I felt I should post some pictures from this summer.  I really haven't been doing too much- mostly working. (My overtime paycheck was quite nice.  Not sure if it made up for the lousy kids I teach!)  I'm on vacation this week, but the weather has been up in the 100s and if its not scalding hot, it's pouring rain.  Hopefully, I'll be going to the expo tomorrow, so expect fun pictures soon.

I want to bring attention to the linked blog: Santos in Seoul.  Janelle isn't really in Seoul anymore, but she is about to enter into the peace corps in Micronesia. She's a good friend of mine from college (flute choir, Japanese, same birthday as me).

Anyway,  the weather is actually nice today (low 90s! 60% humidity!), so I'm gonna go explore.

Summer classes began July 1st.

Class size: 5-15 students
Time length: 80 minutes,
Days off: Tuesday, Friday
Books taught: 1 through 6
Lunch break: 11:20 to 13:00.  Or, whenever the parents and grandparents finally leave the classroom.

I have seen several students from KeJi at the center I teach at.  Two are in my some of my classes.

I teach with a facilitator who helps with translation, discipline, etc.  It makes me lazy and is sometimes a hindrance.  Many times, the students will listen to me and then look at the facilitator for the translation.  I know most the students are capable of so much more, but the facilitators often really slow down their learning. I also feel like I have less control of the class.  If the facilitator steps out, the kids sometimes go wild.   Instead of listening to me, they tell me they don't understand. If I speak to them in Chinese, they just ask where the facilitator went. Not all the classes are like this, at least.

But, sometimes the facilitator is helpful.  I can play more complicated games.  I don't have to discipline as much.  And, not all my facilitators are bad. 

Overall, I miss teaching at the other school. I only see these kids twice a week, and because the facilitator is there, I can't focus on what I think is fun for the kids.  I work with my boss, and sometimes if I start going off into extra topic, she just interrupts and pushes me in the direction of the NB material. She's only with me for the older books, when its mostly review with a few new words. (Seriously, one week the new words are Kim-chi and Sushi. No new songs.  No new sentences.)  Also, 80 minutes is too long for a kid to be in a class. 

This is Terry and Kelly.  We tutor them Tuesday nights.  The family treats us very well and provides dinner for us if we want.  Most of the time, the hour long lesson goes well enough.

Sometimes, they are great.  Kelly is a busy six year old who swims, studies, and already knows her multiplication tables.   Terry, on the other hand, is a smart kid but enjoys being rambunctious and loud.

At any given moment, the kids go from focused to.... Well you can see-- the look on Kelly's face is pretty much perfect. 

Happy belated Dragon Boat Festival!

The Dragon Boat Festival takes place on the fifth day of the fifth month of the Lunar Year. This year, it fell on June 16th.   I have been told the festival commemorates the death of Qu Wuan, a poet from Warring States Period (Around 300 B.C). Qu Wuan was accused of some no-good stuff and eventually committed suicide by jumping in a river. Many admirers were worried fish would eat Qu Wuan, so they made zongzi to feed the fish.   (Chinese friends are welcome to correct me.)  The holiday was re-instated in the last decade.  Chinese people celebrate by eating zongzi and racing dragon boats.  Zongzi typically are filled with meat or beans. I had a particularly delicious one filled with egg and meat.

Days off for holidays works a bit differently in China.  If we have a midweek holiday in America, we generally have a day or two off and the days are added to end of the school year.  Here, they pull some crazy shenanigans and rearrange the work week.  We worked from Monday to Sunday and had our holiday + weekend on the following Monday to Wednesday. I can just imagine trying to get American students to go to school seven days in a row.

I spent most of the holiday relaxing as best I could. I was exhausted from being sick and working.   The Expo had something like 1.4 million visitors during the holiday.

I recently read an article about noise thresholds for people and the idea of loud in different cultures. (Conveniently, I read this as a jackhammer or some power tool was blasting in the apartment next to mine at 7:00 PM.)  Generally, I have found Shanghai to be a very loud city.  I often feel like people are yelling at me when they are actually speaking in normal voices. Once in a while, I can't figure out if they are angry or just loud.  I know plenty of loud Americans but being unable to understand the majority of what is being said to me makes it feel a little more like yelling.  Maybe.  I'm not too sure.

