The countdown begins...

We had quite an interesting conversation with Shining, one of the Chinese girls we live with the other day. Habby is doing a lesson on superstition & luck, etc with one of her adult classes so we asked Shining about Chinese superstitions & customs & what have. Turns out, that pregnant woman are not allowed to touch cold water throughout their 3 terms & also, for about 4-6 months after the baby is born. Their reasoning for this is that it will cause brittle bones in later life......... hmm. We decided not to dispute this & simply agree to disagree.

Lazybones & Broken bones

Well, what a boring week. I've actually done very little of anything really. For example, today, my alarm went off at 9am, I looked out the window, couldn't see the building across the way due to the fog (!!) & so I went back to sleep. When I woke up again around 10:30, it was still foggy. So decided today was a good day to spend in bed watching DVD's! Some may say this was a waisted day. I prefer to think of it as a day in which I culturally enriched my life via film........ yes, that's my excuse & I'm sticking to it!

By the way, if anyone's interested, 'Black Book' is a really good film, bit long, but if you don't mind subtitles, worth watching.

In some ways, it's been quite eventful, however, as last Tuesday night, a crew of us went to the Forgein Student's Bar down the road & when leaving, Habby simply missed the step by mistake, tripped & then tripped over the curb as she fell & broke a bone in her foot twice. She's been in bed all week though she was back at work today as there's no such thing as 'extended sick leave' in China! She was practicing the stairs yesterday with her crutches though so she's taking it in good spirits, despite the 30 Chinese random herble pills a day! *shudders* I wouldn't take them!!


Road Safety


When I was at school, we had 'road safety' talks about looking left & right before you cross, etc etc. Then, when I learnt to drive, I had more 'road safety' talks from my instructor about looking left & right at junctions & not aiming for pedestrians & that sort of thing. This does not seem to exist in China.

I was on my way back from Medical College on Friday & my taxi driver drove straight into the side of a scooter, knocking the man to the ground! The biker sprang from the road to greet the cabby with shouts & violent arm gestures, which is not really that surprising. They taxi driver, however, was more concerned about the damage the scooter may have done to the front of his car despite the fact it was clearly his fault. As far as he was concerned, he had honked his horn & the scooter hadn't gotten out of the way, thus he was not to blame.

The meter was still running as they had their barny on the side of the road & cars were pushing their way past the taxi beeping in protest that the cabby hadn't moved his car. After a few minutes of watching the meter climb & I decided to blow this for a lark, jumped out & scurried into another taxi before he could notice. Perhaps it was wrong of me not to pay, but as far as I was concerned, he'd hit a bike & there was no way I was paying for him to stand there & argue on my time & money!

I also nearly got run over twice today on the way to & from Walmart as bikes randomly decided to drive down the side walk & then down the wrong side of the road which I wasn't expecting!


Not much else to report, however. I'm beginning to think about getting things ready to come home as I only have 2 & 1/2 weeks left now which is quite a strange feeling. Having been living in this 'bubble' as it were for the past 3 months suddenly it's going to be popped & I'll be home. I am looking forward to it; dognuts, cheese on toast, a comfy bed for the first time in 3 months... oh & seeing friends & family of course as well. Tee hee!

While the Tiger's Away the Monkey is King

Caroline, the boss, has gone away to Beijing this week & from there is going to London for about 3 weeks. The girls in the office are all quite excited & keep saying, "while the tiger's away the monkey is king" which basically means, "while the cat's away the mouse will play".

We also learnt another new Chinese idiom this week:

"Ni che wo dofu!" - you eat my tofu!

This translates as meaning that a man takes advantage of a woman as tofu has a similar, how can I put this so that it won't sound crude... feel to a woman's breasts. We find this one highly amusing & so we've been shouting throughout the appartment all week, "Ni che wo dofu!!"

Party on Down at A5

A5 is the appartment off site where a bunch of the others live & they had a party last Tuesday with all of us & a bunch from the University. It was a really good laugh actually & at around 3:30am 7 of us decided it would be a good idea to go to the 24hr Maccy D's on the way home to get burgers as we were hungry. We sat around chatting in there - & having our photos taken by the staff - tilla round 5am when they started making breakfast so we ordered pancakes then as well! Was a good day. Got home about 6am & slept.

