Teaching in China

my 3rd class... can you find me??? click on the picture to enlarge it
my 2nd class
at the first school after we planted a tree in their garden
So as you know I taught english in Zengcheng, China this weekend... It was the most amazing weekend ever! We did so much there in so little time that I don't think I can describe it all... Here is a quick try at a summary:  We left at 8am on Saturday morning on the MTR where we got off after about 6 stops and got on a bus... The bus took us to the border of China (1 hour) and then we got out and went through customs and got back on the bus to go to Zengcheng (2.5 hours). We then got off at the bus stop there and the principal and a government guy (who was our coordinator) came and picked us up in an elementary kid school bus... we then drove into the city where we would be teaching first (30-45 minutes)... We checked into a hotel to drop our stuff before going to the school... We taught at the first school for about 2 hours... 1 hour playing games all together (about 500 students) and then 1 hour teaching a class by ourselves (about 50 students)... After the hour of teaching, some of the students gave us a gifts... I got a windchime with chinese characters on it, an asian stuffed animal, a little jar with characters in it, and a beijing coin bank... It was so cute of them. After class they all wanted me to write my name on a piece of paper for them and i got trampled the minute i signed the first piece of paper haha  The principal gave us each a beautiful bouquet of flowers too.. then we went to the teachers lounge for fruits and tea while we waited for dinner which was cooked at the school... we sat out on the blacktop with the teachers and headmaster and principle to eat a chinese dinner... It was really nice but the teachers did not speak english well so they mostly talked in chinese unless they were asking me a question... they would ask me what my favorite dish was and then would insist on piling my plate with that food haha... I caught on to this trick quickly haha... we then went back to the hotel to put down our presents and the teachers took us around the town... they showed us the famous Lychee Tree that their province is known for... the tree has a story about it about how  a god brought it back to life by placing a green scarf on it so this particular lychee tree produces lychees with a green stripe and they sell a limited number of these lychees for like 40,000 Yuan each... how outrageous haha.. only the government can afford them... they then took us to a dessert shop where they ordered a bunch of famous chinese desserts for us to try... they then gave us each 2 kg of dried lychees to take home with it... it was so sweet of them and they were so excited to give them to us... we then went back to the hotel and the 6 of us who came to teach from CUHK hung out for a while being passing out from the long and exciting day.. 

we had to be ready at 8am the next day (Sunday) to leave for breakfast which was a Dim Sum chinese breakfast with more amazing food. (this was a common theme to the weekend)... the teachers from the first shcool we were teaching at that day were there to have breakfast with us... it was another meal with a lot of chinese so i had little to add to the conversation as you can imagine... the kids I came with all spoke Cantonese and some Mandarin so they could all communicate or at least understand the teachers.. our student escort Lu would sit by me at all the meals so she could translate and tell me what all the dishes were that we were eating... they then took us to the school where we had another little assembly where we were welcomed and then went to teach a class for a little over an hour... I played "simon says" with them and if they made a mistake they would have to tell me their favorite animal or food in english so that they could practice... they really liked this game.. then i taught them direction light left, right , straight, up, down , turn in a circle and we would blindfold one kid and then the other kids would have to give him/her direction to get to the chalkboard where i had drawn a featureless face and they would have to draw a part of the face , like the nose, blindfolded with the kids giving direction again about where to draw the nose... They thought this game was really funny because the figure they drew was "not beautiful" as they put it...They asked me a bunch of questions about what i thought about china, what my favorite things were, and about America... they were very shy to ask these questions an it was really cute... Then the teacher had me pronounce some words from the textbook because she didn't think she was pronouncing them correctly, which she was not haha... the words mostly had the "th" sound it in like thank you, that, this, and then some random words like dinosaur haha... Before i left, they asked me if i would be their friend and if i was coming back soon... it was really cute... once again i was asked to sign pieces of paper or books with my name for them to keep... 

we were then picked up by the teacher of the last school we taught at and we went to another big chinese lunch with more great and fattening food with less english than before... we arrived at the last school a little early and they took us to the principal's room for fruits and tea... I have never drank sooo much tea in my life... your cup was refilled before it was even done and they would tear off a banana and give it to us an make us eat it haha... It is apparently a cultural thing to provide us with more food than we could possibly eat as a sincere gesture to take care of us... I had a piece of goose because they saw my face when i saw the goose head on the place and they told me to try it... i didn't want to be rude and tell them i don't eat meat when the animals head is on the plate, so i sucked it up and put a piece in my mouth... it wasn't good but i defiantly didn't want another piece... Lu, the escort would tell me when there was something i probably wouldn't want to try, like chicken liver.... at the school they told us we would each be teaching over 60 kids... so much pressure haha... and we had 2 hours to teach at this school... at the assembly they gave us each a gift and we played musical chairs... when i got to the classroom they were all in a big circle sitting on the floor since there were no desks and the teacher had me stand in the middle and answer their questions they had prepared for like 45 minutes... these questions were the oddest i had all weekend... they asked me about christmas, they asked me to sing them jingle bells (which i didn't because i dont think i know all the words and my voice would scare them), they asked me when i got here and when i was leaving, they asked me if i had a boyfriend, and if i liked Mao... haha we then played simon says but this time if they made a mistake they had to sing me a song... the ABC's and Happy birthday were the hot pick of songs to sing me haha... I answered the last questions at the end of class and one of the little girls asked me for a hug... it was sooo cute... They then asked me for my email so no 60 little chinese kids have my email and as soon as they get internet connections i'm sure my inbox will fill up with the same questions I answered in class since their english is very limited...  before we left, i was asked again for my name on a piece of paper and two little girls drew me pictures and gave them to me... those were the best gifts... they had little cartoon characters with random english and chinese words and you very beautiful on it... what a compliment :) haha the drawing are very cute... we said all our goodbyes and then they had a bus take us back to the main bus station to go back to hong kong... it was really an amazing weekend... 

Some Highlights:

They would ask the kids : Do you feel happy that we have foreigners?

A teacher sang "If you're happy and you know it Slap your feet" and they would stomp 

I used a squatter for the first time... it is an acquired skill 

The kids taught me a few chinese words and laughed when i tried to pronounce them

I got asked "are you beautiful" ... awkward... haha - I am the only white person they have seen

Derek got 3 statues from 3 different kids of lighthouses in the united states... i think a factory must have overproduced these

A little girl asked me to not forget her :)