Arrival -- TESOL Symposium Beijing Normal University

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After a lovely plane flight from Haneda to Beijing via Japanese Airline (023) -- clean seats, good headphones, excellent food (a Bento box with 9 different samples of food, sherbert mango, and icy Zero coke, with sticky rice topped off with green tea and served in a delicately colorful and charming box) -- I managed to get through the baggage claim area and customs with absolutely no problems (knock on wood) went directly to a tourist agent who looked up the hotel on the internet and (thanks to Wendy) dialed the number and immediately got directions, wrote them in Chinese for the taxi driver and then told me that there was a change booth/bank outside so I could avoid a very long line that had gathered to change money. I walked right out the door, went right up to booth, changed a little money, walked right to an elevator and then on the elevator there was a woman who lived in California and spoke English and helped me with the taxi. The tourist agent said it would cost 350 Yuan and I was shocked...but ok...I had to get to the hotel but the woman said, no, she was going further than me and I should pay only about 90 yuan at the most. And that was what I paid -- 88 yuan (w/ only a 2yuan tip -- I know I'm cheap). I walked right in to the hotel, Judy was already registered so I got my key and there she was in the hotel room on her computer and sitting on the bed was Shirley, one of the volunteers from last summer. What a surprise! Shirley had had dinner with Judy the night before and she was going to help us buy our rail tickets to get to Taiyuan on Sunday....she looks exactly the same (young people don't age, do they?) and they quickly left with my passport and some money for the ticket and I got a much needed shower (I thought that they guy next to me on the plane was stinky but I think itwas me) and then went directly over to the Symposium. I heard Prof. Wang -- I'll get the full name later -- who spoke about teacher education and professional development in China. She presented one technique that is commonly practiced on the elementary and secondary levels -- the public lesson -- that we thought we might be able to incorporate in the program. This is apparently a widely practice policy throughout China in which certain teachers are selected to create and conduct, get peer feedback and then revise and then perform a master lesson before a public audience. The teachers get recognition at the provincial, municipal or federal level in the way of a certificate and this contributes to their credentials. This is perhaps something that we might contribute to our program if we could get the cooperation of the local educational bureau. It was a very instructive and informative presentation...the second one that I attended way by Don Graddol from Hong Kong on English in the globalized marketplace...a focus on the trend of different economies and the spread of English and the relationship between English-speaking demographics and job growth, etc. It was really quite good, fascinating, and kept me awake the entire session. I was sorry to see it end, as a matter of fact. The next event was a banquet..we had a smorgasboard of delicious Chinese dishes -- all quite tasty. After that I crashed in my room. We tried to call Wendy but didn't get an answer and she didn't show up last night. We'll try again today.

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