Adventures in Kunming and Beyond

Well, the semester that was supposed to be the “easy” downward spiral has more or less spiraled out of control instead! First off, Spring Festival was amazing. It was great to see my family and Ryan, Beijing was freezing and Thailand was awesome! The day I left for the break, I came back to my apartment to find that the water pipes in the apartment above me had broken and my apartment had been turned into a swimming pool. Thankfully my family was here, so we cleaned it up as best we could and still made our flight to Beijing that afternoon. But, the apartment was a disaster, and although the Foreign Affairs Office promised to check the pipes and open the windows, I came back a month later to find that…my water heater had leaked the whole time AND my bedroom was in a state of mold infestation! Unreal. So much for checking the apartment. So that started off the semester on a very negative note. Mold doesn’t seem to be a huge issue here, or the fact that it will spread and make people sick. Anyway, it took a little more than a month, but I finally found the right combination of cleaning supplies to rid the apartment of most of it. That meant a month sleeping on the couch. And my closets had to be taken out, so I live out of boxes now (I knew those leftover DHL ones would come in handy, Ryan!). Anyway, so after that start, there were only MORE random events to come. Here are some of the highlights:

About two weeks after I got back, I was hit by a city bus. Random. Anyway, it hit my head, back and foot, so I got to experience Chinese healthcare firsthand. Not good. If I didn’t already want to die, staying at the hospital for a prolonged period of time would have killed me anyway. Needless to say, I’ve spent the last few months hoping I never need medical attention the rest of the time I’m in China! No head injuries (we only know this because I spent that night at Havvah’s and she woke me up every two hours to make sure I didn’t have a concussion), and according to the X-ray of my foot (for which they X-rayed the WRONG side of my foot), it was ok. Our best guess (from qualified English teachers’ non-medical perspectives) is that it was a fracture. It was pretty messed up for a while, but not much to be done, I guess. But it’s a great story to tell at parties, right? : )

I got nailed with six writing classes this semester and two speaking, all for the English Department. WOW. That many writing classes make it impossible to ever get caught up. Of course, most of my students loathe the fact that they have to take writing, as if it were my decision to make them! Oh well. We’re coping the best we can, but not without lots of power struggles. Let’s just say that the sophomores have been putting up quite a fight. Character building, right?

Of course, in general, 2008 has been wild for China as a whole. All of the Olympic hooplah is crazy. Being in Yunnan province makes things even more intense since we border Tibet and Sichuan province, in addition to Burma. Scary. It has definitely been an interesting year to be here with everything going on politically and environmentally.

I have managed to squeeze in some traveling, even though I teach everyday, so taking long weekend trips requires trying to get time off. Our school took us on a weekend trip to Wuding in April. It was pretty, but the altitude on Lion Mountain killed me! Two weekends later Havvah and I went to Lijiang. The altitude wasn’t very friendly there, either, but not as bad as Wuding. My overall impression of Lijiang is that it’s like Chinese Disneyland—touristy, commercialized and not somewhere I’d need to visit again. It was really pretty, but I preferred Dali. Finally, I just got back from Vietnam about two weeks ago. A friend from high school was vacationing there, so I finagled the time off (at the eleventh hour!) and made it to Hanoi alone via night train, buses and border crossings. Once I made it there, we had a blast! We spent a few days in Hanoi and then headed to Halong Bay for a three day boat trip. It was a much-needed break from the semester.

So, I’ve been very busy with everything so far this semester. We just finished midterms last week, so the end-of-school feeling has hit. In typical China fashion, I have no idea when I’ll finally be finished with my finals, but still starting to think about coming home, probably sometime in August.

Okay, I am alive, for those of you still checking up on me and those of you I don’t know who just read my blog (I know these things thanks to the cool tracking device that tells me who looks at this!). Anyway, Spring Festival was GREAT!! The return to China…well, let’s just say it’s been of near Biblical proportions (think along the lines of the 10 plagues, Job, etc.). But all is calm for the moment. Tomorrow we embark on a school fieldtrip to go mountain climbing. Assuming I live through it, updates should be hopefully coming next week.

