Looking up?

Last night I got a HUGE stomachache and basically sat in my bed at about 5:30. I was waiting for Sam to skype me at 8 and I swear, minutes before he was suppose to, I got a crazy sweat come over me and I thought i was going to throw up. I ran to the bathroom and then realized I might have a problem with the other end. It was a good thing I sat on the toilet is all I am going to say. Sam tried to video call me at about that time but it took me a couple of minutes to recover and return to bed before I could talk to him. It stinks that we can hardly ever get his camera to work. Last night was one of those nights.
It was so great though! I seriously needed to talk to him!! We talked until about 11:30 and it was really great. I know, you probably don't want to hear about it but really, it was great. = ) I was just really happy and had a good time joking around and remembering how wonderful I've got it ; )
I'm really marrying the best guy ever!! <3


Today I started teaching arts and crafts. I got some materials ready for each lesson for the week and I'm trying to get most of the classes ready before I teach them. Then I will have more time to plan my next lessons and ELE. I will also have things more prepared and ready. When I went to teach and I was nervous. I just kept trying to remember happy thoughts and kept smiling (like the big bolded letters above). It made me feel good and before I took a shower and felt really good physically. That helped. Classes went rather well. = ) Most of the kids want to finish their projects. That helps them pay attention and try to keep up. (most of the time) I enjoyed it with most of the classes. I say 'most' quite a bit because there are always some downers. ; ) My project wasn't even that cute but it had a lot of details and different steps. It worked out nicely. I am feeling really good. I don't know if it will last but I pray it will!!!!!!!!!!!!!! <3 We have vacation starting Friday! Whooo Hoo!!!! = D

Oh the things we do in China baby....

Another week has flown by. The days really do drag on but weeks are gone in a flash!

It's hard here.

We managed to get ourselves a 9 day vacation for this next Friday. I'm not sure how it went from 4 to 6 exactly but it was something Tim wanted us to schedule in right. This is the story of the nine day trip exchange:
Tim came to Kim one night and said, "I am going to Nanchang this weekend. You all will come. I have a business meeting in Nanchang. So you come. "

We all thought this meant that since he was going already we could just use the bus he is to go into town. Plus he told us we could get supplies for dumpling making for Sunday.
About a day later or so, Bryndi and I were taking our warm up laps for Kung Fu with our friend Casey. (Casey is the Tai Chee teacher) As we got to talking, Casey said she heard we were going to Nanchang Saturday. She asked us about some hotel and said it was some kind of activity in which we go to talk to people from other schools. You can imagine our confusion and partial anger towards Tim for not explaining anything to us. -I would like to insert here a brief note about our dear coordinator, Tim. He is a bit like Yoda we decided. He says things but never gives it all away. We have to search for the rest of the meaning. Hahaha and he uses us very last minute with his 'kindness' always backing it up. Hmmmmmmm.....-
The next thing to do was to take our new news back to Kim and figure out what was happening. We all conspired to get a trade from this day he was taking away from our weekend. (we would have come back thursday from our vacation to teach Friday and then had the night and weekend free) it was only 2 hours of teaching we needed to be here for and our ELE classes that Friday. We were determined to get it off and add the weekend to our vacation since he was having us technically work on a Saturday, even in Nanchang. Kim talked to Tim who talked to the headmaster and approved it. Hence, out 9 day vacation.

--now this past Saturday in Nanchang, we ate breakfast at KFC because they didn't have breakfast ready at the cafeteria we usually eat at. The 6 of us ILP teachers brought overnight supplies because Tim would never answer when we would return to the school and made it sound like there may be a possibility of staying the night. Well it turns out, the hotel was just were the conference thing we went to was being held. No overnight. It was annoying to be carrying around now useless materials. When we go to this conference bit, we still didn't know what we are doing and to this day~don't understand completely. We sat around making small conversation with random Chinese people. We think we might have just been there to show that Mayflora was international and for people to practice their English on us. Seriously. The program was for foreign exchange students. There were random college reps there from Canada, Michigan, New Hampshire, and a few other places. There was one lady I sat next to that was just there to give help for visa interviews. It was boring as all get out. Even Tim came over and was telling us how boring it was. Hahahaha

