More Stories!

I have some more stories that I have been remembering the past few days that I haven’t yet blogged about. Some are recent, some are from a while ago but have forgotten to write down.

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 There is a girl in Carina’s class (which I also teach) and her name is Karmen. She can be a real brat sometimes. Like when she gets really angry and hits other kids, or is screaming the phrases we say in class. Or when she copies me word for word or pretends to be the teacher. She also loves her name brand clothes. I mean her mom is a little fashionista. It’s kind of funny when Karmen comes up to me and says “Look teacher, Tommy!” As she points to the little “Tommy Hilfiger” brand flag on her shirt, or “Look teacher” as she proudly shows off Nike or Adidas shoes. But when she isn’t being a little brat she is actually really cute and is always so eager to learn English and talk. Even when she is copying me I realize that she may not always be doing it to annoy me. (One time I said “I have no brains” and she repeated it and I thought it was hilarious. Yeah I’m so mean). Especially when I am talking to Carina and Karmen is just standing there looking at us and trying to copy what we are saying to each other. But I figured, hey that is how this girl is going to learn English. Sometimes she does it to annoy us, but I think other times she does it because she wants to be able to learn and understand English. This is also the girl that when we got back from Beijing when we are leaving to go back to America.

I was also able to have a neat little conversation with her yesterday about her siblings. She told me she had a brother, who was older than her. Then she asked me if I had a brother and if I had a sister. Unfortunately it was time to start class so I told her we could finish our conversation later and I thought she would forget. But later she comes up to me and says “Teacher, my brother name is Daniel.” It was so cute and I told her I have an older brother and a younger sister. When I told her my sister’s name is Tiffany, her face light up. The class next to ours (Senior B- we are Senior A) has a student named Tiffany. So she points to the other class “This one is a Tiffany”. It is always rewarding to see kids understand and to be able to communicate.

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It also made me so happy the other day during the kids gym class. They have gym every Thursday that is conducted by the gym teacher (who teaches us kung fu) but us English teachers have to stick around. They were playing a game and my kids were saying “Come here [insert a child’s name here]”. I taught them that in one of my lessons! The kids were using Chinese so I told them how if you want someone to come over to you to say “Come here”. It was great seeing kids use what I taught them outside of class without me prompting them. Also when they have gym class I taught them to say “Let’s go [insert name]” when they do relay races. And it’s fun to hear them shout to their teammates  “Let’s go!” instead of the Chinese version. One other thing that Carina and I have been trying to drill into our kid’s heads is to ask for things nicely. Instead of saying “I want this”, we taught them to say “May I please have this” or “Can I please have this”. The best is when all my kids are screaming “TEACHER I WANT PAPER” and this one kid David is quietly in the corner saying “Teacher May I please have paper.” And this is David who is usually a troublemaker. I also teach them to say “thank you”.

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There is a truck that drives the streets of our city and we hear it every morning on our way to school. The truck plays the song “It’s a Small World”, which sounds like a classic ice cream truck song right? I totally thought it was an ice cream truck just hearing it, but nope. Turns out it is just a truck that sprays water to clean the road.

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The guy who lives in the apartment next to ours loves to sing. At least I am pretty sure it is him singing and not a recording, but it goes on for hours at a time! I don’t think his singing is that great, but it’s hilarious. Hours will go by and we’re like “he’s still singing….” I’m surprised he can just keep going for long periods of time.

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Some of the girls’ in my group have an apartment with what they thought was an “Oven”. Turns out it is a sanitizer. I haven’t seen many (or any) ovens in the apartments here, but there are sanitizers. Apparently you put the dishes in them and the heat kills the germs. It also keeps your dishware nice and warm for the next time you want to use them. But the girls in my group just use it to make brownies and cake (because it works beautifully). Also at our school in some of the rooms there is this red light beam that apparently kills bacteria in the room.

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In Chinese people’s home, you must take off your shoes before going in and switch into “house shoes”. You aren’t even supposed to walk barefoot in the house. You wear these Flipflop shoes. All the hostels I have stayed in them provide them for you. Also our kids are supposed to change their shoes before going in the classroom.

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Left overs is not a thing! Whenever I go to Sarah or Susan’s house, we must eat ALL the food. Any food that is uneaten gets thrown away. They don’t believe in leftovers. They cook entirely new food every day. They even shop for food at the local market every day for that day’s meal. They really like things fresh here. It was fun going to the market with Sarah where she picks out some fish and a whole chicken. The lady opens the chicken, takes out the guts, cuts the rest of the chicken up into pieces and we take it home and cook it up (chicken foot but no head). They really like things fresh here!

