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Week 9 in China

Challis Hackley
Jan 8, 2018
6 min read

What I Learned

The garbage trucks are cute.

You know how we have these huge monster trucks that eat our garbage and trundle along. The garbage trucks here are much smaller and cuter.

Here, hamster are 5 yaun.

That's less than $1 USD. That's so cheap. Guess what I'm thinking?

Guo means melon.

I went to my first Chinese lesson this week and actually got to put some of what I learned to good use when, We talked about food and I learned that guo is melon, and it's a part of the names of all the other fruits and vegetables: watermelon, cantaloupe, pumpkin, avocado, and even the word for fruit itself.

Kids can be cute sometimes.

My kids, how I refer to the kids I teach, are a handful, always. But sometimes, very rarely, they can be rather sweet and fun to be around. I am just now starting to get used to all their different personalities and how to handle them. It's getting easier.

What I Did

Sunday

We went to church. Yay! The first time in a while and it was awesome. On the metro ride back, we knew that we didn't have any food at home and the cafeteria has very little on the weekends so we stopped and got some Muslim noodles and ice cream. So tasty.

Afterwards, we went exploring. They really like underground markets here in China, little shops and stands all piled together. Their is one not far from where we live and you can find all sorts of things down there: clothing stores, nail salons, eye glasses, accessory shops and even, pet stores. We all really like the pet stores here. It's something free that we can do to lift our spirits.

Monday

I decorated my classroom for the upcoming Halloween festivities and just spent the day teaching.

Tuesday

My first Chinese class, Yay! learned some fun stuff and got to put some of it to use. We went over numbers, fruit, veggies, meats, and how to say simple phrases like how much is this? I still have trouble remembering all the phrases but I can see myself getting better at them as I try and use them more.

The highlight of my day, however was the open classes after we were finished teaching. The other teachers had organized some example classes for us to go and watch, to get ideas for teaching and what-not. The first class we went to was taught by one of our coordinators. She was talking about international foods with her class and when they came to American food this is the honest-to-goodness actual conversation they had.

Teacher Yuki: What kind of food to Americans like to eat?

Student 1: Trash food.

Teacher Yuki: Fast food *she corrects*

Student 2: Greasy food.

Teacher Yuki: Why do they like that food?

Student 3: Because they are fat.

The other ILP teachers and I were sitting at the very back of the auditorium-like classroom where the open classes were being held. The Chinese teachers that knew we were there all turned-around to look at us in horror, including out other coordinator Bonnie... only to find us laughing so hard we were crying. It was the hardest I had laughed since coming to China.

I had gotten a taste of the bluntness of my students before, and although I know kids sometimes say whatever is on their mind, I think this is a Chinese trait. And honestly, you can either get really offended by it or just laugh it off.

Wednesday

That day was not as funny as the one before but on the way from our dorms to the campus where we teach one of my friends located a public bike that wasn't locked. There are public bikes that you can rent here, using the WeChat app to pay for it and it will unlock for your use. She rode circles around us as we walked and at one point over-corrected and crashed into a fence. She wasn't hurt so it was really funny.

Thursday

My students are sweet. At the cafeteria on the campus that we teach, there is the normal counter and a separate fruit stand. As we were leaving, we passed by the stand a couple of our students stopped us. Julie handed me half of one fruit and a straw, and watched me slurp up the seeds from the odd looking plant. It was really good, sour but good, and our students proceeded to buy us more of the fruit because we liked it so much. They also taught me the name of the fruit (passion fruit) in Chinese: bǎixiāng guǒ (百香果). This isn't the first time they've done that for us and I have to say it makes my day a little better every time, and not just because I'm getting free food.

My students are pretty funny too. In honor of Halloween I did a Halloween-themed Mad Lib with my class, justifying it with a small lesson on parts of speech. They came up with some funny stuff. I especially liked it when they read them aloud because sometimes they were laughing so hard that they couldn't finish it.

Friday

So I actually put some effort into my appearance that day and the results were interesting. I had kids staring at me all day. I thought I must have had something in my teeth but I got some pleasant responses when my kids finally spoke up.

Me: *sitting on my heels in front of their desk* How's it going?

Sam: You're eyes are green.

Me: Yes.

Sam: They're pretty.

Me: Thank you.

Lisa: *looks me up and down* Teacher.

Me: *holds my breath*

Lisa: You look perfect.

Sarah: *stares at me*

Me: *feels self-conscience* Is there something wrong, Sarah?

Sarah: Uh, no. You just look like no white.

Me: I don't look white?

Sarah: No, you look like Snow White.

Me: *blushes furiously* Aw, thank you.

I think I might just miss these kids when it comes time to leave.

Saturday

It totally wasn't planned but I went to Purple Mountain again that day. A couple of people from our ILP group were going, they had asked me a few questions about when I went but I really didn't remember how to get there so i wasn't much help but later, when they were just about to leave, they invited us to come... well more like told us that we should get out of our room and do something today. So I got ready in like five minutes and we were on our way to Purple Mountain.

The thing about Purple mountain though is it's kind of like a state park; it's massive. And when I went before we just went to Sun Yat-sen's Mausoleum, so there was plenty of new things for me to see this second trip. We decided to go and see the Ming tombs because in that part of the park they have these really cool statues lining the walkway. So we set off and decided to see what we could see. The entrance fee here was actually one of the most expensive yet in China, if not the most expensive, but we got the student discount and went in.

Now might be a good time for a little background information. You'e probably heard me mention before that Nanjing has been the capital of China before (cumulatively for over 700 years, on and off since 220 AD and as recently as 1949). It's one of the four historical capitals of China including: Beijing, Luoyang, and Xi'an. So it is safe to say that Nanjing has a rich and extensive history. Well, as the former capital, some of the Chinese emperors used to reside here, and some are buried here. That's the Ming Tombs. It has the same kind of feel as the Forbidden city in parts, with the architecture and the layout.

Anyway, so we want ans saw the tombs and took some cool pictures and them we went to this little park, wandered around a bit, told a few brides who where taking pictures there that they were beautiful, and had a few people want to take pictures of us (no big deal). We were just hanging out, kind of messing around and doing cartwheels and hand-stands just to see how well we could. You would have thought that we were putting on an acrobatics performance with the way the Chinese people watched us, laughing, filming, and occasionally clapping. I just thought it was so funny that they find us so interesting. A few people in our group have joked saying, this is what it must feel like to be a zoo animal.