Most of the time, Shanghai doesn't seem so exotic to me because I see it everyday.  Despite being unable to understand nearly everything around me, I still forget I'm in China.  A couple weeks ago when a friend was visiting, I took a picture of a man attaching a bicycle to a giant load of chairs.  Though I saw more of this in other cities, Shanghai still has its fair share of giant bike loads. 

Sorry it has been so long!  First the flooding, then the roaches, then being sick and generally just being very busy.  I'm actually home today due to a fever, a nasty headache, and a deep cough.  Fortunately, somewhere between 10:00 and 11:00, my fever finally broke and my symptoms starting fading a bit.  Around 11:30, my waiban showed up to take me to the hospital, upset that I hadn't called her earlier in the weekend to tell me I had been sick. 

The doctor told me what I already knew I had to do--take it easy, drink lots of fluids, don't over-exert myself, get some rest and take better care of myself. My fever had caused all the cruddy symptoms that made me want to curl up in a small ball all weekend. Probably just a flu bug. Thanks kids!

Anyway, last Monday was Children's Day here in China!  All my classes prepared 2 English songs to sing.  I wish I could share some of the videos- they were adorable.  However, I neglected to bring my bigger memory card and missed the last performances of the morning (which were by far the best) 

Sorry for taking so long to update.  It's taken me a couple weeks to be able to write about our visit to Nanjing.

  The city, itself, was beautiful and most of the trip was very good, but a few details spoiled a lot of the enjoyment.   Cary was able to book our bus tickets for Saturday morning at 9:27.  Our bus got stuck in traffic for about an hour and during our rest stop break, we had to wait on one lady for probably close to a half an hour in addition to the 20 minute rest stop break we had. 
So, we arrived in Nanjing around 2:30.  The bus dropped us off in a very random location and we had to go buy tickets to Shanghai.  We decided on train tickets since the bus was expensive and slow.  

     After buying our tickets, we went to search for the hotel I had booked online.  It was pretty easy to find, but we were told that the hotel manager was only allowing reservations from Chinese people.  No foreigners.  But,  I paid a booking fee?  Sorry.  Chinese people only.    So began our search for another hotel.  Because it was the May holiday, every hotel we tried was booked full.   Some of them didn't want to book westerners, most of them were completely full.  Cary and I wandered around Nanjing, trying nearly every hotel we came to (except the expensive ones.  We might as well just take a taxi back than pay 1000RMB/night.)  Eventually, we started contemplating taking naps in the 24/7 McDonalds and KFCs in the city during the night if we couldn't find a place. 

   Finally, we called Nanjing Normal University's guest house and they had a room open. However, the Lonely Planet China guidebook told us the hotel was in Nanjing University, not Nanjing Normal University.  So, after wandering around the wrong university and asking several different students where the hotel was at, we finally found some students that were nice enough to call the hotel and ask.  Wrong university.  Whoops.   

   Around 8:30, we found the hotel!   It was actually cheaper than the original hotel I booked, but it was definitely one of the moldiest hotels I've ever stayed in.  But,  I was beyond grateful to have a room that did not cost half my paycheck.   Because we hadn't eaten all day (finding a place to sleep outweighed food in importance),  we had some McDonalds (surprisingly less greasy here!) and relaxed.  (Hahaha! In your face mean Chinese managers, hotels, and taxi drivers! I'm gonna eat some McDonalds!!) 

    Monday was much better, but it was very hot outside.  Unfortunately, after the frustrating day before, the pointing, "laowai!" calls, and shoving were getting to us.    In the morning, we visited the Nanjing Massacre Memorial.  We had lunch (at Papa Johns) near Fuzi Temple.  In the afternoon we rode the cable cars up Zijin Mountain.  The cable car ride took probably a good twenty minutes one way.    We walked along the city walls and around Xuanwu lake, but we didn't want to pay to go into Jiming Temple and the entrance to the wall that was free was closed.   The sun was also beating down on us, and we were trying to stay in the shade.