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I may have already talked about how in China, they pretty much only have hot water. Unless you buy a bottle of cold water, it is hard to come by. At school, everyone drinks hot water. At restaurants, if you get water, it will be hot. All the hostels provide free boiling hot water. I was thinking maybe it is because water is unsafe to drink unless it has been boiled so they don’t bother cooling the water before they drink it, or because they like hot water for tea. But it is actually because warm water is supposed to be healthier for you. Well my friend Sarah, her son went to America for 2 years for college and he told her how no one in USA drinks hot water. And Sarah and her husband thought he was joking, they didn’t believe we don’t’ drink hot water. So one day she asked me if this was true and I said it was. She thinks it is the craziest thing we don’t drink hot water, and I think it is the craziest thing that they do here! The part that blows my mind the most about hot water is drinking it when you are already hot and sweaty. Like after dancing or exercising, they drink hot water! Which is just so unappealing to me.

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They also love to keep all the doors and windows open here. In the hot summer they have screens to keep out the mosquitos. They love to let the fresh air in. Apparently it helps keep people from getting sick because with them closed all the bad bacteria air stays inside. Even as it is getting colder (which still isn’t cold) they keep everything open. I have to wear a coat inside, even gloves too! (Because my hands get so cold easily). Even though it is only in the 50’s right now, it still feels really cold (because it’s been disgustingly hot the majority of the time we have been here and it is humid). I even prefer the colder but drier weather we had when we were in Xi’an and Beijing.

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Thanksgiving! We got to have a buffet lunch with our kids again; it definitely wasn’t real American thanksgiving food. That was two days before thanksgiving because the day of thanksgiving was parent’s day- where the parents come in and watch us teach! Anyways we decided to have our own thanksgiving feast Thursday night at our apartment. There was chicken, cornbread and biscuits, salad, pasta, mashed potatoes, macaroni and cheese. And a few deserts. It turned out pretty delicious. It was also super fun because a few of the girls in my group gave us each “Indian” names and we wore Indian hats. We also had a “thankful” box that throughout the month we wrote things we are grateful for so as we ate we went around the table and read them all. After we played games and had a dance party so it was a great day. Oh did I mention I ate a chicken foot ? Like the really gross kind that comes in a package and is slimy. We passed it around and all took a bite. It was spicy but slimy and a little hard to swallow but I did it 

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So my friend Sarah, her daughter was born in Hong Kong. As far as the one child policy law goes, people are allowed to have a second child if both parents are only children. Otherwise they aren't technically supposed to have them but it sounds like people do anyways and the government has relaxed on it, people just have to pay lots of money for the children. Well a few years ago Sarah went to Hong Kong to have her daughter Laura (so she could technically keep her since she wasn't born under the law) but now it is illegal to go to Hong Kong to have a kid and come back. But since she was born in Hong Kong she doesn't qualify for the government public free schools- she has to pay to go to a private school. I thought it was interesting that you have to be born in China to have your children go to public school.

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Badminton is SUPER popular in China! Seriously everyone knows how to play and people everywhere play it, even without a net they just hit the birdie back and forth. The other popular sport is ping pong. That is also a huge one. The third most popular sport is basketball. Football, baseball, are rare.

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I also learned that a black and white photo of yourself is bad. Black and white photos are only for dead people (like ancestors).

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Just a few statistics

-I have been to 11 cities in China, and 4 provinces
Guangdong Province: Guangzhou, Shenzen, Zhongshan, Zhuhai
Sichuan Province: Chengdu, Leshan, Jiuzhaigou
Shanghai: kind of it's own province
Beijing: kind of it's own province
Shaanxi province: Xi'an
Guangxi province: Yangshuo

- I have taken pretty much all types of transportation: plane, long distance bus, sleeper bus, fast train, sleeper train, ferry, scooter, taxi, car, van, bike, tuk tuk, school bus, city bus

-New foods I have tried: goose, duck, lobster, clam, corn juice, red bean, yak/ox, chicken foot, pigs foot, pig stomach, squid jerky, pigeon, dragon fruit, lychee, jujube (red date),

-Friends and memories I have made while here: countless :)  

Sorry no pictures. I leave on Tuesday! I still need to finish my Beijing post, and will write one more post about my last week.