The Second half of the trip is definitely going to be colder. Dave and I were amazed when we got here and the weather was so good. I certainly just presumed it would be freezing from the word go and that we'd spend our whole time here in big furry hats and long johns. Instead we had 2 months of nearly tropical temperatures which I think have made the sudden drop in temperature in the last week or so harder to take. So much so that I am actually considering going out to buy some long johns today-they're all the craze overhere all my class wear them!
The worst piece of news I've had in a while came on Thursday morning. Woke up for another day at the fun factory, bleary eyed and too tired to function properly. Slipped on my work clothes for wednesday and thursday-everything normal so far- and then I thought to open my curtains. My face suddenly dropped!
Whilst most kids revel in the delights of snow I can't honestly think of one thing I like about it. This mainly comes from having a bully of an older brother who used to thrust vast quantities of the dirty grey slush down my jumper at every given opportunity, but also from school where because I had an outside form room for 3 years getting to lessons was absolute nightmares and everytime we needed to cross the playground we were like sitting ducks- sound like a complete girl now I know. THe idea of 6000 kids waiting in front of the school in eager anticipation of throwing rocks covered in a thin layer of snow at the novelty foreign teachers is something I was dreading. Thankfully the snow we had on thursday wasn't enough to cause mass snow fighting outbreaks but it was enough to result in all my kids coming to class both looking like and smelling like drowned dogs- not pleasant. They are still making the kids do their PE outside in their normal clothes and this has just turned into a mass snowball fight which the teachers seem to allow. Dave has already caught one student with a 'ice rock' in his class, so I've read the riot act to my kids and told them that if any one throws at me or brings me in contact with snow in any way then I will "absolutely throttle them". The only defence I have against it at the moment is a thick coat, two scarfs, massive wooly hat and some gloves, but Dave and I are coming up with a better plan.
I do admit that some snow covered scenery can look quite nice though.
Parents have left for New Zealand for 2 weeks and then on the 8th of December will be flying to China. They are staying for a little over 10 days i think. We will spend the first weekend in Beijing and will hopefully take them to the wall and maybe the Summer Palace and Forbidden city. Then they will accompany me back to the Shiz where there isn'tso much to do so they will probably look around the town and come to a few of my lessons and then at the tail end of the week we hope to fly to Xian to see the Terraccotta army. Booking plane tickets in England is an easy everyday type affair but, of course with this being China, things are not quite so easy here.
Lessons this week were showing Harry Potter: The Goblet of Fire. Which in theory sounds good and sounds like I have a easy week but really there are a few problems with showing a film. Firstly its not ideal showing anything to children on a small laptop screen with the equivalent of bake bean cans for speakers, so you try and find alternative ways of presenting the information. Firstly the went to the theacher's class room and asked to use her multimedia facitilites. One agreed and whilst the picture was great and all 60 kids could see it fine the sound was arguably worse than on my computer and the kids could hardly hear it. So the only solution was for me to take Dave's TV and DVD over to my classroom. I didn't just knick Dave's btw it's just that he hardly ever uses it so it would have been silly to take mine and deprive us of our lunch time West Wing Fix.
The other problem is the point of showing a movie means I have to sit through the movies 21 times. Whilst the first few occaisions are fine and I found some things to do at the back of the class. I would say that maybe 15 classes past in absolute gut wrenchingly slow time. I sat at the back playing PSP for the majority but when the battery ran out I just walked around the school. I couldn't stay and watch the film as they had CHinese Audio on and I don't think I wanted to anyway. I can honestly say that I think I prefer teaching a normal lesson, more interesting for me and arguably less stressful, and I can also say that despite me being a fan of the Potter Franchise;
I DO NOT WANT TO SEE THAT FILM AGAIN FOR A VERY LONG TIME!
See you Later!
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