Bad Kids

7:30 am: It starts. Tennis shoe and Mary Jane clad feet come stomping up the concrete staircase. High-pitch adolescent screams pierce the once quiet morning air. I’m jerked from my dreams and peaceful slumber into the reality of the fourth grade masses of Chinese children. In a couple of hours I will put on my best teacher face and tackle the task of teaching 50 fourth grade Chinese students how to speak English even though they barely understand me. But before teacher face comes, I am just a person in her apartment who just wants to wake up and eat breakfast without screaming children killing her cherished morning time before class. They really take teacher involvement to a whole new level here in China, and put you literally in the middle of the school’s action.

I knew it would eventually come—the retraction of my statement in an earlier blog about how all Chinese children are so cute. And here it is. All Chinese children are not cute and innocent.

For my introduction class, I had the students make name tags and draw three pictures of their favorite things on the back. One fifth grade boy—small, glasses, buzz-cut hair—proudly showed me his pictures as I walked by his desk. Hand grenade, check. AK-47 assault rifle, check. Knife, check. A little shocked, I handed him back his drawings and told him that those were not nice things to draw. He laughed. Great, I thought, Columbine is coming to China. My only comfort is that civilian guns are illegal here.

Another day, I was talking with some of the other English teachers. They told me about a couple of their juniors’ obsessions with Hitler, Swastikas, and naming themselves Friedrich after nihilist philosophers. Let’s just hope this a phase or a small minority. A Chinese scale Holocaust is something I never want to see.

These are extreme examples, but disturbing nonetheless. I might have expected this and more in inner city New York, but I didn’t expect it from a little Chinese boy with glasses.
Most of the time, the cute factor isn’t completely destroyed like in the AK-47 example, but rather it is just diminished by the running, screaming, hitting, chasing, and throwing that goes on during the ten minute break between classes. The day I watched the kids burst through the school’s front gate after lunch, each one hitting the guard, and another one ripping off his tie, the cute factor may have diminished one more level. But, this was still on the “kids will be kids” level of behavior, so all cuteness was not completely lost.

What is scarily lost, however, is my memory of which student is the AK-47 kid. I thought I could remember, but after teaching 600 kids that week, I couldn’t pick him out no matter how many times I pictured his glasses and buzz-cut. Lost in the sea of students, this disturbed child will probably never get the psychological attention he needs. So, thank you China for not allowing civilians to have guns, and hopefully AK-47 kid will keep his ammunition fantasies to his video games.

Typhoon!

A Typhoon hit off the coast of Guangdong, and subsequently school was closed and classes were cancelled for the day. It reminded me of day I didn’t have to go to my college classes because of Katrina, but less frightening since the word Typhoon still sounds like some storm from a story book. All I could think was “thank God for the cooler weather.” The day was relatively mild—just a little rain off and on with a few gusts of wind. The night before was a bit more frightening as I sat huddled in my fourth floor apartment while the metal doors of the school banged and palm trees lashed the windows.

I spent my day off in another kind of storm. The train station was flooded with people by the time my friend and I arrived there at 11 am. My mission was to buy a train ticket to Guilin, which is near the area I am traveling to for National Day holiday next week. I was also flooded by Chinese characters and confusion. Somehow it did not occur to me or my friend that everything would be in Chinese, and we would have to blindly pick which impossibly long line to wait in and try our luck. So, there we were in this sea of people, Chinese characters, and confusion, and we had to pick one line to stand in out of the twenty possible choices. Naturally, we split up, picked the shortest two lines, and hoped for the best. My friend, Megan, got to her window first, and extrapolated an understanding that “there are no tickets to Guilin.” Of course she wasn’t sure if this meant “there are no tickets to Guilin at this window” or “there are no tickets to Guilin left at this train station.” While struggling to determine this difference with phrase book in hand, the young Chinese woman behind her miraculously spoke English and helped solve the problem. She discovered there were no tickets to Guilin left for the day we wanted to leave, so our next option would be the bus.

