Sunday, September 27, 2009

SNAKES

So busy lately. Because of the upcoming holiday we are working on
Sunday, and I forgot how important a rest on the weekend was. I've now
been working 7 straight days with a night of karaoke thrown in there on
Friday, and I'm starting to feel the pain.

I wanted to mention this but I kept forgetting. I had a moment in our
"English Meeting" last Thursday that caused me to laugh for 5 minutes
straight. No one else got it. There was an excellent typo on our
"Common Phrases to Use With Kids" handout one of the teachers had typed
up. The English teacher (Chinese girl) had typed it up, and then during
our English meeting (10 Chinese teachers trying to speak English with me
to practice their English) I was supposed to read it out loud for
pronunciation checking for mistakes as I went. The mistake I found, the
one that made me laugh, was: "Okay kids! Time for breakfast / lunch /
snakes / dinner!" I read them one by one. "Okay kids time for
breakfast!" "Time for lunch!" "Time for snakes!"

When I yelled "Okay kids, time for snakes!" I instantly lost it. I
realized it was meant to be snacks, but after yelling it I just lost
it. I'm giggling it typing it. I have a mental picture of me walking
into the classroom an hour after lunch with a basket of snakes and
yelling "TIME FOR SNAKES EVERYONE!"

I love my imagination. It's what keeps me going.

Friday, September 25, 2009

Weekly Check In

This week has been a good level of busy. I spent a few hours waiting in line earlier in the week to buy train tickets to Beijing. Despite waiting pretty early they had nearly sold out when I got there, and only the expensive tickets were left. I found out afterwards that a plane ticket from Hangzhou to Beijing would have been about as expensive as my train ticket and 10 hours shorter.

In any case, I'm excited for the week holiday. Gloria will come to play with me in China, it is my first test run to see what type of host I am. Will I balance work and play well? Time will tell.

Today I did the monthly review of a selection of the children in my class. Tomorrow they give them out to parents, and I'm expecting to meet with the parents to discuss them should there be parts they don't understand. This whole week/weekend will be a battle until Thursday when we get off work. We have classes on Sunday to give the kids a four day week before the break, meaning I will have no day of rest. Let the gauntlet begin.

Saturday, September 19, 2009

Burning Down the House

Most entertaining story of the weekend comes first. Last night I went
to a particularly nice cafe with my friend, a pricier one that
specializes in a calm atmosphere and great ambiance music. After
sitting for about an hour, the table next to us started yelling for a
waiter. Most places in China you will call for a waiter, but at nicer
places like this cafe it is looked down upon. The waiters and patrons
looked disparagingly at the two gentlemen yelling for a waiter until
their cries of, "Waiter! Waiter!" turned into, "Waiter! Fire!". One of
the lights had burst and the ceiling was slowly catching on fire. Just
as the waitresses realized the ceiling was on fire big pieces started to
fall down and that section of the ceiling began caving in. Everyone
escaped without injury, and the waitresses were all yelling "Put it out!
Put it out!" but no one thought to grab the fire extinguisher or
actually do anything. It took a good minute for someone to come running
out of the kitchen to put the fire out. Those of us who hadn't already
fled were then given discount cards and free everythings. It was a
pretty exciting event, never been in the midst of a fire before.

This morning I went to partake in more part time teaching. The job is
nice, as the money it brings in makes me feel a lot less guilty about
spending money 'recklessly' treating friends to dinner and seeing
movies. When I went to the first class on Thursday I thought I stumbled
at a few places with the unfamiliar format of the class, the longer
time, and having to get new children to have the courage to talk to a
foreigner. I'd forgotten how hard it was to get children talking on the
first day. I didn't think I'd done well, but after the class the
children gushed to their parents about how much they liked me, the
teachers gushed about how well I did, and several parents redid their
children's learning schedules to be in class with me or be in private
sessions. Armed with that confidence, I went in for round 2 today and
just dominated my classes. I'm really starting to enjoy teaching,
especially because I feel I am finally getting really good at it.

