When in China…
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.
