For my Ethnography class, I'm reading The Return of the God of Wealth: The Transition to a Market Economy in Urban China by Charlotte Ikels. The book is an ethnographical study on the culture of Guangzhou; it was written in 1996, but I'm sure much of the information is still relevant today. I've come across some funny/true/amusing facts, which I will list below (some facts are not verified):
• "The national perception of the quality of Cantonese cuisine is captured by the popular saying 'For eating it's Guangzhou'...What both locals and outsiders most appreciate is the freshness of the food, especially the seafood. Most Cantonese dislike purchasing fish or fowl that is not still breathing at the time of the sale. To enhance one's appreciation of this freshness, food tends to be lightly cooked and lightly spiced." (9) - See Exhibit A: Baba.
• "Cantonese are aware that outsiders, even within China, do not eagerly embrace every item of Cantonese food. They mock the more timid eating habits of other Chinese by asserting that while 'Shandong people do anything and Beijing people endure anything, Cantonese people eat anything!'" (9) - See Exhibit B: All Canto people say this.
• "When writing, a Cantonese uses what to a Cantonese are literary words - in many cases the spoken word is entirely different and not expressible in characters. Sometimes Cantonese cheat and make up characters for these Cantonese words, though this is more likely to happen in Hong Kong than in Guangzhou. The convention is to put a little mouth radical on the left side of a likely phonetic - this tactic conveys the meaning 'the word I'm trying to write sounds like this in Cantonese.'" (19)
• Boat People: known in Hong Kong as "Tanka" (literally "egg people" with the connotation that they are born of reptiles), "they lived on boats and made their living by fishing (and, depending on the times, by smuggling and piracy). Both the settled village population and government officials viewed these highly mobile people with suspicion." (22-23)
I'll have to ask my mom about that one...
• "Some workers, such as members of rural construction teams, come to Guangzhou with a job in hand, and it is the responsibility of their employers to provide them with accommodations (usually in temporary structures on or adjacent to the construction site). Others come with just the hope of obtaining a job and if unsuccessful soon move on to other parts of the delta region. At night these people sleep in crowded hotels (or, when their money runs out, under overpasses); during the day they squat beside busy roadways with little wooden signs advertising their skills and try to catch the attention of people seeking an extra hand. When their presence becomes a public nuisance, they are summarily sent back to their home districts...They are immediately distinguishable from ordinary residents of Guangzhou by their simple dress, unfashionable haircuts, slight stature (even by Guangdong standards), and suntanned appearance." (24-25)
• "During most of the day there are few trash barrels to be seen; they are hauled out of their hiding places only briefly, just in time for the daily refuse collection. If the barrels were left in the open for any length of time, they would attract many scavengers and probably create a danger to public health. Thus, anyone walking along the sidewalk (to say nothing of walking in the gutter) constantly risks tripping over damaged pavement, slipping on orange peels, or even stepping into a pile of discarded chewed sugarcane. Daily street sweeping and refuse collection keep the situation from getting out of control, but the walker must be ever vigilant." (28)
• "While Guangzhou residents are generally spared the indignity of stepping into dog excrement (dogs may not be kept as pets), in crowded neighborhoods lacking indoor toilets they face the real risk of stepping into human excrement. Rather than visit the public toilets, parents and grandparents in these neighborhoods allow and even induce their infants and small children to urinate and occasionally defecate on the sidewalks outside their entryways. Despite government efforts to eliminate spitting, the practice remains common, and people spit almost anywhere except on or directly at another person...But even among the urban born, noises issuing from the digestive tract, such as farting and belching (softly), are viewed as natural and inevitable and warrant neither embarrassment nor comment when they occur." (28)
...To be continued...
Notes to self:
• Qingping Road (Liwan district across the river from Shamian) - for buying creatures (to bargain, comment on its thinness) (10)
• Yuexiu Park - Five Rams Statue (11)
• Huaisheng Mosque (13), near junction of Zhongshan and Renmin Roads
• Shamian - near former European-esque town for trade
Friday, September 26, 2008
Tuesday, September 23, 2008
杭州 Day 15-19
Tuesday, September 23, 2008: 杭州 Day 15 (Teaching Day 4)
中国 Day 15
Asia Day 15
• Woke up early (okay, 10:30am is NOT early, but still, early for me -_-). Went to class to teach for two 90-minute periods back-to-back. Nothing super-noteworthy today, but a few tidbits are to follow.
• One of my students fell asleep in class and then I was telling the other students to be quiet until the end of the class period. I also wanted the students to leave quietly...but sleeping beauty woke up during the second half of the class.
• Something went terribly wrong with lesson plans. It was strange because I wanted them to do a listening section, but apparently, it wasn't working out because the dialogue was 1) too fast and 2) students could not pick up the specific words. I asked for input from both classes (although many students were reluctant to say anything). In the first class, I played three listening exercises. Very few people fully completed the exercises. In the second class, as a test-run, I ran through one dialogue three times. It was strange because when the bell rang, there were about 10 people in class. Then, in clusters of 5-8 people, the students kept trailing in. So, some students heard the dialogue once, some of them heard it three times. However, there was a similar result. They could not fill in the blanks because the talking speed was too quick!
• In the first class, I only had time to call on students once (during my discussion activity). My first class was almost perfectly timed (2 minutes left). My second class was a disaster in terms of time. Because I cut off the listening exercises, there was an extra twenty minutes left in class. I spent 40 minutes in a discussion with students - it was actually a chance for me to learn everyone's name. We discussed two different things - favorite Chinese hero and a superpower the students would like to have. I called on almost everyone twice in the second class.
• Favorite (Chinese) Heroes: When I asked one girl her favorite Chinese hero, she said, "Wu Zetian," one of the female "emperors" of China. Everyone in class cracked up. Lots of other people said random people I didn't even know. Some mentioned Yao Ming, some mentioned Jacky Chan (Cheng Long). Quite a few said Mao Zedong. Once, one student said, "Deng Xiaoping," and I didn't really hear what he said, so I said, "Who's that?" People laughed. OH MAN.
• Namely, Names: I saw a lot of my students' English names for the first time on paper today. Let me name some interesting ones: Rainman, Sky, Cloud, King, Hamber, Zero, Shine, Zeus, Abobo, Tank, Carrot, Apple, Mutombo, Peace, Ice, Dinnes (supposed to be Dennis, but different), and Moon. I saw "Mutombo" on my sheet of paper and asked to know who that was - apparently, that student knew that it was an African name. Haha.
• There was also a student who didn't have an interest in anything. I would ask him questions and he would have no opinion. It was like, "Hey, what is your favorite Chinese Hero?" "I don't have one." "Hmm, how about your superpower?" "I don't know." C'mon man, step up to the creative plate! Stop hitting strikes.
• After class, I was so tired that my brain just wanted to shut down. I'm not sure why. Even then, I decided to go to Vanguard to buy some buns that I could steam for the upcoming potluck. (At Vanguard, I was also buying some pre-made buns; it was curious because I would always see bakers bake a huge wad of brown, round bread...and I wouldn't see it packaged. No idea how one consumes the large bread.) I returned around 6:45pm and started to prepare for the meal. I placed a tray of water into the baking oven and placed buns on the grill above it. Then, I waited for it to steam. Also brought up a package of mochi upstairs to Jessica's room.
• Everyone except one person eventually showed up to the potluck. Jamie's friends also joined us (Estelle, Frank, and Aaron). We had Winter Melon Soup, buns, cucumber bits, a special Zicheng dish, yummy mini-chicken drumsticks, and the mochi and brownies for dessert. Jamie mentioned going to a special Guangzhou trade fair that was crowded one year and sparse during the year of SARS. He and the others concurred that it was the perfect place to go shopping, since you could ask for free samples. Funnery.
• Quoteable: Jamie - "Shoes? They're like feet prison."
• Came back and chatted/journaled/blogged ^^.
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Wednesday, September 24, 2008: 杭州 Day 16
中国 Day 16
Asia Day 16
• Nothing exciting happened today. I woke up early (9am-ish) because the phone in the living room was ringing off of the hook. The first time it rang, it rang perhaps 8 times. Then, five minutes passed and it started to ring again. I reluctantly got out of bed to pick it up. It was the mailman, who said he got my package. This was all in Chinese. He asked if I could understand Chinese, to which I said, a little bit. Then, he used English to tell me I got a package and asked for my cell number (but I couldn't understand what number he was asking for). I asked him to say it in Chinese...which was when I finally understood. Har har. I had a slight headache, so I went back to sleep and woke up three hours later...at noon.
• Later, I was planning to go out to buy a bike, as well as run some errands. I get lazy sometimes...such as today. Well, at the moment when I was going to go out, it started to storm and rain...lightning flooded the sky and thunder ravaged my ears. I decided to stay in after all. Webcammed and chatted. Did some homework. Read some texts. Cooked some ramen with sausage and pork wonton. Planned my lesson.
• The following incident happened in Chinese. Baba called several times today to check in with me about my flight. It was quite funny because he told me to hold on after I asked if he booked the flight for Sunday or Monday. Well, he called the agency back and found out they booked the wrong date. I was on the other line listening to him hassle the agent because of her poor customer service. I heard him shouting loud and clear on the other line. He was cracking up, saying to the agent, "dude, I booked it today and they told me September 28, but when I called back, you changed it to September 29. I never said September 29." Then, after the flight was resolved, he hung up from that phone and went back to his cell phone. I asked him if I should have hung up and he said, "Nah."
• Baba asked, "Did you eat dinner yet?" I replied, "No." He asked me when I was going to eat, to which I replied, "Oh, I'm just going to cook ramen..." Then, Baba said, "EHHH?? You can't just eat ramen, my obedient girl [乖女儿]...Don't worry, when you come here, I will cook some 'good food.' Yeah, I ate a chicken today, but I couldn't finish it. If you were here, we'd finish a whole chicken." When I quoted "good food," all I meant was...those were the only English words he used, lol.
• OH, great news! I have a week off. This is strange. I'm teaching Thursday and I have Friday off. Then, next Monday's and next Tuesday's classes are canceled, but they're moved to Saturday and Sunday. Thus, I have to work Saturday and Sunday! WEIRD. I have vacation Monday, September 29 to Sunday, October 3.
...
Thursday, September 25, 2008: 杭州 Day 17 (Non-Teaching Day...)
中国 Day 17
Asia Day 17
• Woke up to the sound of my alarm. During this time, the phone in the living room rang about 6 times (but again, I was too lazy to pick it up and get it). After I came out of the bathroom, my door buzzer rang. I picked it up and let whoever it was inside. It was the libraryman/mailman (since the mail can be picked up at the library's first floor). He gave me my package of "fruit juice."
• Hangzhou, China - A package from the U.S. ends up in Asia, though not all in one piece (well, their respective pieces).
Late last week, an Asian woman from California sent her lovely daughter a package containing acai fruit juice/gel. The package arrived Monday and the daughter was called to pick it up from her school's library. When the daughter did not pick up the package, the package was delivered to her apartment.
This daughter opened the package and was surprised to find that some of the juice packs had exploded in transit. She looked at the package with angst. Gel was everywhere. She sighed and washed each gel pack. She imagined a headline, "Juice Gel Flight Leads to 7 Dead." Within a package of about 40 juice packs, 7 had leaked entirely onto the other packs. Remains were splattered all over the bag. Now, this daughter's sink is full of acai seed (or whatever those little bits are called).
• Something terribly embarrassing happened. It was a learning experience. Today, I was supposed to teach in the afternoon. I got on the correct bus to the main campus. However, I took the wrong minibus, on the way to the East campus. I didn’t notice this until awhile later. I felt that this bus ride seemed abnormally long, when Michael called me and asked if I had gotten on the bus, since it just arrived. I realized I was on the wrong bus and Michael asked me to hand the phone over to another bus patron. Everyone (including the driver) was alarmed that I had gotten on the wrong bus. The bus driver dropped me off on the corner of North Huancheng Road [环城北路] (midway between the campus I live on and the main campus) so that I could take a bus back to the campus. I was looking for the B-1 bus stop, when Michael called to ask if he should have the classes canceled for the afternoon; I wanted to teach at least one class, but I told him that I would call him back when I found the correct bus stop. Once I got to the correct bus stop, I spoke to him on the phone again, only to find that both of the classes in the afternoon had been canceled. Despondent and disappointed in myself, I waited another 10 minutes to hail a taxicab toward my campus.
• Yes, this is the most embarrassing thing that ever happened to me this year. The administration considers it a trivial accident; after the National Holiday, the administration wants me to make up these two classes, so that’s not so bad.
• I learned a valuable lesson: Do not assume you are going to a certain location via public transportation – please make sure you ask (lest you end up in a similar situation as me).
• The embarrassing incident above caused me to feel a bit lost and speechless. I didn't know what to say to the bus patron when I wanted to hand her my phone. While looking for the bus stop, I looked for any discernible signs that would lead me to my destination (I found a map, which was great).
• First Time Alone in Taxicab: Even hailing a taxi was a bit of a challenge. I had never hailed one on my own before (let alone sit in one ALONE), and I was in this busy intersection with nary an idea which place was the safest to hail. I kept changing locations and made some observations. Taxis that are not full may drive on the lane closest to the potential customer. That would be best because they could stop at some upcoming entrance or even at the roadside. I waited for a taxi near a turn, but that yielded nothing. I didn't want to get into a gold or red taxicab; I'm not sure whether they charge more. I saw some opportunistic Chinese people run after some taxis that were dropping people off. Finally, two taxis pulled up into the side lane near where I was waiting and I got into one of the cars. I told him where to go (twice). I found that I had to enunciate my words because I couldn't speak it flowingly (I guess in other words, fluently). I don't feel comfortable slurring my words. Hah. Well, the driver was so random. He said a few things aloud (maybe he was trying to start a conversation with me?), but I didn't really respond (or know what the heck he was talking about). Then, he saw a set of keys on the floor and picked them up, chuckled to himself, and said, "万担啊！" Of course, I wasn't familiar with that phrase, but I thought about it later, in relation to the context, and I think he meant something to the effect of "This person is screwed without their keys." I looked it up a bit later and found the phrase to mean "doomed/out of luck." Before I paid for the cab, the cabbie asked me where I'm from, as my Chinese sounds different from other people. I told him I'm American and Cantonese...hahhh. I guess he was kind of amused. Eh, I guess I was on survival mode (and still have been ever since)...
