Adventure Tim

Finally, it has warmed up. The insides of our building, being concrete, do not agree with the heat and instead make our living areas ice-cold. We head outside when we can.

But I'm not here to talk about that.

I'm here to talk about an enjoyable evening and day today (Friday and Saturday).

As the foreign teachers all enjoy each other's company (more or less), we hang out often at people's places. Last night Adam, Ann, Tatiana and I hung out at Tim's place, mostly because of two reasons: 1) he doesn't live in the apartment complex that the Americans do and thus still has heating, 2) he brought back a Wii with him, a magical white box that somehow encourages team spirit and eats away at your time as a cost.

We played some Wii, watched some movies (I finally saw Dr. Strangelove), and by the time we were all ready to head home, it was 1:30am.

Followers of this blog will remember that the Americans are locked in our gated community at 10pm like children.

However! We had the ~magical gate key~ a key that allows us to get in the gate after 10pm. There is only one. We aren't sure why, but that's what they gave us as they tried to explain. So we said goodbye to Tim, who was probably thrilled to have his room to himself again and went to the exit.

On the glass doors there was a rod, keeping people from moving the doors. On further inspection we found the rod was locked. This was not our own gate key, but rather, the doors to Tim's apartment.

Despite our hollering and knocking, the keeper of the key refused to wake up, and our options were reduced to sitting in the hall all night or Adam, Ann and I crashing in Tim's place.

So we crashed. Ann and I shared the bed while Tim and Adam took the floor cushions. We'd agreed most of us would be waking in the morning for a park excursion at 10:30, so it wasn't a problem.

At 6:30, Ann's phone alarm woke us up. Tim said goodbye as we all left and we went to his building's main door- only to find it locked. Tatiana, who had left at a reasonable time last night, managed to wake up the key-keeper, and finally we were back at our familiar gate.

Which was locked.

So happy we had the key.

We returned to our rooms, and most of us went to sleep afterward. At 10:30, Adam, Tim, Tatiana and I assembled to go park exploring with 6 of Adam's students.

This park was unlike the others I'd been to- instead of buildings and temples, there were rocks. Rocks you could climb on.

The Chinese don't bother with warning signs- in the states, you could easily picture someone falling and suing, so these rocks would never have been climbable. But these rocks were, and there were many different forms. There were also stepping stones across water where you could fall in. What's interesting, though, is that it feels much more fun than if it were in the States- someone is going to sue someone, it's unsafe, it'll be a problem- China just rolls with it. People don't get as injured as we seem to think they will. And the exploring of parks is much more fun here without pavements and perfectly adjusted steps, crawling your way up rocks in the most basic of rock climbing exercises.

On the other hand, if you are in a wheelchair, Kaifeng is not the place for you. There are few ramps, most buildings require you to actually step up and over something, and parks have statues and monuments on top of rock formations that they have built.

So today was full of adventure~!

One Cake Store, Two Cake Store, Three Cake Store, More!

When we first arrived in Kaifeng, there were two stores out the South Gate road. The closest one was called "Gege Cake" (older brother cake), and the other was called "Tian Li Cake". Gege cake is a good cake store, and has the best deal on loaves of bread, however, many of the other kinds of pastries or baked items (think sandwiches, pigs-in-the-blanket, pizza slices, donuts, etc) are simply better at Tian Li Cake.

I like Gege Cake, but after finding egg shells in too many bread items I've kind of avoided them for snacking needs. I never really went to Tian Li cake, maybe because they were on the other side of the street or maybe because they were too far away or maybe because they were expensive. But Tian Li cake is seen as better than Gege by many people.

After a few months, another store opened, Jeanavice. This one reminded Ann and I of a Japanese bakery- so many different kinds of breads, so many fillings, so many tasty, tasty options. (Turns out the owner is Japanese!) And real meat in your bread, not just this fake dog-food hotdog stuff. It was even farther away than Tian Li (about twice the distance from our gate to Tian Li), but it was worth it, and this semester I'm more willing to make the trek.

