Christmas post

圣诞节快乐 bloggers! (That means Merry Christmas) I know it's not exactly Christmas but since I'm not sure what my schedule looks like for Christmas yet... I'll post as usual and if I can get online on Christmas, I'll post another message for you all. But the internet here isn't always the most reliable. It shuts off randomly to prevent students from using it. So last week was crazy and Charity Concert rehearsals are absolutely chaotic. The director said that if he sees even the slightest problem with any pieces, he'll pull them from the show. Ummm yea talk about pressure! Luckily he wanted me to perform more than he wanted my students to look good... so we're performing whether we're performance ready or not... Time to kick my students' butts into shape! I had another student who has had professional singing training help my singer since I can't sing and therefore can't teach her. I worked with my student who I'm dancing with and hopefully everything will be good.

 

On Friday I had a foreign teachers' Christmas dinner. It was entertaining to see all the administrators from the various campuses wasted! I told one administrator who didn't speak much English that if I get drunk I can't talk to him in Chinese and we won't be able to talk. So he helped me escape from drinking that night. He told everyone who tried to spike my drink without me looking that he would "GanBei" them, which means that they have to finish their glass out of respect to him. It's nice to have people high up :) I had a ridiculous vocabulary lesson though... He kept teaching me words that I couldn't say >.< It was a great night regardless and I'm glad I was able to converse with someone with my limited Chinese.

On Saturday I went hiking at 9am. It was FREEZING! But also really fun. The entire hike took a couple of hours and then I went to lunch at Parc 66, took a nap at Cafe 89, and went to dinner at Parc 66 again. I was out all day and it was AWESOME! Normally I get bored staying at home so finding places in town where I can feel comfortable enough to just hang out in all day... it's like being a cast member of Friends and just sitting in Central Perk all the time! I have two cafes that I hang out in now... Cafe 89 on FuRongJie and T House near ShanDong Normal University. The staff speaks no English so it forces me to practice my Chinese. 

On Sunday I ran around town doing a bunch of errands. I finished my Christmas cards for my Chinese friends and started working on the cards for my foreign colleagues. It was a very productive day but today is where it gets FUN!

This week is Christmas week, which brings a lot of scheduling issues. Tutoring and club/activity time are cancelled for the week. Today (Monday) is the IC Christmas party for students. Each foreign teacher is paired up with a class. Of course Giles and I combined our classes so that all of A-Level 12s are together instead of class 18 with me and 19 with Giles. Byron and Angela (our Chinese co-teachers) left the entire thing up to us because we were (and by that I mean I was) so excited to be celebrating Christmas with them :D 

On Tuesday (Christmas eve) and Wednesday (Christmas day) we have classes as usual. We were supposed to have those days off but our schedule changed last week so that we're working. Thursday the foreign teachers have the option to take a holiday because the students have a national exam on Friday so they'll be doing self-study all day Thursday... I don't really get that day off because I have Charity Concert rehearsal on the stage. So I don't have to go all the way to work but I do have to go to the stage. Friday we have to come into work but we don't have classes. Saturday, if you're not in the concert you have regular classes. If you are in the concert, you have dress rehearsal at 7am... So That's meeeee, dress rehearsal 7am. The concert starts at 1 and ends at 3 (Saturday is supposed to be our go home at 12:30 day but we get an extended day because of this concert).

Here's where the fun starts: Sunday... This starts a new week with two possibilities for schedules. Possibility 1: We work full days Sunday and Monday with normal classes (not sure if it'll be a short or long week schedule yet). Then on Tuesday students get a half day and the staff stays late to celebrate the new year during which I have to perform during the faculty talent show (so yes we're at school more than 12 hours). With this possibility, we get January 1-5 off and start a new week January 6. Possibility 2: We have a half day of work Sunday, which will really be the faculty celebration since the students won't come in at all (again this is where I might perform). Then we have off Monday-Wednesday and then work a 10-day work week starting Thursday. So full days normal classes January 2-Januray 11. Either way, we need to make up those days we take off for the New Year. It will be a rough few weeks! I'll be sure to update you when I know what my schedule looks like. Until then... Laters!

I'm on time!

Ni Hao bloggers! :D Here’s the update!

I last left you on Thursday, a bit late on my part sorry about that. But here’s what happened on Friday… So I finished teaching my dance to my student and now all we have to do is clean it up. She’s not great at dancing but she’s trying really hard so I’m enjoying working with her (most days). After work I went to the gym with Giles and Jeremiah to go work on my solo for the faculty party. I didn’t have the studio to myself but it still felt amazing to be on a dance floor again. I worked on my leaps and had a few Chinese women try to imitate me…. That was awkward. Then we went out to eat at a really really delicious restaurant.

