Easter at Shandong University

Roslyn and I had a great time today, Easter Sunday. We attended Church at the Hanlin Hotel with our regular "twig" members and enjoyed and pot luck Easter dinner together with them. Then we headed over to Central Campus and spent Easter afternoon with other foreign teachers and many African students who attend Shandong University from all over the continent of Africa. 

We met some new foreign teachers from Australia who married Chinese citizens and now live and work in Jinan. It is surprising how many people from different cultures live and work together here in China; especially within the Shandong University campus system.

You can see a video of their singing if you scroll down a few slides.




The Chinese have a love affair with rocks. The scraggily or multi-faceted the better. I think it might stem from the beauty of their written language both in its appearance and the depth of implication.

It is very common to have huge rock formation "sculptures" placed in parks, street corners, highway intersections, courtyards and business entrances. The 'rock garden' in the Forbidden City in Beijing is a moonscape of rocks on steroids. They love rocks/

Speaking of 'steroids' ... vases like this one often stand in places of honor in buildings and palaces.
I had John stand next to it to give you a sense of its enormity. It's a stunning piece of workmanship.

I can only imagine the size of the kiln this was fired in.

Here is a video of the Easter potluck feast entertainment featuring the African students who attend Shandong University singing Easter hymns. There is a strong Christian presence in Jinan, albeit small in numbers; maybe several hundred thousand...

in a city of six million.

Around the corner from our apartment building and on the way to school is a hotel with a sideway "parking lot." This gentleman is the watchman for the sidewalk parking space making sure its few spaces are available only for hotel/restaurant guests. The cars we see here are high end sedans.
The friendship we have struck up with this fellow consists of a smile, a wave and "Ni hao."
His special, smiling face is such a warm greeting each day as we walk to school. He was on duty this Easter Sunday so we had to capture his smile for you.