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My First Entry
Well here it is, my first entry. This all started when I was on the Guardian Website browsing the news, and I stumbled upon the world of 'blogs' (that's a weblog to all those as ignorant as I). So I thought 'This may be the most interesting year of my life, why not start one?' I propose that this site will be a place for me to share bizarre stories, updates and complaints, and to give you an insight into the strange happenings of a 'laowi' (foreign devil) in China. There, that's that.
Website: www.bookcrossing.com
This is a fantastic idea... take a book and place it in a public place for an unsuspecting member of the public to stumble upon. The idea is to make the world a public library. I got so much satisfaction from leaving a book for somebody to find. Its true that waiting for somebody to find it is exciting but giving something to someone that gave you joy makes you feel all warm inside. Unfortunately, my reading material is somewhat limited at the moment, so I haven't got many books to cross.... but when I get back to England you won't be able to stop me.
Go through the link below to let them know it was me that sent you.
Enjoy!
TFI Friday
I can certainly say that I've never valued the weekend so much. Talking at Chinese students all week definately takes it out of you. It would be wrong to say that none of them listen... but it can't be pushing 10%. I am amusing myself though by helping one of my classes put on a play of 'Pinocchio'. Its entertaining seeing them rush through their lines and make mistakes such as 'fucker' instead of 'faker'. Correct them? Why?
So other than that it's been a pretty average day. Only really left school to get some takeaway. So I walk into the restaurant and everyone stares but that's normal. I ordered from my mental menu of about 5 dishes and looked around the room. They certainly like their restaurants 're nao' (hot and noisy), not to mention smoky. But as I looked around at the food that people were eating I realised there wasn't one dish I could see that I could say. It's like walking around England only knowing how to order lasagne, steak and chips, a chicken sandwich, garlic mushrooms and curry. Could you live on these foods for a whole year? So, I decided its time to step up the food names learning. A job for this weekend.
I suspect the rest of this weekend will be filled with the following: a chinese painting class, a meal at an Indian restaurant for someones birthday and a chinese lesson... with lots of panicking about applying for Masters courses inbetween.
Wishing all a good weekend....
I'm Lazy
So the day didn't really go according to plan. I barely managed to drag my ass out of bed this morning. Why the Chinese insist on getting up so early I don't know, but this means my painting class starts at 8am on a Saturday morning. Needless to say I've rarely made it there on time.. doesn't stop the teacher from commenting on my lateness every week! Makes me feel like a naughty student every time. It was fun anyhow.. though I did manage to ruin a not-so-decent painting with a slip of my brush and some blue paint. Damn it!
After that had lunch with Xie. We went to the fast food dumpling place and whilst we were laughing over our jiaozi, some evil bastard stole her bag. Why, why? I felt awful having been sitting opposite her, but she wasn't so bothered and said the only expensive thing was her mobile phone. She also blamed it on her unlucky year (the animal year you were born in so.. 12, 24, 36, 48 etc years old). Apparently, she hasn't worn enough red.
Then, for some reason I developed a splitting headache, which was only made worse by an impromptu nap. Where is somebody to run to the shops to get you some paracetamol when you need them? (not that you can find here here but nevermind). Ah, the pitfalls of living alone.
Anyway, after some time talking to JimmyK my headache seemed to clear but it ruined my motivation for the Indian Restaurant party tonight. Instead I have sat here and ate junk food for a few hours. And haven't even done any Masters research.
Oh well. Tomorrow should be more productive with a chinese lesson (student) and an english lesson (teacher). Enjoy Saturday.. for those of you with a decent amount of it left.
Possibly the funniest and weirdest thing... its undescribable
But I will have a go. Imagine this.... your regional televion station (with the shaky camera work and cheesy presenters) decides to hold a pop idol type talent show for all the foreigners in your city to enter. So here i was, on a trip with my school to the television studio- not really knowing what was happening or what to expect. Before we went in, we were assigned t-shirts which we were instructed to wear. They said the name of our school on the front (yay! I can read Chinese) and apparently the name of the TV station on the back. After about an hour of fake clapping for the camera, moving around as they couldn't decide where to seat us, and worrying about the cracking sounds that the 'seating' boxes were making everytime somebody stepped a little too forcefully, the show finally began.