• I read 70+ pages for "The World is Flat"...I'm somewhat caught up for this week's reading for that specific book.
• This is strange, but I think a mosquito bit my fob mark. Now, that bump on my arm has gotten a bit more swollen.
• Mom called and dug up the silly incident and I felt a bit worse. She yelled at me and advised me to tell my students why I couldn't have class. I retorted, "Why should I tell them? Won't that make ME lose face?" Then, she said, "Ohh, like not showing up to class hasn't already made you lose face. Just tell them and you can laugh it off and have a good time." After consulting with more people, I felt a bit better about the whole incident.
• Crapload of homework this weekend. Must be done ASAP.
...
Friday, September 26, 2008: 杭州 Day 18
中国 Day 18
Asia Day 18
Another day of plain NADA-ism. What'd I do today? Nothing. I read articles and wrote a discussion post, read chapter one from one of my textbooks while taking notes, and read a bunch of other random stuff (mostly financial and political news). Oy, I have work tomorrow in the morning. Lesson plans will be done soon (as well as more homework, yuck)...
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Saturday, September 27, 2008: 杭州 Day 19 (Teaching Day 5)
中国 Day 19
Asia Day 19
• This is a little weird. I'm working on a weekend (well, that wasn't so weird when I worked at a nonprofit and did extra hours for weekend events)...but this is school on a weekend...for the university crowd. Haha...ha. Sigh?
• Again, today's classes are the classes that aren't caught up (my Monday classes). Because my software wasn't working at first, I read the script for one of the videos we were to see...but then I found out students did not understand what it was about (maybe I read too fast, or my strange intonations did not make sense to them). I finally got the equipment to work and I had the students watch it again. However, some students still did not know what was going on. Oy. I went around the room for my morning class and subdivided based on region. Memorized (or tried to memorize) names in two different rows, followed by other rows. I was looking at my attendance sheet from Monday, which had some freaking funny stuff on it. Students' names were normal enough, but there's a student named Pedro. I also asked some of the students to describe themselves using two adjectives; there were seven students that wrote "warmhearted" and "understanding" in a row; the one after the last student wrote "hot-hearted" and "understanding"...well, points for creativity, at least. However, I should probably watch these students closer during tests.
• I tried to tell a joke in my classes today. OH...and it failed miserably! People just stared. No one giggled. I guess American humor is different from Chinese humor (or they just don't get it). Eh, not a fan of English puns, are they?? However, the joke worked a bit better in my second class (they nodded their heads).
• The gist of the joke is: a foreigner goes to the restaurant because he is hungry; he looks at the menu and orders “Chicken surprise.” However, when the waiter brings the food over and leaves it on the table, something strange happens. The pot’s lid opens a bit, revealing some beady little eyes. Then, the lid closes. The foreigner cannot believe what he’s seeing, so he asks the waiter for help. The waiter asks what he ordered, to which he says, “Chicken surprise.” Then, the waiter apologizes profusely for giving the patron “Peking Duck” (Beijing Ya), i.e. peeking duck. The great thing about this joke was that I integrated some of the vocabulary words into the joke.
• Entertaining tidbits: I told my afternoon class a few funny remarks from the morning class.
1) I asked the students if the nameless Hero who did not kill Qin Shihuang did the right thing by not killing him; one student said, “he did the wrong thing because he didn't have enough skill” (and therefore should have killed him, but he sucked at throwing the sword).
2) I asked the students about their favorite Chinese heroes, and one girl replied, “Liu Xiang is my hero because he was the first man in China to run fast.”
• Another thing – my plan to play a game somewhat failed. Because one of the other discussions had to do with heroes and superpowers, I had the kids play the “stupid ninja game.” I never thought explaining that game would be so hard! Honestly, I had to explain it 4-5 times for groups to get it – first, I explained two times in front of the class, then I explained another 3 times to individual groups. First, everyone chooses a “word” to associate to an “action” – in this case, one chooses a superhero action and pairs that action with a word describing it, such as “punch” and punching with both arms. Then, after everyone chooses an action, they call their own action and call someone else’s, and this continues until someone messes up. It’s actually really fun, but the students were slow at it. Maybe we’ll play next time, or I can streamline details of the game…
• At times, I can understand the students' remarks to each other, so they hassle each other (about why the student doesn't know anything, or the answers that are given). Sometimes, I will reply in English to a question that was asked in Chinese…and the student will say, “?_? 哦，会听中文？”
• When I asked the students to name their Chinese hero, this one student named three heroes (can you say...overachiever?); he also mentioned "everybody" as a hero and implied I was one, too. Thankee, sire.
• The student who said his English is poor didn’t show up today. That made me a bit sad – he’s missing out on this English-speaking opportunity!!
• Some students are well-spoken in Chinese, but don't know very much English. Sometimes, they start talking, but ask their friends how to say a certain word. Then, they ask me, "可以用中文来说吗？" (they want to use Chinese to speak), but I tell them, no. Heh. I evil :/
• In between classes, I was extremely tired, so I napped for most of the time. May have dabbled in some political news, as well.
• During class, Michael called and texted me, but I didn’t look at it until classes were over.
The text from Michael said: "Hi, when your majesty will come home? I got passport back to you" (LMAO…ZEDONG! >;D)
•I told Jessica about the above and she said, “HE TOTALLY LIKES YOU.” -_-
• I did homework until 6:30pm, when I met up with the others for dinner. Walked to “Grandmother’s Kitchen” (外婆家) with Zicheng, Jessica, Romain, Vanessa, Jamie, and his friend Zhang Yong/Aaron. Zicheng ordered a lot of good dishes (tofu, fatty pork with fish, veggies, bamboo shoots with peppers, and a bunch of other good stuff. I tried Wahaha Brand’s Iced Tea (娃哈哈凉茶). Dinner was 30块. Another instance of “HE TOTALLY LIKES YOU” happened again at dinnertime.
• While walking home, Zicheng helped me practice Chinese. It was most hilarious. I giggled incessantly because speaking Chinese makes me nervous, at the same time that Zicheng said the most ridiculous things. I was like, “Hey!” or “So…” and he replied, “’Hey’是什么？’So’不是中文字。” I thought it was hilarious and tried to think of ways to express myself in Chinese. Then, we had this discussion about milk tea and I asked him if, because of the milk crisis, I could still drink milk tea. He said, “那，我也不知道。。。研究一下。” I asked, “研究是什么意思？” Then, he walked after Jessica and said, “我研究她怎么走路。。。mo2fang2。” I asked him the meaning of mo2fang2, so he showed me that he was copying her moves. Later, we had a discussion about the meaning of “哎哟” (aiyo). Zicheng said, “你如果吃很好吃的东西，就掉在地上，就是哎哟的意思。” I said “哎哟” has a similar connotation as ”可惜” (sad, in a pathetic way). Was so amused by the content of the conversation.
• Later, I briefly spoke to Aaron, or Zhangyong. His English is good and he only started in middle or high school. He isn’t a native (Zicheng also taught me “本地人” = native).
• At night, I did some homework and went to bed.
中国 Day 15
Asia Day 15
• Woke up early (okay, 10:30am is NOT early, but still, early for me -_-). Went to class to teach for two 90-minute periods back-to-back. Nothing super-noteworthy today, but a few tidbits are to follow.
• One of my students fell asleep in class and then I was telling the other students to be quiet until the end of the class period. I also wanted the students to leave quietly...but sleeping beauty woke up during the second half of the class.
• Something went terribly wrong with lesson plans. It was strange because I wanted them to do a listening section, but apparently, it wasn't working out because the dialogue was 1) too fast and 2) students could not pick up the specific words. I asked for input from both classes (although many students were reluctant to say anything). In the first class, I played three listening exercises. Very few people fully completed the exercises. In the second class, as a test-run, I ran through one dialogue three times. It was strange because when the bell rang, there were about 10 people in class. Then, in clusters of 5-8 people, the students kept trailing in. So, some students heard the dialogue once, some of them heard it three times. However, there was a similar result. They could not fill in the blanks because the talking speed was too quick!
• In the first class, I only had time to call on students once (during my discussion activity). My first class was almost perfectly timed (2 minutes left). My second class was a disaster in terms of time. Because I cut off the listening exercises, there was an extra twenty minutes left in class. I spent 40 minutes in a discussion with students - it was actually a chance for me to learn everyone's name. We discussed two different things - favorite Chinese hero and a superpower the students would like to have. I called on almost everyone twice in the second class.
• Favorite (Chinese) Heroes: When I asked one girl her favorite Chinese hero, she said, "Wu Zetian," one of the female "emperors" of China. Everyone in class cracked up. Lots of other people said random people I didn't even know. Some mentioned Yao Ming, some mentioned Jacky Chan (Cheng Long). Quite a few said Mao Zedong. Once, one student said, "Deng Xiaoping," and I didn't really hear what he said, so I said, "Who's that?" People laughed. OH MAN.
• Namely, Names: I saw a lot of my students' English names for the first time on paper today. Let me name some interesting ones: Rainman, Sky, Cloud, King, Hamber, Zero, Shine, Zeus, Abobo, Tank, Carrot, Apple, Mutombo, Peace, Ice, Dinnes (supposed to be Dennis, but different), and Moon. I saw "Mutombo" on my sheet of paper and asked to know who that was - apparently, that student knew that it was an African name. Haha.
• There was also a student who didn't have an interest in anything. I would ask him questions and he would have no opinion. It was like, "Hey, what is your favorite Chinese Hero?" "I don't have one." "Hmm, how about your superpower?" "I don't know." C'mon man, step up to the creative plate! Stop hitting strikes.
• After class, I was so tired that my brain just wanted to shut down. I'm not sure why. Even then, I decided to go to Vanguard to buy some buns that I could steam for the upcoming potluck. (At Vanguard, I was also buying some pre-made buns; it was curious because I would always see bakers bake a huge wad of brown, round bread...and I wouldn't see it packaged. No idea how one consumes the large bread.) I returned around 6:45pm and started to prepare for the meal. I placed a tray of water into the baking oven and placed buns on the grill above it. Then, I waited for it to steam. Also brought up a package of mochi upstairs to Jessica's room.
• Everyone except one person eventually showed up to the potluck. Jamie's friends also joined us (Estelle, Frank, and Aaron). We had Winter Melon Soup, buns, cucumber bits, a special Zicheng dish, yummy mini-chicken drumsticks, and the mochi and brownies for dessert. Jamie mentioned going to a special Guangzhou trade fair that was crowded one year and sparse during the year of SARS. He and the others concurred that it was the perfect place to go shopping, since you could ask for free samples. Funnery.
• Quoteable: Jamie - "Shoes? They're like feet prison."
• Came back and chatted/journaled/blogged ^^.
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Wednesday, September 24, 2008: 杭州 Day 16
中国 Day 16
Asia Day 16
• Nothing exciting happened today. I woke up early (9am-ish) because the phone in the living room was ringing off of the hook. The first time it rang, it rang perhaps 8 times. Then, five minutes passed and it started to ring again. I reluctantly got out of bed to pick it up. It was the mailman, who said he got my package. This was all in Chinese. He asked if I could understand Chinese, to which I said, a little bit. Then, he used English to tell me I got a package and asked for my cell number (but I couldn't understand what number he was asking for). I asked him to say it in Chinese...which was when I finally understood. Har har. I had a slight headache, so I went back to sleep and woke up three hours later...at noon.
• Later, I was planning to go out to buy a bike, as well as run some errands. I get lazy sometimes...such as today. Well, at the moment when I was going to go out, it started to storm and rain...lightning flooded the sky and thunder ravaged my ears. I decided to stay in after all. Webcammed and chatted. Did some homework. Read some texts. Cooked some ramen with sausage and pork wonton. Planned my lesson.
• The following incident happened in Chinese. Baba called several times today to check in with me about my flight. It was quite funny because he told me to hold on after I asked if he booked the flight for Sunday or Monday. Well, he called the agency back and found out they booked the wrong date. I was on the other line listening to him hassle the agent because of her poor customer service. I heard him shouting loud and clear on the other line. He was cracking up, saying to the agent, "dude, I booked it today and they told me September 28, but when I called back, you changed it to September 29. I never said September 29." Then, after the flight was resolved, he hung up from that phone and went back to his cell phone. I asked him if I should have hung up and he said, "Nah."
• Baba asked, "Did you eat dinner yet?" I replied, "No." He asked me when I was going to eat, to which I replied, "Oh, I'm just going to cook ramen..." Then, Baba said, "EHHH?? You can't just eat ramen, my obedient girl [乖女儿]...Don't worry, when you come here, I will cook some 'good food.' Yeah, I ate a chicken today, but I couldn't finish it. If you were here, we'd finish a whole chicken." When I quoted "good food," all I meant was...those were the only English words he used, lol.
• OH, great news! I have a week off. This is strange. I'm teaching Thursday and I have Friday off. Then, next Monday's and next Tuesday's classes are canceled, but they're moved to Saturday and Sunday. Thus, I have to work Saturday and Sunday! WEIRD. I have vacation Monday, September 29 to Sunday, October 3.
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Thursday, September 25, 2008: 杭州 Day 17 (Non-Teaching Day...)
中国 Day 17
Asia Day 17
• Woke up to the sound of my alarm. During this time, the phone in the living room rang about 6 times (but again, I was too lazy to pick it up and get it). After I came out of the bathroom, my door buzzer rang. I picked it up and let whoever it was inside. It was the libraryman/mailman (since the mail can be picked up at the library's first floor). He gave me my package of "fruit juice."
• Hangzhou, China - A package from the U.S. ends up in Asia, though not all in one piece (well, their respective pieces).
Late last week, an Asian woman from California sent her lovely daughter a package containing acai fruit juice/gel. The package arrived Monday and the daughter was called to pick it up from her school's library. When the daughter did not pick up the package, the package was delivered to her apartment.
