“We could’ve had it all, rollin’ in the deep…” Adele has been my absolute muse the past twenty-four hours.
As of Friday, I have been in Shanghai exactly one month. What a month it’s been. Things have changed for the good or the bad; there have been gains and losses. I feel like I’ve hardly had any time to myself… I’ve been too busy experiencing Shanghai culture, learning how to say important things like “I’m a teacher” (“wo shi laoshi”) and “to go” (“da bao”). I’ve gotten lost and ended up walking a mile in the wrong direction (Sam doesn’t believe I have a good sense of direction because of this…). I’ve gotten McDonalds delivered to the campus at 10 in the morning.
I still need to have a day before fall comes where I walk around and take pictures of the campus, it’s absolutely gorgeous. It’s definitely a bubble; we’re walled in with guarded gates, our green forest is a stark contrast to the urban setting outside, and our well-kept buildings clash against the stained, aged buildings right outside. Yet it’s also very easy to leave that bubble. All you need to do is step onto Baise Lu and you’re assaulted with mild stares, children running all over the place, little kids peeing on buildings, a trash bag full of live frogs crawling over each other, and exhaust everywhere. Hop in a taxi and for only a couple of dollars you’re taken to the French Concession, filled with bars, clubs, and western restaurants. Grab a metro and you can go into downtown, though we only go every other weekend or so, and you’re thrown right into the middle of city life. It’s still a little overwhelming how huge the city is.
There are also moments where you go “god, I’m not in Kansas anymore.” Like the previously mentioned giant bag of frogs. Or hour-long body massages where you have to keep them from sticking their hands in places strangers shouldn’t go. Or when a bus starts just randomly driving on the sidewalks. Or when you can get McDonalds delivered to your door at four in the morning.
Teaching has been fine so far. We’re hitting the end of the first month, so we’re getting our “monthly” exams in. I’m already grading them and going “what, how did you miss that, I said it five times in class?!” or being really proud of some students. My ninth graders have gotten better, we’ve become more comfortable with each other, and they understand I don’t take shit. My tenth graders are still plenty of fun. And now I have sixth graders! Apparently I wasn’t teaching enough, so they added an oral English class that I get to be driven to, since it’s at a local Chinese middle school. I’m definitely the only white chick in a kilometer-range, so I got lots of stares. But the kids are absolutely adorable in their little uniforms.
I also greatly enjoy my coworkers. The office is a fun environment, where we play Friday every Friday and have intense political conversations (as we all range from far left to far right, but are smart enough to enjoy a good debate and not get ridiculous – though I’m pretty sure we all thing Bachmann is a joke) as well as weird conversations about whatever comes to mind. The “new” teachers usually go out every weekend, and we sing and dance in the back of taxis to get the Chinese to stare at us. They’re all great, and if you have a particularly bad drunken night they all text you in the morning to make sure you’re okay. (There were unlimited refills of the sangrias! Don’t judge!) Though we all agree that teaching is how one becomes a fat alcohol – you get out of class at 11 and need a drink and some chocolate, pronto.
On that note, the food continues to be excellent. I know how to work my stove, but to be honest it’s easier (and about the same price) to just go out and eat every night. There’s a plethora of restaurants, street food, and anything else you can imagine in the immediate area, and the French Concession a cab ride away if you really are killing for American. I have cereal (with no milk), peanut butter, jelly (no bread), and I keep trying to remember to buy fruit for the mornings. Surprisingly, though, I’m not a big fan of Chinese instant noodles. They just taste a little bit funky. I think I’m going to have to invest in some frozen dumplings or something… Once I get paid. I have no money right now. (Hence the lack of milk and bread.)
With all this eating and drinking, you must be concerned about my weight. But you forget that I live on the fifth floor. Lots of stair climbing, and lots of walking all over campus/Shanghai. At the same time, though, I’ve started running! We’ve done a mile and then a mile and a half, but our goal is the Great Wall Marathon in May. Hell yes that is as badass as it sounds. Also badass is that we’re looking into taking a once-a-week kung fu class. And this is why I’m living in China as opposed to staying in the States.
That’s really all that’s been going on. One last note is that Kevin and I broke up yesterday, but I’m trying not to linger on it and stay positive. If he wasn’t going to listen to what I was saying or try and understand my point of view, we probably weren’t going to work in the long-run anyway.
On a happier note! I’m addicted to Chinese TV. There’s this one soap opera that I watched for a day; apparently these two people got drunk and married, and now they’re figuring out their social life. And then there’s Dragon Ball Z in Chinese. We also have ESPN, CNN, and BBC, so I get American news as well as Chinese.
Alrighty. Next update will be Beijing. Four of us are going from the 3rd to the 7th. I’m excited. Peace out, miss you guys.
