Graduation

Christopher completed his graduation requirements for Clark College a couple of weeks ago.  He was very close as of the end of spring quarter--had only 4 credits left to graduate.  So that made the China trip possible for him since it happened in the middle of the quarter.  He took a five credit online class and finished with a 4.0 GPA.  Unfortunately for mom--he decided not to "walk" at the graduation ceremony.  Some good reasons at the time that he needed to make the decision.  Probably wishes he had now since the biggest reason ended up not being a factor.  But it really doesn't signify being done with his education anyway so I have been rationalizing it that way.  Clark has been a stepping stone--a means of figuring out what direction he wanted to take his life and a less expensive alternative to getting general education credits.  And he managed to really blossom there and we're hoping that success will continue when he goes to Western Washington University.

We had a small celebration with some friends and celebrated with Thai and Chinese food at Chris' request.  And of course cake for the photo opportunity since there definitely wasn't going to be any cap and gown pictures.

Not resting on his laurels, Chris has decided to take a summer class at Clark to help him occupy his time.  And the course is right up his alley--History of American Diplomacy.  So I am sure he will enjoy it very much. 

More China Pictures

I finished scrapbooking Chris' China pictures.  And have ordered the album already because I could get it on sale.  But more pictures keep popping up on Facebook.  Luckily I plan to do at least a couple pages--maybe more--for my album and Chris' college album in addition to getting the China specific album.  So I can try to fit some of those pictures into an album still.  Feels good to have it done but wish there was more to do.  Here are the rest:

Back From China

I'm not quite done with scrapbooking all of Chris' picture from China.  I am hoping that ISLP will post some on their website in the next few days as well.  I still have some pictures from Beijing, the Terracotta Warriors and some Shanghai pictures that I may want to do something with.  But I am nearly done so thought I would post what I have done so far.

Chris had a fantastic time in China.  There were over a hundred international relations/diplomacy students on his trip.  There were four buses.  He got to be really close with the students on his bus.  There are several pictures of his new friends in the layouts that I have done.  He went to Beijing, Xi'an, Hu County and Shanghai.  Here is a smattering of the things that he did and saw while he was there.  Hope you enjoy seeing the sights as much as I enjoyed scrapping them for him.

Maddy at 23

Maddy turned 23 last week.  She and Tom planned lots of activities to celebrate over a few days.  Cakes for a party with the kids at work, a Pensacola Blue Wahoo baseball game, dinners, painting, and more birthday celebrating.

China Bound

Chris has been planning a trip to China since January.  He was invited to go to China as a part of the International Student Laureate Program based on his initiation into the honor society at Clark College and his interest in international relations.  We debated a while whether it was going to be possible or not since the trip was occurring in the middle of his last quarter at Clark before graduation and whether the cost of the trip was going to be doable for us.  As it turned out, he only needed four credits to graduate so he is taking one five credit on-line class to make that portion of the obstacle possible.  And we were able to come up with the tuition and airfare as well.  So decision made--he was going to China.

It was quite an ordeal to work through the diplomatic red tape of getting a visa but after six week of working on it, that was finally accomplished and it was just a matter of figuring out what needed to be packed.  He has been excited at the prospect of going to China and attending the international relation and diplomatic classes that are part of the trip but also nervous.  And I have been nervous about him going on his own to a foreign country as well.  We dropped him off at the airport at zero dark thirty Monday morning.  I restrained myself from trying to call him while he was in San Francisco to see if he navigated through the airport to the international terminal okay.  But his last Facebook post before leaving the country was that he had boarded the plane to Beijing and had seen a lot of ISLP students although no one from his group.  It was then that I realized that he was going a flight with students going on the medical and engineering groups--I didn't realize until that point that they all went at the same time.  It was a 12 hour flight and with no Facebook access in China, communication with him was going to be limited.  We did purchase an international calling plan and text plan but only enough for emergency situations.  So I was anxious to know that he arrived, got through customs and found his shuttle to the hotel okay.  I figured no news was probably good news but a mom still wants to know these things.  By Wednesday morning I was beside myself so I tried to call him but couldn't get through.  By Wednesday night, I was trying to text him to see if that would work.  Luckily he got the text and returned one to me to say everything was going okay except that he was having trouble with getting a decent WiFi connection there.

