Jun 2008

The Chinese sleep in the oddest of places and at the oddest of times.

In the morning on the bus the Chinese teachers will sleep between the two campuses. It is only 20 minutes. They wipe their eyes get off the bus and go and teach!

You will find people sleeping on their motor bikes in the middle of the city on the main road. There will be men pulled up on the side of the road in their trucks in the midday sun catching some ZZZZZZZZZZZ's. I love a good sleep, but I find it strange how the Chinese fall asleep so easily. But it appears that others respect the needs for sleep and avoid those sleeping.

We get 3 hours for lunch. The teachers go home and have a sleep. They cannot understand that we don't do the same. I told them I can't nap for 30 minutes I'm gone for hours.

The Chinese find it strange that on a good day in the western world we would get an hour for lunch but more often than not we would eat on the run. Lunch to them is an important family meal.

Around lunch time and early afternoon you will see many a Chinese man sleeping. Whether it be on his tricycle, in the tray, on the back seat anywhere they can find they will sleep. There are others who own small shops no bigger than a one car garage and sit on a little camping chair, make themselves comfy and snooze.

A Challenge for western teachers is the students sleeping in the classroom. Boys are the worst offenders. In the morning I stand beside them a continually say, "Good Morning," I soon have a class chanting Good Morning. In the afternoon classes I say "Good Afternoon." I'm a shocker though, if they sleep through class in the break I make them stay asleep. One day I had finished class early so I whispered to the students, "let's go and leave the sleepers here." I was amazed that the woke up from silence but sleep through me ranting and raving.

I'm now trying a new tactic - I take photos of them sleeping. They don't like this at all.

Dragon Boat Festival is a Traditional Chinese Festival. The Chinese Dragon Boat Festival is a significant holiday (we worked) celebrated in China, and has the longest history. It is celebrated by boat races in the shape of dragons. Competing teams row their boats forward to a drumbeat racing to reach the finish line first.

The boat races during the festival is a traditional custom in attempts to rescue the patriotic poet Chu Yuan. Chu Yuan drowned on the fifth day of the fifth lunar month in 277 BC. The Chinese now throw bamboo leaves filled with cooked rice into the water. This is to allow the poet to eat the rice before the fish could. The custom now is the eating of Tzungtzu and rice dumplings.

The celebration is a time to protect yourself from evil and disease for the rest of the year. This is done by varying practices including hanging fresh herbs on the front door, drinking nutritious concoctions and displaying portraits of evils nemesis, Chung Kuei. If you manage to stand an egg on it's end at exactly 12 pm, the following year will be lucky!

The school year ends here in July and the new school year resumes in September.

On the 13 May we were advised to check our school calendar and to make sure all the students will get their oral marks and listening marks both worth 20% before their English Classes end this semester. Fortunately for me the teacher that broke her contract and went home had already done this before she left!

Both Arthur and myself had 06 classes and we were both to write the final test for our own 06 Students. The test format was given to us and we had two weeks to write and submit to the school. The deadline was 02 June. Not being one to let things sit around and cause myself undue pressure I wrote the exam and submitted it on the 16 May, much to the other teachers dissatisfaction.

After receiving the exam papers the school decided to mix them up and choose some of the questions from each to make the final exam. I requested a copy of the final exam to ensure my reviews with the students were meaningful.

With mixed emotions I discovered that section 1 on the exam which is 20 multiple choice, 15 were from my exam paper & 5 where from Arthur's. Section 2 which is reading comprehension was a 50/50 split. Section 3 which is to fill in the blanks with the proper form of the words given was from Arthur's paper and in my opinion way too easy. Section 4 which is writing was from Arthur's exam paper is simply a plagiarism of the example given.

Anyway the exam was today and I will receive the exam papers tomorrow afternoon for marking. I await in anticipation of marking 250 + papers! Although I am the lucky one, I have no classes next week and we have until the 1 July to mark them.

The following week I have 2 classes. Not sure how that works when you really have nothing to teach as the exam is over. I am planning on doing karaoke as they love to sing. I just need to get myself either an Ipod or a MP4 player.

If I finish marking my exams early I will head to Jinan. I was planning on going to Jinan to watch a football match on the Saturday anyway. Whilst there I will source either the Ipod of MP4.

After my 2 classes the following week I am unsure what I will be doing. There is poor communication with the foreign teachers. Is it a Chinese thing? Is it a challenge with the language? Or is it the way that the leaders operate with all teachers? From discussions with the Chinese teachers it's a sense of power. It is where the leaders can control everything. By inviting or telling you at the last minute and your acceptance of this indicates the power they have over you!

We have requested staff meetings to share stories both positive and negative and perhaps learn how we could be more effective. This always falls on deaf ears.

China always presents challenges to us foreigners who dare to try and live in this country.

The first and most prominent is of course the language.

I have been fortunate enough not to have endured any illness at this stage (touch wood) but others I have known had suffered from colds or stomach upsets and the result is always,"go to the hospital everyday to get a saline drip!" It is almost impossible to buy cough drops or ear drops. Although Barbara purchased a life supply of cough drops when we were in Qingdao from the Metro Supermarket where we almost caused an international incident.

I have had all sorts of problems with my computer. The computer is actually the schools and I am advised when I need something I must ask, however getting it fixed can take weeks at a time. If it is not interfering with the Chinese then it is not an issue. At times I have had to go to the internet cafe.

At one stage I was almost going to go and purchase another laptop!

When I arrived at the school I was given a mud map of the city. This has been very useful. Although you say a word in Chinese you are always challenged. When you pull out the map and show them they repeat the word and you are certain it sounds the same as what you just said.

On my first day here I was taken to lunch. Recently another teacher arrived and I was summoned to his welcome dinner at short notice of course. Getting any notification is a feature of life! Anyway I was told it would be in the school restaurant. I asked where that was. I was told that it is the same place you had your welcome lunch. I had absolutely no idea where that was. How could they possibly think I would remember where I went for lunch on my first day. I had arrived from Australia with a couple of hours sleep in Beijing. Driven to a city I did not know and a campus where I had spent two minutes. The were kind enough to meet me at the apartments. It really is close to the apartments. Directions would have been very easy.

Not long after I have arrived I had been summoned to the office. I went to the 'girls' who speak no English and asked them if they could take me to see Peter. We headed to an area of the campus which was completely foreign. It appears that they were taking me to his apartment not his office. I have no idea why they thought I would want to go to his apartment! Eventually what should have been a 5 minute walk was a 20 minute walk around the school campus. Perhaps Peter was about to send the search party or maybe I haven't lived up to the no notification period!

Some things happen that we don't understand. When we ask for explanations it is too hard to explain. A common phrase is "How do I say it?" The mysteries of China.

The students do work hard. They start class at 8.00 am and study until 9 pm, although they have a 2 hour break during the day. They must be in their dorms before 10 pm.

When the bell sounds there is a sea of Chinese students heading to either their dorms or to the canteen. They are not allowed off campus unless they have a leave pass which by all accounts is difficult to obtain.

They love their mobile phones - even in the classroom. It is something I continually confiscate. In one class I confiscated 16 mobiles!