This daughter opened the package and was surprised to find that some of the juice packs had exploded in transit. She looked at the package with angst. Gel was everywhere. She sighed and washed each gel pack. She imagined a headline, "Juice Gel Flight Leads to 7 Dead." Within a package of about 40 juice packs, 7 had leaked entirely onto the other packs. Remains were splattered all over the bag. Now, this daughter's sink is full of acai seed (or whatever those little bits are called).
• Something terribly embarrassing happened. It was a learning experience. Today, I was supposed to teach in the afternoon. I got on the correct bus to the main campus. However, I took the wrong minibus, on the way to the East campus. I didn’t notice this until awhile later. I felt that this bus ride seemed abnormally long, when Michael called me and asked if I had gotten on the bus, since it just arrived. I realized I was on the wrong bus and Michael asked me to hand the phone over to another bus patron. Everyone (including the driver) was alarmed that I had gotten on the wrong bus. The bus driver dropped me off on the corner of North Huancheng Road [环城北路] (midway between the campus I live on and the main campus) so that I could take a bus back to the campus. I was looking for the B-1 bus stop, when Michael called to ask if he should have the classes canceled for the afternoon; I wanted to teach at least one class, but I told him that I would call him back when I found the correct bus stop. Once I got to the correct bus stop, I spoke to him on the phone again, only to find that both of the classes in the afternoon had been canceled. Despondent and disappointed in myself, I waited another 10 minutes to hail a taxicab toward my campus.
• Yes, this is the most embarrassing thing that ever happened to me this year. The administration considers it a trivial accident; after the National Holiday, the administration wants me to make up these two classes, so that’s not so bad.
• I learned a valuable lesson: Do not assume you are going to a certain location via public transportation – please make sure you ask (lest you end up in a similar situation as me).
• The embarrassing incident above caused me to feel a bit lost and speechless. I didn't know what to say to the bus patron when I wanted to hand her my phone. While looking for the bus stop, I looked for any discernible signs that would lead me to my destination (I found a map, which was great).
• First Time Alone in Taxicab: Even hailing a taxi was a bit of a challenge. I had never hailed one on my own before (let alone sit in one ALONE), and I was in this busy intersection with nary an idea which place was the safest to hail. I kept changing locations and made some observations. Taxis that are not full may drive on the lane closest to the potential customer. That would be best because they could stop at some upcoming entrance or even at the roadside. I waited for a taxi near a turn, but that yielded nothing. I didn't want to get into a gold or red taxicab; I'm not sure whether they charge more. I saw some opportunistic Chinese people run after some taxis that were dropping people off. Finally, two taxis pulled up into the side lane near where I was waiting and I got into one of the cars. I told him where to go (twice). I found that I had to enunciate my words because I couldn't speak it flowingly (I guess in other words, fluently). I don't feel comfortable slurring my words. Hah. Well, the driver was so random. He said a few things aloud (maybe he was trying to start a conversation with me?), but I didn't really respond (or know what the heck he was talking about). Then, he saw a set of keys on the floor and picked them up, chuckled to himself, and said, "万担啊！" Of course, I wasn't familiar with that phrase, but I thought about it later, in relation to the context, and I think he meant something to the effect of "This person is screwed without their keys." I looked it up a bit later and found the phrase to mean "doomed/out of luck." Before I paid for the cab, the cabbie asked me where I'm from, as my Chinese sounds different from other people. I told him I'm American and Cantonese...hahhh. I guess he was kind of amused. Eh, I guess I was on survival mode (and still have been ever since)...
• I read 70+ pages for "The World is Flat"...I'm somewhat caught up for this week's reading for that specific book.
• This is strange, but I think a mosquito bit my fob mark. Now, that bump on my arm has gotten a bit more swollen.
• Mom called and dug up the silly incident and I felt a bit worse. She yelled at me and advised me to tell my students why I couldn't have class. I retorted, "Why should I tell them? Won't that make ME lose face?" Then, she said, "Ohh, like not showing up to class hasn't already made you lose face. Just tell them and you can laugh it off and have a good time." After consulting with more people, I felt a bit better about the whole incident.
• Crapload of homework this weekend. Must be done ASAP.
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Friday, September 26, 2008: 杭州 Day 18
中国 Day 18
Asia Day 18
Another day of plain NADA-ism. What'd I do today? Nothing. I read articles and wrote a discussion post, read chapter one from one of my textbooks while taking notes, and read a bunch of other random stuff (mostly financial and political news). Oy, I have work tomorrow in the morning. Lesson plans will be done soon (as well as more homework, yuck)...
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Saturday, September 27, 2008: 杭州 Day 19 (Teaching Day 5)
中国 Day 19
Asia Day 19
• This is a little weird. I'm working on a weekend (well, that wasn't so weird when I worked at a nonprofit and did extra hours for weekend events)...but this is school on a weekend...for the university crowd. Haha...ha. Sigh?
• Again, today's classes are the classes that aren't caught up (my Monday classes). Because my software wasn't working at first, I read the script for one of the videos we were to see...but then I found out students did not understand what it was about (maybe I read too fast, or my strange intonations did not make sense to them). I finally got the equipment to work and I had the students watch it again. However, some students still did not know what was going on. Oy. I went around the room for my morning class and subdivided based on region. Memorized (or tried to memorize) names in two different rows, followed by other rows. I was looking at my attendance sheet from Monday, which had some freaking funny stuff on it. Students' names were normal enough, but there's a student named Pedro. I also asked some of the students to describe themselves using two adjectives; there were seven students that wrote "warmhearted" and "understanding" in a row; the one after the last student wrote "hot-hearted" and "understanding"...well, points for creativity, at least. However, I should probably watch these students closer during tests.
• I tried to tell a joke in my classes today. OH...and it failed miserably! People just stared. No one giggled. I guess American humor is different from Chinese humor (or they just don't get it). Eh, not a fan of English puns, are they?? However, the joke worked a bit better in my second class (they nodded their heads).
• The gist of the joke is: a foreigner goes to the restaurant because he is hungry; he looks at the menu and orders “Chicken surprise.” However, when the waiter brings the food over and leaves it on the table, something strange happens. The pot’s lid opens a bit, revealing some beady little eyes. Then, the lid closes. The foreigner cannot believe what he’s seeing, so he asks the waiter for help. The waiter asks what he ordered, to which he says, “Chicken surprise.” Then, the waiter apologizes profusely for giving the patron “Peking Duck” (Beijing Ya), i.e. peeking duck. The great thing about this joke was that I integrated some of the vocabulary words into the joke.
• Entertaining tidbits: I told my afternoon class a few funny remarks from the morning class.
1) I asked the students if the nameless Hero who did not kill Qin Shihuang did the right thing by not killing him; one student said, “he did the wrong thing because he didn't have enough skill” (and therefore should have killed him, but he sucked at throwing the sword).
2) I asked the students about their favorite Chinese heroes, and one girl replied, “Liu Xiang is my hero because he was the first man in China to run fast.”
• Another thing – my plan to play a game somewhat failed. Because one of the other discussions had to do with heroes and superpowers, I had the kids play the “stupid ninja game.” I never thought explaining that game would be so hard! Honestly, I had to explain it 4-5 times for groups to get it – first, I explained two times in front of the class, then I explained another 3 times to individual groups. First, everyone chooses a “word” to associate to an “action” – in this case, one chooses a superhero action and pairs that action with a word describing it, such as “punch” and punching with both arms. Then, after everyone chooses an action, they call their own action and call someone else’s, and this continues until someone messes up. It’s actually really fun, but the students were slow at it. Maybe we’ll play next time, or I can streamline details of the game…
• At times, I can understand the students' remarks to each other, so they hassle each other (about why the student doesn't know anything, or the answers that are given). Sometimes, I will reply in English to a question that was asked in Chinese…and the student will say, “?_? 哦，会听中文？”
• When I asked the students to name their Chinese hero, this one student named three heroes (can you say...overachiever?); he also mentioned "everybody" as a hero and implied I was one, too. Thankee, sire.
• The student who said his English is poor didn’t show up today. That made me a bit sad – he’s missing out on this English-speaking opportunity!!
• Some students are well-spoken in Chinese, but don't know very much English. Sometimes, they start talking, but ask their friends how to say a certain word. Then, they ask me, "可以用中文来说吗？" (they want to use Chinese to speak), but I tell them, no. Heh. I evil :/
• In between classes, I was extremely tired, so I napped for most of the time. May have dabbled in some political news, as well.
• During class, Michael called and texted me, but I didn’t look at it until classes were over.
The text from Michael said: "Hi, when your majesty will come home? I got passport back to you" (LMAO…ZEDONG! >;D)
•I told Jessica about the above and she said, “HE TOTALLY LIKES YOU.” -_-
• I did homework until 6:30pm, when I met up with the others for dinner. Walked to “Grandmother’s Kitchen” (外婆家) with Zicheng, Jessica, Romain, Vanessa, Jamie, and his friend Zhang Yong/Aaron. Zicheng ordered a lot of good dishes (tofu, fatty pork with fish, veggies, bamboo shoots with peppers, and a bunch of other good stuff. I tried Wahaha Brand’s Iced Tea (娃哈哈凉茶). Dinner was 30块. Another instance of “HE TOTALLY LIKES YOU” happened again at dinnertime.
• While walking home, Zicheng helped me practice Chinese. It was most hilarious. I giggled incessantly because speaking Chinese makes me nervous, at the same time that Zicheng said the most ridiculous things. I was like, “Hey!” or “So…” and he replied, “’Hey’是什么？’So’不是中文字。” I thought it was hilarious and tried to think of ways to express myself in Chinese. Then, we had this discussion about milk tea and I asked him if, because of the milk crisis, I could still drink milk tea. He said, “那，我也不知道。。。研究一下。” I asked, “研究是什么意思？” Then, he walked after Jessica and said, “我研究她怎么走路。。。mo2fang2。” I asked him the meaning of mo2fang2, so he showed me that he was copying her moves. Later, we had a discussion about the meaning of “哎哟” (aiyo). Zicheng said, “你如果吃很好吃的东西，就掉在地上，就是哎哟的意思。” I said “哎哟” has a similar connotation as ”可惜” (sad, in a pathetic way). Was so amused by the content of the conversation.
• Later, I briefly spoke to Aaron, or Zhangyong. His English is good and he only started in middle or high school. He isn’t a native (Zicheng also taught me “本地人” = native).
• At night, I did some homework and went to bed.
Friday, September 19, 2008
杭州 Day 11-14
Friday, September 19, 2008: 杭州 Day 11
中国 Day 11
Asia Day 11
• Not much happened today; I woke up late and stayed in most of the day.
• Today, the handyman came by to fix the minor water leak. I was talking to Michael on the phone and he mentioned something about the tone of my voice being very humorous. I was asking how so and he was chuckling nonstop, talking about how my tone is in between a male and female pitch. He then mentioned the way that Jessica's voice was high-pitched and mine was in between that of a guy and a girl. I was like, "Oh...is that so -_-"...although that fact was also kind of interesting, in a slightly disappointing way.
• At night, I got together with Romain, Patricia, Thomas, and Vanessa. Thomas was walking ahead of everyone, so I jested, "Extreme walking" (since he's an extreme-sports-enthusiast). That cracked my buddies up, so of course I have to blog it. We walked to a restaurant about 15 minutes away from our apartments. We just ordered a bunch of dishes (tofu, what I coined "fungi mix," turkey and veggie soup, more veggies, big bowl of rice, and a few other dishes). Thomas left a bit early, but we had a fun chat (that I have no recall of). Dinner was 32 kuai a person. Afterwards, Romain ditched us (had to meet up with a friend) and we gals walked home. Did naught afterwards...
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Saturday, September 20, 2008: 杭州 Day 12
中国 Day 12
Asia Day 12
• I tried to do homework early in the day, but I didn't really get anything done. I woke up around noon (my usual get-up time) and found a text message from Jason on my cell about Chinese-Mexican salsa tasting at 4pm.
• Around 4:10pm, I brought juice upstairs to share with buddies. Jason made some homemade salsa - it was delicious! Just about everyone, less Jamie and Thomas, was there. Lots of fun conversation was had. Thomas stopped by. The lightning and thunder rumbled, causing paranoia within the small apartment (exaggeration). 'Twas a bit hot as well (air was stagnant - no exaggeration).
• At 5:30pm, the entire group (minus Thomas) met up to get dinner - this was eight people! Because the majority of people had bikes, almost everyone took their bike. Jamie, the Aussie, and I walked and chatted. Dinner was at a hot pot restaurant on Baochu Lu (保琡路). We ordered a two hotpots for the entire huge table, but these pots were split in halves - one half was the spicy soup, while the other was not spicy. We ordered a variety of raw dishes, including lamb, beef, tofu, veggies, mushrooms, and some rice on the side. Dinner was delicious. Some of the guys sitting at the end had tried the spicy soup and from the color of their faces, they couldn't quite handle it. It also started to rain a bit outside; actually, no, it was POURING for perhaps 30+ minutes.
• After we finished dinner, Jamie, Jason, and Vanessa had to leave, so I walked with the remaining few toward another destination. After walking about half a block, the bikers decided I should probably sit on someone's bike's backseat. Zicheng invited me to "hop on"...oy. Both Zicheng and Mom told me a bit later about how people in China mount these dangerous two-wheeled machines - they just hop onto the back while the bike is in motion. I was a bit scared (of mis-aiming and falling on my ass), so I always mounted the bike before it moved.
• Oh, and what a ride it was. (It was scary because my dad told me about how I was sitting on a bike as a young'un and somehow fell off.) I had to grab onto Zicheng's shoulders, but I didn't really manage to death-grip those shoulder blades. I didn't want to constrain his movements. After awhile, it was a bit easier to bum a ride, er, sit on the bike. There was once when I almost fell over backwards (I was supposed to hop off, apparently). However, there were two main problems - if my butt wasn't on the seat correctly, I felt like I would fall off. Otherwise, I also had to twist my body into a stable position and that used some ab muscles and some leg muscles - tiring! Overall, I was amused and scared.