Yes, the “to be continued” updates, as promised in yesterday’s post. Alright, well we left off at Thanksgiving where I proceeded to catch a very nasty cold and also where the realization hit that finals and grades were rapidly approaching. I swear that from Thanksgiving until now, the only thing I’ve done is catch up on grading, write final exams and then grade them. Honestly. No lie. It was eerily familiar to being an undergrad, but from the teacher’s side, which I will say can be similarly as stressful. ESPECIALLY when…yes, here come the usual ridiculous parts.

So anyway, clearly December is lacking posts. Well, it honestly was a whirlwind. First off, Christmas was no extravagant ordeal here. In fact, the lack of family and having to teach on Christmas just made it a regular day, which is exactly how I dealt with it. So, no Christmas in 2007, but that’s ok because…my mom and sisters announced they would be visiting in mere weeks!! Actually, they will be here next Saturday. So, that also put some more craziness into December with flights, visas and all of their travel arrangements. And of course, that was in addition to getting all of Ryan’s stuff ready for his Asia adventures. Definitely good things to be busy with!! Yay for seeing everyone soon!

All right, so school. Well, of course I had been wondering about the final exam schedule for weeks but that’s a whole other fiasco. Anyway, condensed version: Lack of planning and notification is just another day here. So, when at last the secret dates were revealed to me, I was told that my four sections of VLS could have their final exams during the last week of classes. Ok, that’s fine. But, we would have to hold out for the writing exam until January 18 since it’s a core class for the major, blah blah blah, etc. Of course that’s not cool since the family arrives the next day and I’ll have 75 finals to grade and get paperwork lined up for (more on that to come). And after much protest, it seems that the almighty gods from some very authoritative department that I don’t even know, refused to budge on the date even with my reason. Throughout all of this, my students had also been badgering me to change the exam date because they wanted to go home earlier. No go. So that explains my current presence in Kunming waiting until next week’s final. So, whatever, no change on that. Well, so I thought I had everything lined up until it was sprung on me that I should give all four sections of the VLS exam together on one day and needed to make those arrangements. Ironically, the purpose would be to cut down on cheating since the almighty gods choose from two versions of the exam you present to them and select the one that will be given as the final. The other will wait until those who fail the class appeal to retake the final. Efficient. Right. So anyway, there was this whole fiasco in arranging a date and time that worked for all 140 of the students and finally resulted in me washing my hands to the matter and telling them that if they couldn’t make it to the final, it wasn’t my problem (Yeah, this is the part of December when I became utterly stressed out and pretty much resembled every evil Disney villain. I’m not even lying; the runaround with everything was out of control.)

So put that one aside for a minute. The good thing that happened was that I read the fine print on some of my IBS forms and found out I could give their final exam a week earlier than expected AND could cancel the last week of class if I went that route. SWEET! So, we crammed in five-paragraph essays and had a final. Voila. Ok, so that was finished, except for the grading and a little bit of paperwork.

Then came the waves of e-mails about the paperwork for the English Department. Very helpful ones, but the fact that there was this much was crazy!! And in Chinese!! (p.s. I went to IBS to ask for help with my Chinese forms and they thought it was strange. Did I also mention my life began to resemble a bizarre sitcom for the last few weeks? Honestly, it was weird.) So yes, on top of the paperwork came the instructions about how to grade the finals. I thought I had accomplished something by mastering the format of the exam (nothing was logical in December either), but the icing on the cake came with the absurd “check, half-check and ‘x’” grading system. Yes, every question on the exam must have one of those. EVERY question. Plus, each section needs a signature. I’ve now signed my name 1,042 times. Ok, so all of these crazy instructions came and I felt like someone was making this hugely insane maze for me. I was on my own for it, too, since there are only three of us teaching for that Department and one of them was vacationing in Hawaii and the other is pretty illusive. So anyway, needless to say, I was waiting for another set of instructions saying something like “wrap the exams in a purple polka-dotted ribbon with a Hallmark Gold Crown sticker and seal with a kiss after barking like a dog three times.” Really, it was that insane.

