The chill from Siberia hung around. This past week we had temperatures between 36 and 40 most days. The skies were cloudy and gray. The sun teased us for an hour one afternoon but then disappeared. Two days of drizzle followed.

This was the last week of the school term. The schools in FuLi and Guilin didn’t need me anymore. I was only at DuTou. Each morning I bundled up in my layers of clothing:longjohns, lined wool pants, turtlenecks, sweaters, coat, hat, gloves, scarves, multiple pairs of socks. I was thankful for the stretches I walk to get to DuTou. A fast walk can be warming.

None of the schools I taught in this term had heating. This week at DuTou we had a wood fire in an unused classroom. The week before we sat outside in the sunshine for warmth and when the sun didn't shine we had a charcoal fire in the staff room. With this weeks colder spell a warmer wood fire was built in the unused classroom.

During the breaks between classes the teachers huddled around the fire while the students played vigorous running and jumping games outside to warm themselves.

At lunch the teachers had hot pots. The hot pots had more meat than our normal dishes. Each had a goodly amount of broth. Very warming. Once the hot pot was chunks of fish and slices of ginger. Once it was bite sizes of pork and three varieties of mushrooms. Hot pot is a good dish to warm you up.

Even though I wasn’t teaching at FuLi this week, I walked through it and past the school in transit to and from DuTou. Therefore I often saw my FuLi students. Their warm smiles and hellos always warmed me...as did my lessons with my DuTou students.

It has been a cold week….but not without its spots of warmth.