What's smorgasbord in English?

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.....back to school. Teaching directions this week, north, south, east, west. The kids already know the Chinese words so that part is easy, except that in Chinese it's east-north, west-south etc, not north-east, south-west. They manage quite well with some help giving directions with a map of the school on the board &, later in the week, many manage, as I frenziedly point at the compass sign above & make directional gestures, to navigate a map after we've worked out the English vocabulary for mountains, river, lake, desert etc. One student in a worksheet in the last lesson covered all bases by, in the blank space of “The mountains are ______ of the desert”, instead of writing “east” put a drawing of the compass with all the cardinal points included.....

…..Becky is by far the brightest student in class 3/9, which is largely comprised of group of Neanderthals that escaped extinction during the last Ice Age. She fixes me with her piercing stare at the end of class & asks, “Do you have a sweet tooth?”. That's not normal Grade 3 English vocabulary. She later also asks, “Are you crazy”. To do three sessions a week with this class, yes, of course.....

…..one big step was taken so quietly & naturally I almost forgot to mention it. I was asked by the Chinese teachers in the Grade 3 teachers' office if I'd like to move in with them. Despite our mutual language barrier we have managed to communicate more & more over the months. Now it should be even easier. The foreign teachers' office is - not sterile - it's too messy & dusty, but maybe impersonal. There's hardly ever more than a couple of people there at a time. The Grade 3 teachers' office is also a much better place to improve my Chinese, as Kelly has in his.....

….another big step is taken in the opposite manner. A team of morons, architects, specification writers, planners & builders conspired to find the material with the lowest coefficient of friction possible for the classrooms & the exposed walkways between them. The walkways being exposed to rain makes this already smooth terrazzo concrete surface a skating rink. For good measure a team of cleaners constantly mop it to remove the last residue of anything that might provide any foothold & wait for a teacher carrying a guitar to see how slippery it is. I know the risk & walk in slow motion mode but still my feet just disappear from under me. I land on the guitar, cracking the top as it digs into my back. Luckily when I pick myself up & find just enough breath to speak a couple of nearby Chinese teachers & cleaners can't understand my vocabulary, the curses I heap on the team of failed architects & planners or references to that mythical Australian waterway the “Far Canal”.....

…..Lisa, one of the best Grade 3 students, turns 10 & so the big birthday bash includes teachers, Wang Quan Hui, her class teacher, Suzy, Pan Laoshi, the maths teacher, & the foreign English teacher (me). The production is huge, as usual. We are chauffered to a massive plush restaurant (again!). Among a list of dishes too numerous to mention there is frog, which does actually taste like chicken, in this case with ginger, also goose & a type of mushroom that tastes & feels like meat.....

…..the word for “to be hungry” is “è” (pronounced “urr” with a downward inflection). The word for goose is “é” (similar but with an upward inflection) which is also the word for a moth, just written with a different Chinese character. Is it any wonder I'm making slow progress?.....

…..one of my students, Zhen Xi Fei, (Jeff), also has a birthday this weekend. The invited teachers are to meet at the school gates & go to the Jing Hua Hotel. In the meantime I get a call from the mother of a student I tutor on Sunday afternoons asking me to go to the Metropole Hotel, on the west side of Yangzhou, for the lesson. Something about taking a new job in Nanjing & staying at the hotel in the meantime.....

…..when I get there she is in the coffee lounge / restaurant but the student isn't. There is some drama going on & I think she is hoping I will take Chinese lessons in exchange for my English tuition. Her English is very good &, as the anchor person on a Yangzhou TV arts programme she has contacts in the arts & music. Maybe it's worth considering. She corrects my Chinese, very nicely, but before we resolve the issue I get a phone call from Suzy about the party. I forgot! I'll have to meet the other teachers at the, - where is it, - Jing Hua hotel. Give me the address. It turns out that the Metropole hotel IS the Jing Hua hotel. I am sitting in the very room where the party is to be held.....

…..Suzy, the Grade 3 Chinese English teacher asks what I'd call this food in English. “A smorgasbord...” I spend the next few minutes explaining this Danish word. It is really good, a mixture of Chinese & Western food that actually works. Children & teachers are all happy. It's also a little more relaxed than the imposing restaurant with full table service last night. No, I'm not complaining, just observing.....