Megan relayed this information to me while the helpful Chinese woman tried to buy her ticket. I then realized that we had no idea how to get to the bus station or how to buy a ticket, so I pushed our luck and accosted the helpful Chinese woman as she began to walk away. She agreed to show us to the bus station, and the clouds suddenly lifted and we felt as if this storm would not be so bad. We discovered her English name is Autumn; she is 23 years old; she has worked in Shenzhen for two years (she couldn’t explain to us what she does in English), and she gave us her phone number and email address so we can meet again for her to show us the city. I love helpful Chinese people.

So, a few wrong turns and about 30 minutes later, we finally made it through the maze of the terminal and found the ticket window. After our tickets were purchased, we lavished thank you’s upon our new friend Autumn. She responded simply, “This is my country. I am the host and you are the guest. There is no need to thank me.”

Would something like this ever happen to me in a big city in the U.S.? I am doubtful, and I am doubtful that if a Chinese person were in the United States they would receive the same kind of help. Of course less Americans know Chinese than Chinese people know English, but I think we could all benefit from adopting Autumn’s philosophy.

The Big Move

When I first met my contact teacher two weeks ago, she immediately informed me that my apartment was not ready. My school was apparently unaware that they were going to have a foreign teacher this year. The Education Bureau told them it would be too difficult for the foreign teachers to get their visas due to the Olympics. We of course did get our visas. So there I was in China, ready to teach, but with no place to live. Their solution was a luxury hotel across the street from my school. I still had to live out of a suite case, but I couldn’t complain. Give me a plush robe, a mini bar, a glass shower, maid service, and a great view any day! Plus after seeing the apartments of my foreign teacher friends and hearing them complain about all of their breaking appliances, I knew I needed to enjoy every second of my hotel stay. So, even though I still felt a bit unsettled, I enjoyed the heck out of that hotel.

Upon hearing the news that my apartment was ready, I wasn’t sure if I should be excited or disappointed. I was leaving the certainty of a working shower and air conditioning for the unknown and definitely uncertain realm of the Chinese apartment. I have toured half a dozen of my friends’ apartments, and they couldn’t be more different. Some are the size of dorm rooms, while others are the size of two bedroom apartments. Some are new and clean, others are old and dingy. The only similarity is the appliances. We are guaranteed a Western style toilet in the contract, so they all had a Western toilet. Of course the contract doesn’t specify a working Western toilet, so there was a variation between apartments here. Every place I’ve seen so far has the same type of shower, which means a detachable shower head in an open tiled room with your toilet—no shower curtains, no tubs, and no glass shower doors. Also, they are all supposed to have air conditioning, but, again, that doesn’t necessarily mean a working air conditioner. Every apartment has a TV, and thus far it seems to be the most reliable appliance if you can figure out how to work the cable box and TV remotes all written in Chinese of course. Furniture is similar, but of varying quality. All have beds, a wardrobe of some type, and some sort of extra seating (chair, couch, etc.). All of this variance among the apartments left me with no clue as to how my apartment might actually look.

I figured my best clue would be to look at the apartments of the two other foreign teachers in the same neighborhood as me. One is teaching and living at the middle school, and the other is teaching at the other primary school. My middle school friend, Allison, has a great apartment, which looks relatively new with wood floors, a living room, a separate bedroom, and a decent size kitchen. My other friend, Kiki, who works at the other primary school, was not so lucky. Her school and apartment are much older and less cared for than the middle school. There is trash in every corner and cracks in every wall. As one of our other friends (who happens to live in the best apartment I’ve seen so far) put it, “Dude, you live in the ghetto!” Kiki was less then pleased with this disparity, but a few days later, after she cleaned and decorated the walls, her spirits were up despite the still broken toilet and frequent roach sightings.

These apartments gave me no clue as to what fate might have dealt me in the world of Chinese apartments, but I decided to assume the worst. My primary school is better kept than Kiki’s school, but the fact that my contact teacher told me herself to enjoy the hotel because my apartment would not be as nice did not increase my confidence.

Moving day arrived, and I had everything in my hotel packed up and ready to go so I could move in that evening after I finished teaching my classes. At lunch time, however, Elli, my contact teacher, told me that she looked at my apartment and it is not ready. I believe the words “it is still very dirty” came out of her mouth. Again, my confidence in the possibility of a nice place was crushed. What on earth could have gone on in this room that it took a week and a half to clean? Oh well, back to the luxury hotel for another night. The next day Elli told me that it would be ready the following morning.

