Beautiful Things in Small Packages

Is there anything more beautiful than hearing a baby laugh? This is Kira mid laugh, such a beautiful sound!

Beautiful things come in small packages. Like this precious baby girl I got to dote upon last Saturday. Or the children of my City director. Those four boys kept me and my teammates in stitches. Children really do brighten up your day.

Another beautiful thing that came in a small package was a letter from home. I got a family photo sent to me, and several hand written letters from my family members. Getting that small package was such a joy.

Yet another beautiful thing that comes in a small package is Hot Chocolate. The weather is turning cooler here and hot chocolate in the evening makes things all cozy and just right. It is very cold in the morning, warm to almost hot in the day and then cool in the evening. I was kindly told by an office mate to make sure I wear layers, because people get sick a lot during this time of the year due to the major shifts in temperatures. It is so sweet how much my students and co-workers care about my health. I have had students tell me to wear a sweater in the afternoons because of how cool it gets. It is so precious.
I love how my students light up when they see me walking. Their precious cries of "Hello Miss Hilary! Hello teacher!" make my day! 
Beautiful things come in small packages, and half the fun is looking for them.
<3

Lessons in Culture

I am halfway through my week and I have had several cultural life lessons already. I love my job and this life!

Culture Lesson number 1:
Today started out like any other. I got up, showered, ate a small breakfast and got ready for a day of teaching. I had on heeled shoes, pants and a white t shirt with the blue scarf my dear friend from Nebraska got me for my birthday. I stepped outside and realized it was gloomy and a bit cool. Not so cool that I needed a jacket, but the pants was a much better choice than a skirt. I debated for about 5 seconds with myself whether or not I should go and get my umbrella just in case the heavens decided to open up and pour down rain. The idea of having to go back up 5 flights of stairs, in heels, for an umbrella  helped me decide to risk it. I then headed off to my office to plug in some office hours.
Chinese culture is extremely interesting to me. They never say sorry if you bump in to somone, or bless you if someone sneezes or coughs, but they will ask the most peculiar questions and not think it strange or forward. Example:
I get to my office and one of my office mates is in there. We greet each other and as I sit down to work on some stuff, she casually asks me "Hilary, did you eat breakfast?"
I internally paused at such a personal if not intimate question, or so it would be in the West.
I replied that I had a yogurt in my apartment with coffee and that I rarely ate breakfast anymore and that was the end of that conversation.

Culture lesson number 2:
Fast forward to after class. Class is over and I step outside, only to discover it is now raining. UUGH!
I take my scarf and wrap it like someone from India would to protect my hair. Half way to the dining hall I hear, "Teacher Teacher!" I turn to see one of my students running up to me with her friends. They crowd around me and one of them holds an umbrella over me. This is the custom here, they take care of their foreign teachers. When I told them I was going to a different dining hall, my student called out to a friend that was walking past and had him walk me to the dining hall I wanted because he had an umbrella. This boy did not know me, but did as his friend said all because I was her teacher. I was very touched by the gesture.

Culture lesson number 3:
My last class of the day was an English Corner which ended at 5pm. As I stepped outside, I realized the temperature had dropped quite a bit. It was now about 50 F with a nice cool breeze making it feel like 45 to my t shirt clad self. As I was walking to my apartment I passed two older ladies. The older of the two, while approaching me, looked me up and down and slightly shook her head and said something to her friend in Chinese. As they passed me, the older lady stopped in front of me, said several sentences to me in Chinese while pinching my bare arms and looking at me expectantly. I quickly gathered from her tone and the light pinching on my arm that she was asking where my coat was. I motioned to the apartment complex and she shook her head and said some more things in Chinese to me while shaking her finger at me. Then she walked away. In reality, this exchange took mere seconds, but the meaning was heard loud and clear. Despite the language barrier, I understood I just got scolded by a granny for not having enough clothes on. I am almost 90% sure the first thing she said was "Why are you not wearing a coat you crazy foreigner? We don't want you to get sick and die!" This is very common actually. The older folk here will come up to you and see if you are wearing enough clothing in the winter. And if they feel that you do not have enough to keep you warm, they will kindly scold you like I was today.

Cultural Lesson number 4:
I was at lunch with B and Hannah. I had hot noodles and a iced tea. As I was eating my noodles, I reach and go to take a sip of my iced tea. B take the tea out of my hand and says "No, you can't drink that! It is cold, your food is hot. Here I brought you clear broth, drink that." (At lunch they serve clear broth for free to go with your meals. I learn why in a few seconds.) I give Hannah a strange look and then ask B why I cannot drink my cold drink with my hot soup. She patiently tells me, the stupid foreigner "Because if you do your stomach will explode." Apparently Chinese have this thing about hot and cold things, you have to balance the hot and cold in your body but you shouldn't drink hot and eat something cold or visa versa. Internally I am laughing, but because B is a dear friend and I know she has my best interest at heart, I listen to her and eat my noodles and drink the broth she had gotten for me. After I finished my noodles she gave me my tea back.