Lunch was great though. It was a big all-you-can-eat buffet of Chinese cuisine. I piled on some veggies and tofu. Then some sponge cake and semi-fried rice(it just had scrambled eggs in it and was more sticky). There were lots of other little things to try as well but I'm not very adventurous I guess or not enough to brag about. =)

Sunday we had a Chinese lady come show us how to make dumplings and we made a ton! I might have to try to make some when I get home. I'm also a fan of some of the tofu here... So I might have to hit up Chinese markets it get me some tofu and tofu noodles when i get back.
Hope this week goes well. I have arts and crafts this week so that should be a whole new experience. Hip hip who-raw. Haha.

Trials and Tribulations

Yesterday I had a really hard day. I like freaked out about my ELE 

class and what I was going to do. Then they were telling eachother 

answers and stuff so I was way annoyed because I can't speak 

Chinese and tell them exactly or stop them. So after it was over 

and I turned a corner, I just started crying and when I got back 

Bryndi tried to comfort me and I just cried for a little longer. I 

think I'm just way stressed. But I wrote down the things I need to 

accomplish and hopefully that will help. It was awesome though when 

Kim came and told us we only had to teach one rotation of kids. We 

had a good opening and like some of my kids like me! Whoot. Haha. 

Then I taught my homeroom class and ran around taking pictures with 

all the kids and of all of them. :) that was fun. Then we sat in 

Tim's office until it was time for the teacher meeting/assembly 

thing. He took is to the gym and had use pull out notebooks (just 

for show) and we doodled,wrote lists, and did lesson planning while 

sitting through a very very boring assembly of only teachers. The 

worst part is just not being able to understand a word. The speakers 

were right in front of us Blaring! I could have sworn I would go 

deaf by the end! Oh and Tim told us while in his office not to be 

smiling loud. Hahahaha or in other words, don't be laughing and 

giggling. Which we would have been really out of place and awkward 

if we had. 
Most of us didn't want to go to Tai Chee or Kung Fu but we had 

already cancelled two nights in a row. So instead we bundled up and 

faced the cold. It turned out being really good and I'm glad we went. 

Casey is really excited about the Tai Chee. She is adorable. I kinda 

turned from Kung Fu to do more tai Chee with her. :) 
She taught me about rings on their fingers and that is really neat. 

If there is a ring on the pinky, they are single and want to stay 

that way or have to. If it is on the pointer finger, they are single 

but are looking or can find someone. The middle finger means you are 

in love or like a really good relationship. Then the ring finger is 

for being married. Casey is married but she wears her ring on the 

middle finger and says she likes to wear it there because it means 

they are 'hot lovers'! Haha well that is why she said but not sure 

that is what she meant. She also tried to explain that it is like 

they are always falling in love. Forever in love. Very cool.

Just for Fun

Oh it's been another crazy week! I did rotations this week- switching each classes kids. It was insane. The kids were wicked bad for the first few days.  Sometimes I wouldn't even have to teach one rotation of kids or only teach for 5 minutes because it would take so long to get them to hold hands, be quiet, and not hurt each other. That was the good end of the deal.

My 7th graders get bored easily and don't know how to line up. Most of them didn't quite get the concept of pictionary but they did play it the full 45 mins I was teaching. That was nice.