Every year, Beijing television station holds the 'Arts from Our land Competition' for the celebration of Spring Festival. It involves waiguoren (foreigners) showing off their skills at doing Chinese arts.. such as singing in a chinese style, comedy or acrobatics. Wow, I hear you say.. that must of been fun. Well, yes it was. I don't think I've ever seen anything funnier.
At the start of the show, all the contestants came onto the stage and i have never seen such a random assortment of people together. Before you consider this, you must understand what a large proportion of the waiguoren who come to China are like. They are freaks in their own country who come to China in order to be considered 'special' and 'different' in a good way. And for the men.. even the old and weird ones can get pretty chinese girlfriends because of their waiguoren status.
Anyway thats besides the point.... the people on the stage were strange and all singing a chinese song. I could not stop laughing but had to hold it in with the cameras regularly focussing in on the only waiguoren in the audience! The second act was a guy in a silver sequined suit, with too much makeup on. Oh, I didn't know what to do with myself. Unfortunately my words cannot come close to describing how funny this was.. the school took pictures so they will be posted at the first opportunity.
The event was supposed the be the award ceremony as the winners had already been announced. It was just like the oscars or the MTV awards with them changing clothes every five minutes. That is apart from the Brazilian woman with the fruit style hat and enormous dress covered in pompoms and dangly things, who merely added a huge ring of peacock and yellow feathers to her back.
Oh the randomness. The worst act by far had to be three american guys. At the start they were trying to rap and i thought that was lame but later on.. they appeared in top hats and only one of them could barely sing... the americans with me were mortally embarrassed. And then when being interviewed afterwards one of them misunderstood a question (in chinese) and answered 'A little' to 'Why do you like Beijing?'. How embarrassing?!?! I would have died!
The fake snow and the over enthusiatic host, along with the chinese I couldn't understand, made it all the more funny. Ahhh. A night to remember.
P.S. Sorry, this post should have been funnier, but before writing this i got bogged down by my increasing debt in the UK and it dampened my spirit a little. :-(
Sunday's ok... but Monday?
Sunday went quite well. Had a great Chinese lesson with Selina, and totally lost track of time and was nearly late for my English lesson (teacher this time). The couple that I teach are really nice and so enthusiastic. Its so easy and I really enjoy it... shame that I can't get quite the same satisfaction out of teaching the kids most of the time.
Saying that though, I had a good lesson today. I just set them a few activities to do and went round and talked to them. Its nice to feel like I'm building up a bit of a relationship with them... one of them even invited me to her house for Spring Festival, so that was sweet. Other student news today, one of the students came to my office and tearfully told me that the judges for the New Year show had rejected their play of Pinocchio. She told me all the girls had cried. Apparently the judges didn't even watch them and just wrote on the paper that they didn't understand it. They suggested that they add some jokes in Chinese. They don't get that the whole point is to show how good they are at English. So I had a word with the headmaster tonight and he said he is going to talk to the judges. If you want anything in this school you have to ask a number of times... so that's what I'll do.
On a final note, got Chrissie pressies from JimmyK and Sab in the post today so that made me vvv happy. Can't wait to open them! Yay, Christmas is approaching! x
Christmas Eve Eve
After going to bed way too late (why is blogging so addictive) and getting up too late today, I kinda spent the in a daze with some weird aches and pains. Lessons went ok though. I got sick of trying to make them work, especially when the teacher doesn't turn up so i kinda set them activities and let them get on with it. It was really nice to just chat to the kids- its weird not being able to build a proper relationship with them because of the language barrier. They ask the funniest questions!
After school I had a lesson at the pharmaceutical company I teach at. I started off with a group of about 10 but my lessons must be poor cos now it is only the boss guy! Anyway, I have really stopped planning lessons for him and I just want him to practice normal conversation as his spoken English is quite poor. We talked about Christmas and why it is celebrated at all in China and how Chinese youths are becoming interested in Christianity. It was really interesting. I love how teaching adults is really just talking and I am really good at that!
Well, I'm off to bed now but I'm excited about tomorrow being Christmas Eve. I've been invited to a school Christmas party tomorrow afternoon, which should be fun, though I am prepared to be bombarded with 'Do you like China?' and 'Can you speak Chinese?'. Lucky there will be 3 other waiguoren to take the pressure off me!
Have a great Christmas and I'll be back to post in a day or so.