Rain Rain Go Away

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We have hit our two week mark of being here in China!! Yay us!
I’m into my second week of teaching and loving every minute of it. Of course there’s those few children who are the class clowns, but I find them so entertaining at times that I don’t mind it as much as I would if I were at home. Today I walked into my Grade 2 class in the morning and said “GOOD MORNING!” The class chanted back “Good Morning Teacher Lauren, How are you Today?” – however, one boy in the first row decided to go against the grain chanting “Good morning my baby!”. Another student from grade three yesterday introduced himself to me as Ice Cream. To each his own, I say! Haha…

It’s been a great few days here in China. Minus the weather… On Monday night it began to drizzle, and we were thanking the rain Gods because we figured it would help out with the drastic humidity that we’ve been experiencing here. But no, it didn’t just drizzle for the night. It’s been raining like crazy since then, and it’s Wednesday now!! We haven’t had a break of it. The streets are soaked, everyone is riding around on the motor bikes and bicycles wearing ponchos to keep somewhat dry – despite my greatest efforts to keep dry, I always end up walking into my school like a drowned rat. It’s terrible! But we’ve been hearing that it rains once in China, it rains the whole week in China. So I’m preparing myself for a few more days of this wet world.

I found a great Bok Choy recipe online, and decided to experiment it with our wok. It turned out AMAZING and I have to say I was quite proud of my end result. I could eat Bok Choy all day everyday; it’s just that good! Courtney and I FINALLY made it back to the random take away place near the pagoda the other night. We have been craving that take away for days, and we finally made it. And I was able to communicate that we wanted our food to go – yay me! See, I’m picking the language up – slowly but surely! I’ve got 8 months to do it, so I’m in no rush!! Anyways, we had the steamed rice, of course, the spicy egg plant which is to die for, green beans with this other veggie that I can’t pronounce and last but not least, the tomato and egg extravaganza that I am just head over heels for. It sounds disgusting but who knew it would turn into one of my favourite dishes here!

We are venturing to the underground market this weekend as well finally. We have been wanting to experience this place since we heard of it! We need to take a bus and a full day to really get the full effect apparently. So we are going to go on this adventure over one of our days off – I’m really excited to see what kind of treasures we will be able to find at this place. Apparently it’s huge! Another reason I can’t wait to go is to work on my bargaining skills. In China, haggling prices is an everyday routine – which I am totally not used to and not very good at, but I’m getting the hang of it. It’s actually really fun to make a game out of it too!

Some less exciting news, is that Courtney and I have discovered that we have a new pet! We are going to call him Stuart, because he’s a mouse. We have seen his… marking (if you will), all through the apartment and were pleasantly introduced to him last night and tonight face to face. The first encounter was when I was innocently walking into the kitchen and turned my head noticing a fat little mouse (who looks a lot like Gus Gus from Cinderella, yes I know Disney comments, classic Lauren) running across our windowsill. I freaked out and closed the window shut, thinking that would be the end of that. We both went to bed ignoring the situation and telling ourselves that our new friend was outside… Until tonight. We were watching a movie curled up on the couch with our Chinese take away when out of the corner of my eye I saw our new friend Stuart scurry along our floorboard and into the back of our long TV cupboard in the living room. We got up, banged around the TV cupboard to see if he would run out onto the open patio, but no luck. So we settled back into our movie and with no sign of Stuart again, went our own ways. Unfortunately, that was not the end of him – I went to go and toast this really delicious raisin bread from our local pastry shop called Madeli when I noticed that big chunks from the edge of my bread had been nibbled off. To say the least, they were tossed and all of our food has been cleverly hidden and stored tonight. Fingers crossed that our new friend Stuart doesn’t make an appearance again!! I think it’s off to the store tomorrow to buy some mouse traps (the NON killing ones, of course!) So when I said I wanted a pet for the apartment, I should have been careful for what I wished for – Stuart has ended up adopting Courtney and I!

Today (Thursday) was a dry but cold day here. It’s the first time I’ve worn pants and a sweater to school and haven’t died of the heat!! But all of that rain made the kids SO crazy. I had one grade one class and three grade four classes – the grade ones were angels, but I can’t say the same for the grade 4s! At the end of my last class I got completely bombarded by the 50 students in that class, asking me for my autograph. Who knew that day would come hahah. But actually, I ended up getting knocked off of my feet, and one student slapped another one on the back of the head to get to the front to ask me. It was ridiculous!!! I have never before gotten that sort of attention from students, it was unlike anything I’ve ever experienced – they were all so annoyed when only a few got my signatures and I left the rest begging because I couldn’t handle them! Only in China!

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Comments

[Di Wilsdon]

Thinking of you!
Loving the blog Lauren! So glad you've settled in well. Love the details you put into your entries - you're really getting across an impression of where you're living. Loving it!!