blogging from Beijing 北京

It looked for a little while that Anna and I would be moving to teach at Renmin University for the 09-10 school year, but things have changed since my last post. Anna and I and our qualifications were initially okay-ed by the Foreign Experts Bureau to go to the University, but we forgot that nothing is final in China until it's a completed action. Ren Da changed their minds on two accounts.

1. They will allow the first-year teachers to return to teach their second year, so they don't have to leave the school as originally thought.
2. They have told Anna and I that we cannot teach at the University without two years of university teaching experience or a masters degree - our experience at the high school and middle school level don't qualify. They're looking for foreign teachers who can bring more prestige to their school, but this is the school's rule and not the fault of government regulation.
   

After a few weeks of not knowing exactly what next year would look like, we are staying where we're at. Nate and Jess, the couple I mentioned in the last post, are still going to Ren Da next year so the University team will number six. Our overall team is growing again - Shi Yi asked for ten teachers and RDFZ (my school) wants 22 teachers among its three campuses. Teachers and spouses bring the grand total to 40, plus three children under the age of two!

I said above that we're staying where we're at. We'll keep the same teaching positions, but we're moving into a new apartment building . . . sometime. Sometime could mean anytime between tomorrow and August. Since the school promised us we would move by September 1, 2008 I will only believe we're actually moving after my stuff is over there. :) The overall space is somewhat smaller than what we have now, but it has a few things I'm excited about. There is a lot of storage and closet space, cabinets under the sink in the bathroom (we have a pedestal sink right now), a big shared walk-in closet (if that sounds weird, it's because it is), washing machines in each apartment, central heating/air (no more radiators!), and a small glassed-in balcony/clothes drying room off each bedroom. The living room has several functions - the walk-in closet is on one side with sliding doors (I told you this was weird), the kitchen counters and cabinets are built in along one corner, and the rest of the space is occupied by the couch area and dining room table/chairs.

Yesterdays temperatures made it almost to 80 degrees. Spring is in the air! Well, it better be because the government turned off our heat on March 15.

I began teaching about the Roman Empire this week. We were discussing the origins of the phrases "all roads lead to Rome" and "Rome wasn't built in a day." When I asked the class about the meaning of "when in Rome, do as the Romans do," a kid responded "when in China, buy pirated DVDs!"

If you've been following my tales in China, you know the visa troubles that have plagued the other schools in our program (Shi Yi and Ren Da) in recent years. China's Foreign Experts Bureau (FEB) has a law on the books that says that all foreign teachers need to have some combination of a bachelors degree, two years teaching experience, and/or ESL certifcation. A new Renmin University VP decided that beginning next school year all foreign teachers must have two years teaching experience or a masters degree. The University has gone before the FEB in years past to petition for an exception for Cedarville teachers, but they will no longer do that.

With the exception of one, all of the teachers who were planning to return to Ren Da next school year have one year of teaching experience, which means they are unable to return. This leaves one position filled and seven empty. While it's probably a step in the right direction for China to start obeying its laws (hello Sanlu-melamine-milk scandal, lead-toy scandal, poisoned-medicine scandal, etc.), it leaves our program at Ren Da in a lurch.

I have two years teaching experience (clearly this qualifies me to teach at one of China's top universities*) so I may be changing schools and going to Renmin University next school year with Anna. Our small team of three next year is only five minutes by bike from where I teach right now, so I'm not moving far. I'll be sad to leave my school and my students, but I'm up for a new challenge. I'm also okay with fuwuyuan at the new school cleaning my bathroom and changing my sheets. I'm pretty sure I won't miss doing that. :)

*sarcasm

"I like history books about humanism. They can teach me to be a great human."

"Many classmates of mine think that I am the most handsome person and I have a better quality than all of my classmates. As for personality, I am a shy and I don't like show off although I have a lot of advantages which are uncountable . . . I like watching beautiful girls like other boys in my class."

Today was the first day back in class. I have 125 new students and I always enjoy reading their information on their notecards. From what I understand, it's not uncommon for Chinese people to say that a child turning 1 is actually turning 2, because they can count the 9 months spent in the womb as the child's first year. It's a cultural difference. In the wake of the Chinese gymnastics scandal during the Olympics where there were rampant birth date confusions and falsifications, I thought this student's interesting fact about herself was especially amusing.

In China's education politics, I should study in Junior 3. But my Mom changed my birthday and birth year to August 26, 1993. So in that way, I study in Senior 1 this year. In other words, I am 1 year younger than all other students in my class.

My students really like math and science. I mean, they really like this stuff. Here's an essay I received from a student named Umbrella.

My life with Rubik's Cubes

I have three Rubik's Cubes, one is 2x2x2, one is 3x3x3, the other is 4x4x4.

When I first saw the Cube, I was deeply attracted by its mystery. I spent 60 yuans buying it immediately and searched for the way to solve it on the internet. It took me two months to practise to solve it. During that time, I was so excited that I use all of my spare time on it.

I really have the happiest time. I have really tasted the sweet of getting knowledge.

