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No matter how often you have used a squat toilet, you still accidentally pee on your own foot once in a while.
While this is true not only in reference to life in China, I find it particularly pertinent to life here, because there is no guarantee that today you sill successfully navigate the bike lane (or toilet) just because you did it yesterday. Plus, it is funny to talk about accidentally peeing on yourself.
Report number three means any variety of things. It means I have been in China for more than seven months. It means I have officially stood up in front of and attempted to instruct 426 Chinese students in conversational English for 21 (of 30) weeks (I did the math). It means that I have changed so much in ways I cannot even imagine yet, but will soon. It means the people who are going to take my job and live in my room have been chosen. It means that time here is running out.
So. What does that all mean? I do not know exactly. I have seen and done so much since coming to China, and there are so many other things I have not seen or done yet. The only way I could possibly manage to see everything that I want to see in China is if I were a millionaire with no responsibilities to do anything but travel, but alas. Few are that fortunate. At least I know I'll be back to see all the things I miss the first time around, and that time I will have all the time, money, and energy necessary to do it even better than I have done it the first time.
School Stuff
Since my last report, we went back to school and started a new semester. Lara and I switched classes, as was the precedent set by our predecessors. The thing I have found most interesting is that, when the students were allowed to split themselves into two classes, they managed to create classes with two very different personalities. The more energetic classes from last semester have been replaced by quieter, more reserved classes. The quiet classes have been traded for louder, less interested classes. The classes I did not enjoy that much last term have been exchanged for classes I really like and vice versa. This has all made for an interesting change of pace. I have found lessons I used last semester work differently this semester, while I come up with new ideas in an attempt to engage my classes more effectively.
The first couple of classes were spent trying to convey the logistics of class this semester, rules and grading, and helping my students get to know me. The school lengthened our classes by five minutes (to a whopping 45 minutes each), which I have found a little difficult to deal with. When you have gotten used to filling 40 minutes, an extra five minutes can seem like an excruciating eternity. Despite this five minute black hole of time now infused into every class, I think the first few weeks of class this term went much more smoothly than last term.
Despite the relative smooth sailing this term, there were still a few bumps along the way. For instance, it was not until FIVE WEEKS into the term that we first saw our Junior II classes, and even then, we had two classes rather than the three we had last term. We kept asking about the Junior II classes and repeatedly heard 'Oh, I do not know' every time we approached the subject. We asked and asked and never really got an answer beyond 'Your Junior II classes will begin next week.' Once they finally did begin, the students seemed a bit strange. I had some behavioral and discipline issues with one of my classes last term, so I think there may be some apprehension among the students (as well as in myself) that I expect will work itself out relatively soon.
We are attempting to manage one class of Junior IIs better by re-dividing their classes. Last semester, I had all of the boys and about six or seven girls from one class of Junior IIs. This arrangement did not work in any way. Well, it sort of started to work when they realized that I would yell until I was blue in the face if it would keep them quiet for even three seconds, which they finally learned to respond to. But there was no way I would wish that upon anyone else, so we made the executive decision to take each class and send only half of the students to the other teacher. I cannot make a final comment on the attempted control mechanism, but it seems to be working alright so far. I have found myself having to raise my voice with less frequency and with more efficacy when I DO raise it.
The Junior I students have begun to learn about U.S. states and all the exciting things they have to offer from California's Disneyland to Texas oil rigs to Minnesota's Walker Art Center's Cherry on a Spoon. I wanted to have something to start out each class period with (and have those additional pesky five minutes), and the students seem at least somewhat interested in different cities and places in the United States. Plus, I get a kick out of pointing to the various pretty pictures I have printed off over the last few weeks and saying 'What is this?' to receive an enthusiastic chorus of 'The Statue of Liberty!' or 'A longhorn cow!' The hilarity of twenty-five Chinese students attempting to pronounce 'statue' is only surpassed by a few other things. Like eye exercises.
