China Trip 10- TGIF!

Friday (day 2 of class)
I went to my first class and was left feeling rejuvenated. These kids are good. They want to learn. Maybe they were just curious and excited, and nervous—like me. Maybe that’s why they were so rambunctious?

Or… maybe not… My first and last classes of the day are wonderful. It’s the class I have before and after lunch that I don’t know what to do with. Junior said he would “come scare them,” but I don’t want them to be scared of me. I want them to like me. They’re not really giving me a fair chance though. They’re so LOUD! I try to quiet them but they don’t listen. Or they listen for a split second. Some of the students don’t even try to do the work. They just sit there. I will be walking around and have to explain it to each little group of kids. I know they can do it, because my first class does. I know they are just as smart. I spend quite a bit of time standing there waiting for them to be quiet so we can move on.

In my first class, they censor themselves. If it starts to get even a little loud, one will stand up and say be quiet (in Chinese sometimes) or Shhh! And then they are all quiet. It’s amazing.

I didn’t really do anything special today. I they said they would tell us in the afternoon if we had to work on the weekend. By this time, though, I knew we did. If they avoid an answer, it’s what you don’t want to hear. They don’t just come right out and say “yes” or “no,” which proves to be even more frustrating than just getting told no.

A perfect example is the internet. We were told we would have it at the hotel or at the school. I would rather have it at the hotel, but I can manage if it is only at the school. I don’t want to use the Chinese computers. I want to bring my own and use it. Brittany and I ask Tommy and he said it is at the school, bring our computers tomorrow (Friday, or today). So we bring them and the cables on the desks don’t work. I have class, so Brittany goes and tells Tommy the internet doesn’t work. He said he will be right in to help, but never came.

Eventually we had Junior come to the hotel with us and ask about the internet. He lived in this same hotel when he first moved here and had remembered having internet. He got it all worked out for us and now we have internet at the hotel. It’s in the “office” but beggars can’t be choosers. I suppose. Tommy never did bring it back up. Oh wait. Yes he did. He actually brings it up continually even Sat. night at dinner he said, “we will get internet for you.” Brittany started to tell him we didn’t need it because we got it at the hotel, but I stopped her. I want to see if he continues with this charade or actually gets it for us. (He never did…)