Back to the VLS exam. It backfired…miserably. The whole purpose for combining it was the Department’s idea to cut down on cheating. Well, the room I was given was just big enough to accomodate 140 students…meaning they were elbow-to-elbow and quite cozy for looking at their neighbor’s test. Luckily (yes, another fiasco) someone else from the Department was available to help supervise so it wasn’t just me. It was like babysitting monkeys. And there was cheating. I actually threw a student out for using notes. No sympathy.

So currently I’ve finished IBS. I went there yesterday to enter my grades since their Website is in Chinese, so probably better to get help. Three of us showed up at the same time to do this, however, Shelly (the woman in charge) looks at me and is like “why do you need help?” Um, well because I don’t understand the directions in Chinese and hello, there are three of us, so clearly I’m not the only incompetent one. Again, truly a hateful relationship from both sides there. So, of course both of their logins worked, but mine didn’t. Of course. So then I was accused of changing a password for a site I’d never even logged in to. Why MEEEE?? Ugh. Anyway, got them finished. Turned in everything for them and said “good riddance.”

That now leaves me with four exam boxes (yes, things are very official) on my floor with completed paperwork, waiting to be turned in on Friday. And while waiting for next week’s exam, I have 70 term papers to read. I’ve already discovered several of them pop right up on Google, so now we’re on to plagiarism issues. Awesome.

As far as social life. Well, I attended the English Club Christmas party. Of course my students were cracking up that I was there and then there was this whole thing with the male students wanting to dance with me. Made the mistake of dancing with one…note to self not to do that again. And then dancing with one caused a whole line to form. EEEEeek.

We did have quite the New Year’s celebration as well. Well, actually it had started a few days prior quite on accident. Anyway, we made the mistake of going to a Chinese club without any male protectors so that lead to a whole fiasco with drunk Chinese men. However, on the upside, later that evening Havvah and I won a dance contest and got a case of beer. It was quite a sight and the video is NOT going on YouTube EVER!! Haha, but it was pretty fun. Other than that, all of the other teachers are starting to head out for the break. I’ve got to stick around late because of my last final. We do have one last soiree planned to celebrate my birthday on Saturday. And seeing as how we usually cause a scene wherever we go and have to avoid certain bars for a few weeks after, we’ll have a good amount of time over the break to hope that we can show our faces again come March

So, if you’re in Kunming, come out for some birthday partay-ing. Otherwise catch me on the U.S. leg of my upcoming Kunming-Beijing-Bangkok-Koh Tao-WI-MN-Des Moines-Phoenix escapade. Let me know and we’ll see what works out!

Happy 2008 as well!

Well, the madness of finals has been upon us…and for some of us it started right after Thanksgiving since we missed the memo that keeping up on grading would be a wise choice. Anyway, just a short update for the moment to say that I officially survived the IBS classes and we parted with a mutual “dislike” for each other. All of their grades and paperwork are in, so hasta la vista to IBS!! Of course, it wasn’t without tension and drama, but hopefully I’ll never have to step foot on that part of campus again. Good riddance!! (More to come…)

So much to recap! Let’s start at the beginning. Dali was a good trip out of the city. Of course, with lots of amusing tidbits along the way. First off, the “bus” we rode in resembled the Mystery Machine from Scooby Doo and doubled as a delivery service. We made some random stops, including picking people up on the side of the road and dropping them off on off-ramps. And, I also discovered what you do in China if someone needs to go to the bathroom in between designated stops. No, you don’t pull off and stop at a gas station. Your driver finds a nice bushy area and there you have it (thankfully it wasn’t me!). If that wasn’t enough to scare me into starvation for the trip home, our designated rest stop restroom facilities lacked doors on the stalls. Yes, a very public display of EVERYTHING. Welcome to China. Anyway, once in Dali, we had an awesome hostel that I would definitely recommend. The Old City of Dali was very chill and laid-back. It was hard to get used to at first because we’re so used to doing things a little less leisurely, but once we got the hang of the relaxation part, it was fun. And of course, lots of delicious Western food. We definitely splurged on cookies, real pizza!! (um, twice) and lots of other delicacies. On a more serious note, we witnessed an accident where a car ran over a small child. It was horrible, and was one of those bizarre things in that we kind of ran into the child and one step later the child ran out in front of the car. Being right there was horrendous, as was the whole incident. The car was part of a wedding group, so that made it even worse.

