Dujiangyan Fundraiser and Thanksgiving

At one of our weekly Sunday class meetings, Raedar made an announcement that some of our classmates wanted to organize an event to raise money for the earthquake victims in Dujiangyan. "Oh, and by the way, I signed you and Sarah up to sing a song." Alright. No problem. Sarah and I settled on Prayer of the Children because the theme of the benefit dinner was "Warm our Hearts."
The location was phenomenal. We ate a very expensive dinner at the Grand Lhasa Hotel in Chengdu. Inside the dining hall was a replica of the Potala Palace. My host family was there too. The event included a catered meal and entertainment by the Americans. We also wrote letters to the children and sent them in envelopes attached to teddy bears. One of the best parts of the event was when some of the boys in our group choreographed a dance to the Nsync song "It's gonna be me." It was the funniest thing I have ever seen. They did such a good job.
As a side note, later that night a few of my classmates went out to the clubs. One of the guys was dancing with a Chinese girl who asked HIM to dance. He found out he was dancing with the wrong girl when he got punched in the head by the girl's boyfriend. They were wrestling around and somehow the Chinese man got a hold of a beer bottle and smashed it on top of my friend's head. After a hospital trip and about 16 stitches later, he is doing just fine. Trust me, the whole situation was much more traumatic, but that is all you need to know.
For Thanksgiving, PLU paid for us to go to a 5 star hotel and have an unbelievably amazing banquet. It was only about 30 US dollars for the whole thing!! Food wise, it was the best Thanksgiving ever...don't get me wrong, I did miss my family's snowman poop and aunt lori's pie.
Around this time I also found out that I got the RA job for Spring semester. Out of 69 applicants, there were only a few spots open, so I consider myself very lucky and blessed to be hired. I can't wait to get involved when I get back to PLU...and the free single room doesn't hurt either! Today, I got an email asking me to start work during J-term instead of waiting until the Spring, so I will be pretty busy when I am back in America! Only 2 weeks (and counting)!