With Risk Comes Delicious Reward

We both knew we were taking some real risks, both emotional and financial, by not accepting jobs before flying over to Shanghai to live for a year. But we really wanted to see the city first and get acclimated before beginning work in our new careers. The risk seems to have paid off and it only took four weeks.

We knew the meeting with the Vice-Principle and Dean of Foreign Students at DanYang Sr. High School went well and we are excited now because yesterday we got an offer from the school to teach there for the next year! They are providing us a more than reasonable salary, a two bedroom apartment on campus for us to live all for free, we can eat at the cafeteria whenever we want for almost pennies, they are providing a travel allowance every semester, and they are paying us half of our airfare after six months and the other half after we have been at the school for a year. It's a fair offer and we have accepted it gladly, we really loved the city of DanYang, Jiangsu Province, and we will be teaching Level 1 and Level 2 high school students the last year before they take their exams and try to get into the universities here in China - the competition is fierce so they are motivated and willing to spend extra time and even pay additional money to have their English improved.

Our apartment will be ready on the 20th so we are headed out from Shanghai to DanYang to see the apartment and sign our agreement in a few days. We talked about what to do during the Chinese New Year (it lasts fifteen days and begins on the 26th) and have decided to take advantage of our situation as much as possible. We are going to drop off our luggage in the apartment, light some incense and bless each room for the new year, and then hop on a train and head a few hours over to Beijing for the Chinese New Year! The home of the Olympics, the capital city of China - Lion and Dragon dances and the Happy Ox here we come!