Weather and Work

From Xi'an, China:

We haven't had a lot of excitement lately but there were some new changes in our life this week.

The rain and wind that we had over the weekend and into Monday cleared away much of the smog and haze that we had our first 10 days here. We have seen the sun each day since Tuesday and it has been a little warmer each day (mid 50's now). The last two days were mostly sunny in the morning, but gradually more haze as the day went on. In the past I had seen forecasts of "smokey" and we now know what that meant. The immediate forecast is dry and some sun; how much sun remains to be seen. Because all of China is on one time zone, and we are 700 miles or so west of the east coast, the sun doesn't rise here (now) until around 7:00 and sets around 7:00; not sure what they do re: daylight savings time.

School began in earnest this Wednesday and I have had 4 classes (of 2 hours each). The students' English, as I said earlier is ok, to fair, to poor. Some students take notes in earnest, some just listen in earnest, a few would rather text on their phone and sneak peeks at magazines. If this was Whitefish Bay, I would take away their phone or magazines. But here, they are juniors in college, adults and they can succeed or fail as they want. We'll see how my new 4 groups (Monday and Tuesday) are next week and how my 2nd meeting with my other 4 groups (Wednesday-Friday) go.

Today was a shopping day. We went (again) the the Metro superstore, this time with 5 other foreign teachers. So we got to meet them and chat a little. Two just arrived last weekend and are teaching with a group of students from Illinois and Wisconsin. They teach both Chinese and American students. The other three have taught here the past few years and are back for 2nd semester.

Then this afternoon Bobbi & I walked a mile plus to the "Lotus" superstore and checked it out and bought a few more things. Both Metro and Lotus and the local Vanguard sell everything from food to clothes to electronics (like a Super Wal-mart or Super Target). These stores as well as the local McDonald's, KFCs, Dunkin Donuts, Baskin Robbins and local stores have around 3-5 times more employees than they need. We think that it is a requirement by the government to have all these employees, in order to open up and stay open for business.

Bobbi also had a week of classes. Here is her story. Well, both of my Wednesday classes with the English teachers were fun. What competitive people! I'm teaching them some of our teaching methods so had them out of their seats as much as possible. They are easy to engage, but hard to keep quiet when others are talking - just like students! There was an administrative miscommunication with the Thursday group of teachers. Their teaching schedules got changed so they had to switch to my Monday class. But the Monday class didn't get the word that they were switched to Thursday. I only had 2 teachers show up in my Thursday class and was worried that there was already mutiny afoot. The English Dept. Chair was in my first class & sent a complimentary email on my teaching, so maybe it wasn't mutiny. I'm starting the conversational English sessions with the students next week. They were supposed to be held right after I was done with the teachers, but I was told this week that the students are only available @ the same time as the teachers, so I'll meet with them on Tuesdays & Fridays when I don't meet with the teachers during those 2 hours. I'm disappointed to only meet with the students twice a week, but that's the way it is.

Needless to say, 12 hours of teaching per week is a LIGHT load and disappointing in not having enough to do. I've been asking the other teachers for books to read and scored with a teacher from England today. I nabbed 2 of her books before she had a chance to change her mind. If the weather was better, I could spend more time outside. Patience must be the lesson here.

We'll be half done with our 10 weeks on the road this Monday. It's always mixed emotions when you hit that point. Hopefully we'll be busy & it will go by unnoticed.

Enjoy the weekend!
Don & Bobbi/Berta