Today was awesome and I’ll start there. I went to see the Sports Meeting at Henan University of Technology or Henan Gongye Daxue河南工业大学. First and second year students participate in a sports event that is very similar to the Olympics. I went this morning to see the opening ceremony and was wowed. Of course all announcements were in Chinese which meant I understood little. But I did understand some and watching the parade of athletes was like watching the Olympics. All of the schools had flags and some had English on the flag as well as Chinese so reading the school being represented was easy. There was a display of Tai Chi, then a dance with fans, and then a Shaolin Temple style kungfu demonstration.
April 21, 2014
I went to lunch alone as Nate was eating with his father. I tried a new food at a familiar restaurant it was douche lingyu youmaicai 豆豉鲮鱼油麦菜 or fermented soya beans, dace (fish), and lettuce. It was very tasty and the fish didn’t taste at all like fish. I also made a new friend her name is Maria we that is her English name. She was the waitress or fuwuyuan 服务员.
Saturdays are the same thing, piano lessons. I am pleased that I am doing better with the pieces I have to play. It used to take me the entire lesson just to play one movement of the Beethoven Sonata I am playing. Now I play a movement and several other pieces as well. This Saturday April 19 was different as a group of us went up to KTV and sang. Nate kicked it with singing in Korean and a good time was had by all.
April 17 and 18
I took my daytime classes on a Nature walk. It was very nice out on Thursday and Friday morning was okay. We walked around campus on the condition that my students describe for me what they saw and say it in English. They all readily agreed, who wants to study from a book if the option is to go outside on a pretty day? I started this last year when I was teaching the teachers class. It was a little scary taking my larger classes out I was worried that some kids would drift off or just out right leave the class, but most were eager to stay with me. We finished at the “playground” or athletic field where on Friday I taught the kids Freeze Tag. I’m sure it has a name in Chinese and we all had a good time, yes all I joined in the fun too!
April 16, 2014
Nate and I often play badminton in the hall of our apartment building and this time I was able to get pictures. One of the men who work’s in our building played a few rounds with Nate while I happily snapped some pictures. On days when the pollen is simply too much or it is rainy or cold we play indoors.
April 9-11
Music Week! After working hard to prepare papers to read for their mid terms, I wanted to do something fun for my students. We turned our room into KTV for one period and I had them all bring an English song and a Chinese song if they wanted and sang karaoke style. Most students were enthusiastic even the ones who were certain that they couldn’t sing had a good time.
April 9, 2014
After returning from Luoyang 洛阳I had lunch with my student friend Emily. She taught me how to say the name of the dish we ate, sweet and sour pork tang cu li ji or 糖
醋里脊. No guarantees that I will remember how to say that.