But recently, something else has happened. Another store has opened, this one even closer to our campus! Gege cake has sent out 5 yuan coupons as retaliation, but this store also did so. This store sells ice cream and some tasty sweet pastries, it's biggest selling points.

Jeanavice is too far away to depend on customers from the school, so it doesn't need the south gate location. But Gege does. It doesn't have much else going for it, other than it is cheap and part of a chain. So they've pulled out a red carpet and are blasting out music in hopes to draw in customers from this new cake shop.

It's annoying. I understand Gege's worry, with three new competitors and two of them in a close location, but please, Gege, stop blasting music.

Chinese at Dinner

So often I meet with Candy, who gives me fun little activities on the side of teaching, like speaking to 400 people or speaking to 100 people. She's not related to the college, but the speaking is fun practice, as I've learned how to draw things out and that I will always take more time than I think I am going to in public presentations.

Tonight, she invited me to dinner after a meeting with her, and I accepted. We went somewhere near campus (because Ann and I have movie-grading nights), and had fried hot-pot- instead of soup, they fried all the stuff for you. It was quite tasty.

As we were eating dinner, I realized I was having more conversation with her husband than I usually do- normally we sit in silence, but today I tried to speak more to him, and we had more communication. And I was able to read a sign. All by myself. It's the little things that encourage me that I am learning Chinese, even if it is not near as quickly as I had hoped, or even if I do no think I am.

In weather related news, I am more and more tempted to call for a slumber party if it means I will be warm after a few hours. Last night I wore five shirts to bed, thick socks and two pairs of slippers, two pairs of pants and had three covers underneath me with a sheet, a blanket, a comforter and a sheet on top of me, and I was... not cold. Not warm. But not cold. I miss insulation. I miss insulation a lot.

Also with the wet rain comes the humidity- I can no longer get things to dry in my bathroom. Going to have to use the drying closet plus the air-conditioner now.

In cleaning news, this weekend I did major cleaning, but I still have to vacuum- my apartment is the only one without one. Boo.

Cold Again

The heat turned off March 15, but even though it snowed yesterday morning, the heat won't be turned on again. I miss the heat. Mostly because I miss the heat. On the other hand, hurray for the long underwear mom brought me- I didn't think it would be that useful, but it is.

I had two cool dreams last night, which prompts me talking to my first class about dreams. They grow tired of it, but I like telling people about my dreams~. I should stop.

The second class came to me to ask questions about twins, which led to birth, which led to me pretending to be the awkward fallopian tube tree. Someone took a picture.

Ah, well. It helped me make sure they knew about twins.

St. Patrick's Day and the day after

Yesterday we celebrated St. Patrick's Day by wearing green. And drinking... non-green things. Hurray!

We all went to Tim's apartment, because it's awesome. Tim was a very good host and put up with a number of people in his apartment. We watched Star Wars reviews, A History of the World, and some heavy metal bands. It was all very fun. Unfortunately, we still have issues with keys and being locked out. We're almost treated like children- we're supposed to be in our gated area by 10:00pm. Except the gate keeper often locks the gate earlier, if he thinks we're in. Two days ago at 9:15pm, he had the gate locked- we were all outside. So we grow frustrated at that.

Today I woke up at 5:30, which was surprising. Or maybe I woke up at 4:30, and just chilled for an hour drinking water. After 5:30, I decided to go back to bed.

Today I cleaned. I wiped down windowsills, took out spider webs, and cleaned my bathroom. Hurray.

It is a windy day today, but I like the wind. :) The only thing I would change about today is that my nose is unusually red, and therefore, today was productive and a good day, as that's not really worth changing.

Springtime for Eaafy and China-land!

It is spring.

What tells me this is not the calendar, which says spring is March 20th. It is not the birds twittering in the air, it is not the mosquitos which made their appearance yesterday (bloodsuckers). It is not calling Mom and Dad and finding out that Iowa has been in the 80s currently. It is not even the sunshine or the rain, after so many days without it.