Was refreshing though as the guys from the Uni down our road have all been here at least 6 moths - a year & so can speak pretty damn good Chinese so I basically said to them, I want that one & they ordered for me! Herah! For once none of this dilly daddling around while we attempt to make people understand us!

Us in Maccy D's at around 4am - the staff wanted photos so I took one too!

There's a good reason I didn't take GCSE Art!

On the Wednesday, Caroline has organised a Chinese Brush Painting lesson for us at the 'old people's' vocational college. Though I have no artistic talent what so ever, decided to go for the 'cultural experience' & also thought it would be a laugh.

Only 7 of us made (though Neil left after about 30mins to go play football at the Uni) it as the others were all to hung over from the night before & the brush painting was actually really hard! I was useless & the instructor seemed to give up on me actually as he stopped attempting to give me advice on how to hold the brush & 'stroke' the page...

That being said, it was an interesting afternoon & at the end of the lesson, all the usual students insisted on giving us their paintings they had done throughout the term so we each got 2 free paintings! They're actually very good. Though one of mine I have since noticed has a blank ink smudge on it.

Escape from Wuhu Number Two!

9 of us went to Shanghai on Friday for the weekend as there was a Drum & Base Party in a club there on Friday & in the day I thought there would be better shopping!

After a very long train journey which just became a nightmare really as we left Wuhu at 3:45pm & didn't arrive in Shanghai untill 11:30pm (depsite the fact the train should only take 5 or 6 hours!) we finally arrived at teh train station. We then had to check into a hotel, but couldn't actually find it in the end & so after another hour (as you can imagine, I was getting quite annoyed by this point) we finally rang Katie & Spela who had gone up the day before & asked them where they were staying & wen there instead.

Finally, at 2am, we got to the club & it was a really good night. The DJ wasn't actually that good, however, when you've been clubbing in Wuhu for nearly 3months, anything would have sounded good! Also, the beer was free if you gave them back your empty bottle so really, no one was complaining! ;)

We got chatting to some people who showed us another bar around 5am & so we all trooped off there & around 7am we all got hungry (seeing a running theme here!?) so went to City Diner with them for a full English Breakfast. Bacon has never taisted so good!! We were in there till around 10am we finally decided to head back to the hotel. By this time there was only Neil, me & 2 guys we'd met in the club left & I wanted to get some shopping in on the Saturday so needed to head off.

I only had an hour & a half's sleep that day. I lived off regular caffine boosts from Starbucks & Costa Coffee. It was a happy day to see coffee shops!

There was a 7 story mall which made me happy just looking at it though in reality when you got inside there wasn't all that much to buy sadly as it was still all Chinese fashion. *sigh* I did manage to find one top though which was good - I've been having withdrawal symptoms from the lack of clothes shopping . I do miss browsing the shops.

Despite the fact that last time I wrote about Shanghai after our trip during Golden Week I didn't really warm to the place, I've decided after this trip that I actually quite like Shanghai. Perhaps it was the clubbing, the fact that I blended in quite happily & could have been in London when I was in coffee shops or bars or maybe it was simply the fact that it's a fun place to be! It's quite easy to navigate (had I had longer than a few hours to do so on more than 1 hour's sleep!) & it was just a nice place to be. I really liked it this time.

It's funny really; you spend your hole life trying to think of ways to make yourself 'stand out' if that makes sense but in reality, I was so happy to blend in this weekend!! Ironic!

Nanjing

On Monday, Jenny, Habby & I planned to go to Nanjing - the old capital of China which is only 2 hours away from us by bus. As it's a bit bigger, we thought the shopping may be better & also, it's just nice to get out of Wuhu for the day sometimes.

Nanjing was the capital of China untill Chairman Mao's revolution in the 1950's & he moved it to Beijing. 'Nan' means south & 'Bei' means north so they literally translate as 'South Capital' & 'North Capital'. Very original thought process for the names there!

Sadly, however, Nanjing isn't quite big enough to have the compitent transportation systems of Shanghai or Beijing or the easy navigatory systems. That being sad, it's not quite small enough, like Wuhu for example, to not need these & so we spent the morning simply trying to find out where it was we needed to be & where we wanted to go!

