Sniff, sniff...aachoo!

I've been sneezing all day for some reason. Maybe the warming weather is having an effect? It remained pretty foggy the whole day.

I spent most of the day working on new teaching material for Monday's class, while L. went off to teach. I found a great website, ESL Gold that has much of what I'm looking for, including simple dialogues and mp3 recordings.

We watched Dallas and Minnesota play NBA ball, with Chinese commentators in the background. Minnesota won.

A couple of students from L.'s class last year dropped by. They looked through our wedding photos. Since there were many pictures of the church L. and I were married in, one of them asked if I was a Christian, which I affirmed.

"Sesame Oil Street"

I got up early this morning, 6 am, to catch Creflo Dollar's "World Changers" show on TV. I still can't believe this show is airing here in China!

I flipped between that and children's shows teaching kids to honor their parents, be a good citizen, do well in school, and practice good hygiene. It might've seemed corny at first, but I see a lot of positive in this type of programming. The U.S. could do well to reproduce it. "Sesame Street" and "Mister Rogers" don't provide as comprehensive and succinct a message on these matters as the kid shows here in China, IMHO. U.S. kid shows seem to focus more on individual self-esteem, fun, and happiness, and not as much on positive interactions with family, school, and society at large. Just my observations, tho'.

first day of work

S. taught his first class here. It's every Monday night for two and a half hours. I accompanied him to provide some support, although he didn't need any, he was great.

Here's his perspective:

Teaching went well, tho' the students knew less English than I expected. Some knew none at all. We went around assigning English names to each person. We went through the worksheets i had prepared earlier. Some students helped set up the AV so that my computer could be plugged into it. It was a good thing, as having the computer helped a lot. We took a couple of breaks during the 2.5 hours of class. L. sat in the back to prepare for her lessons. One student, calling himself "Jordan" (he's an admirer of Michael Jordan) offered to be my monitor and help make copies of lessons for students to study in the future. One student asked if I could use less Chinese and more English, but other students asked me to use more Chinese and have someone help translate. It's going to be a tough balance, but it's looking like I'll have to cater to the lowest common denominator and "dumb" the curriculum down to pre-pre-school level almost, hoping those who know English better will appreciate practicing how to pronounce what they know better. Otherwise, those more advanced may be better off in the intermediate class.

So next week, I will need to find/develop material that's much, much simpler than what I used today (even tho' it, too, was for beginners). Vocabulary and dialogue will be a good start.

weekend in Chaozhou

The university sponsored a foreign teacher weekend trip to the city of Chaozhou, it's pretty close to the eastern coast of China. We left Friday afternoon and got back tonight. It was a very touristy trip - i.e. leaving the hotel early in the morning and catching as many "sites" as possible before heading back. They don't allow for much "rest and relaxation" during these trips. Which is fine, because you do get to see a lot of stuff in very short time.

Quick recap of the trip: We arrived fairly late Friday night. The driver was being quite cautious as the weather was very wet getting there. The company that acted as our tour guide set up dinner at a restaurant that seemed closed for business by the time we arrived. Most of us went and grabbed something else to eat after we were dropped off at the hotel

Saturday: It was cold and wet the entire day. Not a very good day for siteseeing - but we did anyway. Breakfast was very traditional (no pancakes here), but pretty filling and good - especially considering the meal before. S. loved it - all the Chinese "fun stuff" that he doesn't ge to have very often.

We visited many memorials and other sites preserved from the "old" Chaozhou city. Another feature quite common in many Chinese tours is Buddhist temples. Many people burn incense to one or more statues housed there.

(Funny story: at one point the batteries for our digicam were running out, so S. stopped by a couple vendors and bought a few more - both of whom sold him bum batteries. We think that the vendors or whoever they got batteries from just retrieved old batteries and repackaged them. Another foreign teacher also got bum batteries. Grrrr! Hopefully, it's only a Chaozhou thing and not a GZ thing. Unfortunately, we could not take as many pictures with the digital camera as we would've liked.)

We also visited a tea-drinking place, where they showed how to make, serve, and drink different kinds of tea Chaozhou-style. We stopped by a ceramics factory. Chaozhou prides itself in being the ceramics capital of China. It's also known for making toys and wedding garments. We bought several small porcelain cups as gifts and souvenirs.

We went back to the hotel after dinner. It was nicer to be back inside where it was warm and dry.

Sunday: Due to the weather, we didn't get to visit as many places that our tour guide had planned (which was fine with us - we were all ready to go home - but not fine with the guide). So we had to make up a couple sites from Saturday and the Sunday sites as well.