They turned my heating off. That's what did it. When the landlord turns off the heat, it's time to be cold. Luckily, I learned to layer this autumn. It's time to go back to layering pajamas. Soon I'll be able to not do it, but it must be done for now.

I'd like to nap. There's nothing more I'd like to do than curl up in my comforter and sleep for an hour or so, but when I do that, my body adjusts to the new temperature, and it takes so long to get it regulated again.

Sigh. Until then, I have a lot of things that need doing. It's strange how much grading and homework can build up on itself, and the feeling of accomplishment goes away as soon as it comes. Ah well.

A little about behind the scenes

I'm feeling lots better after this weekend- maybe it was the mindless 4 hour session of Civ IV, which was nice, or maybe it's that I do feel better and am far less sick than I supposed, or maybe it's that I'm almost caught up in grading, which will be a feeling gone come next Wednesday.

Adam and I had a talk about last year's teachers and this year's teachers. Our students mention that we seem more serious than last year's teachers- I can't say for certain whether this is true or not. But all teachers put so much time in our lesson plans- there's not a lot of free time during the week. We all assign homework, which means we have to grade it. (I assign quizzes, which mean I have to grade them. This semester I have assigned projects and homework). We are constantly working on lesson plans, sometimes having planned them weeks in advance. And I'm constantly running around for so many materials because they are scare in my audio-visual and survey course, that I feel breathless by the end of the day.

Adam was talking about creating his own course book. I'm tempted to steal his notes- they're quite useful, and we're all trying to prepare them as best we can into what they're supposed to learn.

Adam and Will teach their writing students about different types of writing: Argumentative Essays, Narrative Essays, (I'm forgetting a type), and Research Paper. They're also teaching resumes, paragraphs, and trying to transition the students from paragraphs to papers. It's a hard task, and I don't envy them for it. The two of them have it down to an art.

Ann and Ben teach their Reading and Listening students how to read, too. The biggest challenge in reading is teaching the kids to not stop when they see a new word. Sometimes you get so focused on those words (when you study a foreign language) that you loose the meaning and the structure of the sentence. In our own languages, we teach our children to learn this skill, of guessing words and skipping them over- it's called "context clues". It helps.

In their listening, it's become more and more like my audio-visual class last semester, practicing things like context questions, fill-in-the blank, and trying to discern accents from one another.

For myself, I sadly do not share any classes with them. Instead, I have the Survey Course, which I have to pound 5 countries into a 16-week semester (cry), and the audio-visual, which I thought will focus more on culture, accent, and history than before. There will still be listening. There will still be context clues. But I want to talk about culture differences. "The Office" was a great way to observe this.

Even though I'm repeating the same class, I'm teaching an additional 120 students with it, and that means longer grading hours. I'm not about to stop the quizzes, though, because I'm here for the students benefit. I'm going to keep assigning homework because it helps them- I see this now, as I'm on the opposite end of the student-teacher spectrum.

My sophomores have called me the strictest teacher they have ever had. Good. I'm strict because they need to learn. (My audio-visual classes don't need the same strictness, but I've also told people they can turn off cell phones or leave). I'm strict, not because I want to be (that is a plus), but because there isn't any time for nonsense.

That's just not their nonsense, though. That's mine. Earlier in February I was poking around the internet and I found a flight back home for about $1000 round-trip. I thought about how much fun it would be to poke around for about a week and to return home. I thought about how much fun it would be to bring back snacks to share with the students. I could bring back cheese or jello for the people here. I could spend time with ~Daisy~.

But they were only fantasies. I wouldn't dream of taking a week off this semester unless I was ill or hospitalized. It's unfair to the students. Each week is precious, each hour we spend in class helps them. Each assignment is designed to help them understand something.

I'm not sure if I could write a book, but certainly, I would love to pass on the lesson plans. I'm curious to know if next year's teachers will be as serious about teaching as we are when we came. We arrived, settled in, and right from the get-go made lesson plans, planning our semesters, homework assignments and new that we were here to work. And I'm glad for that- I enjoy being able to plan, to grade, even if it is mind-numbing and time-consuming.

