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Published: March 15th 2011
Today was one of those days where I just had to smile to myself about why this crazy and often frusterating place called China, seems to lure me back year after year.
As I began my journey to my first Chinese language class with the HHS Center, a friendly elderly lady approached me in the subway. She was very lovely and told me (all in Chinese) that next year she was planning to go to America and really wanted to practise her english before she travelled. I told her that I was studying Chinese- and she kept joking (was at least I thought she was joking) that I could be her english teacher while she could be my Chinese teacher. This also attracted the attention of one of the subway workers whos only job as far as I can tell is to hold up a stop sign whenever the train comes, so he does a lot of standing around doing nothing.
Anyway, after having a lovely chat in Chinese with these two lovely people I walked on the subway and the kind old lady asked for my phone number. She was serious!
When I arrived at my stop, I still had another good 20 minute walk to reach my classroom, and on the way there, you often get random people on the street starring at you and then, perhaps one of them has the guts to say 'hello', while the others giggle. Its all part of the charm of China. <3
That morning I was freaking out before I left too because I thought I'd lost my residency certificate from the police. As I was freaking out throwing half the appartment around trying to find this piece of paper, my georgous host Grandma (who can't speak a word of english) decided to start helping me 😊 she didn't know what I was looking for, and I tried to explain in my shocking chinese, but we eventually worked it out and- she was so lovely and when I explained how serious it was if I lost it she just smiled and gave a chuckle. This made the whole situation a lot less stressful for me. I eventually found it that night as my host sister has accidently taken it to school with her- so no worries.
And I have to say one of the most fun things you can do here is to teach kids english songs and dancing! The younger girl here has so much fun! She gets really into it, and we have this system now where she learns english and if she gets it all right she gets a sticker- and now shes insisted that she is my Chinese teacher and now I get tested each week as well (and if I get them all right I get a sticker too! yay!! lol)
So China is a crazy, amazing beautiful place just as I remember it to be; and its great for the soul.
<3
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Sebinhk
Sebastian Kirsch
Interesting. Are you learning cantonese or mandarin? How difficult do you find it? I started learning cantonese but gave it up eventually. But given t hat I live here for almost 10 years now, i should prolly start again and do it this time. :)