Arrival in Nanchong

Tuesday afternoon, September 2 we arrived by bus to Nanchong, our SST home for the next six weeks. We were welcomed to China West Normal University New Campus by the university’s Foreign Affairs Office staff. We received a brief walking tour of the campus and then waited to meet our host families. Expectations and nervous energy in the room increased as the Foreign Affairs Office read names, one by one, and called SSTers and host families to the front to meet one another. Soon there were smiles, laughter, and varying levels of communication across language differences as SSTers and host families began to introduce themselves before setting off for what would be the Goshen students’ new homes.