On my way to the Forestry University last Friday morning, I found myself biking against a brutally strong wind. I was on my way to meet Mr. Wang to get paid. (The past two pay periods have brought us to his office instead of at the very sketchy KFC.) I was supposed to meet him by 8 o’clock and left my apartment with enough time to bike there in a typical Beijing day. However, as I turned the corner out of my apartment complex, I could barely pedal my bike. I thought to myself, ‘this is going to take forever!’ I even thought that I should jump into a taxi instead of trying to bike into the wind. Thankfully, I stuck with it (even to the point of walking my bike because it was faster) because when I got to the corner of the road I was on and another main road, there was a massive traffic back-up. I could not have been more thankful that I was on my bike instead of in a car…ironically enough.
This past Thursday, I was eating supper with a friend. She and I were discussing the awful pollution. There is a way that ‘they’ measure the air quality in Beijing. A number is calculated based on the level of five atmospheric pollutants that are monitored at stations throughout the city. We did not need a number to tell us that the pollution was really bad. I am curious as to what that number was though because it was hard to breath and even harder to see. I even said, ‘we could really use a strong wind right now.’ Hmmm…. I guess I got my wish. And I paid for it on Friday. 🙁 The blue skies did return and it remained very windy outside all day.
I only have two more classes with my Qinghua students. I find myself trying to spend as much time with them as possible before they go their separate ways. I wasn’t expecting to get so attached to them. I had only five students in my lower level class last week Wednesday. This was because the evening before was a big celebration for them, and according to Chinese alcohol culture, you are supposed to keep drinking. I feel sad for them that they believe this is the way it has to be. My five students and I chatted for the whole class. I found out that two of them have little daughters that they are anxious to see when they finish the class, and one of them is going to have a new baby in the beginning of the year. It was nice to see this ‘other side’ of my students and hear them talk about their families so openly.
Throughout the past week, many of my students were emailing me their speeches for the speech contest so that I could check them, give them pointers, and correct their grammar. The speech contest was last night. I was one of thirteen judges and one of five foreign judges. Ms. Fan sent me a text message at the end of last week asking me for my Chinese name. I was curious why she wanted to know this but just sort of went with it. (For those that are interested, my Chinese name is: 施柏雅) I found out later why she wanted to know my name. She had prepared name cards for all of the judges and on one side was my English name and on the other side was my Chinese name. (I kept the card!) The contest was quite an experience! During the break, many of my students came up to me and asked for their picture with me. 🙂 Two of my students were hosts for the contest and it was neat to see them in those roles. We were given criteria to use for judging them. It was not a well thought out rubric but it worked. Many of the speeches were from famous people in history. There was no point deduction for ‘unoriginality’ but I took that into consideration when I was scoring them. The speeches were not great but the quality time with my students was worth all of the time spent there. One of my students, Maggie, won the contest. Her speech was original and she did a good job, but I did not think she deserved to win. I was hoping another student would win. After the contest, Maggie asked me if I would like to get some chuar and so she and Ross (another student) and I went to a favorite restaurant of mine for chuar and beer. We had a great time! It makes their anticpated departure so much more difficult. 🙁
My Qinghua students have a Christmas party next week Friday. I hope to be able to attend their party and say farewell to them. I didn’t get to know them all equally well but I did become good friends with quite a few of them: Maggie, who lives in Tianjin (which is fairly close to Beijing) and would like me to visit her there. I told her I would love to! Jay, who lives a little further from Beijing but will be traveling to Turkey for his job early next year. I may never see him again and that makes me sad. 🙁 Ross, who lives in Hebei province and says he will be in and around Beijing fairly often. I’m so thankful for this because he is probably my favorite student. ‘Little’ Peter, who likes to eat the heads of fish and says, ‘morning, Madam’ each day when he greets me! (I call him little Peter so as not to confuse him with handsome Peter who is another friend of mine.) Michael, who is from Xi’an and tells me to visit him so he and his wife can show me around. This is also the student who didn’t belive G-d could possibly exist but now tells me that he is worried that when he goes back to Xi’an, he will not have anyone to explain the B-ble to him. 🙂 HE is so good! I gave Michael many things to take back with him so that he can continue reading. I also told him to call or email if he has any questions. Rain and Max who are from Harbin and want me to climb a mountain with them. I will probably take them up on this offer at some point.
We have our annual Christmas party this coming Sunday evening. I invited all of the above people to the party. They said they would come! I hope they all make it. I will write more about the Christmas party at a later time.
Yesterday in class with my engineers we played a bunch of Christmas games. My class and two other foreign teachers’ classes all gathered in my classroom and had a competition. We each had our own class for the first hour so that they could practice their ‘performance’ for their Christmas party. Then the fun began. It was hilarious to watch grown men be competitive. We played a game where they had to see how many English words they could come up with from the words ‘Merry Christmas.’ This one was the most hilarious because each team was crowding around one piece of paper trying to compile a list. I have some pictures! We then played bingo and also pictionary. It was a really fun class. My class gave me this weird Chinese ornament as a gift. It was very sweet of them. Then they wanted to have their picture taken with me!
On a sadder note, my bike was stolen…AGAIN. It was even locked to a fence this time. It’s kind of funny because my students would comment on how old and junky my bike was. To which I would reply, ‘I know, but nobody wants to steal it!’ I think next time I should try leaving it unlocked. Maybe that would keep the thieves away. 🙂 The other night while I was at chuar with Maggie and Ross, Ross mentioned that when the class is over he would give me his bike. I told him that I already had a bike and didn’t need another one. 🙂 Yesterday when I realized that my bike was stolen, I sent Ross a message just to tell him that. He sent a message back congratulating me and saying, ‘you can use my bike!’ So, right now, I have a men’s bike with two locks. (Ross thinks you should have two locks…perhaps he’s right!) We’ll see how long I can hang on to this one!
Highlights of the past few weeks: shopping at the scroll shop, learning more and more Chinese phrases from Kevin during our Tuesday night dinners (I am supposed to be helping him with his English), any time I get to spend with my Qinghua students, and Ultimate Uno with Jay, Ross, Michael, and two of the Americans. Ultimate Uno is a made up game that we learned from an American visitor a few weeks ago. Once you learn this version, you will never go back to the boring version. Jay and I and one of the American teachers had hot pot together last Friday and then ‘game night’ sort of developed from that. It was a really fun night!
It will be a little different celebrating Christmas this year. I am confident that it will be just as joyful because it is the message that makes Christmas what it is. Blessings to all of you! Sheng dan jie kuai le! 圣诞节快乐 (Merry Christmas!)
This is from the football game a while ago. Hilarious!
Qinghua University students, Michael (L) and Jay (R)
Qinghua University students, Peter (L) and Ross (R)
This was with Ross having chuar after the speech contest. (which is why he is in a suit...the tie came off right away!)
These are my Sinopec students working on one of the Christmas games. This game was hilarious!
This is my full class at Sinopec. From L-R: David, James, Bruce, Me, the elusive Simon (who hasn't come to class the last two months but showed up for the Christmas games), Tom, Tommy, and Kobe
This is a view of Zhongguancun DaJie (中关村大街) at about 1:00 pm looking north. It is acually pretty dead. Notice the skies, the mass of bikes on the left side of the photo, and the lack of cars traveling north. Zhongguancun is like silicon valley. The very large electronics market is here. I'll try to get a better picture when it is much busier.