• We five (me, Zicheng, Jessica, Patricia, and Romain) went into a bar. Inside, it was smoky and loud. What struck me most was that...they played Backstreet Boys music (the more popular hits). I was laughing in my head. There was also a live band that played - they were actually pretty good. They played "Creep" by Radiohead, as well as some other songs I didn't really know. Everyone drank a little bit of alcohol that night - I only got a Carlsberg on draft - I guess I could taste the watery-ness of it. (Yes, friends in China were talking about how beer in China is watery, like flavored water - "you can't get drunk off of this stuff.")
• So...one of the guys got a lot of game that night. Well, why not say both of the guys and one of the girls? It's true. By the way, that girl wasn't me, or else I would mention it. However, I started to talk to the smoker gal next to me. Turns out she went to Hangzhou Dianzi University and graduated in January. We clinked glasses and exchanged numbers. She wanted an English buddy and offered to teach me Chinese. Hah, I made a "friend." My first "Chinese friend" in China, lol, named Michelle. We'll see how that goes.
• Finally, to end a fun night, we went to West Lake. It was my second time going. We got there around midnight. We took a nice, moonlit stroll on a peninsula part of West Lake (or was it a concrete pier?). Some of my friends were a little bit hyper that night - quite funny. We left West Lake after walking around for maybe 30-40 minutes. Oh, and Baba called to say that he made it back to China safely.
• Rode back on Zicheng's bike's backseat. Poor guy was so tired from taxi-ing me everywhere. Or, should I say rickshawing me? In any case...I need to hop on the bandwagon (more like rickshaw, in the context of China) and get a freakin' bike.
• At home, I realized two not-so-great-things (that didn't mean the end of the world was near):
1) My nostrils did not work, since I breathed in too much smoke.
2) My homework was due on Saturday...so I was behind on homework/had to turn it in late.
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Sunday, September 21, 2008: 杭州 Day 13
中国 Day 13
Asia Day 13
What'd I do today? NADA. Did homework all day and ate a bunch of junk :(. However, the highlight of my day was that I had a really delicious, juicy peach. The only thing that saddened me today was the fact that I had so much homework I had to do (which I turned in late) and the fact that 1 of my 3 peaches got moldy :(...sigh.
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Monday, September 22, 2008: 杭州 Day 14 (Teaching Day 3)
中国 Day 14
Asia Day 14
• My first class was at 8:05am. I got to the building around 7:59am, only to find that another student had already checked in and opened the door/gotten the mic. I used the same lesson plan from last week, but unbeknownst to me, I was supposed to be catching up the Monday classes because we had a holiday last week. I did change a few activities to make it more speaking-centered.
• There were some decent speakers in the morning class, though there were also some smart-asses. When I asked students to use two words to describe their personality/themselves, one male student said, "I am Chinese." In reply, while the other students were giggling, I retorted, "Aren't we all?" (However, I'm pretty sure the students don't understand sarcasm, as it is an advanced cultural/language technique, stemming from hundreds of years of history/literacy.) Anyway, I found it strange that the morning class was divided by GENDER. Literally the left half of the class comprised of females, while the right half of the class comprised of males.
• In every class, I noticed that there's a group of four males who are best friends and are somewhat smart-alecky. They have long-winded, smarty-pants answers that entertain the entire class. The teacher part of me wants to put a stop to the ostentatiousness of these fellows, but the Jingy part of me wants the class to enjoy what they want to say. *Shrug.*
• One of the female students came up to me after class and said she wants to study abroad. She then asked if I had taken any exams, but I wasn't really clear on what she wanted to ask, so I mentioned "TOEFL," which is an English test for foreigners. She nodded her head and explained that she'd like if I could help her with her TOEFLs and I said I could, if she emailed me.
• Up to this point, no one has satisfied my desire for power and called me professor, except for Michael (see Thursday, September 18, 2008 entry)!
• After classes, I met up with Romain and Jason to take a taxi to a foreign center; we three met up with Michael, signed contracts, and ran some errands. I took a look at my medical check - everything looked good. I also got the foreign expert license and applied for a one-year residency. After these errands, I headed home to rest for a bit before my next class.
• My second class was at 1:45pm. In general, there were smart kids in the class, but this class also had a huge concentration of shy ones.
• Minor note: when individually called, the students stand up to talk. It's the "Chinese way."
• We were playing a personality game - people had to define a word without using the word or its dictionary definition in their personal definition. Then, students had to guess the word that was described. Students were amused that I sat in their seats as I waited to hear their answers.
• One student said, "Oh...I'm going to tell a story." I replied, "Oooh, I love stories." The students laughed. The student told a story about where a guy like a girl in class and his face turned red. The students guessed, "Shy," whilst I replied, "Ay?? This isn't in the vocabulary...use the vocabulary words."
• A male student got the ball in his hand, when his friends told him to "sing, sing," and I said, "Yes, sing!"
• One student whom I asked about the personality/traits of Chinese culture had GREAT command of the English language. He said, "Chinese culture is ancient as it is profound..." WOW.
• There was a guy who was easily-startled by the ball. When a student threw a ball at him, he screeched, jumped a few feet, and hit the desk. He was wincing and just moving around in pain after that. He picked up the mic and started to giggle. I thought he needed time to relax, so I had others go before him. OMG...I've never seen anyone this embarrassed before. This is really bad to think as a teacher, but IT. WAS. HILARIOUS. He got the ball a bit later, so he was just laughing (nervously, I presume) and said something quickly before he handed the mic to the next person.
• There was also a student who stood up and said, "My English is very poor." He didn't say much else, but I said I'd come back to him later. However, after class, he came up to me, greeted me ("hi teacher" -_-...not "hi professor"), and asked if I could speak Chinese. I said maybe. Then, he said, "actually, in fact, my English is good. However, my oral English is poor." I replied, "yeah, my oral Chinese is poor, too..." Isn't that endearing?
• I came home from class and chilled for a bit. Finished laundry and lesson plans.
• Later, Patricia called to say that she and others were going bowling. I joined in. This time, I rode on Thomas' bike's backseat. I was pretty scared because the bike went somewhat fast (and was quite wobbly). Again, I worried that my big ass would fall off of the seat. I held onto his shoulders, but his backpack was in the way, so again, I didn't grip hard. He must have biked like 6+ blocks from the campus. Haha, I felt kind of bad, but I knew he could handle it.
• Zicheng rode next to us and asked, "Who gives better rides?" LMAO.
• Whilst we stopped at a traffic light, there was a guy next to us who warned us to the effect of, "Hey, get off the bike, those traffic police will punish you." I heeded this good warning, because all of us saw a huge throng, not thong, of policemen patrolling the area. There was also a video camera recording something, probably for public works. The policeman stopped me when I tried to cross the street by walking; he told me to take the 'sky bridge' or whatever it's called in English. I walked over the sky bridge and I thought everyone else would wonder where I was. Thomas actually came back for me!! LOL.
• Well, we was rough ridin' it for awhiles.
• We finally found the approximate location and parked. We walked around the area until we found the bowling place. It was kind of in a hideaway type of area. 'Twasn't that great, but it was functional. We bowled for about an hour (got two games in, whee). My game wasn't really on tonight - bowled maybe 2-3 spares. Also, everyone's hands got super-dirty from touching those dirty balls. Those heavy, dirty balls.
• We went outside and everyone unlocked their bikes. Patricia was getting her bike. It was lined up with other people's bikes and motorbikes. She suddenly pushed over her bike and there was a domino effect. She knocked over her bike and five others. That was the highlight of my evening :D. I told her that she made my day, to which she replied, "If you hung out with me everyday, I'd make your day everyday." The audience that watched us included a few older folk who were doing some tai chi and a policeman who was just standing around. He said with a stern face, "Any of those your bikes? You're not supposed to park here..."
• So then I got on Thomas' bike's backseat again and we stopped at a noodle shop. We all ordered different yumminesses. Rice or noodles. Mine was good, but it wasn't stupendous. It was a tomato-soup with noodles and pieces of beef with fat -_-. Lol. More like a Chinese pho. Thomas had to go early, so we just finished our meals without him.
• Zicheng, the connoisseur of everything, said (about the meat in his soup), "Yeah, I usually like tongue, but this isn't good tongue." I replied, "You're into tongue, huh." He retorted, "Yeah, you didn't know I was into that type of thing, did you?" LMAO.
• When we headed back, I rode on Zicheng's bike again. I think I got better at hopping off. Whilst he was riding, we passed by a guy wearing a helmet. Then, Zicheng said, "Once, I saw a guy wearing a helmet, but the straps weren't even fastened. It was like he was making some sort of fashion statement or something." Yes, we all got home safely.
中国 Day 11
Asia Day 11
• Not much happened today; I woke up late and stayed in most of the day.
• Today, the handyman came by to fix the minor water leak. I was talking to Michael on the phone and he mentioned something about the tone of my voice being very humorous. I was asking how so and he was chuckling nonstop, talking about how my tone is in between a male and female pitch. He then mentioned the way that Jessica's voice was high-pitched and mine was in between that of a guy and a girl. I was like, "Oh...is that so -_-"...although that fact was also kind of interesting, in a slightly disappointing way.
• At night, I got together with Romain, Patricia, Thomas, and Vanessa. Thomas was walking ahead of everyone, so I jested, "Extreme walking" (since he's an extreme-sports-enthusiast). That cracked my buddies up, so of course I have to blog it. We walked to a restaurant about 15 minutes away from our apartments. We just ordered a bunch of dishes (tofu, what I coined "fungi mix," turkey and veggie soup, more veggies, big bowl of rice, and a few other dishes). Thomas left a bit early, but we had a fun chat (that I have no recall of). Dinner was 32 kuai a person. Afterwards, Romain ditched us (had to meet up with a friend) and we gals walked home. Did naught afterwards...
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Saturday, September 20, 2008: 杭州 Day 12
中国 Day 12
Asia Day 12
• I tried to do homework early in the day, but I didn't really get anything done. I woke up around noon (my usual get-up time) and found a text message from Jason on my cell about Chinese-Mexican salsa tasting at 4pm.
• Around 4:10pm, I brought juice upstairs to share with buddies. Jason made some homemade salsa - it was delicious! Just about everyone, less Jamie and Thomas, was there. Lots of fun conversation was had. Thomas stopped by. The lightning and thunder rumbled, causing paranoia within the small apartment (exaggeration). 'Twas a bit hot as well (air was stagnant - no exaggeration).
• At 5:30pm, the entire group (minus Thomas) met up to get dinner - this was eight people! Because the majority of people had bikes, almost everyone took their bike. Jamie, the Aussie, and I walked and chatted. Dinner was at a hot pot restaurant on Baochu Lu (保琡路). We ordered a two hotpots for the entire huge table, but these pots were split in halves - one half was the spicy soup, while the other was not spicy. We ordered a variety of raw dishes, including lamb, beef, tofu, veggies, mushrooms, and some rice on the side. Dinner was delicious. Some of the guys sitting at the end had tried the spicy soup and from the color of their faces, they couldn't quite handle it. It also started to rain a bit outside; actually, no, it was POURING for perhaps 30+ minutes.
• After we finished dinner, Jamie, Jason, and Vanessa had to leave, so I walked with the remaining few toward another destination. After walking about half a block, the bikers decided I should probably sit on someone's bike's backseat. Zicheng invited me to "hop on"...oy. Both Zicheng and Mom told me a bit later about how people in China mount these dangerous two-wheeled machines - they just hop onto the back while the bike is in motion. I was a bit scared (of mis-aiming and falling on my ass), so I always mounted the bike before it moved.
• Oh, and what a ride it was. (It was scary because my dad told me about how I was sitting on a bike as a young'un and somehow fell off.) I had to grab onto Zicheng's shoulders, but I didn't really manage to death-grip those shoulder blades. I didn't want to constrain his movements. After awhile, it was a bit easier to bum a ride, er, sit on the bike. There was once when I almost fell over backwards (I was supposed to hop off, apparently). However, there were two main problems - if my butt wasn't on the seat correctly, I felt like I would fall off. Otherwise, I also had to twist my body into a stable position and that used some ab muscles and some leg muscles - tiring! Overall, I was amused and scared.
• We five (me, Zicheng, Jessica, Patricia, and Romain) went into a bar. Inside, it was smoky and loud. What struck me most was that...they played Backstreet Boys music (the more popular hits). I was laughing in my head. There was also a live band that played - they were actually pretty good. They played "Creep" by Radiohead, as well as some other songs I didn't really know. Everyone drank a little bit of alcohol that night - I only got a Carlsberg on draft - I guess I could taste the watery-ness of it. (Yes, friends in China were talking about how beer in China is watery, like flavored water - "you can't get drunk off of this stuff.")
• So...one of the guys got a lot of game that night. Well, why not say both of the guys and one of the girls? It's true. By the way, that girl wasn't me, or else I would mention it. However, I started to talk to the smoker gal next to me. Turns out she went to Hangzhou Dianzi University and graduated in January. We clinked glasses and exchanged numbers. She wanted an English buddy and offered to teach me Chinese. Hah, I made a "friend." My first "Chinese friend" in China, lol, named Michelle. We'll see how that goes.
• Finally, to end a fun night, we went to West Lake. It was my second time going. We got there around midnight. We took a nice, moonlit stroll on a peninsula part of West Lake (or was it a concrete pier?). Some of my friends were a little bit hyper that night - quite funny. We left West Lake after walking around for maybe 30-40 minutes. Oh, and Baba called to say that he made it back to China safely.
• Rode back on Zicheng's bike's backseat. Poor guy was so tired from taxi-ing me everywhere. Or, should I say rickshawing me? In any case...I need to hop on the bandwagon (more like rickshaw, in the context of China) and get a freakin' bike.
• At home, I realized two not-so-great-things (that didn't mean the end of the world was near):
1) My nostrils did not work, since I breathed in too much smoke.
2) My homework was due on Saturday...so I was behind on homework/had to turn it in late.
...
Sunday, September 21, 2008: 杭州 Day 13
中国 Day 13
Asia Day 13
What'd I do today? NADA. Did homework all day and ate a bunch of junk :(. However, the highlight of my day was that I had a really delicious, juicy peach. The only thing that saddened me today was the fact that I had so much homework I had to do (which I turned in late) and the fact that 1 of my 3 peaches got moldy :(...sigh.