    We walked back to the hotel, took a rest to get out of the heat and went to dinner at a restaurant called "tacos."  Despite the name, there was very little mexican food on the menu.  It was mostly Chinese-Western fusion food, so Cary had tacos and I had noodles.   It was pretty good, and we were entertained by a young girl that was dancing and waving to us outside the restaurant.  She was five years old and practiced some of her English on us.

    Our train for Shanghai left at 9:03 in the morning, and we were both more than eager to get back to Shanghai.   We got back to Shanghai a little before noon (so much faster than the bus!)  There were other things we had wished to visit and do in Nanjing, but we lost several hours on the first day due to the hotel hunt.   (And, really, once you've seen a dozen temples, you don't need to visit every one of them.)  It was also so hot that it was difficult to move quickly. Also, the city was more than overrun with Chinese tourists... everywhere!  I wish I would've gotten more pictures, but here are a small bunch.

Last Friday, I got to go on a field trip with one of my morning classes.  We went to a Heping park.  While there, we visited a small zoo and amusement park.  The kids got to ride some rides.  (I got to ride one too!) The weather was beautiful and the kids were great. My afternoon classes were canceled and I got to leave school early.  Afterward, I went to pick up an awesome package from my mom!  Thanks mom! 

I've finally been feeling mostly better.  I'm sure the good weather has really been helping.  It's finally sunny and beautiful.

During the weekend,  Cori, Cary, and I went to the Bund.  It was closed while we visited last time, so we decided we should make our way over there before the expo began and thousands more tourists and businesspeople flooded into Shanghai.  I posted a couple pictures of the Pudong skyline before, But here's some more pictures.

I'm currently on a five day weekend!   Tomorrow I will be heading to Nanjing.  So, there will be more pictures and stories coming soon.  

Last weekend, Cary and I traveled to Zhejiang province with a couple of his students and their parents.  We left on Saturday at a bright an early 7 AM to reach People's Square and get on our bus by 8 AM.  Four hours later, we arrived at our hotel in a tiny city about an hour west of Hangzhou.   You could stand in the middle of the city and see the edge of town in nearly all directions.   Despite its seemingly small size, there were still probably a million people that lived there.   Saturday afternoon was spent climbing Tianmushan. 

The mountain was generally very peaceful, but one major gripe I have with here (and pretty much any Chinese tourist site) is the extreme amount of litter.   I always thought the litter in the US was bad about litter, but from a young age we are told that littering is wrong and there are fines for littering.    Generally Shanghai stays pretty clean because people sweep the streets and sidewalks every day, but it was very disheartening seeing the amount of trash in such a beautiful place.  The botanical garden a couple weeks ago was just as bad.  Generally, I try to be very accepting of the cultural differences between American and Chinese manners, habits, and lifestyles (the spitting, the shoving, the lack of information, the staring), but for some reason the littering really gets under my skin.  Even at the peak pavilion, you look up and see a beautiful mountain range, but if you look down you see a pile of garbage outside the pavilion.



 

On Sunday, we spent the day at the Eastern Zhejiang canyons.  We had to wait almost three hours for a small van to take us around the winding roads.    It was pretty much like a roller coaster ride around a giant a cliff that I would prefer not to re-live anytime soon. Various things we saw: waterfalls, bamboo jumping dance, and other naturey things too.

I am quickly growing tired of the lousy, rainy, cold weather here in Shanghai.  I have been told it is usually T-shirt weather by now, but I am still wearing 3-4 layers of clothing everyday! BRR!

Anyway, on one particularly awesome day last week, I had a half day of work!  I finished my 6 morning classes at 11 and had the rest of the day to myself. So, I wandered around my school's neighborhood looking for the Shanghai Botanical Garden. Many sections of the garden were in bloom and it was the second day of "Flower Festival 2010!"  There were many, many students there on field trips, so some sections were very busy and crowded.  (And I couldn't escape the middle and high school students waving "hello" at me and giggling.)     However, some sections were very peaceful and relaxing.  Overall, it was a very pleasant afternoon.