All of these instances were very important cultural lessons. It is nothing in China to ask questions like so, scold someone you don't know for not wearing a coat, walk with a complete stranger and share an umbrella or take a cold drink away from a friend who is eating hot food. All of these are ways they show they care about someone and very good lessons for me. I seriously love it here.
Peace,
Hil

You are going to feel like my stories threw up on you...

 Emily and I at KTV!

 Worlds best Garlic Grilled Cheese and Tomato Sandwich.

 View of the path I take to my office. My School Is BEAUTIFUL!

Dear Readers,

I really must apologize for being such a truant blogger. In penance, you get two posts. Granted, the one post was about last weekend but still. You are most likely going to feel like I threw up a bunch of stories on you, but my brain is fried.

Today’s post is about my first week of classes and my first week as a TEACHER!!!

For all who really know me, and how I used to swear up and down that I would never teach, feel free to laugh away. I absolutely LOVE teaching. Granted it is not always easy, I have to keep reminding myself that my lesson plans are my friends, but I do enjoy it.

My first week of classes went well. The first class was a bit rough. Not horrible, but not the most amazing thing ever. By Wednesday, I was getting the hang of things. My students appear to be sweet young people. I actually wake up every day at 6am excited about teaching. (Ok fine, that doesn’t actually happen until the caffeine has hit my blood stream, but If I wasn’t dependent on it, I would be excited first thing. I am just not a morning person. Lol)

It is pure music to my ears to hear variations of “Hello Teacher”. I am teaching 6 classes in a week. Each class period is an hour and fifteen minutes long. And then twice a week in the evenings I direct hour and a half long English Corners which are basically less structured Classes. In the English corners I get to make up the curriculum and I have a mixture of students.  All in all, I only have 2 preps to do because the classes are all the same for the same level and the English corners are also the same.

I already have a favorite class. (is that bad?) They are my last class on Tuesday (I have three and by that time, I am almost half dead). They are my smallest class, but the funniest. They all crack me up and seem to adore me.

I got to go to KTV this past weekend. For those who do not know what it is, KTV is karaoke. there were 3 mics but almost everyone sang with the songs. I sang two songs...both with other people helping...one was an Adel song that I could actually hit the notes on.

On the way back from KTV, our Chinese friend B was walking with Hannah and I. In China, it is common to see girls walking together holding hands or linked arms. We were being very Chinese and walking arm in arm. I found I like this custom, especially when walking around in the dark. It is comforting to know your friends are on either side of you. While walking down dark side streets to get back to campus, B turns to me and says "Hilary, tell me some American Ghost Stories". At first I was shocked (that was not what I was expecting to hear on a walk in the dark), but then I started telling the scariest one in my repertoire. B ate it up! The entire time, Hannah was shooting me looks of "what the heck are you doing?" Honestly, I had no clue. Even though I knew my own stories, I was starting to scare myself. It was great fun! When I finished telling all my stories, we no longer wanted to walk on the dark sidewalk and started to walk faster to campus.lol

Walking across campus with our big group, I realized something was on my foot...It was GUM! Needless to say I shrieked. Everyone stopped and saw me hopping around like an idiot. It was mushed inside my flip flop. How the heck I got gum INSIDE my FLIP FLOP, I have no clue. China Lesson number 7: Do not wear Flip Flops when walking around China in the Dark, you might get gum inside and all over your foot.

After the gum fiasco, I had a fit of major slap happiness. I then went up to my room and started researching more ghost stories for an up coming English Corner. I got pretty creeped out and my dear friend Hannah let me crash on her couch for the night. That was when I discovered what a great bed our couches make! I had the best night sleep ever! Beds here are kinda firm, not something I am used to. (I wake up sore a lot) So the next day, I slept on my couch. Not only did I sleep really good, but I woke up with no fresh bug bites. Yes, it is not uncommon to wake up in the morning with unexplainable bites on your arms. I had about 10 little red bites on my elbow. Kinda creepy. Bed bugs? I am not quite sure. Don't think I want to know. As long as some spider/ bug isn't laying eggs in my brain, eating me from the inside out or lice playing in my hair, I don't want to know. I can deal with some bites. I have cream for that.

For a very happy note, I have been able to cook in my apartment! I have had 4 successful cooking adventures. I have made yummy cookies, baked asparagus, sauteed veggies, made a tasty meat and potatoes dish, and made the worlds best grilled cheese and tomato sandwich!

Anyways, it is late, I have office hours, a class to teach, meeting to attend and an English Corner to instruct. Tomorrow is going to be busy, But I get Thursday OFF!!! Completely OFF! I am so happy.

