Today, (Tuesday) one of my roommates and I biked to\u00a0\u6797\u5927 to meet Mr. Wang, who would take us to our meeting at Sinopec.\u00a0 We didn’t really know how long it would take us to get there so we left about 45 minutes before we were supposed to meet.\u00a0 It ended up taking only about 15-20 minutes so we were able to enjoy the beautiful Beijing \u5317\u4eac\u00a0weather for a little while.\u00a0 While waiting at the main gate, there was another foreigner wandering around, looking like he was waiting for something too.\u00a0 He finally approached us and asked if we were waiting for Mr. Wang.\u00a0 We struck up a conversation with him and found out that he is from Nebraska and has taught for Sinopec in the past and it was really great.\u00a0 He thinks it is one of the best places to teach in Beijing \u5317\u4eac.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Mr. Wang arrived at the given time and we all packed into his car.\u00a0 He drove us to the northeast section of Beijing, through the Olympic Greens on North 5th Ring Road.\u00a0 We arrived (safely I might add) at Sinopec for our meeting.\u00a0 The meeting was interesting.\u00a0 Dress code and teacher policies were explained to us and then there was a lot of talking about us in Chinese.\u00a0 The Nebraskan foreigner knew Chinese pretty well so he could tell us what they were saying about us.\u00a0 It’s a little unnerving listening to someone talk about you in another language. \ud83d\ude42\u00a0<\/p>\n
After the meeting, we asked Mr. Wang when we would begin teaching.\u00a0 He said, “next week…or tomorrow.”\u00a0 We had a good chuckle about this but wondered if he was a little bit serious.\u00a0 Mr. Wang said, “you take taxi home now.” He wanted to stay with the people at Sinopec to talk about scheduling us.\u00a0 He told us he would pay for our cab and then did not give us money for it.\u00a0 Hmmm….\u00a0 Sometimes I think he is a tad forgetful.\u00a0\ud83d\ude42\u00a0 On our way back from \u6797\u5927, another of the veteran teachers and I had lunch together.\u00a0 During our lunch, Mr. Wang called me.\u00a0 He wanted to know if I could teach that afternoon as a ‘fill-in’ teacher for one class.\u00a0 He made it clear that it was only one time.\u00a0 I said yes and then went to the school to teach some 5th graders about the seasons.\u00a0 They were definitely the worst class I have ever taught.\u00a0 So, I have seen both sides of Chinese education now.\u00a0 I feel blessed to have my Saturday 7th graders! While I was at this other school, Mr. Wang’s assistant said that they haven’t found a teacher for this school and that maybe I would teach there. WHAT?!?! This is not what we agreed to!!\u00a0 Tomorrow I will visit with Mr. Wang about what I am expected to do.<\/p>\n
This evening, we had another jog in the park.\u00a0 This time there were many more people jogging through the park and there was no “bu hao” from an old lady.\u00a0 It felt really good to have tennis shoes on after a long day in dress shoes.\u00a0 Afterwards, the three new girls went out for supper.\u00a0 It was a grand time.\u00a0<\/p>\n
It was a rollercoaster ride of a day.\u00a0 I wonder if this is what my whole year will be like.\u00a0 I have heard that nothing in China\u00a0is written in stone until it actually happens, and even then I have a hard time believing it!\u00a0 Until next time…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Today, (Tuesday) one of my roommates and I biked to\u00a0\u6797\u5927 to meet Mr. Wang, who would take us to our meeting at Sinopec.\u00a0 We didn’t really know how long it would take us to get there so we left about 45 minutes before we were supposed to meet.\u00a0 It ended up taking only about 15-20 […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/amber.schlomer.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/111"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/amber.schlomer.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/amber.schlomer.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/amber.schlomer.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/amber.schlomer.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=111"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"https:\/\/amber.schlomer.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/111\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":117,"href":"https:\/\/amber.schlomer.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/111\/revisions\/117"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/amber.schlomer.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=111"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/amber.schlomer.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=111"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/amber.schlomer.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=111"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}