Blogs from Wuhan, Hubei, China, Asia - page 29

Alexes' birthday was the 22nd so we had a weekend long celebration for both of us. Friday we had two of laura's students come over and one of their mothers cooked jiao zi, dumplings, for us. It was a great home cooked meal. Then we went over to Hankou, across the river, and we went to the Blue sky bar, its a western bar. We ended up getting these little keg things and drank there all night. Our guard locks the gate at 11pm so we decided to stay out until it opened at 5am. We also found a 24 hour McDonalds and had some burgers. Saturday we went shopping for some gifts for Alexes. We also bought another good cake! They even gave us candles that were a 2 and 3. We went to a ... read more

Saturday night, we headed back to VOX to check out the live music scene. We paid the 25 kwai cover charge on a leap of faith (there was terrible screaming metal steaming down the stairs). We got upstairs and ordered a round of beers. The place was totally different than the quiet Indie-cent Thursday night. The tables that had filled the main floor were nowhere to be seen and bodies packed the area in front of the stage (which would soon become a Chinese mosh-pit with a few half naked western guys spinning like possessed tops). We found Steian and he told us that the band was a local punk band that was supposed to be pretty good. They had a “documentary” of their recent European Tour playing on a screen before they started. I got ... read more

Saturday we took it easy and went to International House Coffee Language. It is a great place to relax, chat and grade papers. Afterward I graded more papers and many of my students talked in great detail of their vacations. Some of my favorite lines include: "The cool sea wind was bloing gently across my face, jsut like my mother was stroking me"-Sunny "we walked along the seashore barefooted feeling the soft sand tread by our feet and left a string of footprints" -JoJo "It was a fine day with the special breath of summer" -Stefanie After coffee and grading Sarah and I met with the girl that we are tutoring. We were still trying to explain the differences between schools in America because she is in the process of deciding which school will be the ... read more

Here are some more pictures from my life in Wuhan. I still haven't started teaching but I've enjoyed wandering around the city.... read more

So my first week has been off to a great start. Yesterday my class was very talkative and quick to participate. I taught a class explaining American college. Lots of my students want to learn about how students study, what the application process is, what is the difference in schools. So I explained all about liberal arts and what the admissions officers are looking for. We then had an exercise where the students split into groups and took the role of a different person on the admissions committee. The alumnus, admissions counselor, english teacher and recent graduate. They had a candidate pool of four students from which they chose one. I then split the groups to have mixed committee members. It was cute to hear them talk about which student they would pick. It was good ... read more