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Published: January 18th 2009
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It has been positively arctic here this week, but we have ended up with temperatures around the 10 degrees mark by today, which is unbelievable. We took some pictures of the pond in our compound and just how wrapped up we have had to be to keep warm. The temperature has been down to about -4 overnight but the wind has made it feel much colder during the day. Add to that the fact that the Chinese insist on opening all the doors and windows, putting the aircon heating on full blast and wearing coats all day. As I was discussing with my friend this week, there is no point in choosing clothes if you wear your coat all day, but maybe that is part of the attraction with wearing PJs!
Sophie's friend, Diana, came for tea on Wednesday which was nice. The 3 of us walked home together, and I ended up rolling their school bags behind me as they skipped ahead of me holding hands. Diana is from Korea and China and was a pleasure to have to tea. Bizarrely, she counts herself as being 9 years old, even though she was only born in 2001! In China,
you are 1 year old on the day you are born, and in Korea you are the same, but also, everyone ages another year together, on the Lunar New Year. All very interesting!
This week has been quite hard for me at school, with meeting upon meeting bringing more change and stress. The week culminated in the whole of Grade 5 doing an assembly as we have been doing Advertising and each class has produced an advertising campaign. We have been surveying other grades and finding out what kind of toys, drinks, food and stationery they prefer. My class got stationery (??!!) but worked it well and we decided on an electric blue mechanical pencil from Pilot! Wow, what a product, was my initial thought, but it came together in the end and we had a fun time in assembly.
Sophie did well in her Math assessment, which was a total shock for us all. She got 88%, although this is pretty avergae over here, getting a 60-70% is not a pleasing mark, unlike when I was at school and this tended to be my average! She is very reluctant to do her homework and it is a
traumatic fight every day. She does get quite alot, this is the Asian way of working. Monday, she gets some English sentences and a worksheet to do, along with a Chinese worksheet to conmplete. Tuesday is Maths, Wednesday is Chinese and English again, Thursday is English, and Friday is Math. She asked us this week if she could start going to the after school homework club for Math, so seh duly began this on Tuesday. At a reasonable price, she is able to do her Math homework with the help of a very competent teacher, who has extra practice sheets for when she finished. We have all been impressed by her asking to do this, so we hope it continues to work well. The chocolate yule log went down very well on Monday and she got a green card for writing the whole recipe out so well and in so much detail. She got another green card on Tuesday as she was able to answer some questions in pinyin and read them in class. A risk-taker she is (IB terminology!!) and very proud we all are.
William had Show and Tell morning yesterday, luckily Ian checked what time it
started as it turned out not to be for parental viewing! He took his Christmas photos and plane ticket in and we understand it went well. He has been a bit under the weather this week, with a 'blocked throat'....chicken pox is here again and we are still wishing it his way!! He has been back at karate this week, with his lovely new outfit...how cute!
On Friday evening, I went to my friend, Nazli's, house for the evening. She is leaving school next Friday as she needs a rest. It was a fun evening, although we were all a little concerned by the lak of alcohol involved! Nazli is Persian and cooked a wonderful feast for us from her home country. We were all so full when it came to the belly dancing, it did take us a while to get "movin'!" I think we would all agree we were a little apprehensive about making fools of ourselves and wobbling our wobbly bits (well, I was anyway!) without first having consumed copious amounts of alcohol, but it was really good fun, even when it was our turn to wear the belt thing and make it jingle! It was
an early finish, which was also lovely, as it meant I was home by 10.30pm and totally sober...Ian had drunk more than me back at home!!
We had a very relaxed day yesterday, we have really needed it. We took a trip to Carrefour and bought the children roller blades and pads ready for their birthdays, which was fun, but we chilled at home otherwise, catching up on correspondance. Last night, Ian and I went to meet Mark and Suzanne at the Glamour Bar on the Bund to watch a Burlesque Show. Now, this is not something I would normally agree to go to, but Suzanne's friend from High School was one of the dancers and we all agreed it would be a bit of a giggle! The Glamour Bar is a great location, right on the Bund, and we got there a bit early (for once!) so we took some lovely night time shots before we went in. Amazingly, we bumped into Miss Viktoriya, William's teacher, so she and her friends joined us at our table. The show was about an hour late starting but was really good. Very old style striptease type thing, I think it dates
from the 20's/30's and is a bit tongue in cheek. Not too risque though, and Indigo Blue (Suzanne's friend) came and chatted with us afterwards. By this time, Ian and I were pretty tired (and drunk!) so we came home...it was midnight anyway!
Today has been really relaxed too, as we chilled this morning then Sophie was invited to a party this afternoon. It was a bowling party at a fantastic sports centre so we all went for a family afternoon out. It was great fun, the whole class was there almost and Ian was coach to the 6 kids on our lane. Sadly, Sophie wasn't very good at it but William was quite good and ended up getting a certificate for Silliest Funky Bowler! There was lots of yummy food there too, then the cake, then a few games and finally a pinata! We have Sophie and William's party on 7th Feb, but it won't be anything like the other parties we have been too....we have to start thinking about ckaes and games and the like!! We have just come home and are quite replete but have grumpy children. We are just starting to get that sunday evening
feeling and start thinking about the week ahead. It is our last week before a 2 week holiday for Chinese New Year, which we are looking forward to, but it will be a manic week as there are lots of celebrations at school.
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