...
Monday, September 22, 2008: 杭州 Day 14 (Teaching Day 3)
中国 Day 14
Asia Day 14
• My first class was at 8:05am. I got to the building around 7:59am, only to find that another student had already checked in and opened the door/gotten the mic. I used the same lesson plan from last week, but unbeknownst to me, I was supposed to be catching up the Monday classes because we had a holiday last week. I did change a few activities to make it more speaking-centered.
• There were some decent speakers in the morning class, though there were also some smart-asses. When I asked students to use two words to describe their personality/themselves, one male student said, "I am Chinese." In reply, while the other students were giggling, I retorted, "Aren't we all?" (However, I'm pretty sure the students don't understand sarcasm, as it is an advanced cultural/language technique, stemming from hundreds of years of history/literacy.) Anyway, I found it strange that the morning class was divided by GENDER. Literally the left half of the class comprised of females, while the right half of the class comprised of males.
• In every class, I noticed that there's a group of four males who are best friends and are somewhat smart-alecky. They have long-winded, smarty-pants answers that entertain the entire class. The teacher part of me wants to put a stop to the ostentatiousness of these fellows, but the Jingy part of me wants the class to enjoy what they want to say. *Shrug.*
• One of the female students came up to me after class and said she wants to study abroad. She then asked if I had taken any exams, but I wasn't really clear on what she wanted to ask, so I mentioned "TOEFL," which is an English test for foreigners. She nodded her head and explained that she'd like if I could help her with her TOEFLs and I said I could, if she emailed me.
• Up to this point, no one has satisfied my desire for power and called me professor, except for Michael (see Thursday, September 18, 2008 entry)!
• After classes, I met up with Romain and Jason to take a taxi to a foreign center; we three met up with Michael, signed contracts, and ran some errands. I took a look at my medical check - everything looked good. I also got the foreign expert license and applied for a one-year residency. After these errands, I headed home to rest for a bit before my next class.
• My second class was at 1:45pm. In general, there were smart kids in the class, but this class also had a huge concentration of shy ones.
• Minor note: when individually called, the students stand up to talk. It's the "Chinese way."
• We were playing a personality game - people had to define a word without using the word or its dictionary definition in their personal definition. Then, students had to guess the word that was described. Students were amused that I sat in their seats as I waited to hear their answers.
• One student said, "Oh...I'm going to tell a story." I replied, "Oooh, I love stories." The students laughed. The student told a story about where a guy like a girl in class and his face turned red. The students guessed, "Shy," whilst I replied, "Ay?? This isn't in the vocabulary...use the vocabulary words."
• A male student got the ball in his hand, when his friends told him to "sing, sing," and I said, "Yes, sing!"
• One student whom I asked about the personality/traits of Chinese culture had GREAT command of the English language. He said, "Chinese culture is ancient as it is profound..." WOW.
• There was a guy who was easily-startled by the ball. When a student threw a ball at him, he screeched, jumped a few feet, and hit the desk. He was wincing and just moving around in pain after that. He picked up the mic and started to giggle. I thought he needed time to relax, so I had others go before him. OMG...I've never seen anyone this embarrassed before. This is really bad to think as a teacher, but IT. WAS. HILARIOUS. He got the ball a bit later, so he was just laughing (nervously, I presume) and said something quickly before he handed the mic to the next person.
• There was also a student who stood up and said, "My English is very poor." He didn't say much else, but I said I'd come back to him later. However, after class, he came up to me, greeted me ("hi teacher" -_-...not "hi professor"), and asked if I could speak Chinese. I said maybe. Then, he said, "actually, in fact, my English is good. However, my oral English is poor." I replied, "yeah, my oral Chinese is poor, too..." Isn't that endearing?
• I came home from class and chilled for a bit. Finished laundry and lesson plans.
• Later, Patricia called to say that she and others were going bowling. I joined in. This time, I rode on Thomas' bike's backseat. I was pretty scared because the bike went somewhat fast (and was quite wobbly). Again, I worried that my big ass would fall off of the seat. I held onto his shoulders, but his backpack was in the way, so again, I didn't grip hard. He must have biked like 6+ blocks from the campus. Haha, I felt kind of bad, but I knew he could handle it.
• Zicheng rode next to us and asked, "Who gives better rides?" LMAO.
• Whilst we stopped at a traffic light, there was a guy next to us who warned us to the effect of, "Hey, get off the bike, those traffic police will punish you." I heeded this good warning, because all of us saw a huge throng, not thong, of policemen patrolling the area. There was also a video camera recording something, probably for public works. The policeman stopped me when I tried to cross the street by walking; he told me to take the 'sky bridge' or whatever it's called in English. I walked over the sky bridge and I thought everyone else would wonder where I was. Thomas actually came back for me!! LOL.
• Well, we was rough ridin' it for awhiles.
• We finally found the approximate location and parked. We walked around the area until we found the bowling place. It was kind of in a hideaway type of area. 'Twasn't that great, but it was functional. We bowled for about an hour (got two games in, whee). My game wasn't really on tonight - bowled maybe 2-3 spares. Also, everyone's hands got super-dirty from touching those dirty balls. Those heavy, dirty balls.
• We went outside and everyone unlocked their bikes. Patricia was getting her bike. It was lined up with other people's bikes and motorbikes. She suddenly pushed over her bike and there was a domino effect. She knocked over her bike and five others. That was the highlight of my evening :D. I told her that she made my day, to which she replied, "If you hung out with me everyday, I'd make your day everyday." The audience that watched us included a few older folk who were doing some tai chi and a policeman who was just standing around. He said with a stern face, "Any of those your bikes? You're not supposed to park here..."
• So then I got on Thomas' bike's backseat again and we stopped at a noodle shop. We all ordered different yumminesses. Rice or noodles. Mine was good, but it wasn't stupendous. It was a tomato-soup with noodles and pieces of beef with fat -_-. Lol. More like a Chinese pho. Thomas had to go early, so we just finished our meals without him.
• Zicheng, the connoisseur of everything, said (about the meat in his soup), "Yeah, I usually like tongue, but this isn't good tongue." I replied, "You're into tongue, huh." He retorted, "Yeah, you didn't know I was into that type of thing, did you?" LMAO.
• When we headed back, I rode on Zicheng's bike again. I think I got better at hopping off. Whilst he was riding, we passed by a guy wearing a helmet. Then, Zicheng said, "Once, I saw a guy wearing a helmet, but the straps weren't even fastened. It was like he was making some sort of fashion statement or something." Yes, we all got home safely.
Thursday, September 18, 2008
杭州 Day 10
Thursday, September 18, 2008: 杭州 Day 10； Teaching, Day 2
中国 Day 10
Asia Day 10
• I slept around 1am the night before and then woke up around 6:30am. It was freakin' early. I don't think I got any sleep.
• We got to the health physical place early so we could avoid the morning traffic (the lines inside the building for the tests). We had to wait outside (because we got there before it opened) and saw a playground for adults! AMAZING. The Chinese government wanted the older folks to get exercise, so they built some equipment for the old'uns in a public place!
• I joked to my group about teaching my students "dis type of Engrish," to which my buddies said I was terrible ^^U.
• I had my first thorough physical. This meant a great deal of blood-stealing, urine-cupping, gel-smearing, and a nurse lady telling me to lose weight.
• Blood test: I wasn't that scared, actually. I thought it would hurt when the needle poked into my arm, but it didn't feel so bad. I still winced for effect.
• Urine samples: I was afraid because I hadn't drank anything the entire day and I peed in the morning. I didn't have any urine left in my body!! I was just sitting and waiting...but it didn't come out. I stole Jason's water and tried again. I guess I was really paranoid that I would miss the cup or some other catastrophe would happen.
• EKT (Vision): my weight was measured and my eyesight was tested. The lady told me that her son was about her age.
• ECG (Heartbeat): I laid down on a bed thing and they put measuring 'clamps' on my arms and legs. They also put some heart rate monitors on my chest.
• Blood pressure / heart check: I used the blood pressure measurer and got a pretty low one. The lady told me to lie down as she checked my heart with a stethoscope.
• Ultrasound: they rubbed some gel on me and checked my internal organs. No, I'm not pregnant. However, one of the nurses told me to lose weight. She patted my stomach and said, "减肥."
• X-ray: it was over within a matter of seconds.
• Oh, and while I was waiting in line to finish some of the physical tests, I taught Michael a new vocabulary word. I flexed my arm muscles and said, "guns" (points to muscles). He was laughing, as always.
• In the taxi, someone talked about his/her sister and problems concerning her, in that she seemed to be controlled by her boyfriend. I said to them, "I would NEVER let him control me...I'd control him...j/k." People said, "Hahahahha....SUUUURRRE."
• Got back around 11am. Girls from my apartment invited me to lunch, but I was busy prepping for lessons.
• I took the 12:20pm bus to Xiasha campus. Jason and Michael accompanied me. I told Michael some Chinese jokes (Madonna/McDonald's and 一晚睡觉/一碗水饺) and talked about some Chinese cultural things. I could feel my mouth getting dry >_<. I taught Michael some Cantonese phrases and he thanked "the professor" and shook my hand...whilst I cluelessly asked who was the professor. OF COURSE he was just talking about me. Yay, someone (who isn't a student -_-) called me professor!
• Got to the campus and then switched buses to get to the other campus. I commuted a total of 1 hour, 15 minutes. Went to get the keys and the microphone.
• Both classes had a higher proficiency of English, when compared to the classes on the other campus. I taught them colloquial phrases, not straight-up vocab. I marveled at how young my students look! They look around the age range of 13 - 18...but they're sophomores/juniors in the university. Mostly sophomores.
• There were some guys with their little girlfriends in my second class...and the guys just wouldn't shut up! I purposely called on one of the guys who seemed to be chatting up his sweetie. I told him to explain what I just told the class to do. He looked at me and pointed to himself.
o_o <"Me?")
O_o <"ME?")
O_OO <"MEE!?")
He made one exaggerated face after another, with each one more twisted than the last. Everyone was laughing at him. Maybe he was used to it, because it didn't really deter him from chatting up his girly afterwards.
• After I finished the classes, I left in a hurry and realized I had forgotten to erase the board. I called Michael to tell him to tell the janitor sorry that I forgot to erase the board.
• I was half-asleep on the way back. Then, I went online to waste time. Talked to Patricia about grading exams. Jessica came by with a yummilicious brownie that she made from a brownie mix from Carrefour (she told me she went far away to find it o_o).
• I was tired, since I overstayed my consciousness' welcome!
中国 Day 10
Asia Day 10
• I slept around 1am the night before and then woke up around 6:30am. It was freakin' early. I don't think I got any sleep.
• We got to the health physical place early so we could avoid the morning traffic (the lines inside the building for the tests). We had to wait outside (because we got there before it opened) and saw a playground for adults! AMAZING. The Chinese government wanted the older folks to get exercise, so they built some equipment for the old'uns in a public place!
• I joked to my group about teaching my students "dis type of Engrish," to which my buddies said I was terrible ^^U.
• I had my first thorough physical. This meant a great deal of blood-stealing, urine-cupping, gel-smearing, and a nurse lady telling me to lose weight.
• Blood test: I wasn't that scared, actually. I thought it would hurt when the needle poked into my arm, but it didn't feel so bad. I still winced for effect.
• Urine samples: I was afraid because I hadn't drank anything the entire day and I peed in the morning. I didn't have any urine left in my body!! I was just sitting and waiting...but it didn't come out. I stole Jason's water and tried again. I guess I was really paranoid that I would miss the cup or some other catastrophe would happen.
• EKT (Vision): my weight was measured and my eyesight was tested. The lady told me that her son was about her age.
• ECG (Heartbeat): I laid down on a bed thing and they put measuring 'clamps' on my arms and legs. They also put some heart rate monitors on my chest.
• Blood pressure / heart check: I used the blood pressure measurer and got a pretty low one. The lady told me to lie down as she checked my heart with a stethoscope.
• Ultrasound: they rubbed some gel on me and checked my internal organs. No, I'm not pregnant. However, one of the nurses told me to lose weight. She patted my stomach and said, "减肥."
• X-ray: it was over within a matter of seconds.
• Oh, and while I was waiting in line to finish some of the physical tests, I taught Michael a new vocabulary word. I flexed my arm muscles and said, "guns" (points to muscles). He was laughing, as always.
• In the taxi, someone talked about his/her sister and problems concerning her, in that she seemed to be controlled by her boyfriend. I said to them, "I would NEVER let him control me...I'd control him...j/k." People said, "Hahahahha....SUUUURRRE."
• Got back around 11am. Girls from my apartment invited me to lunch, but I was busy prepping for lessons.
• I took the 12:20pm bus to Xiasha campus. Jason and Michael accompanied me. I told Michael some Chinese jokes (Madonna/McDonald's and 一晚睡觉/一碗水饺) and talked about some Chinese cultural things. I could feel my mouth getting dry >_<. I taught Michael some Cantonese phrases and he thanked "the professor" and shook my hand...whilst I cluelessly asked who was the professor. OF COURSE he was just talking about me. Yay, someone (who isn't a student -_-) called me professor!
• Got to the campus and then switched buses to get to the other campus. I commuted a total of 1 hour, 15 minutes. Went to get the keys and the microphone.
• Both classes had a higher proficiency of English, when compared to the classes on the other campus. I taught them colloquial phrases, not straight-up vocab. I marveled at how young my students look! They look around the age range of 13 - 18...but they're sophomores/juniors in the university. Mostly sophomores.
• There were some guys with their little girlfriends in my second class...and the guys just wouldn't shut up! I purposely called on one of the guys who seemed to be chatting up his sweetie. I told him to explain what I just told the class to do. He looked at me and pointed to himself.
o_o <"Me?")
O_o <"ME?")
O_OO <"MEE!?")
He made one exaggerated face after another, with each one more twisted than the last. Everyone was laughing at him. Maybe he was used to it, because it didn't really deter him from chatting up his girly afterwards.
• After I finished the classes, I left in a hurry and realized I had forgotten to erase the board. I called Michael to tell him to tell the janitor sorry that I forgot to erase the board.
