Information on International Pilgrimages with Youth

March 10, 2003

Submitted by Caroline Martinson, St. Andrew UCC, Louisville, KY

By the time our flight arrived in Chengdu, March 9, it was 11pm.  However, the modern metropolis of 6 million was certainly not asleep.  Our hosts met us at the airport and provided transportation to the hotel. After check-in, it was off to our rooms for a good night’s sleep. Our wake up call is at 6:30am, so……sweet dreams.

Morning, March 10, in Chengdu is the typical bustle of a large city preparing for the work day.  Many bikers, walkers, cars and buses clog the streets.  Our gentle driver understands just how to get us safely through the throngs.  We immediately notice that here the trees have leaves and the flowers are in bloom.  Even a few beds of jonquils are seen.  Yet, the city is in the bottom of a bowl formed by the Snow Mountains, so the skies are hazy.

We have an appointment with the Sichuan Christian Council (SCC) to learn how they serve the 200,000 Christians in these western provinces of China.  Their ministry has been blessed by God and is growing fast.  They are still working to recover church buildings used during the Cultural Revolution. Since pastors have such low pay, the SCC tries to help with health care costs. Now they are paying the expenses for 10 pastor’s children to attend school.  By teaching people to read, the hope is that soon many more people will be able to read the Bible themselves.  This year there are 60 students at the Sichuan Seminary. Soon their names will be added to the list of more than 300 students who have already graduated. 

Our next stop is the Sichuan Radio-Television University (SRTVU).  We were introduced to a UCC family now assigned to work in the university.  Rev. Doug Searles and his wife, Liz, teach English classes at the university.  Their children go to school at the Chengdu Chinese American School.  SRTVU is an open-enrollment institution, much like the community college where I teach back in the States.  This university not only offers classes onsite in Chengdu, but also broadcasts classes throughout the provinces to more than 100 locations.  This university has more than 170,000 students, many of whom have lived in poverty and/or are of minority descent.  Students might travel from their village, where there is no electricity, to a nearby location to take classes.  SRTVU is a real benefit to a population who might not be served by other universities.  Fall 2002, SRTVU brought elementary students out of villages in the Snow Mountains to Chengdu, a 15 hour bus ride, in order to experience the city and to visit students in schools in the city.  With this type of interaction, the aim is to reduce the discrimination and racism that exists toward minority populations in China.  The US can learn so much from China. 

Just when I thought the meeting was over, some SRTVU students from Tibet entered the room and presented each of us with the hada, a white silk scarf.  The presentation looked like crystalline, shimmering white snow, falling from the hands of each student.  That was a very special moment.  Perhaps even more fun was the chance we had to split up into small groups, one American with 4or 5 students, to ask questions and just talk.  The students know so much English, and I know so little Chinese!  The students came to lunch with us.  A dozen or more even piled into a van and made the trip with us to our next stop, Wolong. 

The 4 hour bus ride took us by expansive fields of electric yellow flowers, a part of the oil weed, somewhat like the American rapeseed.  Eventually the road lead us up the mountains and became one lane (okay, maybe it was two-lane, but until we met an oncoming dump truck, I would have sworn it was only one lane).  The twisting curving road led us higher and higher, past areas of extremely primitive living conditions and areas of awesome beauty.  The road, replete with many hairpin turns, followed a river as it tumbled out of the mountains.  In some places the river bed was almost dry, filled with gravel, rocks and boulders – some as large as a house. Soon I realized the source of that river floor was rock slides and avalanches in the mountains.  Other times the river was a rapids, or an aquamarine mountain lake whose waters had been retained by a dam.  The grandeur of nature reminded me that God is in this place.  The humble homes reminded me of the great disparity of resources for much of the world’s population.  Is my life open to “turns”?  Do I ever experience any dry, rocky paths sometimes strewn with giant boulders?  As we passed an altitude of 6000 feet the sun broke through the clouds and added a cheery warmth to our world.  Thank you Lord, for all your blessings. 

In Wolong we visited the Panda Museum to find out a little about the habitat and habits of the panda.  Tomorrow we hope to see, and perhaps even get near, REAL pandas.  As the sun set, the mountains took on a purple cloak of mystery.  After another sumptuous Chinese meal, this time offering us specialties of the Sichuan area, we were treated to a bonfire and Tibetan dancing.  The purpose of the bonfire was to roast a goat.  The purpose of the dancing was to stay warm while the goat was cooking!   The Tibetan students, dressed in folk costume, demonstrated typical line dances that might be done at such an event.  Then they offered us the opportunity to join them in dancing, to practice our dance skills.  Some of us picked up on the choreography, others of us just danced around the circle with our own choreography, and still others of us watched the entire scene.  We enjoyed the time.  Everyone had a smile on their face which communicated the love and joy in their hearts.    The colorful, sumptuous costumes of the Tibetan students, their graceful arms and erect, proud posture, mingled with the crackle and blaze of the fire to provide an entrancing, exotic scene.  What a peaceful way to end another eye-opening, heart-filling day on a Pilgrimage in China.

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