So on to the part of the week I like best, the {week}end!!!!!!! We found out last week that on Fridays, we only teach for two hours. This week we changed the schedule to fit. I barely taught that day. I had an hour before dinner to relax. When I went to get Kim for dinner, I met the other foreign English teacher. We had all been expecting this teacher all week. It turns out, he is from India! He had a pretty thick accent and it is difficult to understand his English sometimes. His English name is Peter because apparently Chinese can't say Vinay. (veen-a). He is Hindu and tells us of some very interesting cultural differences. (in the picture is Ashley and Vinay)

Saturday we went to the city, Fuzhou. We did some shopping and bought food at the supermarket. We rode the public bus to and from. To wasn't that bad. We all got seats and it is a 45 min ride. It was adorable when this lady was watching Ashley write letters because she was standing over her. She had her two kids look over the seat at her. Ashley didn't even notice and went on writing normally. I pulled out my camera just a little too late to catch them. On the way back, it was a little insane! There were so many people that we barely fit on! Many of the people were interested in who the foreigners were. Because Nicole and I were in the doorway of this jam-packed bus, a nice lady offered to hold our bags in front of her. We slowly made our way to the back of the bus as people got on and off. When I was holding onto one of the bars on the top of the bus, I thought my arm/shoulder might get dislocated because of all the quick stops and the frequencies of the stops and turns. The people were super nice! Most of them let us sit down instead of taking the seats. I felt a little bad but most of them got off in only a few stops. When we had about 10 minutes left, it was pretty empty and we all had plenty of room to stretch out.

We were so tired when we returned to the prison....I mean school, that most of us crashed or wanted to. It didn't take long for there to be a knock at the door. Another spontaneous teaching experience. We all went to teach some kids and play games. I didn't realize how tired I was until we had to walk up the hill. We played red rover. Naturally they lined up girls vs. boys. They would always take back the kid that was already on their team. It seemed like an eternity.
Sunday was wonderful. I was able to skype my love. I didn't want to stop talking with him and I ended up being a little late to 'church' in the other girls' apartment. Testimony meeting was a little hard to hear but Sunday school was really good. Lunch was delicious-carrots, little green bean things, big white beans, cabbage and rice. :) at 1 we went to the monastery. We took a bus to a certain point an then climbed soooo many stairs up a mountain to get to the temple.

It made me appreciate our temples and the gospel. Im so glad our temples are not so public and remain sacred. I feel like people were disrespectful there and it was dirty. People were everywhere taking pictures and talking loud. There wasn't a ton of worshipping going on it seemed. It was a very interesting place though and I'm glad we went.

Definitely a good Chinese experience!

Later, we had a visiting teaching meeting all together with our new Relief Society group leader, Nicole. Before I went to sleep, Bryndi and I put in 'the Best Two Years' and projected it onto our wall.
All-in-all it has been a nice weekend :) I need to stop eating so much, especially my junk food!!

p.s.-Tofu is becoming a rather regular thing in my meal plans. . . It really depends on the day if it is good or not. Hopefully it is good for me.

Everybody was Kung Fu Fighting!

Well Kung Fu is pretty tough. Master Fu is pretty awesome. he is nice but we cant understand him so this one lady translates for us. Then he says yes, no, and good. haha One time he just watched what i did then said no and walked away. hahaha then he just laughed at me yesterday. then a mixture of both tonight. i love it. lol. Bryndi thinks he is cute. So we hardcore make fun of her, and him. Its great because we can, right there, and he doesnt even know it. = D bahahahaha good times. We couldn't do painting last night because the teacher had a migraine but tonight we moved on to cherry blossoms and bamboo. hahaha not sure how i feel about the painting. we cant understand him either. = ) this girl, Flora, comes in sometimes now and helps translate while she learns to paint too. Since the Kung Fu teacher was late, Casey (the translator, a teacher, and the lady that is taking us to the monastery on Sunday) showed us some Tai Chee moves. She is going to teach us. She says on June 1st we will preform it in our uniforms that we will buy, if we are good ( i think we will do it anyway because she is so excited about it and is she going to tell us we stink??) hehehe. The one thing I really don't like about Kung Fu is the warm up. We have to do 2 laps around the track before we start. I also am not much of a fighter. . . I don't want to hit anyone. It might help get my frustrations out though instead of on the kids ; ) which have been really bad the last few days. I ended up not teaching one of my classes because they took so long to rotate. They were going crazy! oh man...love it. I swear, that should count as at least one lap for our warm up!! ; )

How we Party in China! ; )

We had a birthday party for my roommate, Bryndi, today. It was a lot 

of fun. We each got our own little microwave cake or brownie dish.

