South Whidbey couple to live in Beijing
Published 6:00 am Tuesday, August 21, 2001
“Skagit Valley College art teacher Dean Matzen is looking forward to a year in China beginning Aug. 27.Jim Larsen / staff photoDeon Matzen and Bob Baerg have discovered a cure for the midlife rut some people find themselves in. They’re going to live in China for a year.Matzen, a 31-year resident of Whidbey Island, is a popular art teacher at the South Whidbey branch of Skagit Valley College, and Baerg is a building contractor.My husband said, ‘We haven’t done anything lately,’ Matzen recalled with a laugh. So she told him about a trip to China she was thinking about. This wasn’t exactly what I had in mind, he answered. But he went along with the idea and the two are leaving for China on Aug. 27.Matzen will go to China as a foreign exchange instructor under the auspices of Skagit Valley College to teach English at Beijing Foreign Studies University. She will be the first South Whidbey teacher at the university. In the past, Skagit has sent teachers from its main campus in Mount Vernon.Part of her job will include teaching American culture to the Chinese, and Whidbey Islanders have given her essays on such subjects as washday, crabbing, blackberry picking and bonding with one’s dog.She also plans to write a newsletter while in China that will be sent to people on Whidbey and be posted at the three South Whidbey library bulletin boards.The university in Beijing is providing an apartment for the couple to live in. Matzen describes it as several steps down from a Motel 6, but the other SVC teachers have survived the experience. The temperature in Beijing is in the 90s in the summer but plunges to an average 23 degrees in the winter.Although Matzen won’t be teaching art in China, she will bring her supplies so she can create art in China’s capital city. One language teaching tool she is bringing is 10 sets of Scrabble obtained from Good Cheer.Like most Beijing residents, Matzen and Baerg will travel by bicycle in China. Foreigners aren’t allowed to drive.I’m really looking forward to not having to worry about a car, she said. It will be a kind of freedom itself. She and Bob have been warned about the six lanes of heavy bicycle traffic in Beijing.To prepare for the trip, Matzen had to get $486 worth of vaccination shots and purchase a laptop computer. The college paid for her airline ticket but Bob had to buy his own ticket.Bob is hoping to find work in Beijing or at least teach conversational English. Maybe he can remodel the Summer Palace, Deon quipped. With Beijing looking forward to hosting the Olympics in 2008, there may be construction work available.Matzen has already written one cookbook and said she hopes to collect recipes for another while in China. There should be no shortage of recipe ideas as people from over 30 countries live in the university’s foreign housing complex.Beijing Foreign Studies University offers 30 undergraduate programs in foreign languages and post-graduate programs leading to a master’s degree in art or doctoral degree in philosophy.Matzen said they will return to Whidbey Island in July 2002 with many new experiences to relate. “