I promise to be more faithful in blogging. Thank you for putting up with my randomness and discombobulated and possibly incorrect grammar. I plead the fact that I taught a lot today and my brain is mush.

Peace and Love!

Lessons from China

Written on 9-2-12

I wanted to wait until the weekend festivities were over till I wrote this new blog. This week was packed full of things. We met our departments, saw our offices, got our books, and made our first lesson plan. It was not all work though. We had a lot of fun also. Friday, Saturday and Sunday were filled with fun stuff. I shall section them off as best I can.

Friday was payday! Much rejoicing was heard on the campus. We get paid at the end of every month and I am learning how to budget here. It will be different than back at home, but I shall adjust.  After we were paid, we made copies of things needed for our classes and had lunch. Again, the cafeteria chairs attempted at dumping me out onto the floor, but I won. I went to a station I had not yet been to and ordered something random. I was not sure what it was (and I am still not sure) but all I know was that it was DELICIOUS! It was some kind of wrap made on a grill and it was so tasty. After we all ate lunch, our huge group of 14 got on the above ground subway and began our venture to the promise land, aka Wal-Mart. Once we got to Wal-Mart we paired off so we could all share buggies (that is a shopping cart for all my northern readers…apparently I say soda pop, which is odd to some of my teammates as well).

Anyway, first thing on my list was school supplies. I found out quickly that China does not have note/index cards! Nor do they have good old Clorox Bleach. I was able to get dry erase markers for my kitchen (the walls are tile so I have been writing on them), toilet bowl cleaner, a good pillow that isn’t moldy and a new bright shower curtain. What I dislike about shopping in a new place is that, even though I have a list, I forget about it and get distracted at all the different things and new layout.  The Wal-Mart was huge. Their produce section was one to be envied! I wanted to buy so much, but once I got there I didn’t know what to get. After we finished our shopping, we took our haul back to our campus. It was quite a scene to haul all of that on a subway.

Once I placed my purchases inside my apartment, I was informed that a group was going to a small suburb (Zhongshan) for dinner. It was stated that there was this chicken dish that was incredibly close to American style fried chicken. Being the foodie that I am, I was intrigued and went along with. We have this saying in our group that goes with hand motions. We say expectation and show a hand up above our head, and then we say reality and put another hand much lower to designate the huge difference between said expectation and reality. When people are feeling down about their expectation/reality conflict I will stick my hand in the space in the middle and exclaim “PANDA” or “SQUIRREL” just to add my flair or randomness and to get them to smile. My expectation of this chicken dish was medium to low. I was not willing to get my hopes up too high and be disappointed. Culinary experiences for me are my favorite thing so far about living in China, but I have had some disappointing ones and I did not want this experience to be like that. We ordered our chicken dish and it arrived promptly. On my plate was three pieces of fried chicken with some sauce on it, a small thing of “coleslaw” and rice. I ate the coleslaw first because I dislike it at home, but this one was amazing!!!!!!  The rice was warm and buttery, something that reminded me of winter days back at home. Then I attacked my chicken. These pieces of chicken were moist and crunchy. The sauce was something like honey mustard. They were all white meat breast pieces. I cannot even begin to express how amazing this dish was. The reality blew my expectations out of the water. 

After we ate, we were allowed to wander and go shopping with instructions that the school gates closed at 11pm. We broke off into small groups and wandered up and down the side streets of Zhongshan.

Saturday:

On Saturday we went to Zhongdon where an indoor market was. We went with some students from our school who are also Brothers and Sisters. The ride to the Market was one I will never forget. When we were in Beijing, we took the bus system almost everywhere and it was no big deal. The bus system here however is a very different animal. The buses are smaller and the driving is scarier. We crammed into a bus and started our journey. It was bumpy, halting and fear inducing. I was so happy to be off that bus. When we all safely arrived at the Market, we were split up into groups. There were three male students, so they just went with our three guys. The girls split themselves up amongst our group.  Hannah and I paired up with a sweet girl name Bridge. She was a marvel at bargaining. She did all of the inquiring for us. I was able to get a phone, SIM card and a hair dryer at decent prices. She also introduced us to different kinds of food. I tried tofu noodles, an interesting snack, but not one I will ever have again if I can help it.  

When we got back from shopping and put our items away, I was invited to play ultimate Frisbee. Never one to turn down an opportunity to play a sport, I was outside in a flash. The game was going well until the very end. I was getting ready to catch a point making Frisbee when someone on the opposing team hit the Frisbee right into my neck. Correction, it was my trachea. It hit me pretty hard, so hard I got the wind knocked out of my throat. Or at least that is what it felt like. I couldn’t breathe for a few seconds, but I was fine after a minute. It just hurt to swallow for the rest of the day.

Lesson number 6 in China, don't catch a Frisbee with your throat.

I am posting another blog in a few minutes that is more up to date. I do apologize for my tardy blogging.