Here are a couple more photos. The first is of Bartholomew on top of my washing machine. The second is Bartholomew checking out the view. The third is the creepy elephant that is saying, "The bathroom switches are here, you idiot!" At least that is what I think he is trying to say. He is creepy. I had asked for my landlord people to take it down, but I guess that might have gotten lost in translation, perhaps. I hope so. I can't seem to get it off the wall without taking lots of paint with me. I'll take any suggestions. He's going to be covered up by something soon, I hope!
Today was a fun day at school. We had a meeting about having a fire drill. This school has been running for over two and a half years and it hasn't figured out an evacuation plan for anything! Our boss put my hard working and over worked mentor teacher Amy up to the task of figuring it out. The lady is mentoring both myself and another teacher who has only been here for two months, Miles, and planning the entire summer academy for the school on top of preparing curriculum and teaching all of her own classes. Miles told me to enjoy the slack that they are giving me now, because, behold our futures! After lots of confusing, but light hearted arguing, the local office staff and teachers figured out who would be the last person out of the burning building. Luckily, the foreign teachers are just suppose to get their class out of there as fast as possible. Not a problem! People on the street were staring at us outside as we tried to communicate in two languages about who would line up where. It was pretty comical.
We had our teachers' meeting this afternoon, and at the end, the group had gotten together and bought me a few presents for my new place. They game me a fork and a knife (which are spendy here, even the plastic kind that they gave me) a mug to keep at work, a plate and a cereal bowl! So sweet! It made feel very welcomed. I also told everybody about my potato and lettuce incident at the grocery store, and I learned that I have to go have those loose items weighed before cashing out. Next time I will know what to do.
I also have a loaner telephone from EF. Someone from the main office is suppose to help me find a phone here, but they have not gotten around to it, so I have one of the extra school cell phones until that person finds time.
I spent the rest of the afternoon working on lesson plans for this past evening and on the weekend. I taught a class of four ten and eleven-year-olds this evening. It was really fun. I played "Forced Choice" with them and we had a lot of good conversations. They were very excited to ask me my age and were very impressed with how many siblings I have. We read a short story on an alien named Zeb finding materials from numerous countries and loading it onto his space ship. However, at the end, it was too full of cows and sheep for the UK, wood from the U.S., clay from China and jewelry from India that he couldn't get it off the ground. I wrote a continuation story for us to read as a sample and then taught the students about brainstorming story ideas through a plot concept map. They had fun drawing the bubbles and making lines to connect their ideas. They each wrote a story in a few sentences. We worked a little on comparative and superlative adjectives and it was time to end class. It was a fun two hours. I'm painfully learning how to speak slowly and more concisely. It is hard. I'm trying not to speak too loudly, Maria, but I've totally caught myself speaking louder when I've been asked to explain a tricky word. I am not immune to that syndrome.
After class, I picked up some sushi to go and sat in my little park outside the building and just people watched for awhile. It was the perfect temperature outside and the sky had a purpleish glow that I know is smog, but I tried to pretend it was from the sunset.
Now, drum roll, please... Introducing Uncle Ladd's Corner. My Uncle Ladd is a very special man in my life and I have learned a lot from him. He has given me some homework questions to work on about the country I've adopted for the next year. I'm going to do my best to answer all of his questions in the next year. His questions will be in bold while I'll write out my answers normally. Here is the first one...
Uncle Ladd's Corner: Is the subway and buses public or private?
The public transportation system in Beijing, I know, is public, and it is pretty outstanding. I read on the web site, The Beijinger, which is in English, that Beijing alone has 520 bus lines! Most of the buses I have seen are huge, double decker buses, and there are some that are more akin to our TriMet buses in the Portland-Metro area. On the buses, it is 2 RMB for one ride. To get on the subway, you must first pass the security check, where you have to put your bag through a scanner, and I have, on a few occasions, seen people get patted down. I have often seen security checking for ID before people swipe their metro cards. You would think I would be asked for ID all the time, but I have learned from the other staff here that the security will leave you alone since they think you probably do not speak any Chinese dialect. It costs 2 RMB (.29 American dollars) to start your journey and 2 RMB to conclude your journey on the subway, but you can transfer as many times as you need to. I was really confused the first time when I had to pay to get out of there! The subway tunnels and cars are air conditioned, but you are packed in very, very tightly, and often have to struggle to make your way out depending on the time of the day!
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