Friendship Art Day: Megan Mraz has returned from Yangshuo with wonderful photos and student paintings from our Sister Cities/Blessing Hands Friendship Art Day. She has written all about it on our blog at http://blessinghands.blogspot.com. On July 1^st over 50 Blessing Hands students and other artists gathered for the morning to watch professional artists and try their hands at their own art. More than 100 drawings and painting have come back with the Sister Cities delegation to Morehead. The paintings will be shared with the elementary schools in Rowan County and exhibited at a Friendship Art show the first two weeks in October at the Rowan County Arts Center. The winning painting in the show, selected by a people’s choice award, will be entered in the Sister Cities Young Artist’s Showcase to represent Yangshuo internationally. We will be photographing the paintings and putting them on the internet for all to see. Everyone said the children were very talented. Perhaps you will see your sponsored student’s art.

Award: Mayor Li, who is himself an artist, hosted the Friendship Art Day. The event was covered by the local news, and we got a video of the news coverage. Another surprise was that Betty Cutts, who founded Blessing Hands, received a handsome plaque from the Provincial Government of Guangxi Province for our work with the students in Yangshuo. Malan Cai, our administrator there, was able to translate for the presentation ceremony, and Carolyn Franzini of Morehead accepted the plaque on behalf of Betty. Malan says this is a great honor, since the award had never before been given to a foreigner. The nomination was submitted by the Educational Department of Yangshuo County.

Sister Schools: Megan also taught a class at Xingping Primary School, which has asked Rodburn Elementary in Morehead to be their Sister School. The Xingping students sent lots of drawings back to their pen pals at Rodburn Elementary. Our pen pal program has gotten off to a good start with packets of letters coming back to Rodburn and McBrayer Elementary Schools in Morehead. Rowan County Middle School pen pals also got letters back. Megan really enjoyed visiting the schools in Yangshuo and will soon be visiting the schools in Rowan County to encourage more students to be pen pals and send drawings back to Yangshuo. These sister school exchanges and pen pal contacts are all a part of opening our students up to the larger world of English and art. The Chinese paintings are so creative, and you can tell that the students really enjoy contact with foreigners. I am surprised by how good their written English is in primary school.

College Scholarships: While Megan was in Yangshuo, she also sat on a scholarship committee interviewing graduating Blessing Hands students who qualify to go to college. There is a national test in China that determines who gets to go to college. We had 15 applicants interview in Yangshuo and another 14 applied in Qinzhou. A total of 6 boys and 23 girls have passed the test and now applied for the twenty scholarships we hope to offer through a grant we have applied for. It remains to be seen how many $500 yearly scholarships the grant will actually fund. If any of you want to sponsor a college student please let us know. Where else but China could a student go to college for such low tuition?

Donations needed: The fall semester starts soon. We always need educational help for our students. For just $10 a semester you can help a primary student with books, school supplies, and clothes. $25 lets a lower middle school student have needed supplies and books as a boarding student. Higher middle school students need $75, since tuition is not free for them. Where else could you change lives for so little. If you have not renewed your support now is the time to do it. I have been reading the spring thank you letters. The students are so appreciative, and I don’t want to let them down. Please remember our students with a generous donation.

Eyeglass Clinic: This July the Qinzhou students have been blessed with an eyeglass clinic by Founding Family Charitable Foundation. The local hospital partnered with Blessing Hands to offer free examines for the fifty students who needed glasses. We have been getting thank you letters for the new glasses. They also paid for one of our students to have a procedure to clear her nasal congestion. Nina Ottinger will be traveling there in October to see the results first hand.

Taiwan Trip: Betty Cutts has just returned from Taiwan where she taught English classes with Emily Hsu in Taichung. She got to teach three lessons at Tai Ping Primary School, which serves about 60 aboriginal children, who live in an area destroyed by an earthquake ten years ago. All of the children attend the school free and most are from very poor families. The students are lovely and interested in learning like all children. She surveyed the needs of the children for a possible Blessing Hands program there. The board will decide this next month. Most of the money given to Blessing Hands while she was in Taiwan was left there for this possible new program.