It's only a small thing in my life, there are many glaring stars in my sky just like the big events in the world history. I do, I feel happy!

So it's Christmastime and my senior classes meet three more times. I'm fairly certain that my last class is going to be canceled, so I decided to show a Christmas movie for the last two weeks. After all my kids have been great - we've studied historiography, ancient Greece, the Roman Empire, the Middle Ages, the Renaissance, and they gave presentations on major world religions that have influenced the West (Judaism, Catholicism, Eastern Orthodoxy, Protestantism, Islam). It was time to have a little fun!

I decided on Home Alone because I didn't think I could watch Elf five times without going crazy. I showed Charlie Brown Christmas to all my junior classes, so I've seen that five times this holiday season too. I watched the first 40 minutes of little Macaulay Culkin (when he was still cute) once this morning and I'm about to show it four more times. Funny this is, I don't think I've ever seen the entire thing. My Mom really hated the movie when my sisters and I were growing up so I only remember watching it on TV with my Mom making comments about how disrespectful Kevin is the entire time. I'm pretty sure my little brother was always allowed to watch it, though. There are perks to being the baby of the family!

Not really.  But sometimes it can be amusing.

"I want to be you friend and share my mind with you."

A number of my students are in the United States this summer for school-related trips, but I didn't know if I'd be able to see any of them or not. But I got a phone call tonight from one of my juniors! She told me all about her experiences in LA and DC. She'll also be traveling to NYC and Boston before she returns to Beijing to attend the Olympic Games. She was in a shopping mall today and someone gave her literature in Chinese about the book and she wants to talk about it when we all get back to China.

It's good to be home, but it'll also be good to get back to life in Beijing and see students again!

"But I was still very happy, because I had had a very plenary and significative day."

"At last, I aimed at a CEO of a mautination company."

"Inconsciently, I become a costume designer."

"Multi-functional bathroom"

"an equipment to gather tervestrial heat"

"Because doctor may let these experience personally the human which the indisposition suffers to get rid of the pain."

In a student essay: "emptying the bowels."

Assignment - respond to the following statement: Rousseau believed that people are born innocent and must be taught to do wrong things.

A homework assignment was to summarize a Greek god and then retell the story in a modern way. The student wrote about a Roman god instead, but it's really cute. [Names and slight details changed.]

Summary
Cupid, the boy god of love, often played with his bow and arrows everywhere. One day, Apollo saw him and laughed at home. Deeply offended by Apollo's insulting words, he shot Apollo with a golden arrow through his heart, causing him to fall madly in love with Daphne. Then he shot Daphne with a leaden one, making her hate all suitors. Apollo couldn't hide his passion to Daphne and asked for love from her, but he received cold reject. At last, Daphne was changed into a laurel tree and Apollo was very sad.

A private story of _____
On September 7, 2004, the first day Joe spent in Ren Da Fu Zhong, Cupid also happened to wander in the school. He saw the clumsy Joe who was curious to anything in the new place for him, so he decided to play a joke on him. He shot Joe with a golden arrow which soon made him crazy. At exactly that time, he came to see a girl, who won the first prize in a math competition a year before while Joe won the second, so he became crazy on her since then.

However, our clever Cupid had already shot a leaden arrow through the girl's heart. No matter what Joe did for her, she didn't show any interest in Joe. Joe became annoyed, so he began to seize every possible chance to argue with her. Once during a snowball fight, Joe shot her so hard that her glasses were broken. After that in a geography class, Joe told all his group to score her zero so as to make her get the lowest score in their class. The girl cried sadly for days because of what Joe did. Then the girl told Joe "I dislike you" with anger, while Cupid saw all of these with a smile in a corner.

Then both of the classmates got bored. They didn't talk to each other for nearly half a year, until Cupid didn't want to see these any longer. He decided to end up this argument, so he at last shot another golden arrow to the girl in 2006. That summer when Joe's friends suggested him inviting the girl to go hiking, he even didn't think that she could agree. They had fun in the mountains and the girl talked a lot with Joe. Joe apologized to the girl for his bad behavior before and the girl forgave him with a sweet smile. Since then they treat each other more and more friendly.

A month before graduation from junior school, Joe got a chance of sitting beside her, and they began to know more about each other. The girl came to know the loneliness deep in Joe's heart and Joe came to know the sadness deep in the girl's heart. They shared their feelings about life and the world. Cupid was at last moved by the couple so he decided not to play jokes to others forever.

It's official - I'm now a legal resident of Beijing until August 19, 2009. I got my new work visa and Beijing residence permit for another year, so I'm all set to return in August for another year of teaching.

It's funny - last year at this time I only planned on spending one year here and then returning to the States to get a "real job." I didn't know that I'd love what I get to do here so much and I didn't think I'd ever be motivated to learn more Chinese than was absolutely necessary. But now the next few years are up in the air - I have no idea exactly when I'll finish my time here. Part of me feels like it would be cool to teach the Jr I students I had this year as more-mature Sr I students three years from now. But then again there's the pull and the pressure to get a job in the "real world" and join the ranks of people working for The Man in order to have enough money to retire on someday and not be penniless on the streets.