Saturday I had to work because it’s a long week. So I went about my business and decorated the bulletin board. Then after work I went to RT Mart (like Walmart but better and cheaper). I picked up a ton of snacks, both for my students and myself. I worked a little on my Christmas cards for my office and friends. It was pretty low key because I mean really, when you have to work but have no classes, you have no stories.

Sunday I finished my Christmas shopping! Yayyyyyy I also had an awesome experience speaking Chinese :D :D I talked with a guy who asked me in Chinese if I was Chinese and when I said no, he asked me where I was from. I said America and he continued to argue with me, “No you must be Chinese!” It was really funny because I don’t have a great vocab base but I know how to say that I am not Chinese and I only speak a little Chinese. He complimented me on my accent saying that I sounded like I was from Shan Dong. Well I would hope so since everyone I’m learning Chinese from is also from Shan Dong. Except Liu Jun. He’s from Shang Hai and speaks Shang Hai Hua. Anyway after shopping I went home and played a little DS then went to dinner and ate amazing dumplings. Overall it was a pretty fun weekend, even if we only had 24 hours.

This week is a short week, which means that we get both Saturday AND Sunday off. Woooooo! But then the week after that is an extended long week. Which means that we WORK both Saturday AND Sunday. Then we go into a short week. So really what it means is that we’re working 14 straight days in a row. At least it’s not 12 hour days like I’ve been pulling for the last week >.< I hate staying here late. They shut off the heat once the sun goes down. You’d think that common sense would tell them that we need heat MORE when the sun goes down. But nope. Frozen! Oh well. I’ll be sure to keep you updated :) Until then… Laters!

Wahhhh So late!

Hey bloggers, Sorry for the late reply but as it so happens, the Christmas/New Year season is upon us. That means extra busy schedules. You know how it is… So here’s the update:

Monday-Wednesday… Uhhh to be honest, I don’t really remember much from that long ago. So much happened on Thursday though :) So Tony walks into my office and tells me that I’m working with a student to dance for the New Year Charity concert. SWEET! So excited to be performing again! But of course this girl doesn’t come find me to talk to me until Thursday night, when one of her friends whom I asked to help me track her down, literally drags her to me. I’m headed off to tutoring session and he comes dragging this poor girl to me in the hallway. So we talk and she’s like yea let’s do it! So I spend all weekend choreographing the dance. Then I discover that there a girl who’s supposed to be playing the piano for us to dance to while still another girl is singing… Um HELLO?! Where was this information last week?! Yea non-existent. I asked the girls, “Do you know how hard it is to dance to live music? This is ridiculous.” So then the girl playing the piano said, “I will try to learn the song.” So I get her the sheet music for the song that I choreographed to and she comes back to talk to me Monday night saying, “This song is not very suitable for the piano. It sounds not good and I think we should play something classical.” Then she plays a song for me… Ok I’ll admit she played beautifully to the classical music but if she plays that, we’d have to change the dance and the singer would be out because there aren’t any classical pieces that she can sing. Oh and did I forget to mention that the girl who is dancing with me has three lessons of modern dance experience? And she wanted me to choreograph ballet for her… Um yea… Not only am I NOT qualified to choreograph ballet, YOU HAVE NO DANCE EXPERIENCE, GIRLFRIEND! This is not going to be an easy task. So I make the dance way way WAY easier for her and she still doesn’t know how to count to music so I do the #1 thing I was trained not to do: choreograph to the lyrics. AWFUL! Absolutely horrendous. But whatever. These are kids who watch wayyyy too many movies and expect to learn a dance and be performance ready within an hour of watching me do the dance. She doesn’t even try to dance while I’m dancing. She just watches it and says, “I will practice when you’re not looking”…. NO NO NO NO NO!!!!!!! That’s not how this works! So it’s been three rehearsal days. I stayed late and took the 7:30pm bus home Monday-Wednesday so that we could rehearse as much as possible. She’s looking better but is still having a hard time with moving fluidly. Today (Thursday) we didn’t practice at all because the students had tests all day. I have until the 20^th to get her performance ready. I’m gonna need a miracle! I hope I can keep you updated as time goes on but time seems to be moving faster than I can run. Until then…Laters.

Hello December!