We played pin-the-tail-on-the-donkey. I obviously won with my gift. 

My "spidey" senses told me the direction. It was only a half an inch 

off! Haha. Because I am so awesome, I won a pack of strawberry 

shortcake Extra gum. It smells just like it! It tastes pretty good 

too. 

Then we played Amnesia. The game that you have a person's name 

taped to your head and you ask yes and no questions to everyone else. 

You try to guess "who you are". I was rather horrible at this game. 

My first was Mr.Darcy. I was the last to guess mine.  Then I was 

Yoda and I should have had it sooner than I did but I forgot that I 

had asked if I wasn't a cartoon character. Our last game together 

was 'what if'. It was silly and fun. 
 
One really great thing about Bryndi's birthday today was dinner. Tim 

arranged for us to eat with him and have a formal dinner at the 

hotel. Oh it was good. It was a great break from our cafeteria food. 

I am gorged still. I filled up on our last dish, can you guess? Yup. 

Fried Rice!!! I almost ate a whole plate of green beans and eggplant 

that was cooked in Something delicious. We are very tempted to tell 

Tim it's one of our birthdays every week! =) 
 
I cleaned my side of the apartment today. Another thing I did 

today and i am going to try out tonight is, taping my sheet to my 

bed. I don't have a fitted sheet and so it goes every where at night. 

I hope it works! It was quite a pain. Typing of pain...my nose is 

being rubbed raw because it is running ALL the time!! I can never 

catch it. I don't know if I ever will....

Getting to know China!

Well a few things to know about china:

• They don't have deodorant. At least not widely available.

• Lots of girls don't shave arm pits or legs here. (I bought men's shaving cream)

• Chinese have less b.o. And less hair. But it doesn't mean it doesn't exist. :)

• Most people really do eat rice for every meal. At more formal dinners, the rice comes last, and it is usually fried rice (restaurants do this). When you eat with new friends, you toast with them. Just good manners.

• It is normal, and common to spit the bones out on the table and the floor.

• It is normal to spit on the ground and floor. (dodging luggies on the ground is quite common for me)

• Many people smoke.

• Chinese people are generally very curious. (what you have, what is around, what things are like,and staring.)

• Things change quickly and can be very last minute.

What a day!

First of all, we woke up at 7:00am. Almost an hour before we usually 

do. We were going to breakfast at about 7:33am and Tim, the 

coordinator, called Kim, my headteacher, to say that we needed to be 

at his office at 20 mins till 8. Kim said, "sorry we are going to 

breakfast and be there as soon as we can." she was still not excited 

about the speech she was going to have to give. Who would be when 

they were just informed the night before that there was even going 

to be an awards assembly for the teachers at Mayflora School? She 

didn't memorize the speech but she did fix the Chenglish. After 

breakfast, we went straight to his office, all dressed up as we were 

instructed. Kim practiced her speech with her 15 year old Chinese 

translator. The girl was a doll. She translated Kim's speech into 

Chinese so the rest of the school would understand. (Kim read a line, 

then the girl translated, then Kim, then Chinese. Back and forth 

until the speech was over. It was only a couple minutes long so that 

was good!!) 

Our Dear Tim

We filled into the gymnasium with "some of the students" from each

class (k-12) and teachers. Since we are teachers and obviously 

*special*, we got to sit on stools. While all the students sat on 

the floor. When it was Kim's turn, I recorded it. The assembly 

itself was... Well as exciting as most of my high school assemblies

...not very. Then to top it off- I couldn't understand what they 

were saying and I didn't have that attitude of "well at least we get 

out of class". Instead I yearned for my firm but WARM bed back in my 

apartment. As it lead on, I began to wonder if my toes would turn 

into Popsicles and they would serve them at our next meal. I tried 

to sit up straight and set an example for the students. The relief 

that came when kids and adults started standing and turning toward 

the back of the gym, was overwhelming. I gladly stood up and began 

to walk. Oh what pain it brought me! My feet were so cold, it 

literally hurt to walk. It was like needles slicing into my precious 

feet. The apartment seemed like an eternity away! 
 
