Land of the Blue Sky

It's hard to believe now, as we fight the smog and humidity of Tianjin, that yesterday morning we woke up looking out over the city of Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia, and looked up to see a blue sky.
Like every adventure in the northern land of Gengis Khan and his successors, our week in Mongolia was one of the unexpected, of joy, longing and a good time with friends.
We took the train up last Tuesday and arrived 30 hours later. It's always quite an experience to cross the gobi desert via train, and see the changing landscape. My heart always feels like it is being released to be free when I wake up to see blue sky, and my hair always feels quite dusty from a night of sleeping with a window open and sand coming in! We shared a car with a couple from England, who went to Oxford and were on a 6 month traveling experience. this prooved to be a very pleasant journey of lot of conversation, reading and snacks:)



Upon arriving to UB, I was delighted to look out the window and see Nara, a longtime friend of mine in mongolia, waiting at the platform. Later, when he seemed very surpised to see me, I realized he wasn't there picking us up at all!! In fact, was there to pick up other people, and we ran into him!! It was wonderful to have that kind of surprise. We found Mujig later, and were wisked off to a Bible School graduation only to see a couple of other long term Mongolian friends and be delighted once again.
Our time together consisted of lots meetings with people---most of them people that I got to know and love during my first year in Mongolia in 2000. That was a definite hightlight!!
Some of the hard things were seeing the church we had built burned to the ground, but with that a bitter sweet understanding that we aren't the ones doing the building- there is someone else with a much bigger view.
We spent a day at the river with Mujig and his family--- and lots of time with his little boys, all who are training to be warriors someday and practiced on us every moment they were with us. Anca does a mean Simba impersonation!!!


We also visited various things that were happening in UB at the time-- a worship festival with 1000 children, an orphanage out in the the countryside that was like a resort, we went to Amaglan Bible Church and saw all of the folks in the community and ate lots of meals with old friends. We are continually reminded and overwhelmed with the hospitality and welcome of these dear people.

All in all, a good trip and a good chance to go together as the "Coons" and be part of the community in UB. Next time we will certainly spend more time in the wilderness, and with lots of kids!

Life in the homey

My husband at work as normal:)

Life in the Coons household ... well, it's been a lot of fun. Patrick and Kim came over tonight with Moyer in tow to celebrate their first Father's Day with us (or, shall I say, we celebrated with them! Crepes with asparagus and mushrooms sauce can't go wrong. We've been around to enjoy our home for only a couple of days, as the last week has found us up again in Ji Xian, this time with a group of 30 kids and teachers who are headed up to Inner Mongolia for the next two week to help with an English Camp at ShamineauEast . No fatherhood here on the horizon!) It's the first trip we've sent up there and we are pretty excited about it, especially because our TIS kids will be living with a doing camp together with local Chinese kids. This is definitely not something that happens normally here, most of our kids don't associate much (at all) with local children so this opportunity to be outside and living in yurts, rafting, horseback riding, camping and corporately teaching/learning each other's language will be a great treat! Two big gifts have been the addition of friends from Wheaton who are joining the trip. Kate, my classmate and former WLPer, and Chuck- friend of most TIS kids at Wheaton have joined the group and are a very welcome addition!!

In other news, Dave and I are headed up to Ulaanbaatar, Outer Mongolia on Tuesday. We are taking the Trans-siberian Railroad up, a mere 36 hour train ride and one that I have become familiar with over the last 6 years. I'm excited to go up to Mongolia again, the last time I was there was in December of 2004. Although we aren't sending a summer team up there this summer, we both thought it would be good to connect with our dear friends up North. I've missed being there, and am a little nervous in some ways to return--- the last time I went up was to say goodbye to my friend Narengerel who has played a very special and profound part of my life. I first visited Mongolia in 2000 during a 2 month summer trip before my senior year at Wheaton and have gone back to visit with TIS kids several summers since. (Actually, Dave led the trip last summer while I was at HoneyRock and met all my friends up there!) So, it will be a bit of a homecoming for both of us.

I've tried to make some positive steps in figuring out why any movement in my knee has been so painful. Last week Dave and I went to a Chinese hospital to see if an MRI would offer any insight to the pain I've been experiencing the past couple of months. Well.... first the doctor hammered my knee with a forceful wrist causing me to scream and tear up... second he prescribed an MRI--- which I did--- and tried to relax for an hour as the machine buzzed and lurched around me. We returned a couple of days later to get the results. Because we were at the Chinese Traditional Medicine Hospital, we got a very interesting remedy: herbs and massage for the next 20 days. Unfortunately, we wouldn't be around for that time so I took the MRI film and left... But so far, no help to my knee. In my limited understanding of Chinese and with the help of a friend, we've deduced from the lab report that I have a swollen meniscus or platella, with lots of fluid caused by, what the doctor said "too many sports." He also instucted that I do no exercise at all for the next couple of months... This is not a happy solution.... So, hopefully we'll get a better look when we head back to the US in a couple of weeks. Until then.... no running!

Our New Home!

We just moved into our new apartment and we've been enjoying it immensely. Here are a few photos to see our new place.

and another ending...

Our Service and Society class ended in a melodic encore. Literally. 3 of the students decided that an appropriate ending to their learning experiences over the year would be to actually do something more for the community and use their talents and particular loves. Sooo... they put on a fundraising "rock concert".. well, almost. Friday night we definitely had our smiles and laughs and joy welling up in my heart as I watched our kids create the "QXB Band" in order to support the "QX project..." The kids responded to a real need in the community they visited at the beginning of the year and raised almost $1000 USD to support purchasing a water pump generator to help water the farmers' fields, and to purchase a 3-wheeler for the family to travel with. I couldn't help but smile as my student Ji Yun presented what he had learned over the year about Service and instructed the concert attenders (almost all Korean students and parents) to get involved in their local community by service and helping fund this project. I've never heard so many Korean pop songs before, so this was defintely an experience for me-- truly cross-cultural--- Koreans serving Chinese villagers through an American school.... cool.