The end (of the term) is near...

...yet not quite near enough it seems. Still classes and tests to be given.

My updates here have been... spotty, I know, I've been using the computer in my apartment less and less, and I keep trying to lighten up on myself and actually do some "relaxing" and "living", rather than working, so I haven't been writing either in the blog, or even my personal journal for the past week.

I met with my friend and colleague Mr. Mu the other day and he told me that some of his students from Harbin would be willing to escort me there at the end of finals one month from now. I've read that the place has a park for Tigers and several buildings of Russian-style architecture, so I'm looking forward to that.
The only dilemma I have is that Faye, one of my Oujiang colleague, expressed interest in going to Harbin, and it will difficult for her to go given that after finals she needs to do some intensive work to properly grade her students.


I've started taking actual Chinese classes at the International Cooperation College (Faye actually teaches one of the classes), so now I finally have some more structured language learning. The classes are only a few students (foreigners, although I'm the only American) and rely on a textbook, so it should be an interesting experience.


This last week I refrained from shaving (other than my neck) to see if a slight beard would improve my feeling in the cold climate. It didn't change much, so I shaved it off this evening.

In other news, the students in one of my classes made a plan to go up the mountain this weekend and they invited me, so that's where I was today - however they decided it was too far to schlep all the food and the grills for barbecuing, so we took vans up to the mountain and hiked just a couple hundred meters in.
I did my usual garbage collection when we finished, but the van drivers refused to bring it back (fair enough I suppose), so we had to leave it behind with an elderly couple that decided to look through the bags for empty bottles.

It's just amazing to me how much disregard there is for the environment. I mean do people just plan to visit these places one time and then never come back?
I think if I started an awareness campaign it would have a slogan like:

"You're here for one day, this (the garbage) is here everyday you don't take it away with you." OR maybe
"You're here to enjoy this day with your kids, this (again garbage) will be here to enjoy a day with your grandchildren's kids. Don't leave what you don't think they'll enjoy."
(...yeah, corny I know, but right now I think this place needs a little corny, if only to get people's attention).

Last thing I'll give is some pictures of the trip today. Sorry the first one is so small, it was far away. And yes, I am that big compared to my students.

Into the wilderness...

...with all of student civilization in tow.


I've said before that hiking for me is a time of quiet contemplation. A chance to reconnect with nature in the limited sense of breathing air that's in close proximity to trees, and not having vehicles, computers or any peculiar noise-making devices nearby. (Granted I did take my cell phone, but that was for the purpose of knowing the time, and it's always on vibrate).

The students I repeatedly go hiking with, however, have a very different feel for hiking and what it entails. When these guys and girls go hiking they do it with MP5s blaring music and constant singing or chattering all the way up. They even have moments when they turn around and shout randomly back down the valley - to tell you the truth it's actually quite annoying.
But I like them a lot, and this gets me out of my apartment, so I'm happy to do it, even if I don't always enjoy the manner of doing.

Today I went hiking, only for a little over an hour, then walked back down, picking up garbage on the way, then I returned some library books that Rose borrowed for me, and then returned to my apartment.

Later in the evening I received a call from some guy who I've only seen a couple times and then I received a call from Rose who said her roommates had gone into town to do shopping and had left her without a key back to their room. What's more, she asked if I was home, I admitted I was, and she said she was "outside my window" and saw that the light wasn't on... yeah...


As far as work, this week I'm going to give the students another lesson in advocating and making choices as a group. This week we'll do shopping and eating.
I'll also assign them to groups of 4-6 and they'll perform together in their final - which it turns out has to be before the new year.

And like that... they were gone

Well, the fam is gone, and I'm still left with my work - and now I have no approaching reunion to occupy my mind.
It was great having them here, and I feel more secure with myself as far as my work, I just wish... I don't know... that they were staying a little longer, that I had as much leisure to learn and enjoy myself as everyone thinks I should, that my Chinese were better, that I could go more places away from this campus... I could go on, but wishing won't make things happen.

So it's back to the ol' salt mines I guess.

Still the visit was what I needed to perk me up some. I may not sound so 'perky' but I'm more sure about what and how I'm teaching, and I was glad to bring (nearly) all of my friends together.

On the academic side of things my Friday classes were pretty lousy - I just didn't know what to give them and was in a mental rut, so I did a review of material from last week, gave them some topics in the news to advocate feelings for, and then gave them free time to do work from other classes.
...yeah, I wasn't feeling too pleased with myself after that - the students weren't upset, but that wasn't much consolation.

The Miners have landed...

At last the day has come. Dad, Mom and Tom are here and (as would be expected of any loving family) they're already making changes to my apartment.
Some of the changes are certainly necessary - for instance a new hot plate for cooking, some more dishtowels, a better inside-doormat, and a more "official" wastebasket - but it would be nice if we could just sit around for a while and relax.
(I guess it's in the genes - can't stay still for too long).

We just took it easy today, got Mom and Dad to their hotel room, had lunch with some of my friends, went shopping for some things and had dinner. They all seemed to enjoy my choice for dinner - it was lighter fare than most of the Chinese food they'd been having so far. It wasn't American food (I would never stoop so low when I have guests in China), but it was a little more "American" in that there was only one vegetable dish (corn, peas and carrot pieces), a scoop of white rice with sesame seeds, and a meat dish more akin to an American style of cooking.