Anyway, so we made it back to Kunming in time to find out more of the madness involving the sports competition. Prior to leaving for Dali on Thursday (11/15), we were informed via e-mail that the Foreign Office was not providing the outfits we needed for the opening ceremony of the sports competition as previously promised. Instead, they were going to give us 700RMB to buy clothes. Someone inquired about what kind of clothing to which we were sent a picture of a track suit. On Tuesday night we also received a detailed itinerary requesting our presence at random things (opening ceremony walking practice, etc.). Whatever. So, we got back and scrambled to get the money and figure out where to go for a track suit, of all things. We hunted them down on Wednesday, only to then find out that by track suit, they had indeed meant formal business clothes. Don’t ask. Of course, it was too late to do anything since the event was the next day. So, we figured we would just compromise with something we already had for teaching. (Yes, I am now the proud owner of one blue fake Adidas tracksuit. Pretty sweet, I know.) Fine. In the midst of all of this hoopla, it turns out our Foreign Office contact had been relieved of her duties!! As in, was no longer employed with the school. Very excellent news, especially considering my track record with her. Well, the icing on the cake came Thursday morning. Of course, we didn’t have class…or so we thought. Turns out, on Wednesday, the school had decided to reinstate classes for Thursday morning. BUT, no one had told the foreign teachers. So, a whole mess ensued for the two of us who actually have Thursday morning classes. That was it, especially considering the class I missed was an IBS one, who I already have a history with. However, due to the communication error, it wasn’t my fault, so I won’t get penalized. But, the overall truama of the whole event had me ready to pack up and go home. There were so many incidents within one week concerning the sport competition and this was the last straw of ridiculousness. Anyway. So, the afternoon came, and we showed up to the ceremony and were paraded around in our own faux Macy’s Thanksgiving Day parade-type glory. Awesome. It was truly an outrageous event where each department, right down to the campus security guards, took part in the ceremony. And, the coordinating outfits, ranging from matching suits, cheerleader fringe costumes and a variety of tracksuits, were quite a sight. Sadly, no leg warmers or sweatbands. I guess the competition actually included track and field events, but I’m not going to lie, the concept of an aerobics competition had me hoping for more of an ’80s Flashdance-type atmosphere. Sad. We finally got out of there and were able to celebrate Thanksgiving Italian style with pizza and wine. Hey, I don’t really like that much turkey anyway, so it worked out well, but missing a family holiday was pretty rough.

The weekend was busy, but in a good way. On Saturday we went to Dounan, which is the largest flower market in Asia and distribtes worldwide. Even though we got there a little late in their day (11 a.m.), we still found lots of cool stuff and I managed to leave with about 60 daisies, quite unintentionally, and for very cheaply. Anyway, so I hauled my flowers back, standing, for an hour on the bus. It was also then I discovered that finding a vase in the city was nearly impossible. And then, I also rediscovered that I am not Martha Stewart. Flower arranging is not necessarily my area of talent, so there’s no way better to find that out in a large-scale than being surrounded by five dozen flowers. Oh well, they were pretty.

