Looking at the blue sky and the white clouds, Tzu Chi members in blue knit shirts and white pants are smiling. With the opening of the Still Thoughts Hall in Houston, Texas, on November 16, 1996, the Tzu Chi Humanities School has a new home.

The tangible building contains unlimited intangible love. "Motherly love" is what sets the Tzu Chi Humanities School apart from other Chinese schools. On the other side of the planet, Master Cheng Yen hopes to cherish the good opportunity of having this hall to plant the roots of Tzu Chi with gratitude.

On Sundays, you can see students in the Tzu Chi Humanities School learning Chinese martial arts. What is more interesting is that their instructor, who teaches them in Mandarin Chinese, is a Caucasian!

When you walk into a classroom where students are learning a Chinese board game, the instructor is also a Caucasian!

You walk into another classroom and find a teacher teaching students the Taiwanese dialect. But instead of writing Chinese characters on the blackboard, he is writing the sounds with English letters. It sure sounds funny to hear the English-accented Taiwanese.

Diverse But Interesting Classes

When class starts, the teacher chooses a line from Still Thoughts that is appropriate for the moral topic of the month. Then, he tells a story to explain the meaning of that sentence. Finally, he teaches students ways to carry out the lesson in their daily lives. This method is rather interesting for the students, who have been receiving American-style education.

However, at the beginning of each class, there is something they have to do first: "Stand up!" "Good morning, teacher!" In schools in Taiwan, where students must show respect to their teachers, the class leader tells all the students to stand up and bow to the instructor. This is normal in Taiwan, but in the United States, when the teacher steps into the classroom, class starts right away. Therefore, students who have just entered the Tzu Chi Humanities School have to get used to the fact that there are volunteers at the back of the class telling them to stand up and pay their respect to the instructors.

Not only do students have to make adjustments, but sometimes their Mandarin can make you laugh. During last summer's graduation ceremony, the student representative from the advanced class wanted to express his class's sad feelings towards their teacher, so he said in Mandarin, "We have lost a very excellent teacher!" This is a phrase usually used for teachers who have passed away. It made the audience howl with laughter.

Racing Against Time

Many Mandarin teachers overseas have the same thought: they have to race against time to teach Mandarin. Classes are only one to two hours a week, so teachers have to make the students memorize Chinese characters and be able to speak, listen, read and write naturally. In addition, the instructors also require patience and the students' full attention. "Education is one of the Tzu Chi missions, so overseas Tzu Chi members start by teaching Mandarin," explained Mr. Hsiung Shih-min, principal of the Tzu Chi Humanities School.

Even though there are more than 20 Chinese schools in Texas, the Tzu Chi Humanities School with its motto of "humanitarianism and love" was established. In order to make the teaching of Still Thoughts useful, the school has collected all sorts of short stories to be used for teaching. The school also encourages the students to join speech and essay competitions with topics taken from Still Thoughts. Every other week, the instructors carry out "Family Education."

Looking for a School Site

The school was established in mid-August two years ago, but its site had been a headache for Tzu Chi members. They once used a building in front of the old Still Thoughts Hall in Chinatown, a travel agent's office, and the Chinese education center in Houston as temporary sites. If they changed to a new site before they could contact all the students, they had to drive the students to the new place. If they had competitions, displayed the results and awarded prizes, they had to hold the events in three different places.

During this difficult period, the Chinese education center in Houston was a great help. Originally, the school had intended to borrow the center for three months, but the new hall was not completed yet, so the lease was extended for almost a year. The center had never lent out its facilities for such a long period of time to any outside organization.

Classes were on Sundays, so Tzu Chi members would go to the center early in the morning to set up tables and chairs. The students were never noisy or ill-behaved, and they never painted any graffiti on the walls. After classes were over, Tzu Chi members cleaned up the place and did not leave until the whole area was spotless.

The conduct of the Tzu Chi members not only gave a good impression to the employees of the center, but won their trust too. No wonder the center was willing to lend its site to Tzu Chi. The employees even went to work 30 minutes earlier to help set up for the Sunday classes.

In April 1996, students were able to move into the new Still Thoughts Hall as their own home.

Emphasizing Chinese Culture

In bright sunlight, some Tzu Chi members direct traffic outside, while others are with the students in the classes inside. "Motherly love" is what sets the Tzu Chi Humanities School apart from other Mandarin schools.

The instructors are all volunteers. In its first year of operation, the school did not charge any tuition, so some parents and students did not seem to take the school seriously, and attendance was often poor. Students who were often absent had trouble catching up, which was a problem for the instructors.

In order to improve this situation, the school adopted a tuition policy last fall, and the school system has gotten on the right track. Currently the school accepts students who are at least five years old. Most students are in the lower grades. Their textbooks are compiled by the Overseas Chinese Affairs Commission of the Taiwanese government.

What is worth mentioning is that most traditional Chinese culture has been forgotten in Taiwan, but the Tzu Chi school is trying to preserve it. Things like Chinese martial arts, Chinese chess, etc. are taught at the school. However, you would never guess that the martial arts and chess instructors are Caucasians!

The Chinese martial arts instructor has to drive two hours to the school every Sunday. The Chinese chess instructor is the secretary of a local chess club. "This is also an excellent chance for these people to come to know about Tzu Chi," Principal Hsiung observed.

Students who learn Chinese martial arts under the sun go through their lessons one step at a time. Once in a while, the instructor shows off his skill, and the students are quite envious. The parents who watch from the sides have smiles on their faces, waiting for class to end to take their children home.