BSK is full of Surprises

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Late Tuesday night I got a phone call from our company and they told me that Wednesday afternoon I would need to go to another school to watch two local Chinese teachers English classes and make notes about what was good and what needs improving. So they texed me the school address in English and in Chinese. I was so nervous to take a taxi by myself to a place where I'd never been before. Just as my luck would have it, the taxi driver got lost. After he made two u-turns, I just got out without paying. Great. Now I don't know where I am. I called Alex between his classes and he told me to just get in another taxi and hope for the best. Thankfully, the next taxi driver knew where he was going. I met up with a few of the bosses and one other foreigner from New Zealand. They introduced us to the Super intendent of ALL the schools in Shanghai, and the supers for each district in Shanghai. Needless to say, these people are very important in the Chinese education system. I'm glad that I decided to wear a dress instead of jeans like I usually do. Anyway, I watched two third grade classes and wrote pages of notes on each one. One of the teachers spoke great english, and she even had her kids practice sounding out words. Since chinese is all characters, they've never needed the skills to sound out words. So that surprised me. I was told that we were going to meet in a confrence room, and I'd be able to share my thoughts on the classes. Well, when I walked into the "confrence room" it was an auditorium of Chinese people! Since I had to teach later in the afternoon they had me speak first on stage behind a podium with a spread of flowers. To be honest, I don't know what I said about their classes. I'm just glad I don't have horrible stage frieght! (thanks to armo and drama classes 😊 It was a great experience, and I should have known that all things the Chinese do is a big deal, and they go all out for it. If there's one thing I've learned here, it's to be flexible!

Well, only 39 more days!!!

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