We never did find the Forgein Bookstore for Jenny who is desperate for something to read as she's hear untill June & already finished her books! I on the other hand did have a successfull day as I found a lovely pair of ankle boots & we did manage to find a little souvinier type market which was quite nice to meander around & there was a rather random golden tree!? We still don't know why it was there!

All in all though, by 5:30pm when our bus back was, we were ready to leave as I'm ill again (walking around in the rain in Shanghai on an hour's sleep probably hasn't exactly helped me fight it off!) & we were all tired & sort of had had enough of how difficult Nanjing is to navigate even with a map!

I'm back at Shuiyang tomorrow - joy of joys - & really can't be bothered if I'm honest. The early morning simply doesn't appeal to me! Hope all is well in the UK - I hear it's snowing!! Not impressed that I'm missing that!! See you all in 4 weeks - damn time is flying by!! xx

Yi ping bing Tsingtao!

Sorry I'm a week late; it's been a bit mental here for the past week & so I didn't get a chance to update the blog last week.

My Medical College students, as I have explained before, are on a two month cycle & the cycle started again last week so the weekend before I spent planning my new lessons for them - literally a day & a bit at a computer searching & organising, etc etc etc. Fuuun.

I then did the lesson on Monday morning - English slang & idioms was the bulk of the lesson - & it went down really well, so that was a relief!

On Thursday morning, Rebecca, who deals with all the timetabling, comes into the apartment & says that the crazy Medical woman who's the head of English or something there has rung to say that the students can't understand us & that what we're teaching isn't acceptable as it's not relevant or from the book. I wasn't happy. So all my hard work is now for nothing & now I have to replan all my lessons. Not impressed.

On top of this, the assistants quit 2 or 3 weeks ago & so I now don't have a Chinese assistant for my lessons at Shuiyang. To be honest, I teach sets 1-6 & the top 2 I can get away with it I've found over the past 2 weeks. However, sets 3 & 4 are a bit tougher & 5 & 6 without an assistant is simply a joke. Their English teacher sat in with me incase I had any problems but actually, their English wasn't good enough to translate for me in some cases!! I was shocked & very frustrated!! Also, the head of English there (who was actually the worst one) wouldn't let my students think for themselves or speak & whenever I asked the class a question, he would go right up to the students, let them whisper it in his ear in Chinese & then tell me!! I got a bit narky with him in the end because he wasn't getting my polite hints, & said, "this is my class today, I want them to speak, not you & I want them to tell me, not you. You're my assistant today." So yes, Shuiyang is slowly going down hill as well & Caroline, my boss, is having problems recruiting new assistants & the 3 she has can't do Wednesdays. So looks like I'm flying solo from now on! Give me strength. It's going to be easy peasy lessons for them from now on in then!

Shuiyang is actually canceled this week, however, as they have exams - yey! A week off practically!

My week just went from bad to worse really as my bank cards then stopped working as well last week. Between it rejecting the pin in one & saying the other had insufficient funds when I know full well that wasn't the case, it just was a bad day!

New Recruits

Two new girls arrived this week (they are living off site with the others, however) from the UK; Helena & Rebecca. They're only here a month as they're traveling on to New Zeland as well before they return home to start their 18 years in the RAF.

We get on well with them which is good & we're actually going to a 'gathering' at their's & the other's appartment tonight which should be good fun.

"Hello... Hi... Good Afternoon... Hello... Hi there... I'm bored how are you? Oh you don't speak English? That's a shame..."

2 weeks ago, we had to go to an education faire & promote Aston Language Centre by standing there at the stall handing out flyers & answering questions to the few who could speak English. It was rather dull.

I did speak to 4 11 year olds though who were justs so sweet! They disappeared after a while & then reappeared with a bunch of orchids & a red rose for me! Made my day! They also gave me this squishy toy thing which is quite fun to play with - bit like a yoyo. They insisted no matter what I said!

