A tragedy

The following is a speech given by one of my freshman boys. I had asked the students in the class to give a 3-minute speech on any topic they wanted. I encouraged them to make it interesting, make it personal, and it MUST be original. In the last class of the day (my favorite class!) we were almost done and I was SO ready to get home! A girl had just finished telling us about a fire in the orphanage in her hometown that had destroyed the building and killed 2 children. It was so sad and as she finished her speech everyone was completely silent and almost all of the girls were crying. The next boy got up and below is his speech, word for word. I copied it (with his permission) from his paper so I would be sure not to miss a thing. The grammatical and spelling errors are purposely unchanged for your amusement. :)


"Hello everyone. I’m Lancelot. Today I will tell you something about myself.

It’s a really bad thing.

It was happened at 1:15am on the 25th of December. My left ear, entered a small cockroach.

It was unfortunate and theatrical. Because in the afternoon we cleaned our dormitory. And we also splashed the demons. It was continued until we went to the bed. At the start, happened nothing. We were wery happy. Because we kills not a few cockroaches.

I guess we killed too many cockroaches. So the cockroaches started revenge.

So I was a tragedy.

When I felt my left ear had an insect, I was fear. Because the cockroach went on the rampage in my left ear. And it was very pain. So I jump out of bed and groan.
My roommates heard my voice so they woke up and helped me. After they learned me, someone said oil or wine. But we didn’t have oil. We had wine, but just beer. And it was not useful. So I realized we can’t solve the thing. But the time was really late. It was about at 1:30am. So my roommates called the ambulance. We rushed outside and waited a moment.

The ambulance sent me to the hospital. The cockroach was killed by the doctor. But because it was so small, the doctor didn’t have the equipment so the doctor couldn’t take it out. So in the morning I went to another hospital. The doctor used instrument and took out the cockroach.

It was a nightmare, a really terrible remember.

Thank you."

MERRY CHRISTMAS!!!

I know, I know. It's a little late for that! But since this is my blog (and I've been reallllly lazy about posting) I can write whatever I want! :) This past Christmas was...different. It just kinda crept up on me, and then was gone before I knew it! And my final exams just happened to fall on December 26th, so I was busy grading projects, finishing final grades, answering last minute questions from frantic students doing last minute studying... But I still had a fun Christmas.

I had a cute little helper that made cookies with me...

We made a LOT!

I have a little kitty and he liked to sit IN my Christmas tree! Can you see him?

I got to be part of a very special family Christmas! I am so fortunate to have such wonderful friends here!

Thanksgiving

Hi! I know it's been a while since I posted anything, so here's what happened in the past 4 months...

This past Thanksgiving I was fortunate enough to attend TWO delicious dinners! The first one with close family friends (my Qingdao family!), and the second was with two great families and a few single girls. Both dinners were amazing, and I truly am thankful for friendship and the people that the Father has placed in my life here.

The Chinese people don’t celebrate Thanksgiving, so it was a good opportunity to talk to my students about our traditions, why we should be thankful, and what I am specifically thankful for. They laughed when I told them what and how much we eat! Chinese people don’t eat turkey, and of course, some of our side dishes and desserts sound completely strange to them. And the amount we eat surprised them. Traditionally, when the Chinese sit down to a feast or important dinner, there is at LEAST one different dish of food for each person. Most of the time there is more. So it’s kind of like a buffet, but it’s on a giant lazy susan on the table and everyone just picks a little bit from each dish and eats as the lazy susan slowly turns. They will eat a lot, but rarely will they completely finish a dish and leave it empty. And they almost never take the leftovers home. So when you think about it, our traditional dinner has the turkey, stuffing, and maybe 4-6 different sides plus 3 or 4 desserts? Depending on the number of guests that’s probably 1 or 2 dishes per person. The difference is, is that we’ll eat almost all of it! And then pack up the rest or leave it out for turkey sandwiches a few hours later! No wonder the Chinese think that most “Meiguo ren shi peng!” “Americans are fat!” :)

This is my best friend. She's fat.

Last week I gave my freshman English classes a writing assignment. They were to write a short biography of a classmate, and then read it to the class. The boys were funny. They would make jokes about their friends, or say that they spent a lot of time playing computer games. Nothing really out of the ordinary. But then I noticed them saying things like, “My friend is a very cute boy.” Wait…what? And it wasn’t just one or two that said it. About half of the boys said that their guy friends are cute! They didn’t mean that they were attracted to them, nor was there anything “lost in translation.” They were simply stating that their friend was good-looking. And it wasn’t a weird thing to say. No one laughed or seemed surprised. Except me. No one heard me though. J

I thought nothing could top that, but then the girls started speaking. They said nice things about their friends, “she’s pretty, she’s kind, etc.” They talked about their friends’ likes and dislikes, “she likes to read, she doesn’t like sports, etc.” Then I heard,”She’s fat because she likes to eat a lot.” Wait…what? I looked over and expected to see the (very skinny in my opinion) friend burst into tears and run from the room. But she didn’t! She simply giggled and nodded her head as the rest of the class joined in laughing with her! The next girl got up to speak and told the class that her friend doesn’t exercise, so she’s fat. And on it went! “This is my best friend. She likes to watch movies. She’s a little fat.”