And I was pleasantly surprised to get a few e-mails the last couple of days.  He is having a fantastic time.  Is really enjoying the roommate that he has and the other folks that he has met on the trip.  Anxious to get back to the U.S. so that he can friend them on Facebook and continue to be in contact with them.  So far he has been in Beijing but just arrived in Xi'an today.  He will be traveling to Shanghai in a few days and returning home on Friday.  In Beijing, he went to the Forbidden City, Tian'anmen Square, the Olympic Green, an American center managed by the embassy, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the Great Wall, Beijing Foreign Studies University and The People's University.  In Xi'an, he will see the Terracotta Army and Ancient City Wall, a school and the Muslim Quarter.  In Shanghai, he will go to the Shanghai International Studies Institute, explore the city and attend an acrobatics performance.  A trip of a lifetime.  He tells me he is taking a lot of pictures and worried that he may not have enough room on the memory card for all the pictures he has been taking.  And I was worried he wouldn't take any pictures.  I will probably be spending a lot of time scrapbooking when he gets back. But so anxious for him to come home to see his pictures and hear all about his experiences there. 

Painting with a Twist

Maddy loves to go to Painting with a Twist.  This is a recent session that they attended creating two paintings that go together.  They went again last night as part of her birthday festival this week.  I may post that picture later.

Pendleton--The Real West

After our tour of Hanford, we headed to Pendleton.  We have lived here for 20 years and have never visited Pendleton.  I was looking forward to seeing the home of the Pendleton Roundup.  That evening we went to Hamley's Steakhouse for dinner.  We were pleasantly surprised.  It was a relatively new restaurant built in 2006 but the Hamley name has been synonymous with Pendleton since 1883.  The family started out as saddle makers and had a Western store.  There is also a cafe in addition to the steakhouse and saloon.  Even though the steakhouse is a newly opened space, it is beautifully decorated in the style of the Old West.  And Bill was able to get his red meat fix.

Friday morning while Bill was doing some work.  I wandered around town taking pictures.  I did a little shopping at the Pendleton Woolen Mills and found the Roundup rodeo grounds.  Bill and I also took in the Umatilla County Historical Museum before we headed to our scheduled Underground Tour.

I've been on the Seattle Underground Tour and have been watching a lot of episodes of "Cities of the Underworld" so I was really looking forward to going on the tour.  As with any underground, there is a seedy history about it.  Chinese workers actually built the tunnels linking the basements to buildings all over the downtown.  There were some legitimate businesses.  An ice cream parlor made and stored its ice cream in the basement.  Empire Meat Co. had an ice water bath in the basement to keep its meat cold in the butchering process making them the most successful meat company in town because their meat lasted longer.  There was also a space that served as a shooting gallery at one time and then a pool hall and bowling alley.  But at various stages in history there were all kinds of illegal activities going on down there.  There were bars that took cowboys' gold as payment and there would be a little bit of over charging as the night went on.  The girls from the brothels would hang out in the bars as well.  During prohibition, there were speakeasies and illegal gambling rooms with secret passageways to escape when the police showed up.  And bootlegging whiskey. 

A big part of the underground involved the Chinese.  There was a group of about 90 Chinese workers that were basically indentured servants that built the tunnel system--partly so that they could move around town.  They were forced to live underground and there was a curfew at night that made it illegal to be above ground.  So they would use the tunnel system to get to where they needed to go at night.  There were also about a thousand Chinese workers in town at the time that they were building the railroad.  The Chinese that had paid for their own passage to America were able to live in homes above ground but at one point all their homes were burned to the ground.  The city did not allow them to rebuild as the property was pretty valuable by that time so they were forced to move to the Portland area.  Hop Sing had a laundry and bathhouse in the underground.  Near the Chinese worker living quarters was also a Chinese jail.  They Chinese dealt with their own prisoners.  And there was an opium den down there. 

The last part of the tour was seeing one of the 18 bordellos that existed in Pendleton.  We got to see the former Cozy Rooms.  It had a chapel for the girls to worship in because they were not welcome at the local churches.  We saw the parlor, madam's room, the working rooms and living quarters for the girls, and the secret passageways to get the prominent members of the community in and out of the building unseen.  The brothels officially existed until about 1953 when a Presbyterian minister blackmailed the city's prominent members to have them shutdown; however, the madam of the Cozy Rooms, Stella Darby, promptly moved around the corner and started Cozy Rooms 2.  It was open until 1967 when she decided to close for good.  Cozy Rooms 2 is now the Working Girls Hotel--also owned by the Pendleton Underground Tours company.  It was a very interesting tour for anyone who plans to travel to Pendleton.