Tuesday

(This update was meant to be posted Tuesday)

Today my fever broke, which meant I could go to class. I'm still weak, but I can eat. And i think i've found some dirt that resembles mouse droppings while cleaning, but it was either very old or just dirt as it fell apart when sweeping it up, and it was by its lonesome. Still, i'm going to keep cleaning, and try and organize my food better. It is no fun being sick, currently because I worry about 8 hours of teaching tomorrow and what'll happen Thusday.

Sent from my iPod

Sickness

I'm going to blame Clare for this, since all children in my family are sick, including me. I'm just glad I don't have class today.

So though yesterday was a keyboard-searching adventure with Tim, today is lay around and hope I'll feel better tomorrow.

Little Mermaid

I have lost my voice. Or more, my voice has been severely strained this weekend, and I don't think sleeping helps.

On Wednesday, I think I've been pushing my voice incorrectly- from the throat, not from my diaphragm, and this causes it to be sore on Thursday. Normally I retreat to my room Thursdays for this reason, and come out in the afternoon or the evening, keeping my thoughts to myself (though it is hard). On Friday, I lecture again for four hours instead of the Wednesday eight, but when I have an exciting day, I normally keep talking. Well, perhaps it was the project, or perhaps it was the class assignment, or perhaps it was the friend I was talking to on skype who stole my voice, but on Saturday I woke up and I had no voice.

It's been feeling raspy, and I think the dryness of the air is not helping me any. So I will have to figure out something. I have a very small voice now, but it is low, raspy, and I'd rather not use it until it absolutely needs to be used.

Hot Plates and Kettles

Today there was a purchase of two electronic items: A hot plate and a pan, and an electric kettle that boils water. One of them was for me. I'm trying to at healthier. Most of my meals here have been eating out, and while it is tasty, it is only recently where I've tried to cut back on the amount of food I eat (which means, unfortunately, that some of the food I order has to go to waste). Inherently I dislike wasting food, so the only solution is to cook my own. And who knows, maybe I'll start eating breakfast again if I do.

The electric kettle, however, was a gift for Will and Tamir, who have gotten their own apartment off campus. It's not a bad set-up. It's smaller than our apartments and it reeks of new paint and paint thinner (they had to paint the apartment and clean it well). Ann and I decided to get them a welcoming gift, and while I originally suggested a bear, we decided to get them a gift they could actually use and would actually want. And a hot water kettle, that boils water to make it safe, is a great thing to use.

It's actually no longer strange getting water from jugs. It's no longer strange that I must ration my water every day, or that I need to boil it first. It's not strange that my plugs need to be more full than stuffed peppers or that the chords are tearing apart. My tolerance for these things has grown, despite how dangerous or annoying they are.

But Will and Tamir did a good job, I thought, in cleaning- it was enough to make my Aunts pleased (with cleaning, not with decoration), which is saying something. Will still has a beer bottle sized hole in his wall that leads to the outside, and he's not sure what to do with that. I don't know what to tell him other than "stick a beer bottle in there and hang stuff from it", ensuring that I will never be an interior decorator.

The other thing that's been happening is that I caught two students plagiarizing on their first assignment of "Tell me about your hometown". However, since I could do another post explaining how this does not automatically kick them out of school, I will shorten it to today, I had to refuse requests to do the paper over. I will not, because there is more than one and to allow one is to be unfair to the others, and it isn't an assignment that will damage their grade. It could be the deal breaker, but it is unlikely. One student is so upset, and I know he is a good kid, but I refuse to bend the rules.

This paints me, I know, as strict. The students are no longer afraid of me (they realize I have a sense of humor, even if they don't understand it), but they do respect my strictness when the need calls for it. Me, Mr. Laser, and Mr. Red Pen of Zero make an excellent team of humor and respect. I need them to pay attention and learn with everything I got, because somewhere in the back of my mind I think, "You are not qualified to teach them about this".

And yet I still do, so there's that.