Some flowery pictures:

School news:
- Today, I had 3 morning classes instead of 6.  AND, they were all well behaved.  

- I am supposed to be chaperoning a field trip this week for the beginners and book 2 classes. Unfortunately, the weather is not in my favor. =(    90% chance of rain tomorrow and 70% the following day.  The field trip was moved to sometime next week. =(

Zhujiajiao. Ancient water town with many structures and bridges dating from the Ming and Qing dynasties.  It was about an hour bus ride from Shanghai and made a great day trip for our three day weekend. Originally, Lenore was going to join us, but she unfortunately became stomach ill. (She's doing better now.)

Our lunch consisted of all street food including: stinky tofu covered with spicy sauce, steamed lotus root stuffed with rice, and fatty pork wrapped in leaf.  The lotus root both smelled and tasted a lot like a sweet potato.  It was delicious.

Many of the shopping streets were just packed with tourists, but it was pretty easy to get away from the crowds and explore more.  Most of the town was very quaint and traditional.  I've included many pictures for those of you that enjoy pictures.  Remember you can click to enlarge and read my captions. 

With the purchase of a bus ticket from Shanghai, we were able to visit any of the Zhujiajiao attractions with just a show of our ticket.  Below are pictures from two temples in the city.

My favorite attraction was the Ke Zhi Yuan.  This garden and residence was just huge and just very quiet compared to the bustling, crowded streets.

The bus ticket gave us about 5 hours to wander around Zhujiajiao, but since we didn't eat in a resturant, are pretty fast walkers, and skipped the boring art museums, we were ready to go back around 3.  Unfortunately, that just wasn't possible.  (The ticket lady and guide book said the "LAST" bus left at 5:45, which we interpreted as there were many buses returning to Shanghai.  This was not the case.)

To occupy our time after we left the old town, we sat and chatted with a man from the UK here on business, and then wandered around a park behind the parking lot that was actually quite pretty. Cary's blog should have more pictures once he updates.

We met another two teachers from Guangzhou who were visiting Shanghai area for the long weekend.  They were nice and we had a nice chat waiting for our bus.  We had run into them several times throughout the day.

I don't know what it is about the weather, but it can make children adorable and well-behaved or small evil devils in disguise. Most of the week was rainy and cold, and the kids were just out of control. Thank goodness Thursday and Friday were sunny and the kids could go outside to expend some of their energy on the playground.

For example:
Every day at the end of class I give every kid a high five, hug, or tickle (or whatever we have agreed on as his/her praise), my last class of the morning got their goodbye privileges taken away for the rest of the week because Monday and Tuesday they were just awful (Not paying attention, rambunctious, hitting/pushing each other, screaming, etc).  On Wednesday, one particular student (my least favorite student, too) decided to switch off the CD player in the middle of a phonics practice. Then, on Thursday, he decided to try to trip me and kick me as well.  He's just kind of a nightmare of a student.  On every other Friday, I give out stickers for students that bring their homework/books as long as the class was good all week.   So, this particular student threw a fit that I didn't give out stickers, went and grabbed his Chinese teacher's stickers and put them in my lap and threw his book in my lap.  What a brat!

However, for every awful kid I deal with during the day, I have around five-six great kids during the day.  Two of my students had new shoes today, which they told me.  Another student sat with me during lunch (why he was in the teacher's room for lunch is beyond me, but he was very excited to see me!)  Another student had a birthday today, so we sang him happy birthday and him and his best friend got a sticker from me.

On Tuesday, Cary and I had dinner with one of his students and his parents. We went to elementfresh. I had an eggplant and italian cheese sandwich and it was great.  (Unfortunately, it didn't really settle too well and I felt pretty crappy for the next day. So sad!)  The parents were very kind and treated us to dinner before going back to their home to play wii sports with them.  Cary will be tutoring their son and a couple neighbor kids on Tuesdays.

During this weekend, Cary and I went and explored People's Square, Nanjing Pedestrian Street, the Bund, and the whole general area.   Shanghai is just so huge.   Pictures below!  My camera was acting up during most the day.  It doesn't handle hazy/humid days very well, so most my pictures turned out pretty fuzzy and no good. =(