“Regrets and mistakes, they’re memories made…”
Saturday, September 24, 2011
Sunday, September 11, 2011
Leaving the Shire
Starting an adventure is often the hardest part of the entire thing. That first step out the door, the glance back towards a home, are often the most painful parts. Accompanying this, the first few words of an adventure blog are often the most difficult ones to write. So, a reason to explain why this has taken three weeks to write, as opposed to explaining what was happening the second I got off the plane.
Nevertheless, I’m here writing. Where’s “here,” you might ask? Jiu-bai-ba-shi-jiu BAI SE LU! You see, people are very good at pretending they don’t understand you when you stutter their language. So we’ve made the joke that if you’re trying to ask something in Mandarin, just say it incredibly fast and angry-sounding. It typically works. And I try not to think that I live on “Baise” road… My French brain still giggles at that.
Yet I digress. Shanghai, China has become for my home for at least the next year. Two years? Three years? Who knows. The topic of “how long will you stay?” is definitely a popular one, but I keep reminding myself that I haven’t even been here a month. It’s a huge decision and I still haven’t properly settled into this culture.
Again, I digress. China. It’s a fascinating culture, and while I haven’t fallen madly in love like I did with France, it’s definitely caught something of me. The downtown area at night is as if Las Vegas and New York had a baby, and then that baby decided to be rebellious and move to an eastern culture. It’s bright, it’s neon, yet it’s still quite distinctly Chinese. There are parts around the city that are filled with foreigners, but there’s nothing that brings the familiarity of home. I had that thought the other day… that while in Europe I had England to make me feel more at home, there’s nothing within fifteen thousand kilometres that feels anything like familiarity.
Since I have three weeks to smush into one blog post, I’ll paraphrase. My fourteen-hour plane ride was lots of fun: I watched Toy Story 3, I played the Sims. Very productive. But I had no one next to me! Yay. My flight was a bit early, so I ended up waiting at the airport for a while before my pickup, but once they got there it was quite easy. We picked up three other teachers, two girls from North Carolina, and a guy from Detroit. I got my first taste of Chinese traffic (makes Italy look tame!) and then we arrived at our hotel in downtown. I appreciated the plushness and a lack of roommate before collapsing. The next day, we voyaged out and got phones, metro cards, went to Pudong, saw the Anal Bead/Pearl Tower, and I made friends with my new coworkers. The first thing I noticed was the staring – especially in groups, us “whiteys” gain lots and lots of attention. We had people taking pictures with us, for god’s sake. The native Shanghainese don’t really mind us, but if you go to the tourist-y places you get all the Chinese who are visiting the big city from all over China… And those are the ones who are amazed by you. We walked all around, then shared a big hot pot after.
The day after, orientation started. The five days of orientation just kind of blur together… There was so much information that I barely got anything into my brain. More importantly, though, I was getting settled into my Chinese life. Two days after I arrived, we moved into our apartments at Shanghai Zhong Xue, AKA Shanghai high school. My apartment is quite lovely, it’s roomy enough for me… Of course, there’s the whole bit of being on the fifth floor. Moving my two heavy-ass suitcases up was really exciting. And of course, because I’m all the way up here, I have absolutely NO water pressure. So showering is super fun. But I can be nice and loud, since I’m all the way up here, and I don’t really hear anyone else either. So it’s nice. The most awkward part is that some of the high schoolers are housed in the building next to ours. They’re gone during the weekends, but in the week I have to be aware that they’re there… Though mind you, they’re quite loud enough that you know.
So the area I’m in is called Xu’hui, a few miles out of downtown and quite suburban. There’s a definite change of upkeep as you step off campus, and things get more crowded and livelier. The street we live on, Baise (heehee), is filled to the brim with shops, restaurants, “salons,” and everything else you could imagine. And things are ridiculously cheap here. As long as you don’t go for western food (where you’ll pay western prices), you can easily go out and eat for an American dollar. The language is also super fun. I know how to say a few food words and how to count, and how to ask a few questions, but that’s it for now. I’ll get there, but most people take it in good humour. The ones who grumble or yell at you in Chinese, well, it’s an experience. There’s also the French Concession nearby, which is filled with all sorts of lovely western things and foreigners, so it’s good if you want to grab a burger or anything that you don’t eat with chopsticks.
Let’s see… I still haven’t worked out my stove, but once I do I’m definitely busting out the cooking. That’ll be exciting. For now, it’s been cereal and PBJ. Sounds like my French diet… Though I get noodles or dumplings a lot out on Baise. Ooh, and there’s an amazing smoothie place which makes me super happy. I keep getting eaten alive by bugs. And the cicadas are suuuuper loud here, it’s very strange for me. The water is completely undrinkable, so we have to buy clean water to drink and cook with. Though back on the subject of food, the food is… interesting. Lots of seafood, which I keep trying and I continue to not like. Occasionally I’ll find strange body parts, like chicken heads, in my food. I ate duck brains and jelly fish and octopus. And I’m working really hard on liking beer, since the wine here is terrible.
