DMACC Faculty in China (Prepared by Will Zhang)

May each year seems the best season for DMACC faculty to plan a trip to Asia. They have every reason to escape from the overly familiar environment to find a more exciting country to visit such as China. In the past summer, Roslea Johnson, Michelle Mosman, Qian Moss, and Will Zhang visited China, and stayed there for two weeks to over a month.

To see the change of China over the last two decades has been Roslea’s major goal in her trip to China. The last time she visited China was 1980, two years after China re-opened its door to the world. Though Roslea went to China alone this time, she met her longtime friends in Beijing, the business representatives of John Deere in China. Then she visited many palaces, such as Xi’an, the Ancient capital in China, the Three Gorges along the Yangzi River, and Beijing, the current capital city of China. In Shijiazhuang, our sister city, Roslea visited local hospitals, a deaf school, social work agencies, families of local residents, and our sister colleges, Hebei Normal University and Hebei Medical University, giving lectures there. She received a warm welcome from colleges she visited in Shijiazhuang.

Michelle’s trip to China is responding to an urgent request from Hebei Normal University, China. When learning from Roslea Johnson that our sister college in Hebei, China, needed several English teachers from DMACC in a short-term summer training program, Michelle got her travelling documents ready in the shortest possible time. She's now much busier in Shijiazhuang than she had expected, both teaching English daily and learning Tai Chi 5-6 p.m. In an e-mail to her friends at DAMCC, Michelle said, "Today in class we celebrated Halloween. They made masks, told jokes, …, I gave them candy, and we carved a jack 'o lantern. It was great fun." Talking about the her life there, she commented, it's the "same here but no iced drinks, swimming pool, etc." Michelle is going to teach English at the college from July 12 to August12 and then tours several days in Shijiazhuang, our Sister City, and Beijing. This is her second trip to China in the past three years.

Having been living in the U.S. for ten years, it has been the Qian’s first time to see China again. Qian Moss became an American citizen last year, so Qian looked at China from a unique angle when she was in her hometown, Hangzhou, China. Qian was absolutely amazed by the change she saw there. Everything seems so familiar to her, the beautiful lake, the bridges and the hills, but many other things like several McDonald’s and KFCs made her wondered where she actually was. Though Qian’s parents and one of her sisters live in the U.S., she still has a sister living in China. This past May she spent three weeks with her sister, and had also been together with her two lifelong friends. Before saying good-bye to them, Qian promised to see them again in about two years.

Unlike Roslea going to China as a tourist, for Will, China is still his motherland. So his trip is typically a homecoming one. While being in the U.S., Will Zhang has a lot to miss, his old mother, his siblings, and his son at college. Going back to China twice within half a year made him very excited. After seeing his mother in Tianjin, he flew to Xi’an, where his son attended a college, and Will stayed with his son for a whole week. As Will said, “Communicating with my son at college has been a biggest challenge to me, especially after parting with him for so many years.” Then Will went back to Tianjin by train and had been with his mother for two weeks. To Will, being with his family is the happiest time in his life of the past ten years.

All of them took many pictures while touring China. To view them please visit Qian’s home page at www.dmacc.edu/instructors/qfmoss, and Will’s home page at www.dmacc.edu/instructors/wwzhang.