Hi my friends! We are doing well. Teaching has been intense these past few days--yesterday being the longest. Thought we would describe a "typical" day:
We start at 7:45 and go until 11:30 (with a short break) then we teach again from 2:30-4.Then in the evenings (some, not all) we have culture activities from 6:30 until 8. And I taught folk dancing last night...just close your eyes and picture that :) It was fun watching them--they were all laughing and having fun--all 90 of them :) Needless to say I was exhausted. Today was better---one of our morning sessions was led by our team leader as a lecture (of course in an unair-conditioned lecture hall, but that's neither here nor there). I have sweat much... Let me walk you through a typical day... 5:30 a.m. the alarm goes off...we press snooze several times. We finally drag ourselves out of bed and begin getting ready. I usually stumble into the shower room--the room is wet all the time--toilet, floor, walls...there is a small hose from somewhere? that drains into that room...dripping dripping always dripping. I shower and get ready enough to chat with the kids on skype. Then it is a mad dash to get out the door--do I have all my books, papers, notes, room key, name tag, water, toilet paper??? We meet briefly in our leaders room--a time for reflection and lifting and reading from the word. Then we walk down our three flights of stairs to the "dining hall," which is NOTHING like any dining hall on any campus in the US. Round banquet tables fill the room, with an elevated platform all along the side containing many more round tables inside "rooms" which have curtains to seal them off from the masses. We sit in one of these rooms and settle into breakfast: today it was a small yogurt drink, hard boiled eggs, bread, apples, and some kind of soupy porridge. Some days we have hot milk or tea, steamed bread and perhaps some noodles. We usually have a good laugh at breakfast over a chopstick mishap or something our team leader has said and then we trek upstairs to the fourth floor to open our classrooms and begin our teaching day. As I suck wind at the top of the stairs (although this is improving daily), I can already see over half my students waiting in the hallway--they are early...very very early...always...class begins formally at 8 with an "early bird" lesson at 7:45...all but one of my students are early birds every day. They file into the room, smiling, telling me good morning, asking if I rested well. The small talk and banter during this time has opened some doors that I plan to walk through this summer...so many deep questions, curiosities...why are you and Mr. G so joyful? We think you are a wonderful teacher...(and then the slyly sneak over the the AC unit and turn it from 22C to 26C...and to be polite I just ignore it and move on...it is an ongoing battle of the cultures...a comfortable temperature in the US is "slightly" lower than here...and by slightly I mean not-so-slightly :) Today for early bird I taught the song "Somewhere Over the Rainbow," which we all enjoyed. I played the only version I have, which is The Blanks singing it accopanied by a ukelele...actually a very pretty version...and I sang along because they all think I have this great singing voice...and funnily enough I probably do sound better over here because I am not nervous singing in front of them...I don't know why but it's true. So the lesson begins and I teach from 8 until 9:30, then we have a break...but my students seem glued to their chairs...I repeat, "you are free to have a break," and then maybe half move, three or four of them coming up front to chat with me...is that your son? was this taken at Christmas? your dog is so cute! you are a very happy family...and it goes on and on until the break is over at 10 and we begin again. Class ends for the morning at 11:30 and I make it out of the room around 11:45 and walk downstairs to lunch with Mr. G and our other teammate Mr K. We sit in our same curtained room and before they close the students are taking pictures of us. We eat spicy everything--spicy tofu, spicy fish, spicy something I can't identify...I have quit asking if it is spicy...IT IS...all of it, but delicious. We use chopsticks and our little spoons and use tissues out of a pack as napkins (this is the custom). We drink tea and perhaps a bottle of sprite if it has been ordered (we don't do the ordering)...and we eat rice...mei fahn...with every meal...with chopsticks...in fact a fork would seem awkward right now (although I could probably adjust :)). We talk with our Chinese liasons during lunch (they sit with us at every meal) and discuss the finer points of our culture...idioms, TV shows, dating...the conversations always elicit smiles and laughter, and the Chinese get a major kick out of our faces when we bite into the peppers...And then lunch is over and it is time for xio xi...my favorite aspect of Chinese culture...xio xi (show she) is basically a siesta..a NAP...I LOVE IT. Mr G and I return to our room and snooze until about 2 and then peel ourselves out of bed and return to our classrooms to begin the afternoon session. We finish about 4 but we also have students who are signed up for "one-to-ones" where they have ten minutes of our undivided attention to discuss anything they desire. Today I spoke with a young man whose father is the deputy provost of this college...i did not know this until today...good piece of information to file away...it was a good conversation and I enjoyed getting to know him further. I dismissed him after we chatted about my family and the transformer movie and his upcoming trip to Japan...and then I turned off my AC and lights, locked the door, found Mr G sitting in his classroom with his students as they planned for a cultural presentation and I returned here to the dorm room.
Dinner happens in 8 minutes so I will end this now...I think my brain must be in overload with all of the newness of everything--the language I am learning, the cultural nuances and subtleties, the teaching methods, the students' names (both English and Chinese), and trying to keep everything straight and filed in the correct place...and then there is missing my children and my family and friends, missing my cell phone, missing my bed...missing my chick fil a and dunkin donuts coffee and ICED TEA from anywhere! and on the other end of end of the continuum is realizing that I am right where I am supposed to be...i think that's all for now....love, K
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