Maaaaaaaaaaaate

I just went to the supermarket...there was NO Tiger Beer...ANYWHERE!

Mans NOT a camel

He needs a good beer after a hard days work playing silly buggers

A female store person whom knows my love for this beer noticed my distress

So began the game of Charades

I pointed to the empty space and began to cry

She laughed...whilst laughing others gathered around to watch the silly foreigner

I played aeroplanes landing and then carrying a case to fill the empty space

She laughed...so did everyone else!

I played aeroplanes again

She laughed...so did everyone else!

I played aeroplanes AGAIN and cried

She joined the game

She played Trucks and then carried a case to fill the empty space

I began giving her a clap...so did everyone else

She ran off!

____________________________________________________________ _____________________

Well...big apologies to you all,

That's about the most exciting thing that's happened for the past few weeks.

I've decided to get stuck into my teaching plans etc to make my future here in China easier. So I'm developing my own one year syllabus and filling it full of all the good stuff I do to make an idiot out of myself whilst teaching.

I've chosen thirty five topics and I've been busy going through my old material and rockin around the net gathering material such as songs, chants and of course a million games to use in them.

I'm also re-doing my all Flash Cards, making them even bigger, getting rid of the ones that are useless and writing up all the chants and songs onto good quality blotting paper.

I've completely changed my Lesson Plan format and have begun to add all song/chant lyrics and game instructions as attachments. I've got so much stuff that I'm creating three lesson plans for each topic. This way I can send a 'Complete Lesson Plan' to those whom email me with requests and have so much stuff that it will take aloooong time to get through.

So much stuff in fact that I'm creating three for Grade 1 & 2's and three for Grade 3 through to 6.

Strangely, I'm having a bloody good time and there is not a Market Place insight!

My market place friends gave me a call the other day and were horrified that I'm way up in Gansu. It was great to hear 'Hersherhers' voice. We couldn't get much through as we couldn't play Charades but it was a huge surprise all the same. I was saddened when he began humming the Wedding Tune. Oh so sad I will miss their wedding along with missing Brads Wedding (Baise Police).

I guess that is the real downside to being a foreign teacher hey...tis a real Bugger too!

School has been going great. I'm beginning to simplify my thinking when it comes to the Grade 1 & 2's but still have a little way to go. I think of a simple thing but think it won't teach anyone anything so I add that little bit more to it and it is that little bit too much so Jo Jo strips it down to what it kinda was in the first place. I'm trying to shred her brain of games and handy hints. She is so fantastic with the kids but sadly I will lose her next month when she leaves to have her baby.

OOOhhhhh, a little baby!

Hey, what about me!

OOOhhhhh, Poor Shane!

Grade 3 to 6 is rokkin! As I'm teaching the same topic to all classes each week it gives me an awesome opportunity to get each lesson right. So that means only four lesson plans...two for Grade 1 & 2 and two for 3 to 6. Same topic but much different.

What else....it was Teachers Day last Friday so we only had half a day of school. All the teachers went back to school in the late afternoon and the gym had been turned into a huge eating area. It was such a good time.

I've found that my new school...in fact, my new town/city is the complete opposite to Tianyang and Guangxi for that matter. Sure one is lush and beautiful and the other (Gansu) does have trees in the cities but is barren everywhere else...BUT the people are so much different socially. In Guangxi Baijo is huge and I mean HUGE! Here I don't really see anyone drinking it much at all.

A school dinner sitting at the Leaders Table was to be feared in Guangxi. It was biajo all the way and you had to drink it or you offended them. I kept away as much as possible. Eveyone else and I mean everyone else drank loads of beer. Here way up in Gansu, well the dinner was strangely mostly alcohol free. The leaders drank tea and water and were not to be feared at all.

The craziest thing about the night was the fact that there was a table of guys drinking biajo and smoking. No one else was drinking at all. The guys at this table were all 'not thin' so to say. I asked who they were and believe it or not, they were the bloody PE Teachers.

I couldn't stop laughing!

I've started English Corner but it just won't be the same as in Tianyang. There I had beautiful green grass, a pagoda, concrete tables and stools and a small group of around ten or so. Here I have a damn classroom, there is no grass, there is nothing to sit on at all outside the buildings and I have an entire class of fifty students.

HHHhhhmmm.....

I am determined to make the most of it though. Over the next few weeks I'll make it into something fun and NOT me being asked the same questions over and over again like the school wants to happen.

Do you like noodles?

What's your favourite colour?

Can you use chop sticks?

Do you like cats?
(yes they taste great! I want to say after the tenth time)

Do you like Pandas?
Yes I'm sure they taste great! I want to say after the twentieth time)

ARGH!!!!!!!!!!! Stop it!!!!!!!!!

The first night was horrible. When we talked about it I explained 'what I had' and what is comfortable for both students and the teacher and when I arrived I was told I had the meeting room and fifty students. I began walking home and the students all came racing over and asked me to stay. We had it outside and it was horrible. They were all yelling and asking the same questions over and over.

I left with a HUGE headache.

English Corner is for the students so like I said, I'm going to make it something special for them. The boardroom has a multi-media set up so I can bring my photos from all over world in to talk about. We can move all the chairs and tables and sit on the floor...there is a lot we can do to make it fun.

What else....I've dropped in at and eaten at many little market stalls and have pretty much found my regulars for lunch and dinner. There is an AWESOME clay pot noodle stall in the covered market area. In one clay pot there are three types of noodles, two types of meat, bok choy and another green leafy thing and four little tiny eggs along with to-fu all in soup. Across from that is the pork/Turkish bread stall. On 'eat street' (the market street across from the school) is where I eat another two types of noodle soups. I've already written about them in my last entry so I won't go on about them.

The lamb one is bloody awesome though!

Even though I live about five minutes walk from the school I've begun walking the complete opposite way and instead I walk around the big park I live beside. This takes about thirty minutes. I do this after lunch and on the way home from school. I also add an extra one in most nights after dinner depending on what I'm doing.

What else....haven't updated any photos yet.

No time, I'm a busy boy, leave me alone!

I've found 'my stores' to buy all my school stuff in. Plenty around but the people in these stores were great and love to play Charades with me. I've decided to only do washing one night a week and stuff as much as possible in to the blasted Twin Tub. We are not friends anymore after last night. I was emptying the fifth bucket of water into it and misjudged the side of the bucket, it hit the side of the twin tub and the water went all over the floor.

Yep, I was just as happy as the night I flooded the entire apartment!

Not much more to tell.

It's been all about lessons lately so I haven't really gone anywhere. I should be at a point where I will relax by next weekend or the following so I'll be off on the bike taking photos of....HHHhhhmmm, well not much really, bare hills with caves in them. I did go for a four hour walk last Saturday out past the train tracks. It was....well, boring! I got sick of looking at nothing so I turned back and walked around town instead.

Luckily there are some rather nice parks here in Baiyin for me to walk around. I'd go stir crazy walking and riding 'out there' every day. The male Chinese English Teachers want to take me to a few villages around the area. Believe me, I'm looking forward to it as I want to find these 'villages'. Maybe they'll have lush green rice fields for me to play in.

Anyhow, that's about it for now, I'm going to head out for clay pot noodles.

MMMmmm mmmMMM the ones I described above!

No Tiger Beer but plenty of bread and noodles to ya...Shane