At this halfway point, I want to share some stories that I have collected over the past two months:
- One day, I had a Grade 9 student say to me, “you are so sexy!” What do you say to that? I’m not convinced they know what the word sexy means. Maybe I’m the fool…
- When we are on a bus or on the streets, we have become really good at tuning out the Chinese language. We refer to it as white noise. The other day I wondered aloud if they consider English white noise. The pun was not intended but was certainly amusing.
- I mentioned in my last post that we didn’t do anything of Friday night. This wasn’t entirely true. Sara ended up going out with a teacher from her school so Alyssa and I decided to wander around. We happened upon a group dancing in a little park by our place so we joined in. It surprises me how much Chinese dancing reminds me of Bollywood dancing. The music selection that night was especially amusing, though. Auld Lang Syne was playing on loop for about fifteen minutes when we first got there. After watching for a bit we decided to join in. The moves were easier than the night I went dancing with Sara! After dancing for a while, we found a shoe store near our apartment. Most shoes are under $30 so of course we had to see what we could find. Well! I wanted to try a pair on and within 30 seconds flat I had four shop assistants helping me. They had me sit down and take off my shoes and then two of them were putting and buckling the shoes on my feet. I felt like Cinderella haha. We learned quickly that we should never go anywhere without a camera! Having the four of them surrounding me, and two of them on their hands and knees helping me at that, was quite amusing. After we were done, they all took turns taking their picture with us.
- Sara and Alyssa wear braids in their hair on a regular basis and they claimed that teachers and students are amazed by them. I am not very talented in the braid department but decided to give it a whirl one day. I had a student ask where I got my hair done and I was told I was beautiful more often than any other day. I guess I may work on perfecting my braiding skills!
- I’m getting my students out of the mindset that Frisbees are for dogs! Whenever they see me walk towards the “playground” (track around the soccer field), they go nuts! Most that play are not my students and have zero English so it can be pretty amusing!
- One day last week, as I was walking back to my office from lunch, I had two Grade 7 students corner me and ask if I could go back to Canada for the summer then come for the next school year. When I said no, they asked me over and over again why. Their solution: Jason and my family can get jobs here; foreigners are always welcome! Haha
- On April Fool’s Day I told all of my students that I had to leave China and that it would be my second last day. It went over pretty well and two of my students even got me back later (one told me it was his birthday and one “made me look”). It didn’t go over so well with everyone, though! One girl started crying when I said I was leaving and then cried even harder when I said I was joking. I felt pretty bad. It is nice, though, to feel so liked as a teacher. It’ll be hard to go back to Canadian customs!
- Chinese toddlers and babies are simply adorable. That said, I have been seeing WAY too much of them. Women whip their son’s….dinkies….out at the drop of a dime. I have seen little boys peeing on the front step of a mall, in the garbage can at the very fancy Science and Technology Museum and on sidewalks all over the city. One very narrowly missed my shoe. Also, parents layer their children up so thick on top they look like inflated cartoon characters. On the bottom, however, they wear pants that are open in the back letting their little bottoms fly to the wind. We can’t figure out the logistics of this. Without a diaper, the little guys are free to go wherever and whenever they please. Does this mean in their parents arms when they are holding them or on the floor of the subway/bus? I don’t get it…
- A discussion about the wardrobes of the teachers is well overdue. I’m really going to miss not having a dress code. In many ways, everything goes and there is SUCH a range. Fifty-year old women wear short leather skirts with high, laced up heeled boots and leopard print tights. 22 year old teachers wear shoooort skirts, scrunchies and running shoes. 4-inch heels are never out of the question. I find it amusing that when teachers find an outfit they like, they could wear it for 3 days in a row. There is one male teacher at my school who wore camouflage (pants and top) for about a week straight. One teacher has the best wardrobe I have ever seen, though, and I’d happily steal her outfit any day of the week.
- One day I had to leave school to go to the city to do some paperwork for my visa. Another teacher, Mr. Song, ended up taking me to the subway. The ride there was amusing. He has VERY limited English so we used my phrase book to communicate in broken language. The rest of the time, we sat listening to Ryan Seacrest’s Top 40 as well as the Beatles! On the train (he also had to go into the city) he used his smartphone to tell me he loves Sloan, the Cowboy Junkies and Nickelback. At least he has SOME good taste haha
- My students in Grade 6 were discussing occupations. I asked “what is one occupation you would say is dangerous?” After getting responses like astronaut and policeman, one student says “musician!” I questioned this student and their reasoning was that musicians all die young. They have no money and then get bad habits then they have too much pressure then they die young. Rankin, I hope you play it safe in your profession
- Tights (pantyhose) are made SO much better here and they are way way cheaper (like $3 a pair). I discovered this after my tights from home acquired a crater-sized hole and my Grade 9 boys were mocking me in Chinese.
- One of my students has a sister in Toronto. As such, he has taken quite a liking to me. Almost once a week, he gives me a small gift and he loves showing me things that he owns. One week he tried to give me $1.65 Canadian. Another week he gave me a green ball with beans inside which is what the Shanghaies eat during Qing Ming festival. Another week he gave me a teensy tiny scroll with a tongue twister on it. I have been teaching them tongue twisters as cool-downs once and a while and he looked up the most difficult one from the Guinness Book of World Records and gave it to me! His latest gift was a bit different. One day he came up to me with a mini-Oreo in a Ziplock back and asked me to eat it in front of him. Canada or China, this is not something I am willing to do with any student. He was insistent, though. I decided I lived a good life until now and bit it. He got SO excited. He asked me what it tasted like. I was confused. Elated he asked, “does it taste like toothpaste?!” He wanted me to try a mint-flavoured Oreo haha. I can get used to this!
That’s it for now folk. There are PLENTY more stories to be shared but I think you did enough reading for one day! Until next time! Bye bye!