Saturday night there was a Christmas fair put on by some local foreign-owned businesses, which made for a very Christmas-y atmosphere. Sunday was also hectic and came with the onset of a cold, which made for a brutal week and has until now kept me hidden in my apartment, aside from classes. Oh yes, and did I mention the building they removed on one side of our building? Yes, we returned from Dali to find that that building was scheduled to no longer exist. And by finding that, I mean that on my third floor apartment, I was now eye-level with Chinese construction men dismantling the building. Of course, since the curtains on the opposite side of my apartment are usually permanently closed (due to my students informing me quite happily that they could see in my apartment), I guess why not eliminate my remaining source of sunlight. Of course, that was better than showering with an audience. So yes, the week has been filled with near earthquake conditions when they decided to pull that building’s walls down one morning, to salvage crews working around the clock to find good bricks in the rubble. So now, we are fully exposed to the rest of campus and of course, know that if a building is coming down, the duration of our stay here will likely be filled with construction on a new addition to campus. Swell.

Other than that, I was VERY thankful for potato soup at Silver Spoon while I was sick this week. Just like home! I’ve also hit my three month mark in China. Scary. But, down to two months until the semester break expedition!! YAY!! Also found out we have a break for Jan. 1, but the school hasn’t set the dates yet. And, that falls within some of the finals. I will say it’s very difficult to understand how an organization functions with such seemingly little organization. I only say this because of the lack of knowledge of all school dates…it’s just unfathomable, right down to when school starts and ends. And, how is it fair to reinstate school the day before?? Honestly, I think that some day I will wake up and discover China has decided to change the days of the week, at the last minute.

So, those of the highlights of the recent weeks. Oh, and did I mention that my new favorite clothing item is long underwear, a beautiful solution to lack of central heating?

MIA again. But I’m trying to keep a low profile. Of course the usual array of mishaps and trouble have found me, but I’ve come to believe my purpose in China is to be an unintentional rebel. Sweet. But, having been here over two months now, I think the initial culture shock has worn off, so a lot of things that I would have flipped out over don’t really phase me anymore. Anyway, somewhat survived midterms. But on to current events. We’re hopefully heading to Dali for the weekend. (By hopefully I mean that I have yet to receive approval for cancelling my one Friday class.) If I do indeed get to make the trip (trust me, it’s entirely possible that said department will revoke my request), it should be a good weekend away from Kunming. On a sidenote: Halloween China-style also rocked.

In other interesting local news: The weather has been decent and somewhat Fallish. Despite the periodic rain, I think the overall climate is pretty awesome in comparison to other parts of China (ie. I regularly see a clear blue sky and the sun). Um, also if you happen to see Kunming in the news anytime soon, there was a huge drug bust on a deal that was headed here. And finally, just for your amusement, our school is hosting an aerobics competition next week. Yeah. It’s insane. It’s like synchronized aerobics for guys and girls. If you walk around campus, there are huge groups of people practicing. I’m even talking all-male groups. But, the best part is that the foreign teachers are going to be paraded around at it…in special outfits. It will be picture-worthy, for sure. And, evidently school is cancelled for two days for this blessed event. Nice for Thanksgiving, but lack of notice is not cool. Never a dull moment

And finally, if there was ever a good introduction to China, it would be this (hilarious and sadly true!!): http://www.sinosplice.com/china/pictguide/

Greetings from my not-so-subtropic climate. It’s sad and true. All you have to do is mention Kunming and people instantly rave about the climate and its nickname as the “city of eternal spring.” Well, evidently we’re not having spring this year…because it’s chilly!! Our local paper also determined that this will be an unusually cold winter for Kunming. Winter??? There was not supposed to be a winter in Kunming. Eternal spring, sun and 50-60 degrees was my impression. Anyway, it’s not so much that the cold is a problem as a whole or that it is even that cold. The problem lies in the fact that nowhere is warm! Give me winter in the midwest because at least I could get into my warm car, go into a warm store or be warm at home. Not so here. Because they aren’t used to cold weather that often, there’s no heat. As in, windows don’t seal and you want to put blankets under every door. I do have a small heater that I sit so close to that I’m scared half of my body is going to be tan. And then there’s the fact that it’s been raining and gray for two weeks now. Seriously, this weather is not uplifting. Gone are the glamour days of skirts. My new interest is in long underwear. So, recent efforts and funds have been concentrated on trying to cozy up the apartment. And, to top it off, our water has begun to sporadically turn off, usually in the evening. It doesn’t really bother me, unless I’m attempting to do something with the water, like shower. So lots of layers and occassional lack of hygiene. I’ve never been camping, but China makes up for that, I think.