I packed up for the second time, and the next morning the promise actually came to fruition. A few strapping men (an ironic term for Chinese men who are almost always smaller than me) and a car were sent with me to the hotel to pick up my luggage.

After a frustrating checkout where they accused me of taking some hotel wash cloths, which I clearly did not take since they were never there, I said goodbye to hotel living, especially the doorman who always insisted on pushing the elevator button for me.

Unfortunately there is no elevator in my school, but the fourth floor isn’t so bad especially when you have men to help you carry your oversized suite case up the stairs. My apartment is adjacent to the staircase, and located on the other side of the staircase are the fourth grade classrooms. This means that even if I don’t wake up to the music blasted over the loudspeakers, I will always be awakened by the fourth grade kids running and screaming down the hallway at 8 am. The location, however, was not a surprise since Elli told me I would be living on the fourth floor of the school. Also, there are about four other apartments to the right of my own, so at least I am not alone in the fourth grade chaos.

Apartment is actually a very misleading word to describe where I live. It is more like a dorm room with a kitchen the size of most bathrooms and a bathroom the size of most closets. To my relief, however, even though dorm room sized, it has plenty of room for me, and it is clean. I have a fake-wood linoleum floor, a bed, a desk, a wardrobe, a chair, a TV, a kitchen with a hot plate and a rice cooker, a dish sanitizer (not to be confused with a dish washer—only heat is involved here, not water or soap), a propane tank for hot water, a microwave, a refrigerator, a western toilet that works, a shower that works, and a washing machine that works! The air conditioner, unfortunately did not work the morning I moved in, but Elli came to the rescue and made sure I had a new one installed by that evening.

I have now spent four nights in my apartment, and my favorite aspect of the place is my kitchen/bathroom/laundry room because it is so different from living spaces in America. If I had the urge to do so, I could simultaneously sit on the toilet, take a shower, and do laundry. All three of these appliances are in the same room, which is about a four foot by four foot square. The kitchen is adjacent, and is the location of the only sink and therefore the place where I wash my dishes and brush my teeth. I also have to switch the propane tank in my kitchen on in order to get hot water in my shower. It has taken me a few days to get use to the set up, but now I appreciate the efficiency and giggle at the thought of my bewilderment the first night I moved into the apartment.

Overall, I’m happy with my set up. Right now the only inconvenience is that the hanging bar in my wardrobe broke forcing me to put all my clothes back into my suite case, but luckily no broken toilets or roaches yet, although there have been a few spiders. It may not be a luxury hotel room, but it makes me feel like I’m more at home here in China.

First Day of Teaching—Ahhhhh!

First day of teaching in China and I’m sick as a dog—hacking up my lungs, blowing my nose every five seconds, and generally feeling miserable. Alas, there is no rest for the only foreign teacher, so I marched on red-nosed into my first fourth-grade class.

I had planned out this power point with a few rules, some pictures of my family and hometown, and some of my favorite things—food, color, sport, etc. to see what kind of vocabulary the kids knew. To my relief, Chinese technology did not fail me, as it usually does, and the power point worked! Hooray! On the downside, I’m not sure my fourth graders understood anything I said. Luckily their Chinese teacher was in the room to explain, but I got a lot of blank stares. Pictures were my savior, however, and they oooed and awwwed at the picture of my house and my dog. They thought my two-story, white stucco house was huge, and I guess it is compared to their apartments. They also love animals, and my little Yorkshire-Maltese dog was a hit on the cute scale. Next we moved on to making name tags for their desks with pictures of their favorite things. (See pictures on right from my 5th grade class). The fourth graders were a little unsure about this, but the 5th graders loved it.

Also let me note here that Chinese classrooms do not have air conditioners — only fans and only fans over the students desks, not the teacher’s podium. So not only was I uncomfortable because I was teaching for the first time and teaching for the first time while sick, I was also uncomfortable because I was sweating through my cute flowered teacher’s shirt. Needless to say, I was soaked by the time I finished teaching—probably not an attractive first impression for my students.

