Chinese Culture Group of Greater Grand Rapids

I love to keep up-to-date on what’s going on in China but often don’t have the time to scan the web. So, I implemented RSS feeds on the CCGGGR site to gather daily news feeds from two sources: Radio Free Asia and Peoples Daily Online.

News feeds are available at China News Feeds - RSS to read more of an article click on the article name and it will direct you to the appropriate website to continue reading. If you know of any other websites that offer a XML or RSS feed please email Mark

Enjoy

Coming this June, all current board member positions will be expiring. Spring is upon us and Summer is right around the corner so we wanted to give you plenty of time to consider serving on the board this next term. Serving on the board can be very rewarding and is a great way to get connected with the group. Please contact a board member if you are interested in one of these positions. For a list of board member email addresses go to http://ccgggr.org/content/contact-us/

Two Year Term Positions:

Chairperson
Vice Chairperson
Secretary
Treasurer

One Year Term Positions:

Member at Large (2 positions)

Due to the slippery roads and extreme cold weather, tonights meeting is cancelled. The meeting has been rescheduled for Tuesday, February 13th.

Thanks,

CCGGGR Board

We need your honest feedback as it relates to our monthly meetings. Attendance for our monthly meetings has dropped dramatically and the board has a few guesses as to why, but they are just that, guesses. Last night we hired Mr. He to teach calligraphy and papercutting and only had a few people attend (4 adults participated). In fact within the past year, we have had very little attendance outside of the larger events (Chinese New Year, etc.)

Please let us know your thoughts and if you’re willing to share, why you and your family have not been attending. This will help us decide which direction we need to take as an organization. Email addresses for board members can be found here

Thanks in advance,

Your Board of Directors

Members of the Culture Group have asked many times if there was an introductory class tailored for adoptive parents or adults traveling to China. Chinese Village has had a long standing relationship with our culture group and is now offering just such a class.

During the 6 weeks students will learn standard greeting in Chinese, how to ask for directions, bartering in the marketplace and other necessary phrases for getting around in China.This new class utilizes the Chinese-At-A-Glance book that can be purchased at Barnes and Noble or any other online bookseller like Amazon. Students will learn the PinYin system, which is the romanized or phoentic way to spell the Chinese language. Sentence structure will also be taught so that students can increase their vocabulary after classes conclude using the English/Chinese dictionary included with the Chinese-At-A-Glance book.

If you’ve ever wanted to learn Chinese but didn’t have the time resources that a semester course demands, please consider this class. Class meets on Saturday for 2 hours which is much more convienent for most adults.

Class will be taught by Esther Wang, who’s teaching format has helped equip dedicated students with the building blocks to begin speaking the Chinese language very quickly. Class is held at Keystone Community Church which is located between Spaulding Ave and Ada Drive.
To signup for this class please visit http://www.chinesevillage.org/register.html

xie xie,

Mark Elenbaas
CCGGGR Secretary and Webmaster

Beginning in January 2007 we will be moving to a pay-per-meeting dues system. We realize that families may not be able to attend every meeting and so a pay-per-meeting structure offers more flexibility for our families.

The meeting fee will now be $5 unless otherwise stated in an event announcement. Both the meeting fee and the building donation can be paid at the beginning of each meeting. If you’d rather just pay the flat $40 dues for the whole year you can still do that by clicking on this link

Respectfully,

CCGGGR Board

Don’t click that back button, you’re still on the CCGGGR site, we’ve just re-designed it for ease of use and added some new features. If you’re looking to signup for an event please go to the Signup menu and then choose the event you are signing up for.

1. Links to adoption related sites can be found on the right hand side. I’ve also included links to a couple China news sites to help us all keep up on what’s happening in China.
2. A photo gallery has also been added so everyone can enjoy pictures from our events. To protect the groups privacy, this section cannot be viewed unless you have a username and password. Contact me at webmaster@ccgggr.org for a signon
I’d love to hear any suggestions you might have for enhancing this site. You can send comments to webmaster@ccgggr.org

zai jian,

Mark