I've been cooking lately after doing some studying of local restaurant
styles, and last night I made some of the best food I've ever made. I'm
not sure if it is cooking with gas or a fluke with lucky guessing on
cooking times, but it was so good. SO GOOD.

Time for afternoon classes, followed by a trip to the movie theater with
some friends to see the latest Chinese blockbuster.

Wednesday, September 16, 2009

Week in Progress

I discovered today while there are no other male teachers at our school. It isn't the reasons I heard before about salaries and social perceptions about appropriate jobs for men. No, it is something much simpler. Today one of the girls was excited to see me and came running up yelling, "Chris! Chris! Good morning Chris!" She was running at top speed to give me a hug, and hearing her yelling I turned around just in time to say, "Hell- OH" as she inadvertently punched me straight in the crotch. It was match point, game over, white man down level of pain. I hadn't been racked like that since football, and by damn I think I'm going to invest in a cup. I've had lots of close calls, but I'd managed to avoid the flailing limbs that are so dangerously aimed around crotch level up until today.

Aside from that, the week has been fairly good to me. I'm getting better and better at handling the kids both in terms of keeping them happy and in keeping them in line. I do know for sure, though, that as a result of my experience I don't want kids any time soon. So intense.

My first day at the part time job is Thursday, two days from now, and I'm not yet entirely sure what to expect.

Sunday, September 13, 2009

Part Time Job Interview

Had an exciting weekend. The Wine Bar we went to on Friday turned out
to be great, we had a lot of fun. We will definitely be making a return
visit, after 10:00 a DJ came in to set up and the music was fantastic.
The drinks were good, and the complimentary buffet that came with the
drinks was fantastic.

I had planned to go to a scenic site on Saturday with some friends, but
I accidentally turned off my phone after setting the alarm and didn't
wake up in time. I spent the afternoon instead going to meet with a
kindergarten about part time work. I was recommended by an impressed
teacher at my current school. Their classes and facilities were
amazing, with touch screen walls for interactive teaching and highly
motivated students. The pay is 150 an hour, far above the average 100
an hour other places had offered me, and the school simply on the
recommendation alone was certain I'd be a perfect fit. It really is all
about who you know in China. In any case, I will probably start some
time this week, and I'll be able to make a good amount of money from the
work. The money will be welcome, too, as I won't receive my first
paycheck until after the first month of work here and I'd like to
bolster my Chinese bank account without making more transfers to it from
my American account. The fees pile up fast!

I am excited about the part time work, it should be fun, and I made sure
that it would be easy to ask for time off should I desire it.

Last night I spent the night at a friends house. We had a sleepover
watching American and Chinese movies that I had bought and eating
copious amounts of fruit. The amount of fruit that people eat here is
just ridiculous. So much.

Tuesday, September 8, 2009

I am Donkey

The Chinese faculty agrees that I act like the Donkey from Shrek. What happens is, certain things just boil up inside of me and I end up breaking into song or dance at random parts of the day. For example,. today I did my 'donkey dance' and sang Billy Jean for 5 minutes in the office. The donkey dance is the dance I did when they first said I acted like Donkey, and it is really well received. They think the dance and I are hilarious. "I'm Donkey! I'm donkey! DONKEY DONKEY DONKEY!"

Internet Tomorrow

The internet providers will come to my house sometime tomorrow to open the internet for me, and after that things will be much more convenient. I am excited. Once I have my own internet I can experiment with proxies and find ways to get to facebook, blogspot, and upload pictures.

To confront Phillip's difficulties the kindergarten had our contact David invite Maggie to come observe and help him prepare for his classes. Maggie has 11 years of teaching ESL experience in various countries around the world, and she certainly is good, but I don't think anyone predicted the result that would come from having her visit. She stepped on pretty much every persons toes and did everything the way we are not supposed to. The office provides us with materials on request, and she decided to circumvent this and go purchase her own supplies. This is fine, though a bit impolite to the woman in charge of finding and maintaining supplies for us.