We left our room, returned our card key, ate breakfast, and boarded the bus. It was darn cold today! 10 Celsius, with humidity and breeze to boot. Spring is only days away, but it sure doesn't feel like it. At least it wasn't rainy.

We stopped by the Phoenix Pagoda (?) Temple, which has three stories, each containing a shrine to some famous Chaozhou historical hero. The top one, which looked like a scared green goblin, was reportedly a god for good grades and school studies. Some men below were selling rides on horses.

Later, we went to the Kaiyuan Temple. It's one of the most famous temples in Guangdong. The smell of incense was suffocating. Many folks worshipped there, mostly elderly women. Some were chanting and walking slowly in front of some Buddha statues. There must've been 50 statues of all sizes there. The biggest ones were situated three-in-a-row and were painted gold, as were many of the idols. Many tourists crammed into the temple. Most of them, Chinese, were there to pay homage to the idols, sometimes bowing to each one of them once. We were told that if a "prayer" is answered, the prayer-er must come back to this specific temple and thank the gods - some even come from overseas. WOW!

Next was a bicycle rickshaws ride through the old residential parts of downtown. Two persons per rickshaw, making an armade of 25+ rickshaws. It seemed like we were in a chariot race of some kind. A fun way to go through town. Halfway through, we stopped off to take some pictures. Amazingly, a few beggars (some even missing limbs) were able to keep up with us....how, we don't know.

Lunch was next, vegetarian and mostly consisting of soups. (Not a good idea before going on a road trip). We headed back to GZ after lunch, with a stop on the way at a "shopping center." This consisted of one large room with some very traditional "snacks," ex: fermented prunes, etc. Most of us weren't into shopping, instead we bought roasted sweet potatoes from a vendor outside the shop. He seemed very happy by the business.

We headed home soon after. There were several "potty breaks" - which was to be expected after serving three varieties of soups to fifty some people. Despite the weather, it was a really good trip as far as getting to know our colleagues better. Being on another campus, we don't really get to be regular part of the international teacher community on the main campus. So, trips and dinners and other events sponsored by the university for the foreign teachers is always a welcome opportunity to get to know other internationals affiliated with our university. What a variety!

"I am Batman!"

We lost a CD that has a bunch of wedding pictures taken by our Boston photographers. Thinking it might've been accidentally taken when our computer was being worked on, we called "M" our computer man to see if he could track down the Tietung broadband guy and see if he has it. "M" eventually came and called the broadband guy. Neither of them had it. Later, "M" found it under a stack we thought we had looked through. We were thrilled and relieved! "I am Batman!" Sam chuckled gleefully. We laughed, embarrassed by the whole thing and thanked him for coming. I like this guy "M".

We went to a restaurant near the main campus. We met a couple of waitresses who were quite friendly. They wanted to know all about where we were from and what we were doing in China. Neither of them spoke any English, but we got by with the little Chinese we knew. They asked us for English names. We called them "Faye" and "Lynn", the closest English counterparts of their names we could think of. They reminded me that it's International Women's Day today. I didn't know....thanks for the reminder! Happy Int'l Women's Day to all!

Creflo in China

This morning at 6 am, I got up to watch "Changing Your World" with Christian pastor and speaker Creflo Dollar. One display on the lower part of the screen was blurred out, but other than that, nothing else seemed obviously censored. It was mostly Bible teaching from Romans 8 and 12. I was quite surprised to see this kind of Christian programming here in China, but this was on ATV, too, so it might be only available in Guangdong.

the wrong bus!

Today was mostly staying at home and unpacking and cleaning some more. I've been craving some American food all day. After 3 weeks straight of jiao-zi (potstickers), noodles, fried rice...i just wanted a burger. S. was fine, but he obliged me (what a sweet man!). The only things "western" available around here are McDonalds and KFC - and since we don't do McDees, it was KFC.

S. wanted to take a bus, which was fine, since getting a taxi at this time from out here in Boonieville is impossible. There were a lot more accidents than we'd ever seen in such a short period of time, even in the U.S. We didn't see one accident all the time we were in India. Fortunately, most car accidents aren't the twisted carnage one might find in the US, probably because folks drive slower around here.

On the way back, we decided to save some money and take a bus as well. There are only two buses that stop by our campus (509 and 523). We saw a 523 and climbed aboard. Our campus is off of a little side road left of the main road. This bus shot right past the left turn and kept going straight, much to our (mine mostly) trepidation. The next stop, where we got off, was at least 2 km past the intersection and i had never been to this part of the city.