After getting through my first class, I dried off, recouped for an hour, and prepared for the other three 5th grade classes I had to teach. Lucky me, my first day of teaching fell on the day I’m scheduled to teach the most classes. No time to complain, however. A few cough drops later and I had to suck it up and teach the other three. The home room teacher of the next three classes also happened to be my contact teacher, and she made sure to help me explain in Chinese anything the students didn’t understand in English. The fifth graders were also much more knowledgeable. So, power point working and Chinese teacher at hand, the next three classes were a breeze compared to the first.
Tomorrow I teach my first sixth grade classes. Wish me luck!

(Below: Picture of my school from the front gate)

Mid-Autumn Festival and My New Chinese Family

Yesterday was Mid-Autumn Festival or Moon Festival, and I made the decision to break away from my comfort zone and spend the day with Elli, my Chinese contact teacher from my primary school, and her family. Don’t ask me exactly what Moon Festival celebrates because I haven’t researched it yet due to internet scarcity, but from what I learned from Elli and the general atmosphere, it is something to do with an ancient goddess, the harvest, families, and the full moon. It reminded me a little bit of Thanksgiving in America, but instead of Indians there is a moon goddess, instead of pumpkin pie there are moon cakes, and instead of the Macy’s parade there is the moon. Our loose itinerary for the day: go see family, go to the beach, watch the moon. (I know I said I would stay away from play by play entries, but the whole day was such a cultural experience I want to include it all.)

Elli, her husband (whom I’ll refer to as Mr. Zhen since I’m still not 100% sure what his name really is since he doesn’t speak English), her daughter Jessi, and I headed out from our neighborhood at 9am to drive to Long gang where their “country home” is located and where Mr. Zhen’s mother and brother live.

As we arrived I soon found out that the picture in my head of a “country home” was not the same as their idea of a country home. The town was more rural in that it was further away from downtown Shenzhen and maybe in the fact that the people are poorer, but that is as far as my interpretation of their term for “country” goes. There was not a field in sight. Instead there was mile after mile of factories, stores, half-built apartment complexes, and dirty roads. Elli pointed out that the crowds of people were made up of mostly young, factory workers. I was surprised that she pointed this out to me, and I was also surprised to see that these young “country” workers were not in more traditional Chinese clothes but modern fashions. The boys even wore the typical hip young Chinese haircut—long, tousled, razored, edgy. They looked more like inner-city New York residents than outer-city country folk.

As we squeezed our car between pedestrians and narrow alleyways which were blocked half the time by construction rubble, Elli surprised me again by acknowledging the fact that I probably had something entirely different in mind when she said “country home.” They apparently had bought their land many years ago before there were so many people, but it took so long to get through all the government red tape that the property was only built a few years ago.
After making it though the obstacle course of people and rubble, we finally arrived at their building. It looked like the typical harsh, rectangular, tiled, bar-windowed apartment building I have seen everywhere in China. The only difference was that I could tell this one was relatively new. Elli and Mr. Zhen own the building and rent most of the rooms to factory workers. Other tenants include Mr. Zhen’s mother, brother, and two nephews who we found relaxing in the open air room that Mr. Zhen hopes will be occupied by a store some day.

Once inside the room, I realized what they meant by country. There was very little furniture—just one little table with four chairs for tea, a little side table with stacks of food products and other random household items, an outdated television, and some hotplates and woks for cooking. Mr. Zhen’s mother was as typically rural Chinese as I have imagined—small, tanned, slightly hump backed from work, missing teeth, and wearing mismatched floral patterned clothing. She hardly sat the whole time we were there as she bustled around taking care of the home, but she smiled every time I looked at her. She was absolutely a delight even though I could not speak a word to her since she only knows Cantonese. (In Picture Right to Left: Jessi, me, Elli)

Mr. Zhen and Elli showed me the rest of the building including Mr. Zhen’s mother and brother’s rooms, which consisted of a bathroom and a straw-mat bed with a mosquito net in each. Next they took me to the top floor, which was built entirely as their own personal flat. I was shocked by the difference in size and quality between the tenants rooms and my contact teachers flat. It has three bathrooms, 4 bedrooms, a nice size kitchen, and a living area. It is not yet complete and has no furniture, and they don’t seem to be in a hurry to finish it.