In other news, some issues with one of the parts of campus I teach for has revealed that Chinese college is more like prison. Let’s just say that students are hunted down if they aren’t in class, teachers are not allowed to use their discretion for anything (such as ending class early) and some reacent incidents have made me pretty thankful for my liberal arts education. I’m not saying I want students to be absent, but really, they’re adults so if they miss, that’s their problem. So anyway, I’m likely going to be deported soon, even though I was not aware of these “rules”. I’ve more or less begged the Foreign Language/English Department to fill my schedule next semester so that I don’t get split between the two and become hated more by the other department that shall remain nameless.

In good news though, I got approval for winter holiday dates so plane tickets and hotels can now be booked! I was in negotiation with all of this since first, school break schedules appear to be unheard of and the fact that I have two departments’ finals schedules to work around. One of them starts finals in late December and the other doesn’t start until mid-January, in addition to conflicts on the school start date for the next semester. But, I have the go-ahead, so school will just have to start without me if that’s the case

But yes, there were some days when I wanted to jump off it!

So, no posts and MIA. What’s the story? Well, the last week of September we had a double week of classes to make up for the ones that we wouldn’t have during the October holiday. Not cool. Anyway, so in the midst of the double week, I was also signed up to judge my department’s CCTV speech contest, get my contestants ready for it, hostess another university’s CCTV competition and go to the next level of my school’s competition to watch my students. CRAZY! It was fun for the most part. I enjoyed being able to be involved in so many aspects of the competition, but I’m pretty sick of hearing about global citizenship (the speech topic). Anyway, so I made it through the crazy week, which included teaching on the weekend…booo. (On a sidenote: I tried to let my Sunday morning class leave early, well, pretty much when we got there, and we got caught!! AND, then we got put under classroom arrest, with some woman standing outside the door until I shut it in her face. CRAZY!! There are days when I wonder why I haven’t been deported!!)

Anyway, so last week (first week of Oct.) we had vacation. We just chilled on Monday after the killer week. Due to a complicated story involving the Foreign Office and a plane ticket, I owed them a good chunk of my first pay check, so exotic travel was a little out of budget (bummer). Oh well. We still had a good time doing some touring around Kunming. On Tuesday we went to a park called Black Dragon Pool. It was in the mountains (which was quite the escapade trying to get there), so it was fun to do some hiking and actually see some trees changing color. I miss Fall! Then on Wednesday, one of our students and her friends took us to a park about an hour away called the Yunnan Nationalities/Minorities Park. Our province has at least 26 minorities, so this place was kind of like the EPCOT of China. Each minority has a little settlement with stuff from their culture. Of course, being minorities ourselves, people were quite amused by our presence. It turned out to be a good thing that we didn’t get to travel far because then I came down with a cold/virus of some sort for the rest of break. Not fun, but better than having it for teaching.

So, that means that we’ve gotten through another week of teaching. We are battling massive amounts of rain and thunderstorms this week, so that’s a bummer, too.

Those are pretty much the highlights of the last few weeks, well the condensed version

Yes, it has been one month since I haphazardly arrived in China. That’s a big deal. I think I’ve made some progress adjusting to life here. I would also say that our quality of life here has improved, primarily through the weather. It was like we woke up one day last week after weeks of rain, and it was sunny. Since then, it has been sunny and upper 60s to low 70s. Not too bad. Kunming looks much better sans rain. I’m told it won’t rain again until the Spring, although the temperature will drop. You’d be surprised at how much better a person can feel with a change in weather.

