Goodbyes Have Been Said

This past week we said our final goodbyes to all of our friends who are leaving us. So SAD! I have been excited though to see what God is going to do in the upcoming weeks and months to give us new relationships with English speaking people. Then tonight my good friend Lydia called and said that they moved to the building right beside ours! Wow! That was fast. What a blessing. Praise the Lord! Here is a picture of Autumn with Lydia's daughter.
This weekend we went to the park with some of our friends. Autumn wanted to try out her new pink glove and baseball from Nana and Pop. So, we all four took our gloves and went. We were quite the attraction--as there is no baseball in China. Most people thought we were playing cricket. The local kids at the park were quite interested and Joel talked them into playing. They were actually very good! However, I think Joel really scared one little girl for life. He had been playing around with her for awhile (she was very cute). Then he ran up...picked her up...and started running with her. She began SCREAMING!!!!!!!!!!!!! She ran to her father and cried for a while. It was kinda funny. I guess we foreigners are a little scary looking.

This week also marked the explosion of a very memorable building for us. When we came to our city for the first time in 2005, we remember seeing a building 25+ stories tall. We were told then that the builder had ran out of money and never finished the project (MANY years before). However, recently we were told another story. The second story is that the owner borrowed money from the bank over 20 years ago, began the project, and then he fled the country. I am not sure which is correct, but we have always remembered that tall building. It stood in an area of town that is developing very rapidly, and it was by far the tallest building of all those around it. Well, this week the building was demolished, and we climbed to the roof to watch. :) Check it out...

If you listen closely, you can hear the Chinese man speaking...and Joel responds in English. Ha! The man was saying that the explosives went off too early. They had told us the explosion would be at 10:30 am, but it actually happened 4 minutes early. Our other foreign friends were NOT ready with their camera. At least one of us captured it!

We need to get some pictures of the wreckage. It actually did not tear apart near like we thought it would. You can still see the columns. It looks like they just broke into four pieces and landed on the ground...with only the rubble from the break surrounding it. Strange... They have a lot more work to do now to get it all cleaned up.