Not to mention that while we were heading that way, I found out I 

would be teaching an ELE class( which are older students) earlier 

than originally planned. I figured, schedules change. Especially 

with assemblies and what not. 
 
Oh I forgot how crazy this day was until now. 
 
So as we returned to our humble foreign abode, I simply lied in bed 

and stuck my earphones in. I listened to dance music and I do 

believe my mind was running the whole time but I can't remember 

because I started to drift off. Alas, there was a knock at my door 

only 54 minutes later. Which seemed but a very small moment. I 

wheeled myself to get up and out the door. 
 
Angel, Kim, and I went towards the class I was going to teach. I was 

unprepared and had no idea what to expect. I was hoping for 

talkative kids and some getting-to-know-you ideas. Yet, I couldn't 

be more unprepared for what Angel had in store. She saw the book I 

was carrying and realize it was for 7th graders. Which was my ELE 

class. Apparently, Tim had added yet another class to our schedule 

and they were (what we expect might be) 9th graders. I decided not 

to be too worried, if they were older they could speak more English,

right? 
 
Wrong. The class wouldn't speak a word. I couldn't tell if they were 

just trying with all their might not to not talk to the American 

English teacher or they just didn't understand me. I'm guessing the 

first though because I looked over their books and they looked 

pretty advanced for English students and they were acting ...teenage. 

I was frustrated as all get out. At some point, I think Angel told 

Kim that I could just read the vocabulary and show them how to say 

it. I did that. They repeated each word. Then...
 
Silence. 
 
I was relieved when the bell rang and class was over. Angel was not 

happy with the students either. She said they were very bad and that 

she would talk to the head master. Kim says we won't teach that 

class. Thank goodness! What a disaster! 
 
I was just about to crawl back into dreaming about my bed when Kim 

mentioned my REAL/original 7th grade class. Oh yeah, had to teach 

that one in 10 mins. Great. 
 
We walked down some steps, across a walk way, and down a hall. 7th 

grade, was much better. They were just learning some basic things 

-where people live, likes,dislikes, and so on. So it was perfect. I 

learned all of their names (English names) and talk about siblings. 

Then we talked about food. Not bad. 
 
There wasn't much time to rest but I still wrapped my one 

comforter/blanket around myself and warmed my body before going to 

lunch. Lunch was good. This time there really were Lima beans! 

Delicious! Along with good sliced potatoes, spicy cucumbers, and 

rice ;) 
 
You thought my day was over. Nope. I slept back in bed and wished we 

could do what the Chinese have been doing and suddenly change our 

schedule. As in, tell them I just wasn't going to teach today 

because at this point, we still hadn't taught our regular youngsters. 
 
I picked the easiest to prepare for lesson and went to face the 

music. Five classes later, exhaustion was setting in. They weren't 

their worst today or their best. I still ran around grabbing them by their coats,

trying to keep them from touching things, from touching each other, 

being bewildered when they honestly wouldn't do anything at all, and 

yelling because the classes echo and I'm competing with 4-8 other 

voices and more if there are random Chinese teachers just in there 

talking to each other. Welcome to ILP in Linchuan Mayflora School. :) 

yet, the kids can be adorable and some kids are really trying. 

Sometimes they enjoy the activity and cooperate. There is however, 

another factor of tokens but I think I've gone on long enough. 
 
Dinner was basically cooked cabbage, cooked greasy carrots, and rice. 

Meager but I kept going back for more carrots. 
 
Now I must do lesson plans that are due tomorrow night and hope it 

all goes well.