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Published: December 25th 2013
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Halloween at Olympic Park
This is one of our co-teachers. Happy Holidays everyone! We are thinking of you and wishing you the best!
Holidays are (as with everything) similar and different here in China. The following are descriptions of familiar holidays and how we experienced them. Next post, I'll describe Chinese holidays.
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Halloween: We began preparing for Halloween at the beginning of October. It is a big deal at our English school as well as the International Kindergarten where we teach in the morning. Students learn about costumes, trick or treating, many of the symbols and some of the history for the older classes. Our school decorated the classrooms with Halloween cut outs, lights, garland and more. The week of Halloween our classes focused on Halloween by dressing up, telling scary stories, watching movies, playing games and trick or treating. After classes, our school had a Halloween party for staff and Kendall and I won second place for homemade costumes. At our International Kindergarten, they informed us the afternoon before that the whole school would be going to Olympic Park the next morning, Friday October 25th to celebrate Halloween. Everyone got on coach buses and traveled to the beautiful site. They handed us Halloween
Halloween
Kendall's class costumes and we all walked to a part of the park. Along the way, we attracted a lot of attention including Chinese folks who wanted their picture taken with us and the park police who wanted us to put away the Jolly Roger Flag. The students took a walk while we waited and then handed out candy when they arrived at our location. We sang a song and did a dance with them, they ate lunch with their families and then we went home.
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Thanksgiving: This was not as big a deal at school, though it is one of our favorite holidays. Since we all had to work on Thanksgiving day, two of the teachers held a big feast after school at their apartment. About 40 people came from the school, both foreign and chinese teachers. The food ranged from a turkey bought from a hotel, homemade mashed potatoes and green bean casserole to chinese mushroom soup and lotus slices. I made a potato leek soup and Kendall made some applesauce. It was a really fun and warm evening.
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Christmas: As at home, Christmas has been on display here in the stores since before
Halloween
Another of Kendall's classes Thanksgiving. When we went on our trip to Korea we saw elves in the mall and Christmas cups at the smoothie shop. Christmas music has been playing for quite some time at the grocery store and sushi restaurant alike. Though most of it is a version of what we hear at home. For example, you might hear the White Christmas song sung by children but never Bing Crosby. I hosted a wreath making party for friends which was fun. Christmas is another big holiday in our schools as well. It is seen as a way to teach children about American culture, though we have noted that schools in America don't usually celebrate Christmas, except with days off! The classrooms have been decorated for a few weeks now with Santa hats taped to the wall, garland and a Christmas tree in each. Though the school bought big ornaments for the trees, I had my students each tie a ribbon on the tree and showed them how to make popcorn garland. Of course we sampled the popcorn as we made it and one of my students said "This American popcorn is so salty!" (Chinese popcorn is sweet). This week we are celebrating
Silver Medalists
Kendall was "Big Muzzy" a British cartoon used for teaching English. Muzzy likes clocks (and parking meters) so I was a clock! by reading Christmas stories, singing carols, making cards and ornaments, baking cookies and exchanging gifts. It seem to vary whether or not students celebrate Christmas at home as well, though according to what is happening in the stores, it seems to be becoming part of the culture. One of our co-teachers told us that 5 years ago, you wouldn't have seen any of this stuff but now it is quite pervasive. For Christmas eve, we went to our friend Crystal's apartment for a Mexican Christmas celebration. We enjoyed taquitos, enchiladas, guacamole, homemade horchata and good cheer. Tonight our school is having a Christmas party after classes along with a White Elephant gift exchange.
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New Year's Eve: When there is a holiday in China, schools and businesses have to make up the day/s off. So about a month ago, our school let us know that the Tuesday and Wednesday of New Year's would be days off for China. In which case, everyone would be going to school and work the Saturday and Sunday before New Year's to make up for it. That in turn, changes our work schedule because if students and parents are going to school and
Halloween
Shannon and a Kindergarten class work over the weekend then they can't come to their English class. Everyone's schedules were rearranged accordingly. Then about a week ago, the government announced that only New Year's day would be a holiday and it would not need to be made up. Cancel the rearranged schedule and take Wednesday off. Apparently the government does that a lot, so making plans is often futile. Anyway, we are not sure of our plans as of yet. We were considering going skiing - no snow in the area but it has been cold enough for the nearby mountains to make snow. However, my friend Vicky said it will be crazy busy with everyone having the day off. We'll let you know if we do anything fun.
How are your holidays going?
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