Anyway, so about slacking off on the posts. Well, things have really picked up with school. Classes are in full swing (8 regular ones a week) and my students enjoy pushing me to the limits some days. For the most part it’s good. I’ve also had some other additions to my teaching schedule/social life. Tuesday nights I’m now a part of English Corner. For those of you unfamiliar with this ritual, it entails the Chinese students finding as many foreign volunteers as they can and then for two hours bombarding them with English conversation. Not difficult, but after you’ve introduced yourself about 50 times and explained your hometown and what you like about China, it gets a little old. The point is for students to practice English outside of class, so the concept is good. And, because we went once, we are now part of the group.

Last Thursday I started my three-week speech seminar, which is probably my favorite class. It’s basically a prep course for the big CCTV speech contest taking place over the next few weeks, but it’s nice because all of the students are there voluntarily and I found that I enjoy helping them with speeches (hmm…maybe rhetoric in grad school?). We have two more sessions of that to go, but we’re actually choosing the students that will advance to the next round (only five from our department) this week. Speech season runs my life right now. I am judging a division of the contest on Wednesday night, so that will be a new experience. I am also making my celebrity debut in China on Friday night as I was asked to hostess another university’s preliminary division. All of these speech events are for the big CCTV one that’s in Beijing, if the students make it that far, so there are a lot of official rules and guidelines that CCTV enforces to any group holding a preliminary contest. I actually have a prescribed order/script that I have to follow for Friday night’s event. (On a sidenote, the instructions are all currently in Chinese, so it will be a bonus when I find out what I’m supposed to be saying in English.) Anyway, I have to attend a rehearsal for it this week. The rules also state that as the hostess, I must dress “formally.” That means my other cultural adventure for the week will be tackling Chinese fashion and shopping. So this week is insanely crazy with all of the speech things I’ve been recruited for. It’s also an extra long week because next week is a holiday. However, to get the full week of holiday, we have to make up two days of classes for next week this weekend. Not cool. The holiday is actually tomorrow (Tuesday), and it entails eating a special dessert called Moon Cakes. The premise of the holiday (Mid-Autumn Festival) is to be with your family and friends and eat these cakes or something. Anyway, so everyone’s been running around handing out Moon Cakes and they’re all planning parties for tomorrow, so I have a list of appearances to make.

Other than that, we’ve vetoed any glamorous plans for the week of break. Unfortunately EVERYBODY in China has time off, so it’s supposed to be pandemonium and chaos. That and the fact that we haven’t gotten paid, and the university is going to take half of my check for my plane ticket means that funding is low. The plan is to hit up some local sights and make the best of it. Perhaps I’ll perfect my badminton game, since I’ve been getting recruited lately (p.s. Chinese alcohol does not improve your game at all) by students. I guess I look athletic? HAAA!

Well, what have I been up to the last few days? For the most part, I tried to survive another week of classes, including my two new freshmen classes. A note about that: I now teach two freshmen writing classes of 50 students each, in a crammed room with only a chalkboard. My creativity will be pushed to the limits.

Outside of being a working girl, Havvah and I had a few interesting cultural experiences. Wednesday night we decided to walk around and see what was going on. Our first encounter was some sort of dance squad/cheerleaders/aerobics class performance taking place in the gym. We were never really sure what to make of it, but it was pretty entertaining, and tame, if these were the school’s version of cheerleaders. Anyway, a mildly amusing event. But the real excitement came when we nearly found ourselves in the middle of a confrontation between a restaurant owner and some pretty intimidating looking guys who were attacking with broken bottles. Not the place you want to find yourself or see that happening right outside campus gates. About two steps later there was another incident that had resulted in injuries so it was mayhem with paramedics, ambulances and onlookers. Anyway, we practically ran back through the gates, and ran into Mr. Wong who was returning from a cigarette run. Of course, that made for an awkward walk back as he would say something in Chinese and we’d be like, ummm, English? Oh, well. To make up for it, and to try to get in good with the people that control our quality of living, we decided to share some of the brownies Ryan had sent with them. That was certainly interesting, and I’m still waiting to get my plate back with some sort of Chinese equivalent (fish heads, maybe?).