Hopefully tomorrow when we have dinner in a Chinese restaurant again they'll be a little more grounded and able to handle the local food again.

In other news I'm looking to ways I can hold my classes on Thursday and how I can best present my present family (there's just something missing when you're not here Matt).

The balance...

...it might not be cosmic, but it seems to work nonetheless.

Quite suddenly the weather turned really COLD. Not quite freezing, but a long way off from the comfort zone.
When I first came here (almost 3 months ago!) I was given a blanket and a single bed sheet. At the time the temperature was still lingering around the summer levels and thus I converted the insides of my blanket into a mattress top to make my bed at least a little comfortable. This left me with a thin sheet for a blanket, which was all I required a couple months ago, but has since proven inadequate to stave off the frigid nighttime temperatures.
I recently asked my boss if the college can provide me with another blanket, which would serve a dual purpose by allowing me to sleep on the couch while Tom stays with me (yeah, Mom and Dad get the hotel, Tom hangs with his big bro).


I was given my blanket today, while at the same time I was given an extra 16 students in my first Friday morning class.
...I will say that once more for good measure: "an extra 16 STUDENTS!"
...It gets better...
The majority of these students do not have the room in their schedule to even attend my class, so they expect me to provide them with make-up work for review and allow them to take the final exam and call it good.

Allow me to make one thing clear, I am NOT accusing Shelley (轲素芬) of any kind of backstabbing maneuver (I've said it before, I'll say it again: She is AWESOME!), but I get the sense that there is some balance being preserved here - I make a demand, I get what I request, and in addition I get more work that doesn't conflict with my contract.

A quick review of my job requirements: my contract stipulates that I will teach no more than 16 credit hours per week, however there is no written clause that limits the size of my classes.


In other news, Dad, Mom and Tom supposedly arrived in Beijing last night, but at said time I was on the South Campus, judging a speech competition for my college and had turned off my cell phone.
One of the contestants was a student of my Friday class, and when it came time for her speech she went free-form and decided to turn some of her attention on me as I judged. She said a lot of nice things, and being that I am somewhat susceptible to flattery I tried to give my scorecard to someone else so I'd have zero chance of giving a biased assessment of her speech.
In the end I kept it and judged as best I could.
She ended up winning second place (along with around 3 or 4 other students).

At the end I was given an envelope which I didn't think to open until today. I expected a generic "thank you" letter... I was right about the generic "thank you" part, it came, however, in the form of a 100 元 bill.
...wasn't expecting that.


Hope Mom and Dad get a phone and call me soon. I don't see them until Tuesday, but I'd like to hear from them before then nonetheless.

Sending out a request...

Tomorrow I start my new unit on Advocacy. Most of it covers everyday social interaction, trying to put kids in an American setting where they have to speak up for themselves (in English) to get what they want as opposed to what is just given.

One thing I really want to add to the unit, however, is situation-based interaction, and since I don't have any American waiters & restaurants, clerks & hotels, students & colleges, or advocates & demonstrations, I need the next best thing:

Pictures and dialogues.

So I invite you to share the American experience with my students - send me pictures you have of your hometowns, of foods you've eaten, and places you've been. I'll see if I can incorporate them into my lessons.


In other news I arranged a hike today with several of my friends and we went up 大罗山 to pick up garbage. I know it's not exactly the most enjoyable way to spend your last day off before school, but I got quite a few people to come along.


















On the way down, after we had collected our garbage, one of the guys stopped to help an old woman carry some tools and supplies up the way we had just come. He said later that normally such actions to him would seem laughable, or would be met with laughter from others, but that after our exploits today he felt no qualms about extending himself to help others. ...that was cool.

Ah the changes...

Hmm, it's been a while since I wrote something here hasn't it? The first long pause in news was due to an oppressively busy schedule, the second time was due to a lack of news to report, and it's been much the same since then.
However, recently a few notable things have been taking place, most of it kind of personal, but I have a lot of other things I feel comfortable sharing.

Despite being on the opposite face of this wonderful ball of rock, air and a myriad of other elements we call Earth, it didn't take long for me to hear the results of the U.S. Presidential election. The news came from Mom yesterday at exactly 13:28 local Wenzhou time in the form of a two word statement on my cell phone: "Obama WON!"

The other night before this event had come to pass, I was in a classroom as a teacher's aide and the students asked me (among other things) who I supported. I told them I preferred staying out of the political scene, but given the choice I'd go for the younger, more optimistic candidate.


For my part in this "new age of change" I've been looking into a program called Future Generations© and its graduate program for a Master's Degree in Applied Community Change and Conservation, as well as its volunteer program for university students called the Green Long March.
I mentioned the G.L.M. in my classes and asked the students to look it up online in order to help with our talk about "Advocacy" next week. Most of the students seemed unable to grasp that the homework was for them to research the subject themselves and continued to ask me "what does it mean?".

In the coming months I'll continue my personal "clean-up-crusade" on the mountain near my school, but I'd like to make it more than that - I want people to see what crap I'm bringing off the summit and make it clear that we ALL need to be more responsible. I also want to involve all my students so that I can communicate with the locals and make my students see what's up there being destroyed through carelessness. But at the same time I don't want it to interfere with their studies.


I also loaned my copy of Uncle Mike's book "Following John Muir" to a friend of mine who's quite fluent in English. Thus far she's only looked at the pictures and not touched on all the great writing, but hopefully she'll get to the literature later.