…..the new School band, as yet unnamed, performs live for the first time at the Women's Day show at the school auditorium to an audience of, mainly, teachers. Given the size of the school that's several hundred, to hear us in a passable performance of Superstar, by S.H.E (no, I hadn't heard of them before either). Rainy & Gyu out front certainly look the part & their dance moves probably help too.....

…..Sunday is now really a working day as I have three students for tutoring in three separate lessons. Still I get a home cooked lunch at Qiao Tianyi's & they are such a nice family it's not a chore......

…..QQ, the most popular messaging & email software in China, is now loaded on my laptop. Almost everyone, after an introduction, will ask, “What's your QQ number?”. It's as well not to be too liberal with your contact details as students are liable to call & practice their English with profundities such as, “What are you doing now?”, “Where are you?” or “Have you eaten?”. I only have 3 contacts at the moment, Li Wenyi, a student from Qiqihar near Harbin, Miss Piggy & Li Meng, the photographer I met in the Forbidden City. It is very flexible, allowing video calls combined with the ability to simultaneously text (as with Skype). This is really useful when conversing with Chinese people to correct errors in what you or they think they hear. It's also possible to do screen capture & attach files or just use QQ as an email client.....

…..the proprieter of the stall round the corner from the Da Run Fa, where I usually buy my fruit, notices an improvement in my Chinese. Another small step for a ren, I mean, man.....

…..we receive our gifts today from the parents whose children's parties we attended, to thank us for taking the trouble to turn up for free slap-up meals in convivial surroundings. Gift wrapped cakes in presentation boxes or bags showcasing the incredible packaging skills of the Chinese.....

….......I call Dr. Wei who is sounding a little happier but still in need of a break. Talking to her parents & thinking of visiting family in Jilin in April. Still keen to visit Huangshan too. I wonder how it will all work out?.....

…..this could be the real start of spring. The sun is shining & we consider it warm. Another layer of clothes removed, no, two! Kelly is pronounced insane by his colleagues in the Grade 3 Chinese teachers' office for wearing a t-shirt but no sweater or jacket. The kids demonstrate they are still wearing up to six layers in the classroom but it can't last much longer.....

…..Sun Yat Sen, Father of post-imperial China, promoted the far-sighted idea after the revolution of 1911 of planting trees to help in avoiding floods & droughts. Tree Planting Day now commemorates the date of his death, March 12th. Thus foreign teachers are encouraged to represent the school for an hour or so near the new bridge. In the area cleared for construction of the proposed Canal Cities Convention Centre truckloads of trees have been delivered (I saw a truck arriving yesterday afternoon). Along with hundreds of Chinese people, many hopelessly ill dressed for the task, including the slim girl in heels valiantly trying to wield a large shovel, we wander around, move some earth & pose with buckets of water as speeches are made. It's good fun & they seem happy that we have made the effort.....

…..Cathy has two student friends studying electrical engineering staying for the weekend. Several go for hotpot in the most popular restaurant in a street full of them. A crowded Chinese restaurant is in a league of its own. Two storeys of jam packed tables, people standing in between, waiting for a free one, a waiting area on the landing halfway to the upper floor where you can watch endless trays of food & the hotpots themselves taken up & washing up, in unbelievable quantities, brought down plus staff with walkie talkies trying to guide the waiting masses to vacant tables......

…..the hotpot is, well, hot. Quite hot. Very hot. At one stage it makes me sneeze, not a good thing with the bruise from my fall last week hurting like hell if I so much as cough lightly. A good meal though, & fortunately, while probably the hot side of the pot would be too spicy for the faint-hearted it does not even approach the face-numbing, supposedly “not-too-hot” one we ordered but couldn't finish in Chongqing last October......

…..Dr. Wei calls sounding quite dejected. The long awaited & much deserved holiday break, including the chance of a long overdue visit to Jilin to see family & friends, is off again. The “master” of the hospital has deemed it not possible at this time. I think most Australians would baulk at the punishing work schedules some people here have to endure without predictable rosters, proper breaks or holidays......

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