It’s a mess! Seriously, I’m not sure I’m going to be able to work this out. The Chinese government has made it pretty much impossible for people to get new visas or even extend current ones without returning to their home countries. I’m still looking into it, but it’s really looking like I’m going to be kicked out of the country come August 1.
It’s really awesome! I’m having such a great time in Nanjing.
Every morning and afternoon we have field trips to different places, all of which have been really interesting. I think my favorite so far was the day before yesterday, when we went to this big park. So many trees! And grass! And other green living things that I’d almost forgotten! We got to ride on a boat and cross a creepy bridge.
What was the most fun? On the lake they had these big, clear, inflatable balls… and you could go in them! It was so fun! They deflated it partially so I could get in, then reinflated it. It was amazingly difficult to stand once it was on the water, and even harder to stay standing. I can only imagine how ridiculous I looked. Next time I have internet on my computer I’ll try to post at least a couple pictures from it so you can all see.
I’ve also eaten a lot of new meats the past couple days. I get they aren’t really that exotic, but they’re still new to me. At the park place I tried goose and rabbit, which were both pretty tasty. Just this afternoon I had little eels. Whole eels! Yep, that’s right, I ate the bones, head, and everything. And you know what? It was pretty good. Quite crunchy. Give ‘em a try if you ever have the opportunity.
I’m finally getting around to telling the story!
Wendy Kang, the awesome person who set this whole thing up for me, gave me directions on how to get to the school. There was an issue at the beginning with the bus I was supposed to take only having Hangkongtian east and west when I wanted north, but I called Wendy and she said I could just hop off at the west and go from there. So I get off at Hangkongtianxi and try to walk 50m north. The first bus stop I reached didn’t have my next bus, so I thought maybe I needed to walk further. This is where having no sense of distance becomes a problem. I spend the next half hour wandering around trying to find the 654. Guess what? Turns out I was misguided and should’ve walked south, not north. Alas.
This second bus takes me a little ways out from the center. It was still the city, but a much younger part. Very much under development. Seriously, the road only had 3 lanes! Unbelievable! After I get off I have the hardest part of my directions left: walk 100m straight, turn right, walk 100m, turn right. Man, did I ever mess that up. I walked waaay too far. When I realized I couldn’t possibly be in the right area, I called the school for directions. In retrospect it doesn’t seem all that unlikely, but at the time I was surprised that no one at the school spoke English. Unhappily surprised. I can generally hold my own in Chinese, but Chinese over the phone? Wow. After much awkwardness and confusion we agreed to meet up back at the bus stop.
Turns out I needed to walk through a little forest and then a neighborhood to get there. A little confusing, no? It’s a neat area, though. The neighborhood looks really old. All one-story buildings, people doing laundry by hand, washing dishes outside, dogs running in the street. Kind of cool.
As for the teaching itself: it’s awesome. I work with one of the English teachers there. The kids are so fun and energetic. They all think I’m pretty strange and foreign-looking. The first day one of them asked me why I was so tall. They’re also all really shy about speaking English in front of me. It’s cute.
Alas, I am too tired to recount my migrant school story tonight. It’s actually a decent story, so I want to wait until I can do it justice. Instead I will appease you with some random information:
Tomorrow morning a couple of my friends are putting together a big Western-style breakfast for everyone! I’m really excited for it. I’m also supposed to look at some apartments with a friend tomorrow.
http://sunvillage.com.cn/Check it out.
I will maybe probably definitely post again tomorrow with details from my Wednesday migrant school adventure. (It was awesome!)
My friend Lirui was really concerned about me being sick after she had heard much I was coughing over the weekend, so yesterday she made me some pear soup. I’m not sure whether it had anything in it besides pears and water, but it was pretty delicious. Miraculously, it also seems to have helped! Today I was only coughing occasionally, and it wasn’t accompanied by the unpleasant can’t-get-enough-air sensation. I imagine it also doesn’t hurt that the air quality’s been really nice these past couple days. On an unrelated note, tomorrow’s my first day at the migrant school! I have no idea what they’re expecting of me, and only a vague idea of how to get there, so it’ll be an adventure. I’ll be sure to post about that, as well as my English adventures a couple weekends ago, later this week.
Today my Chinese class (202) and the 201 class had a singing contest! It was the most awesome class so far! I sang ?????. It’s a pretty silly love song. Everyone got really into their songs and had a good time. The rest of the day was pretty normal. We went to the Xinjiang place behind campus for dinner. I just love how cheap the food is hear. Honestly, I don’t think I’ll ever get over it. Dinner tonight ended up being 17 kuai each, which is about $3.50. And it was a fairly nice dinner with lots of food. After dinner a few of us stopped by a stand for some milk tea. Despite my hatred for milk, I actually enjoy milk tea. I’m not so sure about some of their flavors, though. Instead of just ordering the flavors I can read I instead like to choose the ones I can’t. The unknown ones. Last time I did that I ended up with corn, which was more than a little odd. It wasn’t that it was bad, it just tasted exactly like corn. And had pieces of corn in it. Tonight’s random choice was black sesame, which was alright.
Tomorrow will be my very first time teaching English in China. A school that one of my friends here works for is having an open house type thing tomorrow, and asked him to bring in some friends to help out. So tomorrow we’re heading out at 8 o’clock for the bus. I’m not quite sure what to expect, but I think it’ll be fun. As an added perk, the pay sounds quite good. I’ll let you know how it goes! Also, next Wednesday I start my migrant school internship/volunteering. More about that next time.
Not having a blog for the first month and a bit has left my recording sadly behind. I think I’m going to just focus on my current events, and address past ones when (and if) I have the opportunity. With that decided, it’s time for me to get started! Please leave me comments!
testing testing testing! (I hope it works)