The next issue exploded into a giant fight. Phillip had previously asked for a list of names of the children in the class. The names are posted on the walls outside the class, but he requested that one of our coworkers get the list for him. Note: coworker, not assistant. She obliged, and while Maggie was reviewing the name noticed that 8 of the children did not have English names written down. She also made the comment that "Two character names are girl names, and 3 character names are tricky because they can be boys or girls". I'm not sure where she decided on this from, but it is so hilariously untrue and unfounded that I just didn't care to help her. She was already annoying me by reinforcing every negative American stereotype I try to work against, and the confidence with which she stated her insanely stupid comment caused me to simply stare at my paper to avoid the rush of various emotions that threatened to make me yell or laugh or both.

She first confronted her saying, "This name is two characters, yes? Well then why is her name Max? Max is a boys name." My coworker was confused and simply responded that yes he was a boy. Maggie then responded with, "You know Max is a boy's name? Well then why don't you have her change her name to a girl's name, you shouldn't call her Max." My coworker was more confused, and tried to explain that the child name Max was indeed a boy. Maggie finally decided to believe that this was the one exception to her made up "two character names are girls" rule and move on to her next grievance - the missing 8 names.

Our coworker informed her that the names had recently been decided upon after changes from the parents and not entered into the computers yet, and that if she would like the names Phillip should go ask the teachers in each class for them. Maggie began to berate my coworker and speak to her like a child, insisting that she was Phillip's assistant and needed to do her job by going and asking the teachers for her. She is not Phillip's assistant. She became angry, and when our other coworker turned to ask her in Chinese what was wrong, she responded in Chinese simply explaining and stating that Maggie was telling her to do things she didn't need to. This caused Maggie to yell, "Don't talk in Chinese because you know I can't understand, don't talk behind my back, speak English." Things simply elevated from there, with Maggie storming to the headmaster's office to seek justice and our coworker following behind to not let Maggie soil her name. The biggest loser in this is Phillip, who sat there embarassed and said nothing. Daisy, the coworker that was yelled at, is his partner teacher (not assistant) and shares the upper 3 classrooms with him. Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays foreigners take the younger children and the two Chinese English teachers take the older children, then on Tuesday and Thursday it switches. Phillip needs to be able to work with her and coordinate curriculum, and now not only is she not excited to work with him but most of the teachers in his class witnessed Maggie's tirading through the halls yelling at Daisy and making a scene as she made her way to the headmaster's office.

All in all, the event really annoyed me. Maggie, seemingly not knowing the situation of the school and how things work (I hope) despite my impression that Phillip had explained it to her, came in and proceeded to offend and anger as many people as possible.

Aside from that, I can't stop losing weight. I was around 215 when I came to China, and I am now down to 198 with no signs of my weight stopping. I'm not sure what I'm losing since I feel like I look the exact same, so I'm rather confused at the moment. Oh well.

Monday, September 7, 2009

A New Week Has Begun

A new week has begun, and I am continuing to dominate the kindergarten. Phillip is struggling and perhaps has given up, he didn't prepare anything for his classes today and there was a pretty big meeting about it followed by him getting a stern private talking to. I couldn't hear what was being said, but I think everyone on campus could hear the tone through the walls and knew what was going on. The only thing he did was hand out whistles to his first class, which if you know anything about kindergarten and preschool aged kids is a terrible idea. He said he realized this after it backfired and didn't give any out to his next classes, but needless to say he isn't on good terms with the whistle classes teachers now.

The kids and I have been getting along well. They are baffled by my body hair and think it is amazing. All the previously shy students are all opening up to me, and they are learning so fast it is amazing. The job takes so much preparation but is so rewarding.

I went and bought Dr. Suess after the insane success of reading Hop on Pop to my classes. I prefaced it by telling them Dr. Suess was what my mom used to read to me, and they were so mystified and excited that I was sharing it with them. I also think I'm going to keep my copies instead of trying to get reimbursed and giving them to the school. The books come with Chinese translations at the bottom along with a short Chinese bio about Dr. Suess, and I think these are definitely worth collecting. The books that the local big book store didn't have I have ordered to complete my collection. I am needless to say very excited.

