Yesterday was the last day of the semester. We did our performances for the parents. No riches, though. I was under the impression that that's what teaching was about -- the full collection of "Teacher of the Year" mugs. Anyway, the performances went kind of well. I had to rewrite Cinderella, as only about half of the class showed up. Yes, they have big tests now, but can't you let the teacher know about that *before* you take the role of Fairy Number 4? Fortunately, the other kids were sports and filled in. My non-talking four year old was pretty good. She didn't get to the "play teacher" part (the part she couldn't do to save her life), since I pulled her chair out from under her and she fell down and then refused to leave her mother's lap. Good move on my part.
On the way home I picked up Charlie's Angels II and stopped in the store that sells brandy, but they were out. "Ni you brandy ma?" "Mei you." "Mei you?" "Mei you." "Mei you brandy?" "Mei you." "[whiny sound]" The guy suggested putting the local fire water into a bottle of wine, but that struck me as ridiculously disgusting. I found a local liquor made from something-berries. I forget the name. I've never seen them in America, but it was drinkable.
Summer intensive classes start on Wednesday. Until today, mine were set to start on Thursday, but apparently there weren't enough students of a certain age, so they cancelled that class and scheduled an older teen class in its place and moved it up a day. Not cool. So now, I have to plan for a very advanced class and I have one less day to do so.
One of my teenage students came in to meet his teacher. His name is Michael. He was unable to ask me any questions. HM was with him and repeated my query and he said in Chinese that he was unable to ask them. Are foreign teachers really that scary? I feel like I can't ever place kids in classes, because I have no way of knowing how well they speak.
I asked HM about getting our TV fixed, so she will be sending over someone this afternoon. Right now, Jenna and I are hitting it with a shoe to keep the screen from going black. It did the black screen of death thing when Jenna was showing her class a movie and the boys all got up to fix it, as only boys can do. She took a very 2001: A Space Odyssey, monkeys and obelisk picture of them (I haven't seen the movie, but I think that's it).
Her boys are pretty funny. I had two of them in my intensive class in the beginning of the semester: Skywolf and Ted. They were learning to write letters recently and Jenna had them write to a university they want to attend to request information. Ted's ran something like,
Ted
Zunyi
China
Harvard
Boston, Massachusetts
USA
Dear Harvard,
I am Ted. I am going to attend your school. I must live in the school because I am from Chinese. [something, something, i can't remember, but it was funny, something]
Yours faithfully,
Ted
"Dear Harvard, I am Ted." And really, doesn't that say it all?
Guiyang
Yesterday, Jenna and I went to Guiyang to visit Julian and Nick, and return Julian's Simpsons DVD. I am waiting for South Park to come out on DVD here, but I don't know if there is a market for it.
We left early in the morning. Jenna was good enough to wake me, as my alarm clock tends to strike me as a confusing annoyance, rather than something with meaning attached. We got to Guiyang and went to the school. Jenna yelled down the hall that the coast was clear, so I left the bathroom and joined her and Nick in the office. Nick asked her what the deal was and she said that I was avoiding TMIMW. Unfortunately, she said this in front of his daughter. Fortunately, the phrasing wasn't as damning as it could have been. She said that I was avoiding a lesson with him, so perhaps I just don't like lessons. Right... "perhaps," or rather, "lessons." We got lunch with Nick; he's leaving China soon, traveling through SE Asia, then back to England. He will be there for a few weeks, then he's coming back to SW China, to found the new branch of Interlingua in Kunming. Kunming is in Yunnan province, where corruption apparently isn't so bad. Guizhou is chock full of "fees." Also, Yunnan is supposed to be really beautiful and it borders Vietnam, Laos, and Burma, give or take a country or two.
After lunch with Nick (his treat), we went back to the school (Jenna announced that the coast was clear) and met up with Julian. Then we set off for Qianlong(sp?) Park, which is really nice. It's on the north side of Guiyang and comprises several good-sized hills/small mountains, a large lake, a couple of ponds and a zoo that perhaps surpasses the Zunyi zoo in terms of ability to depress. Here we have one lion, one tiger, one jaguar, one bear, and one wild boar. They have two or three lions, and a tiger or two. But the cages in Zunyi are a bit bigger and they are more open, so there is more sunlight. There was a group of youngish men banging soda bottles on the rail that was in front of the cage where the lion was trying to sleep away his life, so I went up to them and said, "Hey." Ignored. Perhaps I was yelling at the lion. That seemed to be the order of the day. "Hey!" Nothing. Me in my limited Chinese, "He's very sad!" with a distressed expression on my face. They stopped and I hung out around the big cats to make sure they didn't resume. They didn't. Jenna yelled at them when they bothered the monkeys, but yelling foreigners tend to be sources of amusement, rather than deterrents.
