My first meeting with Zhiqi

This is a little late but I met with my exchange student, Zhiqi, last week. She is a freshman from China and she is one of the sweetest people I have ever met. 

We decided to meet at the TCU Barnes & Nobel and get a drink at Starbucks to meet each other for the first time. As the meeting time approached I got in line to order thinking that Zhiqi would join me soon. I received my drink and 5 minutes went by, and she still had not shown up. 10 minutes, 15 minutes, 20. Nothing had occurred. I looked around, searching for a girl that might be my exchange student, realizing that I really had no way of recognizing her. 

I emailed her on my phone saying that I did not see her in the Barnes & Nobel, and that maybe we had a miscommunication. As I was walking out to go back to my dorm, I got an email from her saying that she was sorry and was on her way. 

I walked back into the Barnes & Nobel and shortly after a petite girl came in rushed. I recognized that this must be my student immediately. 

Quickly after introductions, Zhiqi apologized over and over again. She was not feeling that day and overslept and felt terribly about it. She kept insisting that she buy me a drink or something to make up for it but I told her that was completely unnecessary. We sat down and began to question each other. 

She talked of how China was so much different from here. She kept mentioning how peaceful and easy going everything and everyone in Texas was. Everyone is China was always so busy and she truly appreciated the way people took time to appreciate the little things in their day. It was so interesting to hear, because so often it is said that our society is becoming too impersonal and speeding through life. 

We began to talk about our families and Zhiqi spoke of how her Dad was always away in different parts of China on business, and that she rarely ever saw him. I showed her a picture of my 6 person family on Facebook and told her about how my parents are retired and are currently working together on reconstructing our house. The one comment she made was how my parents really must love each other to work together day-in and day-out on such a project. I had never thought of the project as a portrait of their relationship and commitment but when discussing it with her it completely made sense. 

She began to confess that for the last month or so she had been amazed by the concept of love in America. She was amazed at the relationships between married couples and that it was amazing that they truly loved each other. That really threw me for a loop, when all I hear about relationships in the media is how a huge percentage of marriages are ending in divorce. I never realized that her parents might not love each other the same way that my parents did. It was beautiful to see the smile on her face when she talked of one day falling in love and being happy with someone. I have never had to consider marriage as anything else except love, but many countries, including China, can simply view marriage as business. 

I am excited to see how the rest of our meetings go. I can already tell that she is going to make me realize the blessings I have here, not because she does not have them there in China, but because she recognizes them more.