On International Women's Day (March 8), Lara and I got the day off, although no one told us we had the day off and we just thought the Junior IIs were not showing up for class again. Once things were cleared up, we headed over to Fuzi Miao with Ms Fang to go boating. I am not exactly sure what all the things we were supposed to be looking at were, but I know I saw the former residences of at least four famous prostitutes and a whole menagerie of colorful fake animals, including the only squirrel I have since coming to China. It was HUGE. I mean, it was supposed to be ridiculously large, but it verged on disturbingly gigantic.
In true China fashion, one Wednesday afternoon we were asked to join the Senior teachers on a trip to another school in Jiangsu Province on Friday. So with the requisite 48 hours' notice, we were off to Nantong to participate in something about which we were unsure. It turns out that we were visiting one of the best schools in the country (or so we were told). Unfortunately, the entire presentation was in Chinese, so I certainly didn't get as much out of the experience as I would have liked. But, we also got to see a new city and some museums and temples, which was nice. Plus, it set a precedent, and it sounds like we will be invited to join the Junior teachers on a similar trip to another city sometime soon.
Life Stuff
The weather has begun to improve drastically in the past couple of weeks. Right after we returned from break, it was still winter in Nanjing - it even snowed one day! It was quite a shock to my system to go from warm, sunny Southeast Asia to cold, gray Nanjing. I felt very Chinese every morning I woke up and immediately donned my long underwear in an effort to keep the wet cold from getting into my bones and making me wish for death rather than miserable cold. I do not know how the people of Nanjing survive without adequate heating and insulation. The only place I ever wanted to be was in my room because it was the only place I had any chance of not being miserably cold. Fortunately, spring has arrived, and I have been cherishing it as much as possible. Given the fact that fall only lasted about two weeks or so, I suspect it is only a matter of days before it is ungodly hot and humid again.
In a dual effort to fill up some of my free time and also make more money for life and travel expenses, I have taken on a couple of other teaching jobs. Twice a week for an hour and a half each day, I ride to the end of the universe (or so my 45-minute bike ride to and from makes it seem) to tutor an 11-year-old Korean boy. Lara and I have also started working at a private English school we were told about by another teacher we know. It is there that we work part time teaching English to adults through planned lessons, TV. and movie viewings, and English corner. These other jobs have been very interesting because, while I am still utilizing the most important skill I have in China (speaking ENGLISH), they are very different than working at NDFZ. I now have experience teaching people of a wide range of ages in a wide variety of environments, whether it is one-on-one, in classes of 30 teenagers, or English corners of up to 50 adult students.
My family came and visited me as well, which is part of the reason this report is late (man, I ALWAYS have an excuse for my late reports…). It was really nice to see some familiar faces and also to see some new things in China. Lara got to spend three weeks in Shanghai before coming to Nanjing in August, but I had only spent one weekend there at a teaching conference, so I did not get to see much of the city. My family flew from Minneapolis to Shanghai via Tokyo and we spent five days in Shanghai before coming to Nanjing. Shanghai was exciting because it is so close to Nanjing geographically, yet there are many ways in which it is like being on a completely different planet. In Nanjing, English is not a consistently useful form of communication, while in Shanghai, almost everyone you come into contact with seems to speak at least a little bit of it. The city is much more metropolitan and seems to have a lot more going on at any given moment than Nanjing does (which is actually saying a lot, considering
Nanjing has a population of SIX MILLION PEOPLE). Coming back to Nanjing definitely felt like returning home, but coming from Shanghai illuminated how different, and more difficult in many ways, life in Nanjing is.
With three-quarters of my time here finished, I find myself looking forward in certain ways to the end of this experience. After the nine or so weeks of teaching that we have left, I think my career as the teacher of students who HAVE to be in my class but do not necessarily WANT to be there will be over. As much as I have appreciated my experience here, I think I am becoming more and more ready for that end to come. I know I will be sad when the last day of school rolls around, but I think I will be ready for it.
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