I am going home‏

Yeah, July 15 I will be going home. Will I come back? The last time I only lasted 2 months! Last time I was only here for 9 months and now it is another 15 months. I will miss so many good people.

I will visit with some friends before I go home. Pan lei will visit me on Monday. She is from Zhengzhou in Henan province. Maybe 41 years old. I have visited her before. I need to clean my home!!

On May 1, Joseph, Reena and Joel will visit. They are from India. I hope she can share some recipes with me. I love her curried food. I will stay at their home in Shanghai later. I want to visit the Shanghai Expo with them.

I will visit Amanda in Hangzhou and lijun in liyang. I want to see Rez and Jing in Changzhou. Also, Olivia, Neal's daughter. I have not seen her yet. I hope to go Xi'an to see the terracotta warriors. I only have 3 months. I still have classes and final exams. I will only work at the training school for one more month.

I finally found a restaurant that has hot and sour soup! I have been looking for more than a year. I was thinking that it is only a Canadian invention. But a new restaurant opened almost next door to me but their menu was all Chinese so I didn't go there. But last Wednesday, Krista wanted to eat so we went there. The food was great! She said they have hot soup. I said isn't all soup hot? No, she said, this is spicy soup. I said you mean hot and sour soup? Yes!!!! It was so good. Not the same of course but very very good. I can now go there and order it. Only 3rmb. I am happy. suen la tang. Or something like that. I can point to it on the menu if they don't understand me.

Am I happy to go home? I don't know. I have made many friends here. Good people. Yes, I miss my family and friends at home but now this has become my home away from home. I will go home but I am not the same person that I was when I left. China is a part of me and I will not be able to tell you how I feel about it.

I will have lunch with two students. We are going for a duck hot pot. I had it before. Very good. She is so small. I think about 155cm and she weighs 41 kg. I am more than twice that. A very pretty girl. And so small!!!

I will miss China so much. I may come back. It is difficult to spend more than 2 years meeting people, teaching, living here. My friends are here. I will miss every one of them. But it is time to go home. When I get on the airplane I will be crying. But life moves on. Will I come back? Maybe. Maybe to work or maybe to visit but everything will have changed Like it has changed at home. We always think that everything is the same, like a snapshot, but life does not stand still waiting for us. I will go home. But everyone will be different. I will miss my friends.

Don