The traffic here is insane. People drive in the opposite lanes, in two lanes at once, they run reds, they cut people off, they come inches within each other, the scooters and bikes all run lights and get all over the place… I am terrified of getting a bike. I would die. The weather has been really toasty, in the eighties and humid and rainy, but it seems to be cooling down. I think it’s supposed to give us one final heat wave before cooling off at the end of the week.
Teaching! Teaching is… interesting. It’s a lot of work. All of my teachers ever, I’m so sorry I never appreciated you as much as you deserve it. Really. It’s hard. It’s a lot of work outside of the classroom. I’m slowly getting the hang of it, though… It’s weird to always be dressing professionally, but I don’t think I’d want to dress smart casual or anything. I’d be mistaken for a student a lot. My tenth graders are amazing, they’re very fun. My ninth graders are exciting. They’re a challenge. I’m teaching them twice, once for history and once for English. I got to drop a book on two sleepers in the front row on the first day. And then I finally started getting respect when I failed a few tests for talking. (Okay, I exaggerate, but I did take away points!)
Let’s see… Shanghai in general is really great, I’m loving it. I’ve spent this weekend just wandering around. During orientation we took a river cruise, and I must say I loooooove the Bund. It’s like being back in France, so I pretend to be a French tourist. And Pudong is absolutely gorgeous. The night scene is really nice… It’s mostly foreigners, so it’s a little expensive, but it’s still really fun. This weekend we went to a brewery after a banquet (big fancy dinner with weird food to show off how rich the school is) and we met lots of cool people. And then today I hung out at Chairman Mao’s old house. I don’t think I’ll ever be able to work for the government because of that. We also went to a temple, stood in the wrong line for ten minutes, and got sufficiently lost two days in a row. My friends don’t believe in my sense of direction, but it’s rather difficult when everything’s in Chinese.
Okay. Coming up on two pages, so I’ll wrap up. I’m having a really good time, miss everyone back home. We’ve got a trip to Beijing planned for our week-long National Holiday. (Flying, not taking the deadly bullet train.) Going to Japan for Christmas to visit my wonderful brother. Then we have three weeks of lovely, lovely vacation, in which some of us are planning to do southeast Asia. We’ll figure out details later. Oh, and Hong Kong during the western New Year’s sounds really fun as well. We’ll make it happen.
Peace out, friends/family/etc. Holding up the Californian awesomeness in China. Miss you all.
PS – go Angels!
Nevertheless, I’m here writing. Where’s “here,” you might ask? Jiu-bai-ba-shi-jiu BAI SE LU! You see, people are very good at pretending they don’t understand you when you stutter their language. So we’ve made the joke that if you’re trying to ask something in Mandarin, just say it incredibly fast and angry-sounding. It typically works. And I try not to think that I live on “Baise” road… My French brain still giggles at that.
Yet I digress. Shanghai, China has become for my home for at least the next year. Two years? Three years? Who knows. The topic of “how long will you stay?” is definitely a popular one, but I keep reminding myself that I haven’t even been here a month. It’s a huge decision and I still haven’t properly settled into this culture.
Again, I digress. China. It’s a fascinating culture, and while I haven’t fallen madly in love like I did with France, it’s definitely caught something of me. The downtown area at night is as if Las Vegas and New York had a baby, and then that baby decided to be rebellious and move to an eastern culture. It’s bright, it’s neon, yet it’s still quite distinctly Chinese. There are parts around the city that are filled with foreigners, but there’s nothing that brings the familiarity of home. I had that thought the other day… that while in Europe I had England to make me feel more at home, there’s nothing within fifteen thousand kilometres that feels anything like familiarity.
Since I have three weeks to smush into one blog post, I’ll paraphrase. My fourteen-hour plane ride was lots of fun: I watched Toy Story 3, I played the Sims. Very productive. But I had no one next to me! Yay. My flight was a bit early, so I ended up waiting at the airport for a while before my pickup, but once they got there it was quite easy. We picked up three other teachers, two girls from North Carolina, and a guy from Detroit. I got my first taste of Chinese traffic (makes Italy look tame!) and then we arrived at our hotel in downtown. I appreciated the plushness and a lack of roommate before collapsing. The next day, we voyaged out and got phones, metro cards, went to Pudong, saw the Anal Bead/Pearl Tower, and I made friends with my new coworkers. The first thing I noticed was the staring – especially in groups, us “whiteys” gain lots and lots of attention. We had people taking pictures with us, for god’s sake. The native Shanghainese don’t really mind us, but if you go to the tourist-y places you get all the Chinese who are visiting the big city from all over China… And those are the ones who are amazed by you. We walked all around, then shared a big hot pot after.
