International Fair

Once every year, there has been an “International Fair” at most of the Universities in the USA. It was no exception at ETSU. Usually there is a dinner followed by a program. The dinner has a minimal charge, giving you a chance to taste foreign students cooking. Clearly it is good sometimes and also bad sometimes. However, it is generally authentic. The program also varies quite a bit from one year to another. When we were students at the University of Illinois, we participated every time. When I started to teach at ETSU, we joined the folk dance group to perform some dances in the program during the first few years. For one reason or the other, we gradually backed out of that part, and only went there to watch our students’ performance.

Folk Dance

International Folk Dancing was a part of our regular activities at ETSU on a weekly basis. Generally Janice was more regular than Tom. Bernard and Audrey Kaiman were the leaders of the group. Bernard was working at the Veteran’s Hospital locally and was teaching folk dancing at the University. They had been an integral part of this activity for many decades on campus. While it was not as big a group as at Illinois, it was a steady, faithful group. It certainly provided worthwhile get-togethers for many participants, including both Janice and myself. This was an important outside activity for Janice, besides the Monday night bridge group, when our kids were very young!

 

Visit to Tuskegee University

Our good friends, Adriane and Larry Ludwick, were both teaching at Tuskegee Institute after they received their PhD’s in Chemistry at the University of Illinois. Adriane was teaching Organic and Larry Inorganic Chemistry. They adopted a two year old boy, Michael. When we went to meet their new son, we also visited the school and the town. It was our first time to visit an all-black University. The Ludwicks are both white and Michael is also white. We are sure that it was quite an experience for them to teach at an all black school! They are both dedicated teachers and Tuskegee was very fortunate to have them there. We certainly enjoyed our visit in Alabama for just a few days. We saw the Carver Museum, Booker Washington Statue, their church, etc….

Dr. Edwin Meeks

Let me tell you first that Dr. Meeks is probably the person who has my deepest respect outside of my field of Chemistry. He was our children’s pediatrician from the time they were born until they left home to enter college. There was a shortage of pediatricians in Johnson City in 1971. When we called his office to ask for an appointment for Pan-pan and Steven, we were told that he was not taking any new patients. Later his office called back to tell Janice that Dr. Meeks remembered me from when I was a student at ETSU and would be glad to take our children. So we were with him for the next eighteen years! Not only did we appreciate his expertise is caring for our children, we also admired his personal integrity. He was a typical southern gentleman and a model human being! While we did not agree with his conservative political point of view much of the time, we did respect his sincerity. We do not have a picture of him when he was practicing medicine. The pictures below are from his son’s Facebook page. His son sang in the Civic Choral with me for many years.

The stage was set already!

As I told you in my last blog, the 1972 Xmas break was a very good break for everyone. Father went home before the Chinese New Year in early February. Janice and I talked about that get-together. Both of us believe that this set the stage for Father to make a decision quickly - 12 years later – without hesitation - to come to the USA to live with us after Mother passed away. He was very comfortable with the life in Johnson City during this Holiday break. While this is a story for later, we certainly did not realize at the time that a wonderful holiday break had such important implications. It was only when I reviewed the slides I took during those days that I started to feel emotion about my Father during that period. Some of the pictures below were collected to give you some taste of my feelings:

A Very Good Holiday Break!

One thing great about the teaching profession is the regularity of “Holiday Breaks”. Both winter and summer vacations, plus other national holidays, are available to you and your family. You could have a long summer vacation, if you did not want to work in the summer and you did not need any summer income. It is really up to you to decide how much you want to work. Dean was also teaching in 1972, so his family came from Kansas for the winter vacation break. Ed and Kai were in school, so they also came for the break. Father was very, very happy with all his kids and grandkids. Besides playing DiPai, a game from his native Hubei, and Mahjong with the adults, he enjoyed activities with the young ones!

While Ed and Kai were in Johnson City, they even got a chance to take some pictures in the snow with Father.These pictures are rare and precious:

Xmas 1972

That Christmas was certainly one of the most important ones for the  Huang family, since there were more Huangs together in one place celebrating Christmas than ever before. In Taiwan, we did not do much celebrating for Christmas at home. Father certainly did not care at all about Christmas. This was the first time when all my siblings could come together for the Christmas Holidays in the USA. In addition, together Dean and I had provided four grand children for our Father to enjoy. We had a lot of “togetherness”! Ed had a classmate who was with us then as well. We had a FULL house. Can you believe that we men ALL even had our ties on! That fact was certainly a very special case!

To See Snow Again!

It was an emotional experience for Father to see snow again in the winter of 1972. When the family lived in Nanking before the communists came and forced our family to escape to Taiwan in 1949, my Father was familiar with snow every winter. We were certainly among the “privileged”. I remember that I was picked up from school by a sedan when snow came and it was cold outside. The sedan was provided by Father’s working place in Chiang Kai Shek’s government. In Taiwan, there is no snow. So Father had not  experienced winter time since ‘49. After twenty some years, when he saw snow in Tennessee, he said that he had not imagined that he would ever see it again in his life-time, especially in the USA!!!, of all places in the world. We had to take some pictures to remember this! The following were taken in our front and back yards in Tennessee.

Beech Mountain, North Carolina

We often took advantage of the fact that Father was in the USA to visit local scenic spots. So, in 1972, on a beautiful day in late Fall, we drove to visit Beech Mountain, NC, where a new attraction had just opened - the Yellow Brick Road. Not only did we get to see the beautiful Fall colors in the area, but we also walked on the Yellow Brick Road and talked to Dorothy, the Tin Man, and the Lion . We told the story to both our children and to Father for the first time, and they watched the show on top of this mountain. It was a very fun day!

Watauga Lake

One of Father’s favorite local places was Watauga Lake. The pictures below were taken the first time he came to the USA. This big lake gave him an impression which was deeply imprinted on his mind. Later, when he came to live with us, we had bought a vacation hide-out on the lake. He never lost his enjoyment in going there. We were not sure how serious he was when he told us later that he wanted to have his ashes scattered at the lake after he passed away. In 1972, when he went to visit the lake for the first time, you can see on his face his appreciation for  this beautiful place!