Shilly has invited us over twice since then. She took Taylor and I shopping, and INSISTED she buy us new jackets. $116 Nike jackets. I felt a little guilty at first, but if buying our love with Nike products is what makes her happy, then I may as well not be rude, and accept her gifts. Haha.
Halloween is not really celebrated in China, but for us foreign teachers, the homesickness is starting to set in, and we wanted to celebrate Halloween with our students. The school allowed us to make a list of Halloween items we wanted, and they would do their best to get it to us. The night before Halloween, we received our Halloween package from the school. We got almost everything we wanted, decorations, balloons and crape paper (sheets instead of streamers... Oh well). We had also asked for candy corn.... Hilariously disappointing. (The kids loved it. Ew.) We asked our students to dress up, but were told they may not be able to because they have Chinese classes in the afternoons. We were really happy when 1st grade and 3rd grade both came to class decked out. They weren't really wearing "costumes". It looked like they had looked through a costume box and put on every random mask, hat, and cape they owned. But they were still really super cute. This is my class. Left to right: Michael, Levy, Justin, Spring, Dora, Edward, and Teacher Lilly. Teacher Taylor and I were invited over to one of our students houses. Her moms name is Shilly. Shilly, her husband and her daughter live in a huge 5 story apartment. When we walked in, we were asked to remove our shoes, and put on slippers. This is normal Chinese culture. Their apartment was very elegant, and the every floor matched, and was decorated the same way. We were given gifts and a whole table of snacks to enjoy, so by the time dinner was ready we weren't hungry anymore. That didn't stop them from piling each of our plates with 2 steaks and 8 dumpling. We ate all of it. By the time we headed home, we felt like our stomachs were going to burst. Shilly has invited us over twice since then. She took Taylor and I shopping, and INSISTED she buy us new jackets. $116 Nike jackets. I felt a little guilty at first, but if buying our love with Nike products is what makes her happy, then I may as well not be rude, and accept her gifts. Haha. I'll end with a montage of my favorite selfies from this week: "And that's the way the fortune cookie crumbles" -Head Teacher Timber
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Just an update for you. I'm back in Nanjing after my 10 day vacation. I'll admit, I wasn't too happy about coming back. Traveling was amazing. Visiting places I've only seen on Sagwa was unreal. Pictures, of course: My wonderful roommate Sabrina and I. Tobogganing down the wall was almost more fun than the wall itself. Beijing street food/art. More art. Abandon (haunted) amusement park that farmers have reclaimed. Tapping into my inner Mulan. Almost too cute to eat. Almost. Post travel iSpy? Passport The Grand Budapest Hotel Fox Mulder Not thrilled to be back in Nanjing, but I am happy to see my students again. Spoiled, snotty and sassy, I still love them to pieces. When we play games in a circle on the floor, students fight over sitting next to me. They make up songs about my "yellow" hair, and hug me and tell me they love me. Leaving them in Decemeber will be difficult. Until then, I'll be soaking up every moment with them. I've spent the last few days in Yangsho. I think I could live here forever. The city is surrounded by mountains, so I feel right at home. Almost. The street markets are great. I've never experienced bargaining before, and have found that I am quite good at it. I've left more than one shopkeeper a little angry. The first day here we explored the mud caves. The worker would not allow us to take our own pictures, so had to buy the ones HE took. We spent more on pictures then on the cab ride over AND the entrance fee. Yesterday, we decided to explore the rice terraces. We woke up kind of late, but didn't think much of it, and caught a 2 hour bus to Guilin. From Guilin we rode another bus up a mountain. It was a 3 hour ride, and about half way up we discovered that the last bus going down the mountain that night was at 5:00. We talked about staying overnight on the terraces, but we had a train to catch the next morning. We made it up the mountain and immediately got on a bus headed back to Guilin. We were all really upset. We had spent 200¥ in total on travel, and wasted a whole day of our vacation. I was really REALLY upset. I