHHHHHHH!!!!!!!

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I did something today that I hadn’t done in a LONG time. Blame it on 7/7/07 if you will (July 7th of 2007), but I slept 12+ hours! I went to bed last night at 10:30 PM and I woke up at 10:59 AM this morning. I can’t believe I was so tired. I guess I forget how draining 5 hours of classes and reading/memorization of homework can be. Right now I’m taking two classes: one is the methodology and theory behind first and second language learning; the other is the phonological nature of language. The former is a lot of reading and new terms to know; the latter is charts to memorize and sound placements/labels of the mouth. I actually like the Phonology course and the teacher; they’re both enjoyable.

While at Wheaton, we have a liaison between Wheaton and our organization. Pam is her name and she’s wonderful. She’s having a BBQ for all of us students at her home, so I’ll be going there later. In the meantime, I need to crack open some more pages of reading.

On another note, Seth is my roomie here. Yeah, it’s a long story, but for some reason I guess he can’t get enough of me. So every morning I get to wake up to his beautiful shining face. How special is that?! We have bunk beds in our rooms; I’m bottom and he’s top. So we’re not only roomies but “bunk buddies”!

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Lonely Path to Abortion for Women (June 19, 2007, Shanghai Daily) Nearly half of young women who called Shanghai's first pregnancy hotline go to hospital for an abortion by themselves without parental support, said officials in charge of the hotline on Sunday. The hotline (6587-6866) based at No. 411 Navy Hospital in Hongkou District received 325 young women for abortion surgery between January and May. Almost all the women were under 25 years old, including 36 girls under 18. Only 7.8 percent of patients were accompanied by parents, who should show more care and understanding to girls who have premarital sex and get pregnant, doctors said.

Hunt for 400 Children Feared Held as Slaves (June 25, 2007, South China Morning Post) Police in Shanxi province have vowed to help search for 400 children who have gone missing and are feared to be working as slaves in brick kilns, days after parents appealed to the central government for help. Premier Wen Jiabao has ordered a thorough investigation into the allegation by parents of the missing children that despite the nationwide crackdown on enslavement in the wake of the Shanxi scandal, a lot of children have yet to be rescued, China News Service said yesterday. The parents launched their second public appeal in a letter, published by the Chongqing Morning Post on Thursday and carried by mainland news websites, urging officials to take immediate action. "The online appeals by some netizens for help to look for their missing relatives have caught attention of top leaders and the Communist Party committee and provincial government of Shanxi, with Mr Wen and other State Council leaders ordering a swift and thorough investigation," the report said. The shocking revelations of slave labour in brick kilns in Shanxi and Henan emerged after the first appeal by the parents last month. Reports of the slave trade, rampant in the two provinces and in some cases for over a decade, have sparked a public outcry and forced a widespread crackdown.  Police in the two provinces have raided more than 8,000 kilns and small coal mines and freed 591 workers, including at least 51 children. In Shanxi, 359 migrant labourers were rescued, 65 of whom were mentally retarded, Xinhua said.

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I just arrived at the Holiday Inn in Carol Stream, IL. I’ll be staying here until tomorrow when I check into the apartments at Wheaton College. It was a very quick drive from Muskogee, OK (about 12 hours) and went smoothly. Good news is that my voice is returning.

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