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Published: September 10th 2009
If I knew what was going to happen today I don't think I would have gotten out of bed.
It all started last night, Yahoo was acting up and I couldn't log in so I went to bed. This morning I woke up and Yahoo acted as if it was blocked. When websites are blocked in China they just appear as a blank white page and say done at the bottom. NICE!!!! now China decides to block Yahoo, when our program specifically told us to use Yahoo cause it doesn't ever get block. So not only do I have to be REALLY patient to use a proxy server to get around Facebook now I have to use it for Yahoo. Great way to wake up.
I rode my new bike to the bus stop where I can catch the city bus 933 directly to our school. I had my first class at 9:05 this morning so no free school bus for me. I get to the stop and locked my bike up where all the other bikes were and remembered exactly where it was at, due to the large volume of bikes. I was told in China bikes don't get stolen they get lost cause there are so many people forget where they put their bike.
I get on the bus and get to my school 20 minutes before class begins. I went to my office that is shared with about 15 other teachers along with Pete and we get free milk everyday. I always drink the milk and have never had a problem. Well today was my lucky day!! As I took a swallow of milk, I felt LUMPS in the milk. I immediately stop drinking it and ran to the bathroom to dump it out. I thought to myself "If I get sick while teaching that would just make my day."
Today was Teacher's Day in China so when I walked into my 1st class the kids all stood and wished me a Happy Teacher's Day along with a red apple and a sign they made saying how much they never ever liked me. I was confused but thought they probably didn't mean that due to the translation problem between Chinese and English. I think they met how much they like me instead.
After class I took the city bus back to Rainbow(dept store/supermarket) where I parked my bike. I went into the store to pick up an extra surge protector since we were short one for the kitchen. As I walked out to get my bike to come home, I searched 5 times and NO BIKE TO BE FOUND. DAMN already someone stole my bike. GREAT DAY and it is only 10:30am. There was a guard there when I left my bike and no guard to be found when I returned to NO BIKE!!
So I walked home the 20 minute walk and tried not to cry about 5 times. This damn China is going to get the best of me/China WON"T get the best of me, I will beat this. I kept telling myself over and over the 20 minute walk home. As I came in the door Pete could tell I was upset and I told him what happened (all 3 things, Yahoo, sour milk and bike stolen). Thank God I didn't have class again until 2pm so I could recover.
My afternoon turned out to be much better. My 2nd class of the day sang a song for me that was about 3-4 minutes long for Teacher's Day. Another class that I didn't see today had a card on my desk with very kind words. I also got a few small gifts from students including candy, origami rose, plums and throat lozenges. Being a teacher is really about the students. Today they sure made my day and reminded me why I came to China. I wanted to make an impact on peoples lives and I am doing that by teaching them to speak English better.
I had a 2 hour break until my next class so I sat at my desk in the office. While sitting there other teachers informed me of a banquet tomorrow night at a very expensive restaurant for all the teachers to celebrate Teacher's Day. (Nowism at the greatest less than 24 hr notice). Pete and I planned to get out of town for the weekend and head to the city as soon as we got done teaching around lunch time on Friday. Now we had a dilemma. Do we tell the school we already had plans and go to the city to see friends or do we cancel our plans and go to the banquet? We are going to go to the banquet since now our friend that we were staying with Friday night now also has a Teacher banquet tomorrow night.
We also got 2 packets of fabric softener, 5 boxes of facial tissue, and 10 rolls of toilet paper each from the school today. Strange gift right??? I was told by another teacher that at the start of each term all teachers get these items from the school. I never refuse free items that we actually will use.
We also got the great news that our request for high speed internet was approved by the headmistress of the school and they are to be at our apt tomorrow to install. We will find out what "High Speed" is to China. Not holding our breath just yet.
Good thing is that I never got sick from the lumpy milk and Yahoo is working tonight(slowly but surely).
So all in all today was an EMOTIONAL roller coaster, that is my motto for China.
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non-member comment
I think if I tell you my experience, probably it will make you feel better. I got seven bikes stolen just in roughly 2 months. Although those bikes are pretty cheap, the emotional shock was pretty huge. After that, either I walked or took bus. Think it positively, 20 mins walking is no big deal. It's good exercise.