Thursday was the climax of an ongoing situation between myself and our contact at the foreign office. Basically, all foreigners need to get extensive medical check ups, even if you had it all done in the States. Every time this person at the foreign office gave us a few hours notice that she was taking us (which happened on three occasions), I had a class conflict. Other particulars aside, it was getting old, and without the medical thing, I couldn’t get my residency permit, which takes two weeks to process. The problem there is that the October break is quickly approaching, and I didn’t want to find myself without a passport and be stuck in Kunming. To attempt to resolve this, I offered to go to the clinic by myself (meaning on my own time, without the foreign office, but with Havvah). Well, after bringing this up, I was told I needed to go immediately. Ok, but Havvah had a conflict. Well, after explaining several times that I was willing to go without the foreign office, but not without someone who had already been to the place, I was given an ultimatum: go today and get your passport in time for break, or wait and don’t have it. You might think I was being a baby, but I promise, I wasn’t. The clinic was on the opposite side of town and took me an hour to get there. Armed only with the characters for the clinic and directions to hand to the staff, I set out to get the damn thing taken care of. Again, an hour in a taxi only psychs you out more for something of this caliber. So we pull up to this building, which definitely didn’t look like a medical facility, and the fun began. Let me say that there was no English the entire time. The process included lots of tests, like an ultrasound, x-rays, an EKG and bloodwork. They were definitely not the friendliest people…I’m quite certain that bedside manner is not a concept here. I got yelled at so many times, and the thing is, this is the clinic that all non-Chinese people have to go to in order to get their permits so perhaps they would not be new to the idea that most of their patients are not Chinese speakers. Well, I survived, and took a LONG shower afterward. And we celebrated with a trip to Salvador’s for supper. So, hopefully my results don’t come back with any reasons why my health prohibits issuing me a permit. And, my next task is fighting for reimbursement of it. Just for your amusement, the total cost of the exam, with all tests, was $50 USD.

Anyway, Friday was a Metro trip. Nothing too exciting. Saturday I tackled the mound of laundry taking over. I also put my new Lysol with bleach (courtesy of Ryan) to use. It was beautiful. Saturday night we got out to sample some more of China’s nightlife. Last weekend we went to a British-type bar (Chapter One), which was ok for hanging out, but probably more of a sports bar atmosphere. So, the selection for this week was Speakeasy. It turned out to be a very eclectic underground bar with lots of Chinese and foreigners. Havvah drank cheap beer, but I was determined to find anything but beer. Unfortunately, that comes with a price, so I think I’m just going to have to suck it up and learn to drink beer Oh, well. We met some guys from the Netherlands who were in Kunming doing some kind of tulip bulb research for their job. They were a lot of fun to hang out with. However, my small Dutch town origins did come back to haunt me. One of the guys was actually from the real Friesland in Holland, so I was telling him about Friesland in Wisconsin. How ironic. Anyway, it was fun to meet new people and just chill.

And, of course, that brings us to Sunday, which is still synonymous with homework and lesson planning. It would have also meant sleeping in, but some sort of convention/assembly/pep rally has been going on all day, all weekend at the auditorium right outside my window. That would really sucked to be woken up by it if I had had more than my one rum and coke last night. Oh, well. We are also planning to hit up a fine American delicacy in the form of McDonald’s today, too. Beautiful greasy goodness

Oh, and did I mention that I also got myself accidentally signed up for teaching a Saturday morning class??? Yeah, never assume that weekends aren’t an option. So, next Saturday morning I begin the first of three Saturday, two hours classes where my task is to teach global citizenship and speech writing to prepare these students for a contest in October. Yes, basically six hours total to teach them something, how to write a speech about it and then make sure they have a final award-winning product for the last session. I mostly just feel bad that these students’ fate rests in my hands…a lot of pressure…and why didn’t I ever take any of those global citizenship classes Drake offers?? Ah, regrets.