I’ve learned that there’s no such thing as a personal question here. It’s perfectly acceptable to ask people how old they are, how much money they make, how much they spent on something, and more. People don’t think twice about telling someone that they’re fat, or that they’re not very good-looking. A lady once told me that my curly hair was messy, and that she could tell I was a foreigner because I was fat. Not because I had fair skin, big eyes, and spoke terrible Chinese, but because I was fat. J I don’t know if this candidness is a good thing or not. Maybe some things are just better left unsaid.

These are a few of my favorite things...

Part of living in a different country means eating new foods. When I’m out with friends or students I like to try different foods, as long as they don’t look too suspicious! When I’m home however, I like to eat what we call “Western” food. To you at home in the states, that’s just the everyday food from Wal-Mart or Publix. Sometimes going grocery shopping here is “Like a box of chocolates. Ya never know what you’re gonna get!” And when you do find something that you don’t expect, like a favorite candy or baking supplies, it can make your entire week! Often times we’ll go to the Western food stores and come home feeling like we’ve found buried treasure. So I wanted to show you some of the things I consider treasures, that you might not think about at all.

Here are some of the "Western" foods that are actually sold in China. See if you can figure out what they are! :)





Who would have ever thought that you could even find Nutrisystem foods here?? :)

Freshmen and Frustrations

Last week the Freshmen started their classes. I thought I was only going to have one Freshman class, but I ended up having 3 more added to my schedule. I wasn't too happy about it, but then I found out that I would get paid extra for those classes, so that made things a little easier to accept. The Freshmen though...they're something else. :) When you walk into the classroom for the first time, there's a loud "OOH!" and then whispers of excitement. The cell phones come out and they start taking your picture. It's all flattering at first, they sure know how to boost the ego! :) But then each time they talk to you it's, "You're so beautiful", "Do you have a boyfriend?", "Do you think you're beautiful?", "What kind of boys do you like?", "Do you think I'm handsome?" (oh yes, I got that question!), "How old are you?", "How old do you want to be when you get married?", and on and on and on! It gets kind of annoying after a little while, but they can be kind of fun, and they hang on your every word!! Unlike...

My Juniors!! Most of the time they're pretty good. But they can be so frustrating!!! I think the biggest problem for me to deal with is that their classroom experience is different than what I'm used to. In American university classrooms, the teachers encourage discussions, students ask questions, and learn to think critically. My experience has been so different here! When I ask a question, I get blank stares. I understand that there's a slight language barrier, so I give them a little extra time to process the question. Then they look down at their textbook and read a sentence that may or may not have anything to do with what the question was about. When I try to initiate a discussion, I get nothing. The students look down at their books, or look at their friends with a "Is she serious?" face. They're not used to an interactive classroom. They're used to being lectured at. They're not used to critical thinking, they're used to memorizing their textbooks to find the correct answer.

And the cheating!! Oh my word! It's practically an art form. Now not all of them do it, but the ones that do have perfected their craft. They write the answers on the desk, shamelessly look at a friend's paper, leave their notes or textbooks wide open on their desks, or just ask someone what the answer is. I had one student that missed a quiz because he was sick. When he came into class the next day I gave him the quiz and told him to go directly into the next room to take it. He went back to his desk, grabbed his cell phone, and tried to walk out. I told him to give me his phone. He did, but then went back to where his friend was and asked him for the same quiz that I had already handed back to the others! You have GOT to be kidding me! Right in front of my eyes! It wasn't like I was distracted or anything, he knew that I was watching him and waiting for him to leave. I went over, grabbed the quiz and told them (and the whole class) that if they ever pulled anything like that again they would get zeros. They just kind of smiled, and the kid went to the next room and took his quiz. He got a 100. I'm still trying to figure that one out... But whatever. Cheating is a big problem here. It's almost expected. So now I have to make them sit at least one seat apart from each other, and I'll make them switch desks to throw them off a little. I have to be just as creative as them.

I now have even more respect for teachers and all the junk they have to put up with! I only wish I had been a better student! Now all the stuff I tried to pull is coming back to bite me in the behind! :)

The Death Star and Moon Cakes

A couple of weeks ago, I woke up one morning and in my groggy, blurred vision state, I thought the Death Star was outside my window! If you don't know what that is, you must be a girl with no older brothers. :) It was actually just a big advertising balloon. Still, it was a little startling first thing in the morning.

 

So last weekend was the Chinese Mid Autumn Festival. I don't know too much about the history behind it, you can read about it here: http://www.chinavoc.com/festivals/Midautumn.htm . I just know that we get a few days vacation and people give us Moon Cakes. Moon Cakes are these small pastries that can be filled with nuts, fruit, or eggs. Really, you should open the link and read about them. :) The outer cake part kind of tastes like the outside of  a Fig Newton, but there's not much of it to snack on. Last year was my first experience with them, and it wasn't really something I was looking forward to having again. This year I was given a beautiful box from the university where I work. So I tried one just to make sure. It was filled with a red bean paste. I wasn't a fan. :)