Hey hey bloggers! Are you ready for the next entry in the craziness that is China? Well here it is…

Last week was the most stressful week by far since I got here. Somewhere around 2-3 weeks ago the director of the school went to our librarian and asked if the foreign teachers could prepare a Thanksgiving dinner for the IC staff. That’s about 80 people. None of us had ever cooked for that many people before so we were all like uhhhh no…. But of course, like drinking (yes as in alcohol), if you refuse, you could be considered scum of the earth. So we all chose a dish to prepare for Thanksgiving. I chose decorations because, let’s face it, I can’t cook. So the senior 3s were supposed to help us prep the meal for the faculty so that we could partake in this “cultural sharing experience.” But then the point got brought up, “Why are the students helping us to cook when they won’t get to eat? The faculty should help us cook if they’re gonna be the ones eating.” So of course that blows up in our faces and the admin says, “great idea! You do two dinners! One on Friday with/for the students and one on Saturday with/for the staff.” Crap now we’re stuck doing two… Did I mention that by doing these dinners, we’re staying late at school? We stayed 2 hours past normal bus time home on Friday and 6 hours past normal bus time on Saturday… There went our weekend. So anyway, we start prepping for these dinners by telling the students what to bring from their hometown: cranberry sauce, spices, etc. All the students complained because they’re providing all the supplies for a dinner they didn’t ask to be a part of. Some of the ingredients, especially for 150+ people, can be upwards of 600 yuan (about 100 USD). Would you ever ask your students to provide $100 worth of stuff for other people? Probably not… but here in China, it’s the norm. 

So two weeks ago I started working on the decorations. I had an idea of what I wanted in my head but I was having a hard time making that a reality since there was a lot of prep that needed to happen and I was running out of time. I ended up delegating some of the work to a few students, who by the way, MESSED IT ALL UP! I ended up having to throw away half of what they made because it wasn’t at all even close to what I had directed them to do. So I ended up doing 90% of the work myself. Technically I had to redo some of what they “undid” so I was pissed off. I stayed up until 11pm every night after work doing those stupid decorations. Then some students fell through on what they were supposed to bring in terms of supplies so I ended up going and getting them myself or asking Jeremiah for help in finding some of the supplies. Thank God for Jeremiah because he helped me out so much when I was so stressed that I wouldn’t get it all done in time. I even started crying in front of him, which I’ll admit is a bit embarrassing. Anyway, it all ended up working out. Every table had a tissue paper turkey, some tinsel, paper leaves with teachers’ names on it, and some tea candles. It was EXACTLY how I had imagined the table would look before I lost hope and started adjusting my decoration plans. It was totally worth it but during the week I was sleep deprived, a little delirious, and so sick of looking at my decorations. I ended up throwing everything away. Some of the teachers took my tissue paper turkeys home because they loved them so much and I was glad to be rid of them! So that’s my story… let’s see what some of the other stories were from my coworkers….

Every American teacher took a group of students to prepare a dish. Once the students got to the cafeteria they were pretty excited to get started. We all told them that they needed to wash their hands before starting to work with the food and every single one of them asked, “why?” It was gross when they told us why that was weird to them… apparently washing their hands with the water that comes out of the school’s sink taps puts more bacteria on their hands than not washing their hands at all! But they washed their hands regardless and started helping out. There were one or two mini food fights and students sampling every single food there was (even raw foods that should not be eaten raw). When I was done decorating I walked over to where the students were mixing what looked like cranberry sauce and one of my students grabbed a piece of bread, dipped it in the sauce, and said, “Chelsey! Try this it’s awesome!” Then he held it in front of my mouth like he wanted to feed it to me. I was like, “AHHHH NO THANKS!” Then he did it to his Chinese teacher (female) who let him feed her. CHINA IS SO WEIRD! He fed a few other girls in his class and I just watched in disbelief. I would never let a student feed me, let alone a male student! Weirdddddddd. I think all in all the students had a great time. We had turkey (that tasted more like duck than turkey), stuffing, mashed potatoes, corn, something that was green (maybe mushed beans?) cranberry sauce, yams, pumpkin pie, apple crisp, and apple cider. It didn’t taste like America, but it was close enough.

The next night it was the faculty dinner and pretty much the same deal happened. It was like not-so-instant replay. The only difference between this prep time and last prep time was that the faculty chose to wear gloves while prepping the food IN REPLACEMENT OF washing their hands…… yea in America, we do both. So gross! The teachers also sampled EVERYTHING while preparing the food. The faculty really didn’t have as great of a time as the students and I think that was because they were giving up their time off of work to do it whereas the students were getting out of class to do it. So Saturday wasn’t as much fun but the food was still good and my decorations were AWESOME!

Unfortunately we only had one day off this week and I was EXHAUSTED. I was so frustrated that we were required to stay late on both Friday AND Saturday. They didn’t even really give us an option. They just said, yes you are doing it. So now I’m back at work and half falling asleep. On the plus side, the senior 3s I don’t teach are now saying hi to me and adding me on wechat :D New friends to teach me more Chinese! Yay! I think this week will feel boring compared to the stress of last week but I’m moving on to the joy of Christmas planning. December 28 is the school concert and I was just asked to dance in it! They’re trying to get students to dance in it but so far only singing and instruments are scheduled. I hope I can get students to dance with me! I don’t want to do a solo. I’m also making stocking cards for my officemates. The crafts never stop here in the counseling office! I’ll be sure to keep you updated as the week goes on. Until then…Laters!