Felt a bit like an animal at the zoo though as people would walk past the stall & just gawp at us! Or when you were talking to someone, they'd form a crowd around you to listen in or watch. Very odd. Wasn't exactly how I would normally spend my Saturday but it comes with the job, these random bits & pieces liek meet & greet dinner & promotional stuff we have to do. Fun fun fun!

Escape from Wuhu

This weekend just gone, Neil & I headed off to Hefei (the capital city of Anhui Province) as, well, in all honesty, the bars are better & I thought because it was the capital the shopping would be better!

As it happened, I didn't get to go shopping as my wallet was stolen on the Saturday & so I had nothing. Luckily, it was only my wallet & not the iPod, Camera, phone or Neil's passport which were all in my bag as well, so really, could have been a lot worse. There wasn't really any money in it, the most they'll get out of it is the VIP cards for Pizza Hut, a few restaurants in Wuhu! Unless they intend to get in a taxi & don't speak English as all my 'taxi cards' with all the places I may ever need to go were in there too with the Chinese characters written on them... that reminds me, need to get them reprinted!

Other than that, it was actually a really good weekend, however. We stayed in a rather local hotel despite the fact there was a perfectly good Holiday Inn we could have stayed at. But where's the fun in that!

The receptionist came to our rooms after we'd checked in - after much gesturing, phoning Shining for a translation & then drawing pictures on paper as well! - & motioned 'sleeping' & then pointed to the locks (yes, plural + chain) indicating that we made sure the door was locked when we went to sleep. (Now you see why I was carrying all my valuables with me in my bag!) But it was fine, & we felt perfectly safe to be honest.

We went clubbing Friday & Saturday night & made some friends who we'll never see again. Neil got dragged up by the host singer man to play the club games (they stop the music 1/2 way through the night to play random games like 'Beat the Intro' on the dance floor!) both nights & had to win one girl's heart one night & the second, do as many pushups as he could with another girl sat on his back. Very bizarre! But highly amusing for the rest of us!

On the Friday, I got chatting to a group of people, mainly through a girl called Baby (think she'd seen Dirty Dancing too many times!) as she spoke the best English. However, Baby seemed to think that we were suddenly the best of friends & girls in China are much, umm, closer shall we say than they are in the UK. For example, on the dance floor, she grabbed my hips & starts daning with me like a guy & a girl would dance at home & later tried to come to the loo with me! I shut the door rather quickly to my cubicle! She was nice enough but I like something we call Personal Space which she didn't seem to get!

On the Saturday, we went back to the same club & played dice (a drinking game here which we've gotten really into) with some of the staff & they taught us Chinese dancing - somewhat similar to 'Saturday night' dance from year 7 discos! But we were having fun & at 2am, we were the only people left with all the staff & were having quite a laugh. Suddenly, the owner says, "dinner!" So we all troop off to a restaurant down the road & he pays for everything. However, this means in China that you cannot be rude & not eat it as it would be highly offensive... those of you who know me know how picky an eater I can be... you understand my dilemma in these situations...

So, what's the first thing they put down in front of us? A tray of cray fish, heads, shells, tentically thingies & all! I don't eat seafood. Hmmm. So Chen, a girl next to me took delight in showing me what I had to do & I picked up my chopsticks, took a deep breath & bit into the meat. Actually, I was shocked, but it was really nice! Just the shelling bit I have issues with! I ate a 2nd, which i shelled myself - badly - but then another dish of vegies & what I swear was worm looking things arrived & by that point it was a case of, 'just don't look or think about what your eating!'

The owner kept plying Neil with Bei Jiao as well (Chinese alcohol which is over 50%). He surreptitiously poured some in the soup instead but then he simply refilled his glass! Chen, bless her, kept telling the owner to stop but he kept ignoring her until she reached across & literally took Neil's cup away from him - he was very appreciative of this!

The host singer man kept telling me he loved me as well which was a tad awkward. I was like, "umm, thanks?!" I mean really, what do you say to that! Very strange night!

We didn't end up getting home & to sleep till gone 6am. & then I was up at 9:30 to get breakfast as I was hungry & we had to check out by 12!

Anyway, not much other news. Going to a party tonight at the apartment of those who live off site so that should be fun & we have more promotional work this week to do as well which won't be quite so fun. Never mind. See you all soon xx