One of the happiest days of my life!!!!! This is a picture of the bus list for my school's bus stop. I went out tonight and there was a new sticker for a NEW BUS!!!! All year I have only had one bus that goes out to my school. It adds a bunch of hassle and time not having more than one bus. So getting a second one is a BIG deal. I was so happy I did a little jig at my bus stop.
This is just a random picture. My mom sent me another package and there was a Christmas candy stick it! Don't really know why the abominable snow man made the cut.
There was a big race in Yantian including a 10K, half-marathon and full marathon. Most of my China family was participating in the race so I went out to support them. It turned out to be a beautiful day and I was glad I made the decision to go out and see them. They all did a great job and I was there to take some pictures and cheer them on. Afterwards we went out for hamburgers so they could celebrate their completion.
Cliff and I hung out at the mall most of the day. We were walking around and spotted some little kids getting ready for a performance. We stopped to watch and saw Eliza! She is one of our friends and sings with her church. So we stayed for longer and got a chance to hear her sing.
My two students Lyn an Alem (the two sisters) invited me over to their house for dinner. Kay, the boy, is another one of my students who lives in their building. The evening was a lot of fun! We had home made dumplings and hot pot. All of the food was great. Their family was also really nice, but didn't speak much English. After dinner their mom made us all Kung Fu tea. It turned out that the actual tea was not called kung fu, but it was the way it was prepared that was called Kung Fu. It is made in the traditional little clay teapots and there is a long process of making a couple batches of tea and doing certain things with them before making a batch to drink. Their mom also made her own wine. She kept it in a jar hidden behind their couch because supposedly it was supposed to stay in a dark area to get better. The wine was actually pretty good. When they served it to me and my students I commented that in America this would never happen because the students were old enough to drink and I would never consume alcohol around kids I taught. They laughed and said that in China it was ok. The evening ended with my students and me sitting around telling jokes. Alem introduced me to Cold Humor (the Chinese term for dry humor). It really is not funny but Alem has such a funny laugh herself that whenever she would tell a joke she would crack up and we would all laugh because she was laughing. The title of this blog was one of her favorites.
I have stupidly agreed to perform at my school's New Years Celebration in front of the entire school. This has been the bane of my existence for the last two weeks. I told them I would be doing the waltz and I found a fellow teacher to be my partner. Then I was asked if I could possibly dance while one of the other teachers sang. I accepted (worst decision ever) and since then our performance has changed a minimum of ten times. The song the teacher wanted to sing did not have a rhythm that was possible to dance to. So he wanted me to do an interpretive dance instead. I finally made it clear that I was not going to do such a thing and we moved on to trying to find a new song for him to sing so that my dance partner and I could perform to it. About fifteen songs later, he kept trying me to go back to his original song and approve it, not going to happen. We finally found one, set a dance to it and performed it in front of the choir teacher for approval. After viewing it she basically told us we needed to extend our dance by two minutes and add a lot more frilly stuff to it. This was the day before we had to perform in front of the principal for him to ok our performance for the celebration. So...we decided to scrap the entire thing, change our idea and instead do American line dances to an arrangement of songs. After we had decided on that, the singer came back again and said we really should have a Chinese song in there and he still wanted to sing so we changed again to add the Chinese song. The day of our viewing came and went and we didn't actually perform for the principal (I still don't know why). The next day I found out that the choir teacher was mad at me because we hadn't performed for the principal and that she had been waiting for me all day even though I have never talked to her by myself and she doesn't speak any English. So it turned out that the singer and I were supposed to perform but didn't. Now the big performance is on Wednesday and we still have not been ok'ed by the principal. And also I have asked a bunch of my friends to come and help me dance. I'm really excited about them coming but very nervous to see how all of this works out.
Welcome to the DVD store. This is in Dongmen and has a large array of bootleg DVDs. You can find whole sets of TV shows and an impressive selection of American movies, including things not yet out on DVD. It is also very cheap. One movie usually costs about one USD. The Seinfeld packet, with every season, costs less than thirty USD.
This is the China Post office. I have had some strange adventures in there. My first two times I went with some fellow Chinese teachers and they helped me sort out the chaos. This past time I went by myself and ended up receiving assistance from a fellow patron who started mimicking planes and boats to help me figure out how I wanted to send my package. Things to know about Chinese mail - you can only mail a package with a China Post box, they search through your stuff before sending it, and unless you send it by air it will take up to 40 days to get where it is going. The other funny thing is that some of the methods of the post office are a bit behind the times. To close an envelope or put on a stamp there is a lovely bottle of glue sitting at the table. You help yourself to use the glue brush to spread on an appropriate amount to hold the stamp.
My mom is awesome. She has been great at sending me packages throughout my stay in China. The last couple have been Christmas related and included a stocking, presents and Christmas necklaces.
I bought this the other day when I went dancing with my friend. Around Shenzhen there are tons of what I call "plastic stores". They sell an arrangement of plastic stools, garbage cans, etc. It is strange how large of a need there is for these items, but plastic stools are everywhere and now I am a proud owner of a "I love you, Happy Everyday" stool!
Thanks to Greg's idea, I am starting a book club with some of my more fluent students. Saturday I invited five students to come to the local Book City and choose an English book for us to read. They ended up deciding on Around the World in 80 Days (the future would show us that this book is too hard for their level, but oh well). After our meeting I was going to catch up with Andrew and Cliff at the library next door. Some of my students asked if they could join so they came with me and met my fellow Americans. It is interesting, there is a set of generic questions that almost every Chinese person thinks of to ask an American if they see one. Our hope when we bring Chinese people with us to American outings is that they will think of something beyond those questions as an opener. Nope...once my students met Cliff the first thing they said was "You are so tall! Do you play basketball?"
On every bus there is a set of two TVs. These provide immense entertainment to the various riders throughout the day. The interesting part is the selections of showings that are played. There are the typical Chinese commercials and such, but the rest is an assortment of America's Funniest Home Videos and English people doing crazy things. You can see circus performances, comedy routines, strange dances, etc. We are all convinced that the Chinese are being taught that all white people not only have some strange talents but like to regularly show them off to fellow white people as well - no wonder we get stared at so much.
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