Every day here is an adventure. We had the biggest downpour I've seen in Beijing, and maybe ever. It started midway through my elective this afternoon. The sky blackened and a storm directly over us shook the building and sent down fire bolts from the sky. I saw too many people running around outside who looked like they had fallen into a swimming pool and I didn't want to ruin my leather shoes, so I put my socks and shoes into my bag and rolled my pants to my knees. All the students who were standing around waiting for the rain to let up thought I was really funny-looking and weren't afraid to say so. A student took pity on me and walked me to the building we live in under her umbrella. The water still came up to my ankles! Beijing isn't used to much rain and the drainage system is terrible. Later on, I set out to get some dinner and parts of the road were so flooded that the water was halfway up my bicycle tires!

There are many stories I could tell, but my favorites are about the students who are looking for a friend or who are too excited to show me around their city and share their country's 5000 years of history. Since China's one-child policy was passed in 1979, most students grow up without siblings or cousins close in age. Their classmates become their family and the we as foreign teachers often become their role models or their big brothers and sisters. It's so much fun to make cookies with them or play games from the U.S., like Uno (we added more rules and renamed it "Funo"), Skip-Bo, Phase 10, and Scum.

It's worth it to be here when I get encouraging e-mails like this from students:

"I think you are a good teacher and I want to talk with you about everything you like, like friends."

Two weeks before school is finished, I have a five-day weekend. The Gao Kao is a national exam for seniors in high school that basically determines which university they'll go to. As one student put it this week, "we spend twelve years preparing for a two-day test that determines our future." The Gao Kao is a crazy exam and a blog topic for another time. There was no school today for setup for the exam, and then the test is tomorrow and Sunday. Monday is a national holiday - Dragon Boat Festival. The Senior I students (10th graders) have important exams on Tuesday, so my classes were canceled.

We have to move out of our apartment. Even though Anna and I are both returning for a second year, the school uses our apartments between contract dates (July 16 - August 20) for international students and guests of the school. We're trying to find a way out of packing everything up and putting it in storage, but it's not looking good right now. It's amazing how much stuff we've accumulated in ten months - and we arrived with just three suitcases! Hurray for IKEA in Beijing!

I got up early this morning and started a thorough cleaning of our apartment, washing the kitchen walls, cabinets, floor and moving on through the rest of the rooms. Now I'm taking advantage of the extra unexpected time to get my grades ready to turn in. Some students are coming over on Monday from Class 11 to play some games and hang out, maybe watch a movie. They're a cool bunch of students with great English.

After we studied ancient Greece and Rome in 10th grade Western History class, I assigned my students a writing exercise. They were to choose any Greek god to summarize, then retell the story in a modern way. It's been a lot of fun to read through them, laughing from time to time at some of the interesting phrases and words creatively strung together. Here's one written about Zeus:

"Zeus is sad to be the god of the gods, but he is probably the dinner of his father. His father, the best god of the Mt. Olympia, is sad to be beaten by his sons, so he swallowed all his sons, but the Zeus' mother want to have a son. So she changed Zeus into a stone and hid Zeus in some place. The Zeus' father swallowed the stone and after the Zeus' adultness, he forced his father to drink a drug which can make the drinker puke all his sons that he has swallowed. The Zeus and his brothers fight against their father, and they won. Zeus replaced his father's place in the Mount Olympus."

All of my students choose an English name for my class. Here are some of the more memorable ones from this semester:

Zander
Sonic
Nobel
Porry Hartter
Jojo
Willa
Irisky
Arthus
Snow
Wen Ye Like Ken Ye
Sunny
Corona
Tinky
Salvi
Fatima
Clover
Kitty
Frozen
Zebedee
Barton
Klose
Money
Luckers
Allegro
Pluto
Fiona
Lavine
Jameson
AABC
Artina
Lio
Garfield
Zane
Tired

I made a huge mistake in class with my 10th grade students this afternoon. Chinese is a tonal language. This means that a sound can be pronounced four different ways - high, falling, falling/rising, and rising. Each one of these has a completely different meaning, so it's extremely important to get it exactly right.

I was explaining what a Russian czar (or tsar) was and I was trying to get them to pronounce the word correctly. I told the students that we don't have a good representation for the sound in English, so we use the weird combination of "zc" or "ts," but it's exactly the same pronunciation as a word beginning with "c" in Chinese. I used the very common family name "cao" as an example. I didn't actually say the word, I just wrote it on the board without the specific tone.

What I failed to remember was 1) the fact that high school students will twist anything and everything to make it off-color is a global phenomenon, and 2) "cao," said the right way, is one of the dirtiest words in the Chinese language. When the entire class erupted in tittering and laughter hidden behind their hands, I figured that I had done something really bad and ignored it... but I didn't realize just how bad until after class when I got out my dictionary!

Having never said anything really stupid in Spanish or Chinese (to my knowledge) thus far, I'm proud that I got this far before badly embarrassing myself. :-) Unfortunately, it was before 28 students and I'm sure I'll be the talk of the school this week!