The day after, orientation started. The five days of orientation just kind of blur together… There was so much information that I barely got anything into my brain. More importantly, though, I was getting settled into my Chinese life. Two days after I arrived, we moved into our apartments at Shanghai Zhong Xue, AKA Shanghai high school. My apartment is quite lovely, it’s roomy enough for me… Of course, there’s the whole bit of being on the fifth floor. Moving my two heavy-ass suitcases up was really exciting. And of course, because I’m all the way up here, I have absolutely NO water pressure. So showering is super fun. But I can be nice and loud, since I’m all the way up here, and I don’t really hear anyone else either. So it’s nice. The most awkward part is that some of the high schoolers are housed in the building next to ours. They’re gone during the weekends, but in the week I have to be aware that they’re there… Though mind you, they’re quite loud enough that you know.
So the area I’m in is called Xu’hui, a few miles out of downtown and quite suburban. There’s a definite change of upkeep as you step off campus, and things get more crowded and livelier. The street we live on, Baise (heehee), is filled to the brim with shops, restaurants, “salons,” and everything else you could imagine. And things are ridiculously cheap here. As long as you don’t go for western food (where you’ll pay western prices), you can easily go out and eat for an American dollar. The language is also super fun. I know how to say a few food words and how to count, and how to ask a few questions, but that’s it for now. I’ll get there, but most people take it in good humour. The ones who grumble or yell at you in Chinese, well, it’s an experience. There’s also the French Concession nearby, which is filled with all sorts of lovely western things and foreigners, so it’s good if you want to grab a burger or anything that you don’t eat with chopsticks.
Let’s see… I still haven’t worked out my stove, but once I do I’m definitely busting out the cooking. That’ll be exciting. For now, it’s been cereal and PBJ. Sounds like my French diet… Though I get noodles or dumplings a lot out on Baise. Ooh, and there’s an amazing smoothie place which makes me super happy. I keep getting eaten alive by bugs. And the cicadas are suuuuper loud here, it’s very strange for me. The water is completely undrinkable, so we have to buy clean water to drink and cook with. Though back on the subject of food, the food is… interesting. Lots of seafood, which I keep trying and I continue to not like. Occasionally I’ll find strange body parts, like chicken heads, in my food. I ate duck brains and jelly fish and octopus. And I’m working really hard on liking beer, since the wine here is terrible.
The traffic here is insane. People drive in the opposite lanes, in two lanes at once, they run reds, they cut people off, they come inches within each other, the scooters and bikes all run lights and get all over the place… I am terrified of getting a bike. I would die. The weather has been really toasty, in the eighties and humid and rainy, but it seems to be cooling down. I think it’s supposed to give us one final heat wave before cooling off at the end of the week.
Teaching! Teaching is… interesting. It’s a lot of work. All of my teachers ever, I’m so sorry I never appreciated you as much as you deserve it. Really. It’s hard. It’s a lot of work outside of the classroom. I’m slowly getting the hang of it, though… It’s weird to always be dressing professionally, but I don’t think I’d want to dress smart casual or anything. I’d be mistaken for a student a lot. My tenth graders are amazing, they’re very fun. My ninth graders are exciting. They’re a challenge. I’m teaching them twice, once for history and once for English. I got to drop a book on two sleepers in the front row on the first day. And then I finally started getting respect when I failed a few tests for talking. (Okay, I exaggerate, but I did take away points!)
Let’s see… Shanghai in general is really great, I’m loving it. I’ve spent this weekend just wandering around. During orientation we took a river cruise, and I must say I loooooove the Bund. It’s like being back in France, so I pretend to be a French tourist. And Pudong is absolutely gorgeous. The night scene is really nice… It’s mostly foreigners, so it’s a little expensive, but it’s still really fun. This weekend we went to a brewery after a banquet (big fancy dinner with weird food to show off how rich the school is) and we met lots of cool people. And then today I hung out at Chairman Mao’s old house. I don’t think I’ll ever be able to work for the government because of that. We also went to a temple, stood in the wrong line for ten minutes, and got sufficiently lost two days in a row. My friends don’t believe in my sense of direction, but it’s rather difficult when everything’s in Chinese.
Okay. Coming up on two pages, so I’ll wrap up. I’m having a really good time, miss everyone back home. We’ve got a trip to Beijing planned for our week-long National Holiday. (Flying, not taking the deadly bullet train.) Going to Japan for Christmas to visit my wonderful brother. Then we have three weeks of lovely, lovely vacation, in which some of us are planning to do southeast Asia. We’ll figure out details later. Oh, and Hong Kong during the western New Year’s sounds really fun as well. We’ll make it happen.
Peace out, friends/family/etc. Holding up the Californian awesomeness in China. Miss you all.
PS – go Angels!
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