The topic today is about a risk I took and how it worked out. This is an easy one for me. In 1992 I was in graduate school in Kansas, and I had no plans for what to do after I graduated. On a bulletin board in the Administration Building, I found a 3×5 card with information about teaching overseas. I wrote my name and number on it and dropped it into a mailbox. A month later I had a voice message on my dorm phone, an invitation to teach in China.

I took the risk. I took the job. Adventure was on my horizon. My roommate was Chinese. (ok, he was from Taiwan as he would say, but our friends, from the Chinese mainland would say, “he’s Chinese.”) He and his Asian friends had a secret bet about whether or not I would really go. The ones who bet I would never go lost.

It was the greatest adventure of my life. I signed up to stay a year and I wound up living in China for 3 of the next five years. I could write a book about the details, but needless to say it was a life changing experience.

I’ve been told it took courage to take such a risk. Others have called me foolish. Honestly, it was a little of both.