• I was half-asleep on the way back. Then, I went online to waste time. Talked to Patricia about grading exams. Jessica came by with a yummilicious brownie that she made from a brownie mix from Carrefour (she told me she went far away to find it o_o).
• I was tired, since I overstayed my consciousness' welcome!
Wednesday, September 17, 2008
杭州 Day 9
Wednesday, September 17, 2008: 杭州 Day 9 - Proctoring an Exam
中国 Day 9
Asia Day 9
Today, I woke up relatively LATE - 11am. I got up and planned my lesson, which only took 2 hours this time, thanks to the guided exercises in the textbook. I did some laundry and ate some food, then headed out to the classroom 3 minutes away.
• Call me Doctor Proctor. I had to proctor an exam for students who failed their finals. The administration told me to take it easy on them, so I tried to be as merciful as possible; most of them did really well on the dialogue parts, but as for the dictation, I guess it's hard for them to write down the English terms. However, for the dialogue section, I allowed them to write down some key phrases that they thought they would need to use (the best of the best just talked on cue, and some were really expressive - this led me to think that they should have passed the class, except maybe what happened was other classes got in the way, similar to how some people take languages for general education requirements and just want to get it out of the way). There were a few students that wrote almost nothing for dictation. I repeated the dictations twice (and I was even saying it slowly anyway). I asked if any of them wanted me to repeat the dictations once more, but they were adamantly against it, saying it was too hard.
• Dialogue highlights:
1) One of the students was alone in creating a dialogue, so he made a monologue. I think he did fairly well. However, there was this pleading prelude, with the student saying that he thought his failing was a mistake in grading, that he wasn't one of the best students and not one of the worst. Then he went on to talk about how he only learned some English in middle school. After that, he answered the question somewhat fluently.
2) Another group of students were quite funny because they were presenting on why English is important to learn (advantages/disadvantages). One of them said that they needed to know English to pass this final exam, eliciting laughs from me and the entire group. Haha. Was it not-very-teacherly to laugh? 'Twas funnay!!
• Oh, the challenge of grading. There's this feeling one has as a teacher - teachers don't want to pass someone who doesn't deserve it, but wants all students to pass. I am already facing such a challenge, BUT there are some students that don't deserve it because they didn't study.
• On the way back from proctoring, I saw homogeneous groups of students (separated by gender) dressed in military uniforms. They were doing their "military exercises" - I guess it's a form of physical education and discipline. Michael had done it back in his undergraduate freshman year; Baba did it back when he was in college (that was a LONG-ASS time ago). It's an old tradition, I suppose. Anyway, I saw this attractive older (25 years of age?) man in uniform; he was probably in the military. Actually, from this practice and watching other students around campus, I noticed that students didn't hang out in heterogeneous groups of guys and girls. It was usually all girls or all guys. Otherwise, a girl and guy would hang out one-on-one if they were dating. It's interesting because it shows that students in America are a bit more liberal, since there's groups of guys and girls that hang out.
• I went home to rest and to indulge myself in Moon-Cake-ness. Afterward, I decided to go back out and explore the campus. I walked around campus until I thought I knew every nook and cranny, granny. On one side, there's the main gate; on another, there's the East Gate (near the foreign teacher apartments). Then, there's a fenced boundary separating the university from the outside, non-sheltered world. There's some really nice archaic architecture on campus, so of course, I took many pictures. After this exploration, I went back to my apartment for a few minutes and then left to explore the streets. By this time, it was already 5:00pm.
• I turned right after exiting the gate. Walked to a fresh produce store and bought some heavy fuzzy peaches and some persimmons. Those persimmons were medium-sized and a bit squishy. Honestly, if I were to apply a little more pressure, I'm sure it would have exploded. Then, an angry Chinese woman would shout, "AHHH!!!! YOU BREAK YOU BUY AH!"
• Next, I went to the boba shop nearby. There were only two girls working, but they...were...s-l-o-w. I waited for about 10 minutes for them to make the boba of some schoolgirls. Then, another girl who was BEHIND ME in line chimed in her desires, erm, order before I did. Well, we got both of our orders done at the same time, though. I ordered a "珍珠奶绿" (probably a boba milk tea with green tea?). It was only 3 块. You could ask them to poke the straw through it (开 = open it). Hooray. However, it wasn't as good as I thought it might be. It was quite milky, yes. The balls were smaller than those balls they have in the U.S.
• After having lugged around those heavy peaches and squishy persimmons for 10 minutes while waiting to order and then waiting another 5 minutes for my order to be completed, I decided I wanted to drop the kiddies off at home. By kiddies, I meant my fuzzy, obese peaches and the about-to-explode persimmons I loved unconditionally. Well, I can't say that just yet, since I haven't tried them. But even then...no, I only loved them on three conditions - that they be fresh, soft, and juicy. After I got home, I didn't feel like budging.
• I read some information sheets from the police department and university, which said a multitude of things in Engrish:
1) "A foreigner shall not keep to the bottle and be sot, and is not allowed to fight or tussle with others." I think that means the foreigner should not get drunk in China o_o.
2) "Foreigners who are religion holders may go to the church in Hangzhou for cult, but are not allowed to preach, to spread religion booklet or to develop members in any occasion."
3) "Foreigners shall abide by the Road Traffic Laws of China, and obey the management of traffic police." (HAHAHA...WHAT traffic laws?! HAHAHAHA!!!!)
4) "It is prohibited to log onto pornographic and reactionary websites. If viruses invade the computer system because of inappropriate browsing, the school authorities are not responsible for the paralysis of computer system and look into responsibilities."
5) "The marking method can be either hundred mark system or five-level system, namely, excellent, good, ordinary, passed, and failed."
6) For the campus catalog, there's a section detailing student participation in events, such as competitions. For one of them, it said, "Mathematical modeling." That conjures images of nerdy mathematics majors posing and lavishing attention on flashing cameras. Of course I know what mathematical model isn't - it's not a pageant - yet, just those words create amusing imagery for me.
• I called Patricia to see if she had eaten yet, and it turns out she was still on the bus. When she got back, we decided to go upstairs and knock on people's doors to see if they'd eaten. All had, or they were too tired to go. Patricia and I went outside of campus and walked around until we found a new place to eat. It was really close to the front entrance of the university.
• When we went into the restaurant, this cute lil' boy took our order. They told me they didn't have any green beans, so I had to choose another dish, so I got noodles with chicken pieces and mixed (spicy) veggies. Patricia got fried rice. I taught Patricia some Chinese, too. Haha. We were talking about how she wanted to put the little boy in her purse or how she wanted to adopt him, and I was like, "Did you see 'Tropic Thunder'?" Then I made a stabbing motion, rofl.
• Anyway, they thought Patricia was Malaysian!! HAHA. I also made some conversation with the people. Turns out the little boy was 14 years old. His dad was from 青海, in the northwest part of China. Their whole family kept smiling at me and Patricia (mostly at her, though) NONSTOP. I asked the father if the little kid was his son and he replied yes. Then, I asked if the other kid was his son, and he said yes. I asked the older son how old he was and he said seventeen. Rawr? LOL. Patricia was asking about age differences in China...
• As I was finishing my dinner, some creeper stood outside of the shop, staring at our table. Patricia claimed that he was looking at ME and/or checking me out. I was reacting adversely, such that I screeched like an unsexy beast. I also said, "Yeah, he wants some of this Chinese-American goodness." I looked back a few times and yes, indeed, he was looking at me T_T. He was about 50-55 years of age. Ewww...I suggested we walk fast after we finished our dindin.
• As we were walking back, we saw this guy who was moderately attractive and Patricia said, "OOoooh I saw you checkin' him out!" I said, "Yeah...and he was aight..." She busted up laughin' at my ghettoness.
• We got back to the front of our apartment and saw Jessica. We had this conversation (paraphrased):
Patricia: Hey, she got a new boyfriend (indicating me).
Jing: Ahhh, but she did, too!
Patricia: Yeah, mine is 14.
Jessica: Oooh.
Patricia: Yeah, hers was outside of the window, checking her out.
Jing: Ohhhh! I thought you were talking about the other one.
Jessica: What? Other one? You have so many that you lost track?
Got bitten by bugs at least 5 times whilst standing out there. Then, I came back inside to do some unfinished bloggery.
中国 Day 9
Asia Day 9
Today, I woke up relatively LATE - 11am. I got up and planned my lesson, which only took 2 hours this time, thanks to the guided exercises in the textbook. I did some laundry and ate some food, then headed out to the classroom 3 minutes away.
• Call me Doctor Proctor. I had to proctor an exam for students who failed their finals. The administration told me to take it easy on them, so I tried to be as merciful as possible; most of them did really well on the dialogue parts, but as for the dictation, I guess it's hard for them to write down the English terms. However, for the dialogue section, I allowed them to write down some key phrases that they thought they would need to use (the best of the best just talked on cue, and some were really expressive - this led me to think that they should have passed the class, except maybe what happened was other classes got in the way, similar to how some people take languages for general education requirements and just want to get it out of the way). There were a few students that wrote almost nothing for dictation. I repeated the dictations twice (and I was even saying it slowly anyway). I asked if any of them wanted me to repeat the dictations once more, but they were adamantly against it, saying it was too hard.
• Dialogue highlights:
1) One of the students was alone in creating a dialogue, so he made a monologue. I think he did fairly well. However, there was this pleading prelude, with the student saying that he thought his failing was a mistake in grading, that he wasn't one of the best students and not one of the worst. Then he went on to talk about how he only learned some English in middle school. After that, he answered the question somewhat fluently.
2) Another group of students were quite funny because they were presenting on why English is important to learn (advantages/disadvantages). One of them said that they needed to know English to pass this final exam, eliciting laughs from me and the entire group. Haha. Was it not-very-teacherly to laugh? 'Twas funnay!!
• Oh, the challenge of grading. There's this feeling one has as a teacher - teachers don't want to pass someone who doesn't deserve it, but wants all students to pass. I am already facing such a challenge, BUT there are some students that don't deserve it because they didn't study.
• On the way back from proctoring, I saw homogeneous groups of students (separated by gender) dressed in military uniforms. They were doing their "military exercises" - I guess it's a form of physical education and discipline. Michael had done it back in his undergraduate freshman year; Baba did it back when he was in college (that was a LONG-ASS time ago). It's an old tradition, I suppose. Anyway, I saw this attractive older (25 years of age?) man in uniform; he was probably in the military. Actually, from this practice and watching other students around campus, I noticed that students didn't hang out in heterogeneous groups of guys and girls. It was usually all girls or all guys. Otherwise, a girl and guy would hang out one-on-one if they were dating. It's interesting because it shows that students in America are a bit more liberal, since there's groups of guys and girls that hang out.
• I went home to rest and to indulge myself in Moon-Cake-ness. Afterward, I decided to go back out and explore the campus. I walked around campus until I thought I knew every nook and cranny, granny. On one side, there's the main gate; on another, there's the East Gate (near the foreign teacher apartments). Then, there's a fenced boundary separating the university from the outside, non-sheltered world. There's some really nice archaic architecture on campus, so of course, I took many pictures. After this exploration, I went back to my apartment for a few minutes and then left to explore the streets. By this time, it was already 5:00pm.
• I turned right after exiting the gate. Walked to a fresh produce store and bought some heavy fuzzy peaches and some persimmons. Those persimmons were medium-sized and a bit squishy. Honestly, if I were to apply a little more pressure, I'm sure it would have exploded. Then, an angry Chinese woman would shout, "AHHH!!!! YOU BREAK YOU BUY AH!"
• Next, I went to the boba shop nearby. There were only two girls working, but they...were...s-l-o-w. I waited for about 10 minutes for them to make the boba of some schoolgirls. Then, another girl who was BEHIND ME in line chimed in her desires, erm, order before I did. Well, we got both of our orders done at the same time, though. I ordered a "珍珠奶绿" (probably a boba milk tea with green tea?). It was only 3 块. You could ask them to poke the straw through it (开 = open it). Hooray. However, it wasn't as good as I thought it might be. It was quite milky, yes. The balls were smaller than those balls they have in the U.S.
• After having lugged around those heavy peaches and squishy persimmons for 10 minutes while waiting to order and then waiting another 5 minutes for my order to be completed, I decided I wanted to drop the kiddies off at home. By kiddies, I meant my fuzzy, obese peaches and the about-to-explode persimmons I loved unconditionally. Well, I can't say that just yet, since I haven't tried them. But even then...no, I only loved them on three conditions - that they be fresh, soft, and juicy. After I got home, I didn't feel like budging.
• I read some information sheets from the police department and university, which said a multitude of things in Engrish:
1) "A foreigner shall not keep to the bottle and be sot, and is not allowed to fight or tussle with others." I think that means the foreigner should not get drunk in China o_o.
2) "Foreigners who are religion holders may go to the church in Hangzhou for cult, but are not allowed to preach, to spread religion booklet or to develop members in any occasion."
3) "Foreigners shall abide by the Road Traffic Laws of China, and obey the management of traffic police." (HAHAHA...WHAT traffic laws?! HAHAHAHA!!!!)
4) "It is prohibited to log onto pornographic and reactionary websites. If viruses invade the computer system because of inappropriate browsing, the school authorities are not responsible for the paralysis of computer system and look into responsibilities."
5) "The marking method can be either hundred mark system or five-level system, namely, excellent, good, ordinary, passed, and failed."
6) For the campus catalog, there's a section detailing student participation in events, such as competitions. For one of them, it said, "Mathematical modeling." That conjures images of nerdy mathematics majors posing and lavishing attention on flashing cameras. Of course I know what mathematical model isn't - it's not a pageant - yet, just those words create amusing imagery for me.
• I called Patricia to see if she had eaten yet, and it turns out she was still on the bus. When she got back, we decided to go upstairs and knock on people's doors to see if they'd eaten. All had, or they were too tired to go. Patricia and I went outside of campus and walked around until we found a new place to eat. It was really close to the front entrance of the university.
• When we went into the restaurant, this cute lil' boy took our order. They told me they didn't have any green beans, so I had to choose another dish, so I got noodles with chicken pieces and mixed (spicy) veggies. Patricia got fried rice. I taught Patricia some Chinese, too. Haha. We were talking about how she wanted to put the little boy in her purse or how she wanted to adopt him, and I was like, "Did you see 'Tropic Thunder'?" Then I made a stabbing motion, rofl.
