UA Dallas receives warm welcome at Huaxia!

Oh what a welcome we received at Huaxia Girls' Academy of Beijing on Monday! As always, our sisters at Huaxia are detailed and considerate beyond measure. The morning began with students attending classes. They attended an art class where they made individual Chinese Opera masks and they also had a PE class where they practiced Tai Chi. All of this exciting activity took place before we teachers arrived because classes begin at 7:30 at Huaxia.

Once we were all at school, we took a moment for introductions of the Huaxia Administration and we exchanged individual gifts. Then, there was a formal welcome ceremony in the school auditorium. We were officially welcomed by the school and then school gifts were exchanged. Each student introduced herself (mostly in Mandarin!) and then we shared two student presentations - one on Dallas and one on Ursuline.

We feel so at home at Huaxia and we are always made to feel so special - The welcome we received began our school week in a wonderful way. Some highlights are below:

Ursuline presented Huaxia with several photos - Here we are presenting photos of Sr. Margaret Ann in honor of she and Dr. Li, the two visionary leaders who began this sister-school partnership in 1996

Huaxia Students at the welcome ceremony

Asst. Principal Hong and Principal Song - great leaders and dear friends

Huaxia presented each UA student with a Huaxia mug and scarf

Dallas guests with Mrs. Hong, Dr. Li and Mrs. Song

Dr. Yang introduces Lelesse to Dr. Li

UA students proudly displaying their Peking Opera Masks

Mattie & Sabrina presenting information about Dallas

Dr. Li smiles and displays a lovely bracelet, a gift from Sr. Margaret Ann, her "best friend"

Caroline says hello to Huaxia students

Jennifer introduces herself at the welcome ceremony

Huaxia Host students



UA Teachers attend Huaxia Wedding in Beijing!

Today was an extra special day in the history of Huaxia Girls' Academy of Beijing. Two Huaxia teachers, our friends, Juve and Grace, got married! We have known Juve and Grace over the years as both have welcomed us to Huaxia and Juve visited Ursuline in 2007. It was so special to be able to join their celebration and we (Ms. Chevallier, Dr. Yang & Ms. Nipp) felt so honored to be invited to the wedding.

The wedding was not only beautiful but also so interesting! The bride wore two different dresses - first a white western-style wedding gown and later a traditional red Chinese wedding dress. There was a ceremony which included vows, a toast, an exchange of rings and a thanking of the parents. The most surprising part was when the groom walked down the aisle carrying a bouquet to the theme of Star Wars! Flower petals were thrown and confetti flew at various times in addition to almost non-stop bubbles during the ceremony - It could not have been more festive!

But the most festive and happy part of the wedding was seeing so many old and dear friends from Huaxia - some who no longer work at Huaxia and whom we haven't seen for many years. One of the most special guests of honor was Dr. Yiru Li, our dearest friend and the foundress of Huaxia.

We can't thank Juve and Grace enough for including us in their celebration and wish wish them every happiness in the years to come - Congratulations!!!!

A wedding Photo of Huaxia Administrators past & present along with UA Dallas guests

A Portrait of the bride and groom greeted us

Old friends, Dr. Li & Dr. Yang, together again

Our beautiful table

There was a slideshow of the bride and groom which included baby pictures

Juve and Grace - Congratulations!!!

One last official proposal

Juve declares his love for Grace

A toast and speech by Huaxia Principal, Mrs. Song

We loved all of the details of the decorations

Old friends joyfully meet again

The bride and groom in their traditional clothing

Receiving a wedding gift of Texas treats from UA Dallas

Huaxia Families welcome UA students to Beijing

What a thrill it was to see our sisters from Huaxia Girls' School and their parents waiting eagerly for our students at the airport in Beijing! All of the host students were there - some of them we recognized as our old friends who visited Dallas last Fall. It was a happy sight with lots of happy reunions, including the teachers who reunited with Huaxia faculty friends from delegations past.  

This evening, the students are spending their first night with their Chinese host families - we can't wait to hear all about the weekend on Monday!! In the meantime, enjoy the photos below:

China Delegation Arrives in Shanghai !

Greetings from Shanghai where our enthusiastic China delegation has just arrived! We wanted to let everyone back home know that we are safe and sound and that the only challenges so far have been a mosquito bite and some electronic curtains that weren't working and resulted in a room change - not bad !!

Tomorrow we will fly to Beijing where we will be welcomed by Huaxia Girls Academy, our sister school for the past 15 years! We can't wait!!

UA Delegation departing at DFW

Welcome to China!!!!

Ms. Nipp's lovely honeymoon hotel room - we don't know why she was given this room but it's a lovely and romantic environment for writing this blog

Our first dinner in Shanghai - we had noodles, broccoli, cabbage, lotus root and soup

Yumm!

This delicious noodle soup was perfect welcome meal for our weary travelers

Good Times with our friends from Uganda

This past weekend, we were blessed with the opportunity to spend a little more time with our friends from Uganda before they left the USA for home. As always, it warmed our hearts to be with them. And, as always, we were amazed at their boundless talents and love of life.

In addition to the Spirit of Uganda, we were also blessed with the presence of Maria Naita, renown Ugandan artist. Maria has welcomed our students to her art studio Uganda so we were thrilled to welcome her to UA as our visiting artist. It's another one of those awesome relationships that we have seen come full circle from Africa to Dallas and back - just like our relationship with Agnes Kasule, our alum who is originally from Uganda and an orphan herself - now we at Ursuline are working with Agnes in her work as Director of Empower African Children in Uganda.  And what joy it has brought to our community!

A few examples of those joyful moments from this past week are below:

 

UA Faculty members attend the Spirit of Uganda performance at SMU

UA Seniors and Sharon - friends forever!



Pot Luck Dinner at Emma's house



Emma and friends

Agnes Kasule and Maria Naita with Sr. Margaret Ann at the President's Circle Dinner

African explorers together again

Spirit of Uganda farewell performance

Special cake for special pals

UA parents and friends join in the fun

Promoting UWEZO shoes at the African Market

A beautiful moment in the Farewell performance

It's hard to say goodbye!!

Moses charms UA moms

Maddie and George reunited in Dallas

A rare moment of competition between UA and Spirit of Uganda

It was an intense game - Let's not say who won...

 

Cheers! to Ursuline High School

Today was our final day with our sisters from Ursuline High School in Wimbledon and we were very sad to say farewell ! We were happy that we had time to share a Lenten prayer service and a festive lunch before our guests had to leave.

As many of you may have heard, we had huge and rather dangerous storms in the Dallas area today. Thankfully, all are fine. The flight to London was delayed so our guests will get home a few hours late tomorrow. Still, we are grateful for the safety of the group and for all of the great times that were shared this past week!