Water Leeza,
So your two issues are with contaminated water - at the micro and macro scales. One, you drank a glass of bad H2O and the other is all of the Gulf sea water going bad from the oil spill.
Hopefully this note finds you fully recovered and back to eating squids on a stick. Although today, I admit, I ate at Subway. a 6" BMT. in a mall. in Beijing...it's just not right.
The other is that as an official news junkie, I see absolutely no pushing the oil spill story to the backburner by the media. It's all over CNN, MSNBC, FoxNews, Reuters, CBS, ABC and China Daily. And yes, I read both MSNBCommunist and FoxReactionaryRightWingPropogandaNews. Then I go to the AP site. Truth is in their somewhere, just gotta go look for it.
Oil spill is also generating all sorts of lunatic conspiracy theories: it's the work of Al-Queda, Taliban, Cheney's Goons, Obama's goons, tea-party, out of work welders (yes, really!), Iran, and I'm pretty sure soon they will include Elvis. Sometimes an industrial accident is just an accident. Argh...
They announced today that they are constructing a large containment structure to sit over the broken pipe to capture the oil and then pump it up to a waiting super tanker until they can drill a relief well and then plug the current well. That could take 6 - 8 days for the largest leak. Relief well could take 3 months. I sure hope this containment chamber idea works!
I get my oil spill news from yahoo. There may have been something on the news, but I haven't seen it. Without you in town, my watching of the news goes way down.
I think the word "Happy" referenced the bumper car play place. I remember one of the other floors was called "Sporty" and another was "Fashion". You get the idea.
I wanna live there I want to live on the 4th floor; it may not be Alan's Rainbow and Pony Farm, but for an urban setting, I bet it's great! Do you know why they called it happy? Were the other floors named?
I know, right? This is the same story as the Balkans, the partition of Pakistan, and common school yard bullying, for that matter. No one wants to talk about it. No one wants to remember it, not even the people who lived through it. Certainly no one wants to admit that they or their children are capable of this--they brand the perpetrators as monsters rather than realizing that we are all precisely the same. And thus, history continues to repeat itself and humanity continues to destroy itself.
I Got Nothing That is nearly beyond comprehension. It was brave of you to visit, and even more important to share. Too many people don't believe or don't want to believe stuff like this happens. And still happens.
HIYA GEORGE! Thanks for liking my blog. I really miss updating it. I'm still not sure about China--I think it's ok, and I really like the folks at my school. I have my own apartment, which is a plus. But then you get instances like this: I walked into a KFC and was unable to order because 1. I couldn't read the menu, and 2. I didn't know the words for popcorn chicken. In the end, I had to walk out leaving a trail of tears and hunger. Anyhoo, I signed a 5 month contract, and will reassess where I am in a couple of months to see if I want to stay all winter.
Zach is actually just 3 hours north of my city, Jining. He's at Jinan. I tell you, he's pretty good at this teaching stuff. Where will you be working, and what age levels are you teaching?
I think your blog rules! How's China? Is the city as awful as you thought it would be? where did zack end up going? I think I start work in vietnam around the 20th. have a good one.
george
Thanks Jen Normally I would have said just what you said. But my negativity is becoming a real issue in my life and the lives of people around me. I'm trying to stop! I'm also tired of people who rag on me about it. Right now, I think it's best to isolate myself from such situations. Starting here.
don't Liz - don't be so hard on yourself - look where you are and what you're doing! Keep being honest with yourself AND in your blog - the hell with what other people think about what you say :)
Rainbow and Pony Farm Hey, I grew up on Rainbow and Pony Farm.....just north of Route 40...we had ice cream and lollipops every day.
Leeza, OK, maybe I exaggerate just a little bit. Anyway, feel free to express yourself as you like, warts and all. It's your life, you're free to say what you want. But also feel free to blow your own horn once in a while. Seems to me that you found a way to bring some control to your class. You created a fun and competitive game and it kept everyone engaged. Looks like success to me. Your method may be different than the other teacher's (which worked for him), but different strokes for different folks.
Gotta go, I think it's time for a cupcake...
See, this is what I'm talking about. LADIES AND GENTLEMEN--you see what I mean?? This is what I mentioned in a previous comment. You tell the nitty-gritty truth about ONE THING. You mention the reality of what you did and how you feel in ONE SPECIFIC SITUATION--and everyone jumps down your throat!!! To the best of my knowledge, I was not complaining. I was giving--GOD FORBID!--an honest self-analysis, an expression of my amazement at really good teachers, and a discussion of my day for folks at home who might never do such a thing themselves. I thought I was passing along interesting and potentially valuable information for other readers. CAN YOU UNDERSTAND THAT??? No--instead, you have to write to a random stranger and totally insult her. I suppose you only want to hear disingenuous syrupy goodness bubbling from my blog, am I correct? Then FINE, stop reading this blog and go back to whatever YOU like to do! AND TO THE ORIGINAL POSTER--I'm sorry, but it sounds like YOU need EFL lessons as well. Please don't insult me until you can use adequate English grammar.
