Hmmm ....  I wonder if I am just trying to have my cake and eat it too!  (or pie, as I MUST make a few pies once I hit August in Wisconsin - wild blueberry pies, yum!  I have already ordered that there be enough rain so that the wild blueberries are PLENTIFUL, so plentiful that the bears won't bother me!!! - They LOVE those wild blueberries!)

OK - so here I have found is the dilemma (which is not really much of one, I now think):

I want to travel Heilongjiang and Jilin in June - that's the Manchurian area of China - just north of North Korea.  I will also leave for the U.S. and Salt Lake City on June 26th, my flight has been set since August. 

The RUB:  I only get a work visa for one year.  My contract for next year with SILC lasts until the end of June!  In order to get a new work visa, they need to have my passport for at least one week, during which, of course, I can not travel! 

Solution: There is a one time, one month extension allowed.  So that if my visa is issued June 1, I can stay until July 1, 2009! 

That means SILC and I need to sign my contract and work almost immediately through May to get the Foreign Expert Certificate, my Work Visa and all of the "t"s crossed and "i"s dotted!!  I expect I need to leave on my birthday for the north, especially if I want to get to Vladivostok too!

So Maybe I CAN make my pies, whole wheat bread, eat them and have cake too - in Alaska!
 *grinning wildly!*