As we looked out the window of their apartment over the vast landscape of apartment buildings, Elli asked me if I thought Chinese buildings were ugly. Taken aback by the bluntness of the question, I wasn’t sure what to say. I, of course, wanted to say yes. I even wrote a journal entry in my notebook earlier in the trip about how aesthetically unpleasing Chinese buildings are with their uniform rectangular shapes, moldy tiles, and barred windows. However, I took the more cautious route when answering her and said that some are, but not all of them. She replied, “I think they are very ugly. People just build them that way to get the most space for their money.” I was surprised yet again by Elli’s answer.

We then went downstairs to sit around the tiny table and have tea and sample moon cakes. Moon cakes are all round moon shaped cakes made of some sort of dense filling of various types. I have not had one I liked yet. Even the Chinese don’t really seem to like them, but they eat them anyway. Elli and her daughter both admitted that they didn’t care for them—another surprise. I guess I kept getting surprised by how culturally critical Elli and her family are sometimes. They complained about the pollution, the bad drivers, and the slow government. I loved their honesty and it made me realize how wrong I was to think that all Chinese ignored the problems around them.

On to a more pleasant atmosphere, we drove to the beaches in Yantian. Like most Chinese women, Elli did not want to be in the sun because she hates getting tan, so she insisted on sitting inside while Jessi (whom Elli insisted take an umbrella with her) and I walked on the beach looking at shells and crabs. While walking I noticed that there were only a few women on the beach and most of them were wearing clothes or very conservative swimsuits whereas the men were all shirtless and in short shorts splashing around in the water. I wore my bikini under my clothes in case I wanted to swim, but I was way too uncomfortable to take my clothes off. Jessi and I discussed how funny it is that Americans and Chinese are so opposite yet the same when it comes to our skin. Chinese women spend thousands of dollars on skin whitening products, and Americans spend thousands of dollars on tanning products.

As the day went on, I realized I felt very comfortable with this family. Elli mentioned that Jessi could be my sister because I am so young, and I indeed felt like she could be my sister especially as I watched her thumb through the pages of the Seventeen magazine I had given her earlier that day.

From the beach we headed to an outdoor restaurant by the seaside which Elli likes because the seafood is caught fresh everyday. It was quite an experience watching Mr. Zhen pick out the still alive fish, oysters, crabs, and shrimp from the tanks a few feet from our table. They were right about the food though, it was very good. They laughed at me when I tried eating the crab because I had no idea how to get the meat out, but I’m used to it by now since I have a hard time eating anything involving the whole animal.

Nice and full, we left dinner and headed to a different beach where we could watch the moon. There were miles of cars parked along the edge of the road, and we had to drive a while until we found a parking spot. The beach was perfect. Not too crowded, but enough people that I could watch the families enjoying the night and the moon. Some were swimming; some were cooking out; and others had pitched tents and planned to spend the night on the beach. My favorite moment was when one family tried to send a huge red lantern off into the sky like a hot air balloon. It didn’t manage to take off, but it was beautiful seeing the huge red lantern lit up by fire.

The entire day was very low key, and nothing extremely eventful happened, but that is why I liked it so much. It gave me time to notice the details of everyday Chinese life that I miss when I’m out with my American friends. I haven’t felt that relaxed since coming to China. I didn’t notice the stares for once, and I didn’t have to worry about figuring out where to go or what to do. For those who are traveling or living abroad, my advice is to hang out and get to know the locals because it will make your life more comfortable.

Happy Teacher's Day!

