Friday, October 5, 2007

Life and it's craziness!

It's been a while since I've really updated people on my life (ummm ok so like maybe a couple of weeks... but soo much has happened, it seems much longer!!! like about 2-3 months)A couple of Sat. ago I went with my roommates, and several co-workers to climb a mountain near our school. This mountain has a natural spring on the top, so many village people take empty containers to fill when they reach the top... so there were many elderly people passing me and some of the rest of our group as I am panting on the side of the road... *embarrassing!* At the top of many mountain's here are Buddist's temples, so we looked at them (really wish I could get a pic. to show, but it is disrespectful) and some of my co-workers are Buddist so we just started asking them questions about the different icons, idols, etc... some of it was fascinating and saddening... Many just believe Buddism so that they will be rich, whatever you want -you pray to that specific Budda. The more I head about it and learned it seems it can be a manipulating belief. They only pray to get riches, wealth, happiness, etc... So then my co-workers asked us (foreign girls) what we believed, so we just talked about life etc... the down the mountain. Then we went with Laura (another teacher in my dept.) to her husband's restaurant outside the back gate at school. They serve the Yunnan noodle (which is the boiling pot of water or broth, with meat, egg, and vegi's added and it cooks in the bowl and then you add the noodle, mix it up and eat it.) I was sooo hungary I ate the noodles and a huge dish of fried rice... yum I started teaching a freshman class a few weeks ago, and it has been rather interesting... I have more guys than girls in the class which is a switch from my English courses. I only have 3 boy, and in my Business English class it is mostly boys... wow!!!! It has been a while since I have connected with freshman boys... emphasis on the boys! I feel like I am with junior highers which is rather interesting. One class period I caught 2 of my boys with a play station in class... dun dun dun!!! You ain't seen nothing yet! It is rather frustrating because their English vocab is very poor, but they know grammar. This can be confusing and difficult because they know how to format the sentences, but they don't know what words to put in the sentences... fun times. Mid-Autumn day was a few weeks ago, and everyone spends time with their family looking at the moon and eating mooncakes. It is a time of reflecting and thankfulness. Mooncakes are a small round pie dough consistancy with red bean, meat, or vegi filling... umm I just ate the dough and threw out the filling (but don't tell). I was invited to two parties, my Freshman class had a party (which they are proficient at) so Jeana and I go since we both teach this class, so there is Karoke, fruit, nuts, and mooncake. We are looking at everyone uncertain of what is happening since it is happening in Chinese and we don't have anyone to tell us what's happening. Anyway we end up playing muscial chairs, and all the losers have to sing, dance, or do something... lol Well I won the game, but Jeana was at a loss as what to do, so we just sang a disney song... only we couldn't remember half of the words, but the students loved it anyway. :) Then we were trying to sneak out since we were invited to another party... anyway didn't happen and we had to give speeches before we left. Wow!!!! I think I will have mastered the art of impromtu speaking before I leave. :) lol Then we went to the other party, where they wanted to give us more food.... and then our hostess explained Mid-Autumn day to us, etc... This week is National week, so we get a week off of school to "remember" when China became a Socialist Republic (don't really get that.. but that's how they describe it) anyway all of the foreign workers in Kunming were invited to a huge dinner which we found out we were required to go the day before. It took almost an hour to get there we sit in the lobby (the point of the dinner was the mix and mingle with other foreigners.... yeah, so there wasn't a whole lot of that happening...) then it is time to go eat dinner in this huge banquet room with the most amazing sparkling crystal chandeliers, we hear a few speeches and then dinner is served... ok another humiliating Sarah moment- (chopsticks have a different feel depending on how much of a plastic coating or just a raw wood). I do better with the raw wood as opposed to the plastic kind... yeah so being my normal clumsy self with extremely plastic coated chopsticks... I am dropping most of the food, but the Chinese who were from our dept. were struggling too... anyway the head waiter comes up to me and asks me if I would care for a fork or a knife. I was like WAAAAHHH I'm really not that bad at using chopsticks. Later in the meal we were given a toast from the head people who are related to the foreign business/experts... our whole table then gracefully slip out. On Monday I went with 2 of my students, Angelina and Astor to a lake a couple hours from Kunming. It is the second largest lake in China (I just never remember the name!) We left early and get there around lunch time. There were small fish all fried with spices... I couldn't eat it... ewww fish head, brain, black beady eyebals looking at me, etc... so I finally ate the fish except the head. Then we go out to the lake and are in a raft just floating along...then I just sat in the shade while Angelina and Astor went on another boat. It was so great just to sit and almost sleep in the shade. After dinner we walked along the coast and had some really good conversation about life and various things. The next morning we climbed all over the mountains took pictures and just took in the beautiful scenery. It was a wonderful relaxing time! :)

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