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Published: January 20th 2013
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New photos on:
http://s251.photobucket.com/albums/gg311/draftwrite/ …..Yangzhou's air, while by Australian standards is pretty woeful, is thankfully much cleaner than Beijing's. On a scale of air pollution on which 300 is considered an emergency & in the USA goes to a top reading of 500, it hit 755 in Beijing last week. That's apparently around 35 TIMES the safe level. The photos of the murky city's air reminds me of an old TV dog-food ad., “So chunky you could carve it”. Another commentator refers to it as, “Like evening in Mordor”. It's cold here, (always a little above or below freezing), but with some, sunny &, by Chinese standards, clear days.....
…..Here comes the sun, doo-'n'-doo-da.....this is a brief blog to say to some readers, have a break while I'm away for the Chun Jie jia qi, Spring Break or Chinese New year holiday. To others I warn you that I should be in Australia for a few days from the 9
th of February, via Thailand. With teachers Alex & Krista, a Canadian couple & 2 of their friends, plus Mike, after a couple of nights in Bangkok we'll be going to an island off the east coast of
Alex at the Old Brewery
Trying on another customer's crazy glasses southern Thailand. I'm planning to leave the island a little early to go to Kohn Kaen, about 6 hours by bus on the other, (north), side of Bangkok to visit an old mate from Australia before flying back to Bangkok then to Adelaide. Chun Jie Kuai Le, or Happy Chinese New Year.....
…..they promised to install water heaters in the foreign teachers' apartments, after around 3 months of complaints about the total inability of the school to stick to the already paltry times allocated for hot water & often not providing any in the mornings. Sure enough, true to their word, the heaters have been installed. There are no wall sockets to plug them in yet however. I now have an extension lead running to the bathroom. The plan is to meter our apartments in the same way the Chinese teachers are metered, a certain amount allowed for free, any excess charged. It might well put a stop to the people who abuse the system by leaving heaters, (or in summer, air conditioners), on while they're teaching.....
…..the wiring has been “installed” for the heaters, along with a piece of plastic conduit tacked to the bedroom wall to
accommodate the wiring for the meter. The plumbing from the heater to the shower appears to be of the same plastic conduit, assembled by a blind man & left hanging in space, rather than fixed to the wall. No, not complaining, just saying.....
…..great idea, thanks Patrick. When it's freezing & you want to take a trip on the bike to the west of Yangzhou try another layer, trackpants on top of long underpants & trousers. Still warm, (apart from my fingers), after the 12km or more trip from the school. I can then take off the track pants & put them in the luggage space under the seat ready for the trip back.....
…..it's around zero in the early morning, a bit less, a bit more. To work, past the cold apartments, across the freezing playground, a brisk walk up the chilly steps & a biting walk along the exposed corridors to the minimally heated teacher's office before going into a frigid classroom for 40 frosty minutes. “It's a hot, sunny day. What will he wear?”, I ask, pointing at the picture on the screen, beanie pulled down, thick coat on & wishing I'd brought my gloves.....
…..I'm cracking up, literally. The skin on my hands & particularly fingers. It's a battle between lanolin cream & chalk. The chalk is winning.....
…..Patrick & Steve have copies of a book designed for foreign students of Chinese & with vocabulary based on the HSK Chinese exam, (like the ones we did in Nanjing). They're well written, come complete with a CD of .mp3s, with the story's read both at normal speed & slowly. I mentioned the book to Shen Yue & next time she turned up at the school while visiting her son she brought a copy for me, having found it on a Chinese internet site. Finally, I'm (slowly) reading Chinese.....
.....on the subject of the HSK … maybe the less said the better. All three of us failed, with scores between 43% & 50%. We made a pact in Nanjing that the highest scorer would shout a beer for the other two. We all go to the Old Brewery, where the least-worst examinee (!), Patrick, hosted our failure commiseration night. As you can see from the photos we were not by any means suicidal. The Fillipino band is always a good tonic....
…..I
Patrick at the Old Brewery
busy forgetting the exam result have had to replace the hard disc in my laptop. I left it too late & wasn't able to image the ailing disc so I have been busy reinstalling everything, finding software, loading files from backup, all that stuff that makes using the computer a real chore. Still I have learned a lesson. Get some imaging software, (done), & make a copy of the thing when everything is up to date. The old 320Gb disc has been replaced by a 1Tb hard drive, for the princely sum of ¥500, or around Au$80. Better than spending ¥5000, (Au$800), on a new computer.....
…..already we are approaching the end of the first semester. Halfway through another year. Big changes for me next semester. George hasn't been enjoying his time teaching Grade 8 & would rather teach in the Elementary School. Having taught Grade 8 last year I guess I was first on the list to be asked to swap. Grade 6 are not a holiday either. As usual some really smart, well-mannered, polite, just plain nice kids there, along with the yahoos, self appointed comedians, motormouths, the chronically inattentive & a few remarkable specimens who are defying the Theory of Evolution
& whose future is unlikely to require the use of English.....
…..what does “QQQ” mean? It means, “Thank you”. It's another example of Intenet shorthand from China. “San” is the Chinese word for “3”. “San Q” is pretty close to the Chinese pronunciation of the English, “Thank you”.....
…..testing is a soul-destroying experience at times. So many just don't get it, despite drilling, practising & reviewing. A few think outside the square & brighten up the dismal process of asking the same 7 questions well over 300 times while testing all my 10 classes of students. “It's a cold & snowy day, what will you wear?”. One kid has a mental blank about clothing. He blurts out the items he can remember. “I wear t-shirt & shoes”. I shake my head. “But it's cold & snowy”. He looks at me with a grin. “I very strong”. Well done, kid.....
…..I wonder why most of the students don't say, “I will wear ….”, usually they just say, “I wirr ….”. I realise it's because “will” & “wear” are virtually indistinguishable to most. Because they don't use tenses as extensively as we do they can't see the point of
Recycling e-bikes
You can't beat an old pedal powered trike for taking 'em away repeating the same word!. I'm looking forward to Thailand & Australia. I wirr wirr a t-shirt and shorts.....
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