Teaching After reading your journal, I think that it seems you spend more time complaining and whining instead of making the situation better. If you whine and cry that much, then you should removed yourself completely from teaching English in just about any country. Go back to do what you have like and leave the teaching up to somone who will enjoy it with a passion regardless of how hard it will be. Just my two sense on it.
Damn the torpedoes! Damn the torpedoes, full steam ahead! Jinig! You're so close to an experience most will never have, and if it was easy, anybody could do it. You're not an idiot, you've learned Arabic. You may not be a born teacher, but you can learn how to be a better one than you are now, which is all anyone can expect.
Go for it You know, I think you should give yourself some credit for what you're having the opportunity to do in Cambodia and do bear in mind that the kids are probably gaining a lot more from your lessons than you're giving yourself credit for. Although qualified, I'm a volunteer teacher here in the UK and am gaining experience so that I can do just what you're doing right now and I take my hat off to you for having the courage to step out and do this. I would go to China seeing as you have already sorted out your visa; if you don't go, you may regret it in later years and anyway, just think of all those amazing travel stories you'll have to tell upon your return
Go to China Leeza, Cambodia is interesting, but China is essential. Don't let $329 define your future. Since you are a person who has had international experience, you will be a better fit for China. They will value your perspective, it might be a slow process, but it will happen.
The Chinese admire the American ability for being intellectually nimble and not being tied to systematic thinking. Go there, and just be yourself. The best part about you that I have observed is your curiousity and interest in the future. It may be why you get frustrated with those around you at times, but in China you have the power to make change at the most personal level.
I can see it now, "OK, kids, the first word we learn today is, sustainability".
HONESTY! Thank you for appreciating it when I go on a rant. The last time I tried that was in Dubai. I mentioned the somewhat disorderly process in the admissions office and discussed the gail storm that my plane flew out of in London. I wasn't even complaining; I just thought it made interesting reading. But the study abroad coordinator told me it was far too negative and that I should only be positive in my blogs. Classmates were not appreciative either of my honesty, either. I wound up lying about virtually everything that happened to me there because I was pressured to write nothing but syrupy goodness.
As it is, one of my classmates here keeps giving me condescending lectures about "looking at the glass half full" since I complained about my assignment. Easy for him--he's going to Jinan. Maybe I'll go to Jining, but to me a half-full glass is knowing that I have the option to do other things.
Jining Leeza, Jining is the face of much of China. There are a lot of Jinings out there that are part of the industrial make-up of the country. But, I've never failed to find something interesting in places I have traveled to. Jining has something, it's just up to you to go find it. Plus, I'm told that there are some interesting smaller villages around Jining which might be fun to visit. As to how things have been going for you lately, just remember, any bad experience can always be turned into a good story. I have lots of good stories..............
Good luck! And keep up the honest story-telling. It's cathartic, and all of the rest of us get to live our lives vicariously through your experiences.
Jining Not only have I heard of Jining, I've been there!!! And while I was there I drank too much baizhou and got sick. But I'm sure all of that alcohol killed all the germs, but it about killed me. So take heart that many of the Jining'ers have seen a westerner and it was me puking.
As to Jining itself, it is an industrial town, so it is pretty gritty. It is at the scale of Dayton roughly. I will tell you that everyone I met was very nice to me. And we found a few decent places to eat (don't ask me where). When I was there at the end of last summer, there was a massive streetscaping program going on all over town - replacing curbs, new sidewalks, trees and pavement. As we drove about there were some nicer areas. But not a lot of english on the street.
Just so you know, I've been to worse places in China. With worse Karoake and worse beer.
Three things:
I teach English in Phnom Penh, Cambodia.
I trained here, then taught in China for six months before returning.
I'M SO GLAD I LEFT CHINA.
ADVENTURE!!... full info
Alan
non-member comment
Water
Leeza, So your two issues are with contaminated water - at the micro and macro scales. One, you drank a glass of bad H2O and the other is all of the Gulf sea water going bad from the oil spill. Hopefully this note finds you fully recovered and back to eating squids on a stick. Although today, I admit, I ate at Subway. a 6" BMT. in a mall. in Beijing...it's just not right. The other is that as an official news junkie, I see absolutely no pushing the oil spill story to the backburner by the media. It's all over CNN, MSNBC, FoxNews, Reuters, CBS, ABC and China Daily. And yes, I read both MSNBCommunist and FoxReactionaryRightWingPropogandaNews. Then I go to the AP site. Truth is in their somewhere, just gotta go look for it. Oil spill is also generating all sorts of lunatic conspiracy theories: it's the work of Al-Queda, Taliban, Cheney's Goons, Obama's goons, tea-party, out of work welders (yes, really!), Iran, and I'm pretty sure soon they will include Elvis. Sometimes an industrial accident is just an accident. Argh... They announced today that they are constructing a large containment structure to sit over the broken pipe to capture the oil and then pump it up to a waiting super tanker until they can drill a relief well and then plug the current well. That could take 6 - 8 days for the largest leak. Relief well could take 3 months. I sure hope this containment chamber idea works!