Since my last entry unleashed my negative side, I’d like to follow it up on a more positive note.
September 10th in China is Teacher’s Day. Usually, there is some sort of teacher’s banquet involved, which most foreign teacher’s in our program dread because it is awkward sitting at a table with your fellow co-workers, whom you only met a few days earlier, while they repeatedly toast you shouting “ganbei” or “bottoms up” trying to get you drunk and getting drunk themselves (It’s the unofficial Chinese Olympic sport). My school, fortunately, held their banquet early, but from what I heard from my other foreign teacher friends, the banquets weren’t as bad as they expected (probably because they were drunk).
Banquets aside, I thoroughly enjoyed the other part of teacher’s day, which involved the students giving their teachers gifts. Although I have only been at my school for four days and have not begun to teach yet, I was still greeted at the gate by a line of adorable children with bouquets of flowers. As soon as I walked up, one of the little girls rushed up to me with her flowers and a huge grin on her face as she succeeded in giving the new foreign teacher her bouquet. All day students would burst into the teacher’s offices to hand them a variety of flowers from roses to little plastic and foam flowers. The brave ones would give me flowers too even though they did not know me yet. My favorite gift was a note attached to a little foam flower from a little girl whose English name is Susan.
The note read:

Happy Teacher’s Day Miss Lori!
My name is Susan.
I’m welcome to you come our school.
Our school student all happy
Because they listen to Lori is coming now!
I like you Lori!
Happy Teacher’s day!

Needless to say, my heart melted. In my last entry I complained about all the Chinese people staring at me all of the time, but I never get tired of the children staring at me. It just seems natural for children to stare. They are allowed to have an unguarded curiosity because they don’t judge people in the way that adults do. I love the various looks I have received from the children at my school—the opened-mouth stare, the shy giggle, the excited wave. My favorite was a little boy who kept peeking at me through my slightly opened office door, and then would run away giggling every time I looked up at him only to come back a minute later to do the same thing over and over.
Although I haven’t started teaching yet, I am so excited and thankful that I am teaching young children who are still excited to learn and who will love me just because I am their teacher.

What are You Looking at?

In my American independence-driven mind, I’ve always hated the attentive sales person. “I can decide what I want to buy for myself, thank you very much! When I need you, I will ask.” This is not a good attitude to have while in China, unless you plan on never shopping or going mad while doing so. Last night I neared the latter state of mind as I shopped on the bustling streets of Dongmen. Imagine street after street of little shops the size of most closets selling clothing, jewelry, bags, shoes, designer knock-offs, and whatever else you can imagine.
Now imagine that you are not Asian, and you are casually walking down these streets trying to browse through these little shops. The inevitable result: stares, Chinglish “hellos!” and bombardment. Within two seconds of walking into the store, there is a sales attendant literally six inches from you staring at you as you finger through the racks. If you are lucky, they will not also finger through the racks for you, but most of the time you will not be so lucky.
I had already experienced this in a smaller way in Zhuhai, but I was more forgiving since I was in my “honeymoon” period there. In Zhuhai I was just amazed at the number of employees in every business—attendants in every aisle of the grocery store, waiters at restaurants who refilled your glass every time you took a sip and hotel employees who opened doors and carried you luggage at moments notice.
Sigh. Now I glare at my hotel’s doorman who insists on walking with me to the elevator, pushing the button, and then creepily selecting my floor number once the elevator doors open. There is only so much “attendance” I can handle, and yesterday I began to reach my limit and dip into the “hostility” phase of cultural adjustment.
I’m not typically this negative, but adjusting from a country where staring is not polite and personal-space bubbles are closer to two feet than six inches is not easy. My reactions aren’t always hostile. In fact most times I just have to laugh at the differences and think “oh, China, only here.” For example, yesterday while walking towards downtown with one of my American friends, a Chinese man pushing a run down car off the busy highway rubber-necked it several times to stare at us while still pushing the car. Not even the weight of a car or the fear of speeding traffic can prevent the stare—oh, China.

The Long Awaited Blog

After almost three weeks of nonstop training, exploring, adjusting, and dealing with my new life in China, I’ve finally managed to start my blog. I won’t go into detail about the last few weeks because they are over and somewhat stale for me, and I have way too much to talk about every moment here to worry about the past—Chinese “nowism” has taken me over! (If you don’t know what “nowism” means, just keep reading and you will soon understand.)All I will say is that I am here in China to teach English for a year in the Shenzhen public school system with a program called CTLC (www.chinaprogram.org). I spent two weeks in Zhuhai training to get my TEFL certificate to teach. I’m now certified and have been placed in a primary school in Futian—one of the central districts in Shenzhen.