It was quite deserted at the bus stop, with a couple motorbike taxi guys hoping to provide a ride. We headed for a footbridge that would take us across the road and hopefully back to our campus. It was pretty late (around 10:00 p.m.) and very dark. On the other side of the bridge, there were a couple restaurants. On a whim, S. and I decided to explore (since we were there anyway and probably wouldn't come back)...we saw an entire alley of shacks selling everything from blankets to shoes. It was a whole 'nother - quite alive - world out there. I would have never guessed even just standing at the bus stop, a hundred feet away. This market was much more dirty and it was outdoors. We picked up a couple items because they were unbelieveably cheap. After walking about half way through the alley, i was done, but S. saw some blinking lights at the end that he was curious about, so we decided to walk the entire length of this place.

The "lights," we discovered, were decorations for karaoke bars. There were about 15 of them with no doors sitting right next to each other (i.e. sharing a wall), forming a giant "L" shape. It was horrendous! Incredibly dissonant sounds eminating from each bar as tone-deaf singers tried to drown their neighbors, in order to hear themselves. Stick 15 tone-deaf people in a room, all singing a different song, in Chinese, at the top of their lungs and it's close to what we heard that night. My ears are still ringing. (There's an oxy-moron: a tone-deaf Chinese. You'd think they'd be really good since Chinese is a tonal language.)

We took a taxi back. The whole thing (the bus ride and taxi) ended up costing more than had we just taken a taxi back. So much for "saving money" - but then again, we would have missed out on the karaoke bars.

Our Colleagues

This evening we had dinner with the rest of our "foreign" colleagues, hosted by the university. There are over 60 this year - quite a gathering. It was lovely colleagues who had become friends over the course of last year. We, along with another newlywed couple, were congratulated on our recent nuptials and presented with a gift. We also heard the clinkling of glasses suggesting we kiss - the other couple did (he was from the States and understood what the "clinkling" meant), but we didn't. I'm not sure everyone would have wanted to see that. It was interesting to hear what "clinkling" meant in other countries, for ex: in England, it meant asking for a speech, instead of a kiss. Well, anyway, i'm glad we did neither.

It was great to catch up with folks on their summer, previous semester and spring festival break... We'll have to start planning for our summer break...

Tonight's TV break:

NBA basketball, Houston vs. Washington

"60 Minutes" featuring American combat stress teams serving American soldiers in Iraq, connection between Howard Hughes and Richard Nixon, and Saudis fighting terrorists in Saudi Arabia.

"Just For Laughs"....a Canadian "Candid Camera" of sorts. We saw this show in India as well. A riot!

First day of classes

L. went to teach classes for her first day of work. I stayed home to clean hangers and wash dishes, while watching NBA game highlights. There don't seem to get a lot of live NBA games, instead just broadcasting possession-by-possession clips.

M. the computer guy, came by with a colleague to install DSL broadband - which didn't take. M. and I talked a bit about his work and school. He graduated from a university in Guilin, which is his hometown, and he's been in GZ only 3 months to do his job. When we initially met M, he seemed standoffish, but he's turned out to be a pretty nice guy. He watched NBA basketball with us, while his colleague was trying to install the broadband connection. L. was yelling enthusiastically at the game as usual....she’s more of a fan than anyone I've ever known (so cool :-). M's favorite team is the Minnesota Timberwolves and his fave player is Kevin Garnett. He taught us how to say some of the players' names in Chinese (Michael Jordan's last name sounds like "fried egg" --- "chao dan". He seems impressed that I once worked for Microsoft. He thinks I could get a job easily here and pointed me to some local websites. If only I could read Chinese. He'd like to get better at his English, he says, if he had more money.

L.'s classes (she had three today) are made up mostly of women. One class has only 2 men out of 30-40 students. If the one-child policy and families' desire to have boys over girls has indeed created a shortage of women that the news reports, it sure ain't obvious here at XM (the name of our campus)!

Still cold, still dreary, still overcast. No end in sight, it seems. :-P

...wear space-age goggles to make you taller!

I thought American media had gone infomerical-crazy....some of the Chinese TV channels, for an entire morning, broadcast infomercials selling lotions that enlarge breasts, whiten skin, remove age spots, pills & racks & space-age goggles (I kid you not) to make people grow taller, straighten spines, and electronic devices that strap around waists to trim fat. One informacial showed a woman interviewing 3 men asking if they prefer women with white skin or dark skin. They all said they prefer white skin, which, of course, is why women should "buy their product". The "before/after" shots of the women's faces would've been convincing had the "before" shot not been shot in the shade. Not surprisingly, like the U.S., much of China is becoming obsessed with looking good.

Let us know if you find any mistakes in our postings. We can post, but curiously we can't view what we post. Blogspot.com seems to be blocked here.