took this shortly after hopping on the bus down: Like I said, I was really upset. But I had a good 5 hours ahead of me to think about things. I felt really stupid for being so upset. As if just being in China isn't cool enough. At least we made it up the mountain in time to catch the last bus. We literally got off the bus, and ran to catch the one going down. And 200¥ is only about $30. One teacher I know got her phone pickpocketed out of her backpack. Another, had to pay to replace a rental scooter she crashed. I'm actualy really lucky that this has been the only hiccup in my vacation so far. Rice Terraces aren't even that cool anyway. Right? Here's a picture I COULD have taken: Here are some pictures I DID take: Eating rice with a spoon with chopsticks. All is well. Today was my first day of my 10 day vacation. I spent the whole day out of my comfort zone. Way way WAAAY out of my comfort zone. We started with the longest cable car ride in the world (about 50 minutes). The ride began in the middle of the city and took us up the top of Tianmen Moutain. It was unreal. I don't like heights. I don't like small spaces. But... China. The rest of the day was filled with trails like this. Some cement and wood between you and 4,000ft drop. I surprised my entire group and even myself with this next trail.... Glass. This is Jazz (Left) We met today. He is English, and I don't know much else about him. We spent the entire day with him. Each ribbon is a prayer. Best day here so far. Exhausted. Goodnight. One giant French fry. 😍 Loving the weather here. Can't wait for fall. It was dry. Sugo/fish pedicures feat. Taytay Probably the best thing I've eaten so far. Don't ask me what's in it. I have no idea. My students teaching me meditation. Hannah, Taylor, Addie, Darby and I. Teaching is a lot harder than I thought it would be. But it's also more fun than I thought. Some days are really hard, and I am really tired, and others are great. My first graders are wonderful. They probably understand 2% of what I'm saying (that's 2% more than they unserstood 3 weeks ago!). The best feelings come from watching a first grader's face when it FINALLY clicks that "he" applys to boys and "she" to girls, or whatever lesson we are working on. 6 and 7 year olds can be really hard to control, especially with the language barrier, but I've learned that they love you no matter how much you yell at them. So don't hold back. I'm having so much fun. Not too much homesickness. So far.... (; 再见啦 晚安 P.s. Month 1, and already more updates than Micheaela, mom. Traveling here is not very fun. It's about a 5 hour drive to anywhere exciting outside of Nanjing. Here are a few ways Brian likes to spend his time while traveling: Same jacket, different days. We took a bullet train to Shanghai this weekend for a YSA conference. The ride was an hour and a half, instead of 5 hours. Pictures from Shanghai: Believe me, I was tempted. We all know how much I love baby animals. (I ate it!) I'm basic Still, so beautiful here. Tiramisu. 😍😍 Staring an album called "Pictures of people taking pictures of me" Next weekend will nice because we will not be traveling. I'm almost more excited for that than I have been for our trips. I still need some time to accept that fact that I'm actually here in China. It's still so crazy to me. If you know how to mail a burrito, let my mom know please. Teaching started on Monday. I teach 4 hours each day. I have a third grade class, and a first grade class. The first grade class doesn't speak much English. That makes things kind of difficult. But most of them know the essentials: Teecha pee pee! I want. Water. Teecha, cold. Sank you. Everything else they try to communicate involves wild hand gestures. Randomness from my camera roll: Metro selfie feat. Darby. David. One of the cutest 1st graders. Not sure if I'm allowed to have a favorite student, but I do. Hansen. Leo. His favorite foods are "rice and hotdogs!" Aaaaand no. The food is getting better. I can't tell if the quality of food is going up, or if my standards are going down. We found pizza at a market and if felt like Christmas. So beautiful here. 再见 I've been in Nanjing for 3 days now. It feels like I've been here for 2 weeks. Just about everything here is awesome. The campus where I live is beautiful. Prettier than any picture I could take of it. I start teaching tomorrow, and couldn't be more excited.I'll be teaching 1st and 3rd grade children. The food is pretty much hit: Or miss: Overall, I'm pretty darn happy ...and greatful to be here. Zàij aiàn! |