Although our
Zhangzhou apartment wasn't as big as the one in Kunming, we still put it
to good use, sharing Christmas traditions with students and friends.
(Left) Advent opened with Board Game Night, when
10 students played Careers and Life with us. (Right and
Below Left) We also enjoyed a creative evening making greeting cards.
(Below Right) Christmas isn't Christmas without lots of music, so one
Sunday evening we sang together and enjoyed some of Vivian's holiday
treats.
Here are some
more photos of "greeting card night" and the night when students helped us
to decorate our apartment and small Christmas tree. (With our relocation,
the budget was rather tight this year; this was the smallest tree we had
ever had, but we made up for it the next year!) Below, you can see our
Advent wreath; each Sunday of Advent we lit a
candle and read about one part of the historic
Christmas story. You can also see some candy
canes. Friends in America sent a big box of these traditional treats
with our son (who visited during his Christmas break at the university),
and we passed them out to grateful students, along with a leaflet
explaining the meaning behind the peppermint
candy treat.
In early December, Vivian got a second-hand
toaster oven "for Christmas", but she put it to use all month
making holiday goodies for our students. In the first photo, she is
dishing out cake with strawberries on the chocolate icing. In the center
photo, Vivian brought fresh strawberries to our showing of "Home Alone" on
campus, which happened to fall on the day that Andrew arrived. Though he
was jet lagged, he still helped Michael to pre-teach one of the important
dialogs in the film.
(To learn more about Christmas, see these Christmas pages on our
website: the traditional Christmas story,
who is Santa (圣诞老人)?,
candy canes,
Christmas Perspectives (poem), and the pre-Christmas Advent season.
Also look for Christmas wallpaper
here. You'll also find movie study guides on this website for some
great holiday films: A
Snoopy/Charlie Brown Christmas, Last Holiday,
White Christmas, The
Grinch, Christmas Carol,
It's
a Wonderful Life)