More exciting and heartwarming was the local vendor who stopped me on the way back. He runs a cigarette store, but he is the place right outside our gate and I always drop by to buy water from him and do a bit of talking. He was a gruff guy at first, but he is really nice and I've enjoyed making him open up and be nice to me. He saw my books when I stopped to get water, and asked me if they were for my classes. He was intrigued about the Chinese written on the page to help with learning the English. He told me his daughter was only 3 and had just started school, and that her English was bad. Then he proceeded to ask if I had any good books for alphabet learning. I pulled out Dr. Suess's ABC book, one of my favorites, and he asked me how much it was. I told him they were all 18 RMB, and he without hesitation pulled a 20 out of his pocket and gave it to me. I told him not to worry about paying me, but he was too proud and wouldn't take the money back. He flipped through the new book so happy that he had a gift to give to his daughter, and he was so involved with being happy with his new acquisition that when I asked him if he had anyone to read it to her he didn't hear me at first. He responded that he did not, and I offered to stop by during my break in the afternoon and read it with her. I thought he was going to cry, he was so overwhelmed that a foreign English teacher from the best kindergarten in Hangzhou was offering to read to his daughter, the daughter of a cigarette store owner who doesn't look to make much money. I didn't think about it that way until after, so his reaction caught me a bit off guard, but I assured him that I would come and read it to her. The whole experience was really heart warming.

Work has been going well, and tomorrow I am scheduled to go get internet hooked up and get a bus card made. I am excited, this means more convenient internet and more frequent updates.

I also bought about 50 of the best English movies from a local movie store 3 days ago. My friend has just gotten out of the hospital with appendicitis, and his request during recovery was to watch my favorite English movies with me. We have already watched countless Chinese movies, so I decided to go overboard and stock up with my favorite from every genre. I have an exciting week of movies ahead of me, along with a trip on Friday to a wine tasting and dinner party. I have to find a date. Oh dear.

Wednesday, September 2, 2009

Fishing For Names

It seems my week will be rather uneventful from Monday to Friday with the exception of class. My friends have started school again or work, and we often only have time to eat after I get off work, then we all return to our respective residences to do what we need to do. In my case that means playing Hearts on my computer and setting a new record while listening to Chinese music, followed by reading one of the new Chinese novels I bought and falling asleep by ten. My life has become horrifyingly adult in the last few days. I find myself spending my free time cleaning the bathroom or scrubbing certain parts of the house. Things that years ago showed up on my chore list are now things I williningly do with no bribery or threat of punishment, and after I do my work I go to sleep at a reasonably early time to wake up early and plan for work. Horrifying.

Class was even more fun today. The class culminated with the students fishing for their English names, and after they fished them out we each took a picture together with their fish (name on the front). I am going to use these pictures to remember their names, and I also plan to print out copies and give them to the students. Apparently my first day made a great impact on the students but more so on the teachers, they never thought I would do so well starting out with no experience. This has been a rewarding week, I hope the kids are ready for more this afternoon.

Tuesday, September 1, 2009

The First Day

The first day has been absolutely amazing. The children love me, and I love them, everything seems to be going so well. I am so happy that everything is going so smoothly, I think this is really going to be a fun semester. The best moment of my day so far has been the kid sitting next to me in one of the classes rubbing my arm and marvelling at my arm hair. He asked me why I had so much, then wanted to rub my face to see if I had a beard. It was the most novel thing I've had happen to me in China in months. Top notch awesome.

I sang songs, did introductions, and it looks like it will be fun. I forgot to mention in yesterday's entry that my TA taught me how to make a fishing pole out of paper. I am going to go fishing for children tomorrow to give them their English names. This fishing pole may be the coolest arts and crafts thing I've ever done, it is so strong and amazing. SO AMAZING.