Teaching, Song Contest, and other thoughts

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Jo's Notes: Taught my first week of classes. Money & Banking and International Investments. Have had fun with the students introducing themselves to me with their English sentences. Also have wonderful student helpers, Yuky and Dong Ping. Last night I was a judge at an English Song Contest, complete with coed belly dancers. My students very excited about the Obama win. Me too!! I like the Chinese lifestyle. A few pictures of the library and campus life.

Full Story: Today is Friday, and I have just completed my first week of teaching. A couple friends, in responding to the blog, expressed surprise that I am teaching sections of Money & Banking and International Investments. I was surprised too, but happy. My contract says I'm to teach Business English and Foreign Affairs. When I met with Economics Dept. Vice-Dean Yan, he immediately expressed greater interest in my business background and asked me to teach investment-related courses. He wants the students to be exposed to this content in English. I am coming in mid-term, so the classes will only have about 8 weeks to tackle these huge subjects. Dean Yan isn't concerned. Also has given me complete freedom to design curriculum. It's really fun to be an academic again. Next term, he may give me one section of Business English, but mostly more finance classes.

The students are eager, and their English is pretty good, so I'm finding it very satisfying. For the most part, their knowledge of investments is limited, so I'm starting with the basics. Vice-Dean Yan also assigned another teacher -- English name Scarlett -- to assist me. Scarlett tapped two of her best upper-class students -- Yuky and Dong Ping -- to give me help getting documents printed, getting e-files from my computer uploaded to the classroom computer, etc. Yuky's English is excellent, and they're both fun to work with. Very energetic and enthusiastic. They ran over to my apartment Wed., with a USB Flash Drive, and showed me how to use it. Then, yesterday, they showed up at my classroom to help me get the computer and microphone working. They are so interested in improving their English they stayed through the entire 90-minute class.

The classes are fairly large, with 48 the smallest, and 60 the norm. The students are very polite and respectful, quick to smile and laugh at my jokes. They particularly enjoy my efforts at pronouncing their names. Many of them have English names, so I use those as well, which they also find quite funny. Starting in this week without textbooks, I decided to put the focus on getting acquainted. I asked the students to each write 5 sentences in English about themselves. For the second class period of the week -- yesterday and today -- each student got up in front of the class to read his sentences. They all talk about their career goals (international trade so they can travel), their families, and their hometowns. This last always couched as "I come from _____ (Mao Ming, Foshan, etc.), which is very beautiful. WELCOME TO ______ (Mao Ming, Foshan, etc.)!! Please, you are invited to visit sometime and you will see how beautiful!" Also, most of them preface their sentences with a statement of appreciation to Ms. Bai (me), and the hope that we'll become friends. (One student even teared up she was so grateful for the chance to speak about herself!) They are all really nice kids. One class is planning to take me on an outing to the nearby famous mountain sites weekend after next. A couple hours by bus. I'm excited.

Last night I had a special and fun campus experience. I was asked to be one of 4 judges for a Karaoke English Song Contest. It was amazing. There was an opening musical number -- a pastiche of difference American rock songs, titled the English Opera Music Number. Then, 6 different acts came out and sang Karaoke-style along with recent American pop music. A couple solos and several duets and trios (two girl groups, a couple boy groups). The students mutilated the pronunciation of the lyrics, completely unaware they were doing this. They actually did a good job of capturing the appropriate emotional tone despite the lyrics being unintelligible. After the first group of acts, there was a break and suddenly a group of eight darling co-eds took the stage. Dressed in electric blue-sequined belly dancer outfits, complete with flowing yellow chiffon pantaloons, they belly danced their way through some middle-Eastern sounding music. Made up with glitter on their eyelids, they looked fabulous if somewhat unbelievable since all of them were very thin without much in the way of bosoms or hips. To their credit and probably due to a lot of rehearsal, their hip action was pretty good. But they were all very serious, and concentrating so hard they were at times frowning and looking pretty tense. Made for a most unusual number. The audience of 500 students watched politely, clapped when they finished, and that was that. The remaining 5 karaoke acts then performed. I didn't take my camera (would have been out of line for a judge to be snapping pictures), so I'm sorry I can't show you how this looked.

In the meantime, for my role of judge, I was given scoring sheets, written mostly in Chinese, with a totally confusing scoring system. Pronunciation 30%, Singing Ability 40%. We judges sat in the front row, with red-velvet-covered tables in front of us. Me, another English teacher (Sherry, a woman I've met at the English Salon), a music teacher, and the Communist Party Secretary. She is a middle-aged woman, quite friendly. Sherry told me she is the highest ranking official at the university! When I asked Sherry to explain the scoring system, she had to ask the Party Secretary to explain. The answer -- "Yes, the total is 70%, but just make sure no one gets less than 35%." !?! As it developed, I found out I was considered a high-ranking judge myself. So at the end of the contest, I was asked to go up on stage to make a critique of all the acts!!! I kept the critique to general congratulations, saying no matter the outcome, they were ALL winners! The crowd gave me enthusiastic applause. Then, Sherry awarded the 3rd Prize, I awarded the 2nd Prize, and the Party Secretary awarded the 1st Prize. The winning line-up were all my first choices as well. First Prize went to a really talented young woman with a great voice and great charisma. She did a credible imitation of Celine Dionne singing the theme from the movie Titanic -- My Heart Will Go On. The crowd loved it. Each winner received a gold-embossed certificate and the applause of the crowd. After the awards ceremony, all the performers came on stage for the obligatory group shot. We judges were placed prominently in the middle. Quite a night!!

I've been meaning to comment on the pace of life here. I like it very much -- quite laid back. It's interesting in that, unlike other laid-back places I've been (like in Central America), here everyone seems high energy and is working hard. The day starts around 6:30 for most and they are up and out by 8:00. The grounds are constantly being worked over by dozens of peasant gardeners. The facilities are all clean, and there are always people showing up to do things -- like unlock and lock up my classrooms, pick up the trash, deliver my bottled water. My neighborhood has several trash-street cleaner ladies who work around the yards every day. But a great tradition is that lunch stretches for over two hours, for the entire university. Everyone takes off for lunch by 12, and the whole place shuts down. The staff and instructors who live in town take the bus home. No one gets back to work before 2 or 2:30. No classes. No activities. Quiet. Some days I lie down for a nap. It's really nice. The work day ends around 6. People come home and have dinner with family, typically between 7 - 9. By 10:00 the neighborhood starts to settle down for the night. Though since we have many families with small children and everyone keeps their windows open, there is always some child screaming and yelling (fussing the Chinese call it). The Chinese seem to have infinite patience for their children. The kids just go on yelling and screaming, without too much attention by any of the adults. I'm learning to ignore it. My days run between 6 am and 10 pm, with the mid-day siesta thrown in. I'm feeling more relaxed and well rested than I've felt in years.

Right now, however, it's 10 pm on Friday night, and there is someone practicing the dragon dance and drumming over in the outdoor stadium a block away. These kids never let up!!

I've been having fun walking around campus at different times of day, taking pictures. A few are included here.

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