• Anyway, they thought Patricia was Malaysian!! HAHA. I also made some conversation with the people. Turns out the little boy was 14 years old. His dad was from 青海, in the northwest part of China. Their whole family kept smiling at me and Patricia (mostly at her, though) NONSTOP. I asked the father if the little kid was his son and he replied yes. Then, I asked if the other kid was his son, and he said yes. I asked the older son how old he was and he said seventeen. Rawr? LOL. Patricia was asking about age differences in China...
• As I was finishing my dinner, some creeper stood outside of the shop, staring at our table. Patricia claimed that he was looking at ME and/or checking me out. I was reacting adversely, such that I screeched like an unsexy beast. I also said, "Yeah, he wants some of this Chinese-American goodness." I looked back a few times and yes, indeed, he was looking at me T_T. He was about 50-55 years of age. Ewww...I suggested we walk fast after we finished our dindin.
• As we were walking back, we saw this guy who was moderately attractive and Patricia said, "OOoooh I saw you checkin' him out!" I said, "Yeah...and he was aight..." She busted up laughin' at my ghettoness.
• We got back to the front of our apartment and saw Jessica. We had this conversation (paraphrased):
Patricia: Hey, she got a new boyfriend (indicating me).
Jing: Ahhh, but she did, too!
Patricia: Yeah, mine is 14.
Jessica: Oooh.
Patricia: Yeah, hers was outside of the window, checking her out.
Jing: Ohhhh! I thought you were talking about the other one.
Jessica: What? Other one? You have so many that you lost track?
Got bitten by bugs at least 5 times whilst standing out there. Then, I came back inside to do some unfinished bloggery.
Tuesday, September 16, 2008
杭州 Day 8
Tuesday, September 16, 2008: 杭州 Day 8 - First Day of Teaching!
中国 Day 8
Asia Day 8
• Woke up hecka early, but went back to sleep several times. It was strange because I first woke up around 7:45am, but I was in a half-awake mental state until around 10am, when I finally got out of bed. At this time, I had a slight headache and stomachache and did not know the cause. I chatted and laid down a bit before I felt better. Also polished up the lesson plans.
• At 1:20pm, I left for work. Little did I remember, the walk from my apartment to the classroom is about 3 minutes away (from when I step outside my door to when I reach the classroom). I also had to get the key to the room, as well as the microphone. The lady in charge of those items just had me write the room number and sign my name on a sheet of paper. I went upstairs and I was already starting to sweat. No, this is not a result of being out of shape. It's the weather!
• I unlocked the door of the classroom and then went inside to set up the computer, audiovisual equipment, and projector. This is sad, but there was no internet on the computer, so next time, I will have to bring a USB drive. I also turned on all the fans...to the highest dials. ARGH. By this time, I was already drowning in a pool of sweat inside my own clothes! GROSS HUH. TMI INFO HUH! Well, too bad ;)
• By the time I was almost set up, some students walked in 10 minutes early. A few were like, "Eh? So early..." (哦？ 这么早。。？) I started by introducing myself briefly and then we launched ourselves into the lesson. (Class times were 1:45-2:30, 2:35-3:20, 3:25-4:10, 4:15-5:00. There were two main classes, with two periods each. My classes averaged 37 students.)
• Last night, I created a new email JUST FOR this purpose (of teaching Jinglish). However, I decided I wanted them to call me Professor F, so I made a gmail account with TeachJinglish (except that I used my last name in place). I was trying to explain the joke to my students, who didn't really laugh (either they didn't get it, or they did get it and didn't think it was funny). How dare they not laugh in my presence!
• I had everyone go around to introduce themselves and talk about their own personality. I also passed around this globe stress ball, which would indicate that someone was to speak. There were some inaudible responses from the gals, so I started just walking and stopping next to the student that was speaking. It seemed to me that the second class I had was more knowledgeable in English (but the period I had before that actually had lunch, so that could explain why some people weren't as alert). Next, I had everyone go around to read the vocabulary words. I made sure to repeat words that caused people trouble. After that, I usually had 3 minutes to spare, so I just made up a mini-game out of thin air. I said I would toss the ball to someone and they would have to pronounce a word. However, when I had barely even gone through 2 words, the bell would ring. I would tell the students it's break time and some would stay in the classroom. After break, I would continue the lesson with listening exercises from the book. Okay, boring, yes; it wasn't that effective, though, because as I've seen in both classes, the "fill-in-the-blank" exercises were primarily blank, except that the best of the best students did take a stab at it...and made it BLOODY. So the true/false and multiple choice exercises were easiest for students to understand. After this, I had students discuss a question with a partner; it was about what personalities were considered to be "Chinese" and because of this, whether that student thought of himself or herself as Chinese. Then, after we went through everything, the bell would ring. Wow, I feel like everything was well-timed; implementation was good, but I need to have more students feel a bit more confident.
• General worries:
- Today, I think I may have embarrassed a few students; nothing big, of course. There was a student that had passed on the ball because he didn't want to go, but I kind of made him go after two others went. I should have just asked whether he wanted me to come back later. I think I saw the beginnings of a scowl. (However, there's this other student who wasn't ready and I came back to him later...and it all worked out.)
- I also worry that I was "all up in the grill" of the students, invading their personal space. This is a bit unavoidable, though, if I want to be able to hear what the students are saying, since they speak so softly.
- I'd like the students to speak with more confidence and to talk louder. For the second class, I decided to pass around the microphone. It worked fine for the introductions, but when I told people to use it for the group discussion questions, at least half did not want to.
- I'm thankful that there are no huge misbehaving behaviors within the students. There are, of course, some smarty-pants, though they make the class more interesting. However, I will of course try to call on the quieter ones and try to encourage them.
- I was talking to another foreign teacher and he suggested I build the competitive spirit with games. Good point. This will foster intrinsic motivation and cause people to speak up, I hope.
- Erm, there was a mishap with the ball. For the first class, I warned them three times that I was going to throw the ball. One of them was supposed to catch it and s/he would have to pronounce the word. The first time, I threw it very far back, but it worked (until the bell rang). The second time, I warned them about two times, and then I said I wasn't even going to look and then toss the ball. I tossed it...and I think...apparently, it hit one of the students (was he not paying attention)? LOLOL...I apologized profusely, as the gal students giggled. Oh god...
• Funny responses:
1) I asked students to describe the personality of Chinese people, and one student said, "Chinese people are very in-going." I was like, "Hrm?" He said, "Opposite of outgoing."
2) There was a group of smarty-pants in my second class. When I asked them to introduce themselves and say their name, one of them said something to the effect of, "Hello, good afternoon, my name is __ and I am from Ningbo, the manufacturing center of China. You can buy lots of clothing when you visit there." It was so touristy-toned that I was amused.
3) Another smarty-pants student was answering my question about Chinese people's personalities, and said, "We all share the same great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-grandfather, so all Chinese people are the same." That cracked up the class.
4) When I asked one student to talk about Chinese people's personalities, he said, "Chinese people like to build cute things with..." and then asked his friend, "How do you say dirt?/怎么说泥土？" and then I told him, "dirt," and then he continued. I repeated it, "Hmm...so Chinese people like to build cute things with dirt? Interesting, I didn't know that." LOL. And then I went to the next person.
• Some students had some good responses about Chinese people's personalities. One said something to the effect of, "People of the world are all the same. So, there should not be much difference between Chinese people and others."
• Another student (in the smarty-pants group) said that, "Chinese people are very shy, so in an English class, it is hard for them to talk." I then asked that group how they thought I, as a teacher, could get my Chinese students who are shy to speak up. They just wrinkled their foreheads in deep rumination and I said I would come back later to ask.
• Some answers were just super-detailed, especially in the second class.
• Ahh, so I returned the microphone and keys to the janitor room and happily walked home, having achieved a first in my life. My shirt was GROSS. It was black and I had been sweating madly...so there was a white stain of salt on the outside of where I had sweat. Please don't think I'm overly gross - I'm sure the same would have happened to you - this is, after all, China.
• I chilled on my computer for a moment and then went to grab dindin with Jessica, Romain, and Vanessa. Dinner was select-what-you-want-to-eat-then-throw-the contents-into-a-soup, similar to a hot pot. I ate dumplings, veggies, mushrooms, noodles, and red mystery meat; it was red before he put it in the pot and it was red afterward (I'm pretty sure it was due to some type of treatment, like marinade, or at worst, harassment). I asked the cook what the red meat was; he replied so fast, it was as if he hadn't answered. I told the guy it was okay if he made it a LITTLE spicy...but I guess he didn't know what 'little spicy' meant...and made it terribly spicy. All of us were crying. After dinner, Jessica said, "Quick! What's 33 divided by 4?" I said, "Hmmm....33 divided by 4 is pretty close to 32/4 = 8, so a little over eight." Romain and others laughed at my mode of approximation...
• Then, we walked a bit. Explored a bakery and then a mini-supermarket. Afterward, Romain and I looked at a small fresh produce store. We didn't know how to choose a watermelon, but I later Googled it. You smack it upside its head - if you hear a hollow sound, that means it's ripe. I had one of the shopboys choose a watermelon for me and then I left for home. Patricia came over a bit to deliver me some notes from today's meeting (that I had to miss because of classes). Now, here I am...blogging my life away. Going to journal in a bit.
中国 Day 8
Asia Day 8
• Woke up hecka early, but went back to sleep several times. It was strange because I first woke up around 7:45am, but I was in a half-awake mental state until around 10am, when I finally got out of bed. At this time, I had a slight headache and stomachache and did not know the cause. I chatted and laid down a bit before I felt better. Also polished up the lesson plans.
• At 1:20pm, I left for work. Little did I remember, the walk from my apartment to the classroom is about 3 minutes away (from when I step outside my door to when I reach the classroom). I also had to get the key to the room, as well as the microphone. The lady in charge of those items just had me write the room number and sign my name on a sheet of paper. I went upstairs and I was already starting to sweat. No, this is not a result of being out of shape. It's the weather!
• I unlocked the door of the classroom and then went inside to set up the computer, audiovisual equipment, and projector. This is sad, but there was no internet on the computer, so next time, I will have to bring a USB drive. I also turned on all the fans...to the highest dials. ARGH. By this time, I was already drowning in a pool of sweat inside my own clothes! GROSS HUH. TMI INFO HUH! Well, too bad ;)
• By the time I was almost set up, some students walked in 10 minutes early. A few were like, "Eh? So early..." (哦？ 这么早。。？) I started by introducing myself briefly and then we launched ourselves into the lesson. (Class times were 1:45-2:30, 2:35-3:20, 3:25-4:10, 4:15-5:00. There were two main classes, with two periods each. My classes averaged 37 students.)
• Last night, I created a new email JUST FOR this purpose (of teaching Jinglish). However, I decided I wanted them to call me Professor F, so I made a gmail account with TeachJinglish (except that I used my last name in place). I was trying to explain the joke to my students, who didn't really laugh (either they didn't get it, or they did get it and didn't think it was funny). How dare they not laugh in my presence!
• I had everyone go around to introduce themselves and talk about their own personality. I also passed around this globe stress ball, which would indicate that someone was to speak. There were some inaudible responses from the gals, so I started just walking and stopping next to the student that was speaking. It seemed to me that the second class I had was more knowledgeable in English (but the period I had before that actually had lunch, so that could explain why some people weren't as alert). Next, I had everyone go around to read the vocabulary words. I made sure to repeat words that caused people trouble. After that, I usually had 3 minutes to spare, so I just made up a mini-game out of thin air. I said I would toss the ball to someone and they would have to pronounce a word. However, when I had barely even gone through 2 words, the bell would ring. I would tell the students it's break time and some would stay in the classroom. After break, I would continue the lesson with listening exercises from the book. Okay, boring, yes; it wasn't that effective, though, because as I've seen in both classes, the "fill-in-the-blank" exercises were primarily blank, except that the best of the best students did take a stab at it...and made it BLOODY. So the true/false and multiple choice exercises were easiest for students to understand. After this, I had students discuss a question with a partner; it was about what personalities were considered to be "Chinese" and because of this, whether that student thought of himself or herself as Chinese. Then, after we went through everything, the bell would ring. Wow, I feel like everything was well-timed; implementation was good, but I need to have more students feel a bit more confident.
• General worries:
- Today, I think I may have embarrassed a few students; nothing big, of course. There was a student that had passed on the ball because he didn't want to go, but I kind of made him go after two others went. I should have just asked whether he wanted me to come back later. I think I saw the beginnings of a scowl. (However, there's this other student who wasn't ready and I came back to him later...and it all worked out.)
- I also worry that I was "all up in the grill" of the students, invading their personal space. This is a bit unavoidable, though, if I want to be able to hear what the students are saying, since they speak so softly.
- I'd like the students to speak with more confidence and to talk louder. For the second class, I decided to pass around the microphone. It worked fine for the introductions, but when I told people to use it for the group discussion questions, at least half did not want to.
- I'm thankful that there are no huge misbehaving behaviors within the students. There are, of course, some smarty-pants, though they make the class more interesting. However, I will of course try to call on the quieter ones and try to encourage them.
- I was talking to another foreign teacher and he suggested I build the competitive spirit with games. Good point. This will foster intrinsic motivation and cause people to speak up, I hope.
- Erm, there was a mishap with the ball. For the first class, I warned them three times that I was going to throw the ball. One of them was supposed to catch it and s/he would have to pronounce the word. The first time, I threw it very far back, but it worked (until the bell rang). The second time, I warned them about two times, and then I said I wasn't even going to look and then toss the ball. I tossed it...and I think...apparently, it hit one of the students (was he not paying attention)? LOLOL...I apologized profusely, as the gal students giggled. Oh god...
• Funny responses:
1) I asked students to describe the personality of Chinese people, and one student said, "Chinese people are very in-going." I was like, "Hrm?" He said, "Opposite of outgoing."