After leaving the park we dropped the DVD off at Julian's and continued on to Shakey's Pizza for dinner. It was the first time in six months that I've had pizza and it was wonderful. MMmmm... Pizza.... It was actually decent stuff. The crust was well don and the cheese was plentiful. Then the three of us went to the tea house on the river. It's an old pagoda built on a bridge in the middle of the river and it sits by an old temple group. It's downright pleasant. So pleasant that we missed the last bus to Zunyi. We got to the station a little after 10p.m. and the taxi drivers told us the buses were all gone. Perhaps you remember the taxi drivers in Urumqi who told us the airport was open at 3a.m. They are not to be trusted. It would have been late to call anyone at the school for a place to stay, so we were either going to have to take a two-hour taxi ride or pay for a hotel. The drivers said it was 60RMB each, but we had to wait for two more passengers, or 100RMB each if we wanted to leave then. Of course there weren't any other passengers. Julian had stayed to help us in the bargaining and be there in case we decided to stay in Guiyang and the fellow he was talking to quietly offered to take us for 90 RMB each and said we could leave then. We really didn't feel like hanging around in Guiyang, and this driver was much less sketchy than the other driver, so we took him up on his offer. The other drivers were quite angry- I think ours must have been something of a scab, but we left then, he agreed not to smoke (though he tried when he thought we were asleep), and we made it home by 12:30a.m.
Other crazy stuff. Jenna is currently illegally in China. My old TA apparently did something wrong with the Z-visa form and it expired in May. Jenna just happened glance at it and noticed this. HM immediately called the police and reported what had happened. The official penalty is 200RMB a day beginning when the visa ended -- which would add up to 10,000RMB. Fortunately, I believe there will be an alternative, lower "fee" that we can pay to take care of things.
And the word on the English school downstairs: The guy who is running it is a former Interlingua employee who has written slanderous articles about the school in the paper. There's a picture of (presumably) the headmaster in the stairwell. He looks like such the Chinese Man, smoking, sitting back, sleazy, insufferable. I am currently accepting names for the soap opera.
Later that day...
I forgot to mention the teenage boy I evaluated this morning. Many of the kids here have never spoken to foreigners, so we are *really* scary. I can't imagine he was as bad as he seemed. He had finished high school and couldn't even tell me what he liked to study, plus he was sweating profusely. I told HM that I often have that effect on men. I attribute her not laughing to a language gap.
Last night or the night before last, a man was stabbed to death in Zunyi -- I think in the Old City (my neighborhood). Big trouble in little Chinatown. Drugs are a problem in SW China and apparently this town has a little coke problem. The guy didn't have enough money for the muggers, so they killed him. As one does.
Dinner's here. Gotta run.
I found my map of Zunyi that I bought here and, surprise, there is a Zunyi park. I'm not sure how to get there, since the map is pretty general, but I'll figure it out.
The Most Insufferable Man in the World came to Zunyi yesterday. He wanted to meet with me so we could discuss teaching and he could give me pointers. Back when I complained to him about one bad class, Jenna had told me not to talk to him if I could help it, but I thought, "Hey, it's just like cocktail party conversation. No one cares, no one remembers." Sometimes it's better just to bear the awkward silences. So, before dinner yesterday, he asked if I was available to sit down and talk after class. First of all, I had been testing students for the last two days, straight. The last thing I want to do is sit down with TMIMW for an interminable session where he imparts his wisdom unto me. And my mom was calling, so I got out of it. Then he asked if I wouldn't mind getting up early so I could meet with him at 8a.m. today before he left town. No. Again, the teaching thing. Mondays mornings are made to be slept through. He also asked me if I would move to the other city to teach there. I was like, "Before I even came to China, I asked to be placed in Zunyi. Absolulely not." I asked him why he would even ask me, and he said that there were more students in Guiyang. I think I mentioned before that there are two more teachers coming to Zunyi (Jenna is leaving in August), but I'm supposed to be spending part of my time tutoring, so hopefully having the three of us will work out. Now, I think I'm an okay teacher. And Julian, who is coming from Guiyang is a good teacher (and he threatened to quit if they made him stay in Guiyang), but Angel, who will be arriving in July is supposed to be really mediocre. I don't know why the said they would take him back. He taught here for a year, married a local girl, and then moved back to LA. His wife likes LA, but he likes China, so he asked the school if he could come back and teach for them and the school said "yes." Despite the fact that he is a mediocre teacher and tells the school that he will use the text book, but then doesn't. It's so dumb here. They don't like to say no, so they say yes and then go to the person who complained the longest ago and try to inconvenience that person, and then go down the line, inconveniencing everyone and not quite fulfilling the request the person had just made; all so they don't have to say no. As long as they don't try to inconvenience me, I have no problem with that.
There is construction going on on the second floor of this building for the Westpoint English School. How weird is that? I don't know if they are hoping to steal our students by making people think they have foreigners there (we're the only school in town with foreigners) or what. It's just weird. And how do they pick these names? There is a Cambridge English School and an Ivy League English School in town. Do you have to be a U.S. citizen to go to Westpoint? If not, how would you pay for it? Anyway, sketchy.
My brain isn't working. I'm off.