2) There was a group of smarty-pants in my second class. When I asked them to introduce themselves and say their name, one of them said something to the effect of, "Hello, good afternoon, my name is __ and I am from Ningbo, the manufacturing center of China. You can buy lots of clothing when you visit there." It was so touristy-toned that I was amused.
3) Another smarty-pants student was answering my question about Chinese people's personalities, and said, "We all share the same great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-grandfather, so all Chinese people are the same." That cracked up the class.
4) When I asked one student to talk about Chinese people's personalities, he said, "Chinese people like to build cute things with..." and then asked his friend, "How do you say dirt?/怎么说泥土？" and then I told him, "dirt," and then he continued. I repeated it, "Hmm...so Chinese people like to build cute things with dirt? Interesting, I didn't know that." LOL. And then I went to the next person.
• Some students had some good responses about Chinese people's personalities. One said something to the effect of, "People of the world are all the same. So, there should not be much difference between Chinese people and others."
• Another student (in the smarty-pants group) said that, "Chinese people are very shy, so in an English class, it is hard for them to talk." I then asked that group how they thought I, as a teacher, could get my Chinese students who are shy to speak up. They just wrinkled their foreheads in deep rumination and I said I would come back later to ask.
• Some answers were just super-detailed, especially in the second class.
• Ahh, so I returned the microphone and keys to the janitor room and happily walked home, having achieved a first in my life. My shirt was GROSS. It was black and I had been sweating madly...so there was a white stain of salt on the outside of where I had sweat. Please don't think I'm overly gross - I'm sure the same would have happened to you - this is, after all, China.
• I chilled on my computer for a moment and then went to grab dindin with Jessica, Romain, and Vanessa. Dinner was select-what-you-want-to-eat-then-throw-the contents-into-a-soup, similar to a hot pot. I ate dumplings, veggies, mushrooms, noodles, and red mystery meat; it was red before he put it in the pot and it was red afterward (I'm pretty sure it was due to some type of treatment, like marinade, or at worst, harassment). I asked the cook what the red meat was; he replied so fast, it was as if he hadn't answered. I told the guy it was okay if he made it a LITTLE spicy...but I guess he didn't know what 'little spicy' meant...and made it terribly spicy. All of us were crying. After dinner, Jessica said, "Quick! What's 33 divided by 4?" I said, "Hmmm....33 divided by 4 is pretty close to 32/4 = 8, so a little over eight." Romain and others laughed at my mode of approximation...
• Then, we walked a bit. Explored a bakery and then a mini-supermarket. Afterward, Romain and I looked at a small fresh produce store. We didn't know how to choose a watermelon, but I later Googled it. You smack it upside its head - if you hear a hollow sound, that means it's ripe. I had one of the shopboys choose a watermelon for me and then I left for home. Patricia came over a bit to deliver me some notes from today's meeting (that I had to miss because of classes). Now, here I am...blogging my life away. Going to journal in a bit.
杭州 Day 6-7
Sunday, September 14, 2008: 杭州 Day 6
中国 Day 6
Asia Day 6
• Woke up at 10:30am to the sound of Baba blowdrying his hair. Got up and got ready for the day, as Baba watched television. It was starting to rain pretty hard around then. Both of us ate a breakfast of bao (buns). He also gave me a cake (that I presume came from his flight last night).
• Around 11:30am, we headed outside of campus to get me a simcard. We walked all the way to the front gate of the university and across the street. Baba did all the talking and asked for an easy-to-remember-number. He also made smalltalk with the shopkeeper/people chillin' in the shop and told them that I'm teaching English and that I'm an American ^^U. Heh. They had the general reaction of, "Oh, can she speak Chinese?" and Baba answered, "Yeah, she knows some - she took 10+ years of Chinese school"...lol.
• We waited at least 15 minutes for a taxi! The street we were on wasn't very busy, so we walked a bit farther. It was quite funny, as taxis full of customers kept passing us by. We finally walked farther and saw a taxi that said "空车" (empty car) on the dashboard. I saw that the guy was smoking, and I thought, "Uhhhh...ohh great." Again, Baba made smalltalk with the taxi driver and asked about Hangzhou and the humid weather. We finally arrived at the restaurant.
• Baba paid for the cab and then found his friend, who was in his car. The friend motioned for us to get in, and he told us that the wait was really long for the restaurant he wanted. Thus, we went to another restaurant in a hotel. We were immediately seated (and all the extra plates were taken away).
• Whilst Baba's friend, or Mr. Sun, as I shall now call him, left the table momentarily, the waitress told me to sit "over there," almost across from where I sat, so that we three would be more spread out, as the table was big enough for about 8 people.
__8_
1 / \ 7
2 | | 6 <===Approximate
3 \____/ 5 diagram
4
Let's say Mr. Sun sat at 1, Baba sat at 3, and I sat at 4. The lady asked me to sit at seat 7. I didn't want to move so far from my Dad, so I asked why they didn't just move Mr. Sun to another seat. Then, the waitress said that the "主人" (master/main man) sat in that seat, so I understood. Then, the lady proceeded to move all of my silverware and plates to seat 7. I was kind of like..."Uhhh...wtf." It was also a mark of bad customer service, as I saw it. Anyway, I thought I'd move later if they wanted me to move, but for the time being, I sat next to Baba. He first talked about the family, then talked about some business, then spoke again about family/me. Again, he talked about how I know some Chinese and how I've taken Chinese school for a bit. Mr. Sun asked me a few questions and whenever I paused, I was feeling a bit indecisive - hope he knows that! I.e. when he asked my dad what I wanted to drink, I didn't really know what to say...and then the waitress just named off all of the drinks in a superfast order. I ordered apple juice, but when the waitress presented it, it was HUGE...and I didn't feel like opening and wasting it, so I just had tea. Before the meal started, Mr. Sun saw my silverware at that other space, and he said irritatedly to the waitstaff, "Hey! Move that back over there." I was giggling in my head. I WON...yeah, bad customer service, whatchu gonna do when the master says, "You gotta move it, move it?"...Yeah, you move it. That's right.
• Ate crab claws, si1gua1, 丝瓜, (almost like xi qua), little fish with tiny bones (okay, today's wasn't as great as yesterday's), beef steak pieces (delish!), a plate with a sea cucumber *giggle* with a scoop of rice and three pieces of broccoli, mystery fish, and watermelon/tomatoes on a plate for dessert.
• Okay...I've got to say, the sea cucumber didn't taste like anything! It was squishy and tasted very neutral, but the thought of eating a sea cucumber almost made me a little queasy. I thought it had the consistency of jellyfish.
• As for the "mystery fish," I have no idea what it is. However, Baba said that he used to capture them when he was little, and they would go into the mud to hide. I didn't see any fins on it and the structure of the mystery fish was a bit different than normal fish. I wonder what it's called. Mm, it was actually pretty good - a bit spicy and it had the consistency of sardines.
• Mr. Sun asked if I'm used to eating this type of meal, and I said I wasn't, and he seemed kind of disappointed...lol. Anyway, he drove Baba to his office and Baba and I went to an office next door so Baba could do business. I noticed that he started by making smalltalk, then talked about the business. I was zoned out because I was playing with my phone. Hehe...I don't think it's as cool as my iPhone, due to the weird scrolling non-user-friendly function, but it has a touchscreen and a better camera (but not as good as my actual Sony cameras). Otherwise, it's cool :D
• Afterwards, Mr. Sun drove Baba back to my apartment; Baba picked up his luggage and left for the airport. Mr. Sun also gave his number to Baba who gave it to me (he lives in Hangzhou and does business here). Cool.
• After Baba left, I cried for like 5 minutes, then felt better when I chatted with people. I must have wasted a bit of time before I started my homework. Ehhh...well, time to journal, do homework, and then sleep ^^
...
Monday, September 15, 2008: 杭州 Day 7
中国 Day 7
Asia Day 7
Woke up at 11am and went online. I was working on my Mercantilism post for my class, when I started to chat (once again). I didn't finish the post until about 8pm. Had some interesting convos with some drunk and sober friends.
Two amusing things (otherwise, there's not really much to today, except for sitting on my cushioned chair, chatting, and typing out a response for homework):
1) One of my expat friends was talking about how her ego was growing, due to the unsuppressed flattery of a Chinese guy, who kept telling her she was pretty (because she joked that girls like to hear it).
2) I was talking to an expat friend online and she said she needed to ring up one of the other teachers. I said he was a "saxy guy" and she said, "oooh, I'm telling." Then she's like, "Don't worry, I'm a good friend, I'll hook you up." I protested, and she said, "He can be your bf until you get good enough at Chinese." LOLOLOL...
Still have lesson plans to do.
中国 Day 6
Asia Day 6
• Woke up at 10:30am to the sound of Baba blowdrying his hair. Got up and got ready for the day, as Baba watched television. It was starting to rain pretty hard around then. Both of us ate a breakfast of bao (buns). He also gave me a cake (that I presume came from his flight last night).
• Around 11:30am, we headed outside of campus to get me a simcard. We walked all the way to the front gate of the university and across the street. Baba did all the talking and asked for an easy-to-remember-number. He also made smalltalk with the shopkeeper/people chillin' in the shop and told them that I'm teaching English and that I'm an American ^^U. Heh. They had the general reaction of, "Oh, can she speak Chinese?" and Baba answered, "Yeah, she knows some - she took 10+ years of Chinese school"...lol.
• We waited at least 15 minutes for a taxi! The street we were on wasn't very busy, so we walked a bit farther. It was quite funny, as taxis full of customers kept passing us by. We finally walked farther and saw a taxi that said "空车" (empty car) on the dashboard. I saw that the guy was smoking, and I thought, "Uhhhh...ohh great." Again, Baba made smalltalk with the taxi driver and asked about Hangzhou and the humid weather. We finally arrived at the restaurant.
• Baba paid for the cab and then found his friend, who was in his car. The friend motioned for us to get in, and he told us that the wait was really long for the restaurant he wanted. Thus, we went to another restaurant in a hotel. We were immediately seated (and all the extra plates were taken away).
• Whilst Baba's friend, or Mr. Sun, as I shall now call him, left the table momentarily, the waitress told me to sit "over there," almost across from where I sat, so that we three would be more spread out, as the table was big enough for about 8 people.
__8_
1 / \ 7
2 | | 6 <===Approximate
3 \____/ 5 diagram
4
Let's say Mr. Sun sat at 1, Baba sat at 3, and I sat at 4. The lady asked me to sit at seat 7. I didn't want to move so far from my Dad, so I asked why they didn't just move Mr. Sun to another seat. Then, the waitress said that the "主人" (master/main man) sat in that seat, so I understood. Then, the lady proceeded to move all of my silverware and plates to seat 7. I was kind of like..."Uhhh...wtf." It was also a mark of bad customer service, as I saw it. Anyway, I thought I'd move later if they wanted me to move, but for the time being, I sat next to Baba. He first talked about the family, then talked about some business, then spoke again about family/me. Again, he talked about how I know some Chinese and how I've taken Chinese school for a bit. Mr. Sun asked me a few questions and whenever I paused, I was feeling a bit indecisive - hope he knows that! I.e. when he asked my dad what I wanted to drink, I didn't really know what to say...and then the waitress just named off all of the drinks in a superfast order. I ordered apple juice, but when the waitress presented it, it was HUGE...and I didn't feel like opening and wasting it, so I just had tea. Before the meal started, Mr. Sun saw my silverware at that other space, and he said irritatedly to the waitstaff, "Hey! Move that back over there." I was giggling in my head. I WON...yeah, bad customer service, whatchu gonna do when the master says, "You gotta move it, move it?"...Yeah, you move it. That's right.
• Ate crab claws, si1gua1, 丝瓜, (almost like xi qua), little fish with tiny bones (okay, today's wasn't as great as yesterday's), beef steak pieces (delish!), a plate with a sea cucumber *giggle* with a scoop of rice and three pieces of broccoli, mystery fish, and watermelon/tomatoes on a plate for dessert.
• Okay...I've got to say, the sea cucumber didn't taste like anything! It was squishy and tasted very neutral, but the thought of eating a sea cucumber almost made me a little queasy. I thought it had the consistency of jellyfish.
• As for the "mystery fish," I have no idea what it is. However, Baba said that he used to capture them when he was little, and they would go into the mud to hide. I didn't see any fins on it and the structure of the mystery fish was a bit different than normal fish. I wonder what it's called. Mm, it was actually pretty good - a bit spicy and it had the consistency of sardines.
• Mr. Sun asked if I'm used to eating this type of meal, and I said I wasn't, and he seemed kind of disappointed...lol. Anyway, he drove Baba to his office and Baba and I went to an office next door so Baba could do business. I noticed that he started by making smalltalk, then talked about the business. I was zoned out because I was playing with my phone. Hehe...I don't think it's as cool as my iPhone, due to the weird scrolling non-user-friendly function, but it has a touchscreen and a better camera (but not as good as my actual Sony cameras). Otherwise, it's cool :D
• Afterwards, Mr. Sun drove Baba back to my apartment; Baba picked up his luggage and left for the airport. Mr. Sun also gave his number to Baba who gave it to me (he lives in Hangzhou and does business here). Cool.
• After Baba left, I cried for like 5 minutes, then felt better when I chatted with people. I must have wasted a bit of time before I started my homework. Ehhh...well, time to journal, do homework, and then sleep ^^
...
Monday, September 15, 2008: 杭州 Day 7
中国 Day 7
Asia Day 7
Woke up at 11am and went online. I was working on my Mercantilism post for my class, when I started to chat (once again). I didn't finish the post until about 8pm. Had some interesting convos with some drunk and sober friends.
Two amusing things (otherwise, there's not really much to today, except for sitting on my cushioned chair, chatting, and typing out a response for homework):
1) One of my expat friends was talking about how her ego was growing, due to the unsuppressed flattery of a Chinese guy, who kept telling her she was pretty (because she joked that girls like to hear it).
2) I was talking to an expat friend online and she said she needed to ring up one of the other teachers. I said he was a "saxy guy" and she said, "oooh, I'm telling." Then she's like, "Don't worry, I'm a good friend, I'll hook you up." I protested, and she said, "He can be your bf until you get good enough at Chinese." LOLOLOL...
Still have lesson plans to do.
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