Triple Birthday and a trail of Donkey carnage

Last night, we met up with foreign teachers and Chinese friends to celebrate Matt's and two Japanese teachers' birthdays, Mikao and Sannei. We had a private room with a gi-normous table for 16 people with a lazy susan. We ended up ordering a set menu and thus a myriad of dishes came to us. Often in Chinese cuisine, certain dishes are not recognizable and require one to ask about the content. I totally understand this predicament, as I try to avoid meat. However, last night during the meal, there was quite a spectacle.

One of the guests, aptly with her chopsticks, picked up a pita pocket thing, filled with meat and started to eat it. She has been a teacher in Jilin for about 2 years, I believe, so I would expect her to have some cultural sensitivity or at the very least good manners. So when someone asked what was inside and the response was Donkey, she immediately hurled the pita pocket which landed on the table and made a huge commotion by spitting out the food and screaming. I sympathize with her that she had donkeys on her farm growing up and couldn't fathom eating a childhood friend, but at the same time, if I had accidentally eaten a furry friend, I certainly would not throw, spit or scream. I, as my other friends, were horrified and felt awful for this show of disrespect towards our friends who had planned this wonderful evening. As we strolled along the trail of Donkey Carnage, others stopped and enjoyed the pita pockets and hopefully made some small amends towards our hostesses. Matt ingeniously placed his camera on the edge of the lazy susan and set it to video (can you find me!?)

The candle on the cake was also quite spectacular and we took a video of the show, as it blasted the Happy Birthday song and blossomed:

Imagine in China, using chopsticks to eat cake!

Settling in

Its been 2 weeks since I've arrived and things are beginning to become familiar and I'm inching towards somewhat of a routine.

I usually schlep to Chinese language class in the mornings, if I don't have to teach. Otherwise, I'm either preparing lessons for my medical English class or constantly writing Chinese characters, hoping that they imprint on my brain. I try to go for a short run every other day, usually by the Song Hua River, which has some beautiful scenery and is an escape from the polluted roads.

Most meals are eaten out, as my culinary skills are not being employed. Its fairly cheap to eat out and the food is great.

I'm enjoying teaching immensely. Whenever I arrive to class, I have bounding energy and the 2 hours fly by. The classes here are usually 2 45-minute periods with a 10 minute break. Also, it helps that I'm teaching medical English, so I find it all very interesting. On Friday, I gave out some American candy, Jolly Ranchers, so that my students wouldn't fall asleep during my lecture on Hypertriglyceridemia. They enjoyed the candy, the lecture, not so much.

While I was studying Chinese this morning, I discovered another quirk in the language. So apparently, the same character can have 2 totally different pronunciations, for example, in English imagine if you said bank, but it could mean post office depending on the context. I'm not sure if I'm explaining it clearly enough, but that's representative of how difficult this language is! Or its my shoddy explanation skills :)

Anyhoo, some more pictures of us at dinner and at the Park:
Kevin, Me, Elena, Natalia (Russians), Matt, Ashley, and Joo

Computer on the Fritz

Yesterday, my computer became angry with me and now is refusing to cooperate. I believe that the fan that cools it down is broken, which has caused my computer woes. Thankfully, my friend Matt is letting me use his laptop.

Thinking that it could just be the fan, I emailed the COMIS, the UVM computer experts, asking about what I could do about a faulty fan. I couldn't believe it, but they responded with "We can send you a loaner and the shipping material to send my broken one back." I was flabbergasted. At first, I thought maybe they assumed that I was in China, MAINE, not China, the country. So I replied clarifying that I was 1/2 way around the world. I just checked my email and they said it would be possible, but that they'd double check.

The COMIS dept gets an A+ for dedication to UVM medical students!

The other night I went out to dinner with 2 Korean friends, Ashley and Joo, and my friend Kevin. We went to a Si chuan place and we think that a spice they used in the dish gave us awful nightmares. Kevin dreamed about helping Harry Potter escape from quite large spiders, while I was trapped in a house and couldn't escape.
Eating out has been an interesting experience, mostly because we say "chicken" or "tofu" in Chinese and are presented with something much more complicated than our one word ordering. One time, we ended up with this delicious tofu dish, so we had the waitress write it down in Chinese and we showed the slip of paper the following week at another eatery. That was amusing.

But its somewhat frustrating and hilarious because I think that I'm saying the word correct, but I can't get my point across. For example, I asked for garlic, da suan, I thought I had the tones right, but we ended up getting toothpicks! Go figure.

Also, I just found out that I have been telling our friendly food servers that "I am a vegetable." No wonder I've been getting quizzical stares. I thought that "Wo shi su de" meant I am a vegetarian, but my 2 Chinese friends told me that the translation is more "I am a vegetable." (I forgot to say Wo shi chi su de) Or if I said, "wo chi su de" it just means I eat vegetables. And so what? You eat vegetables, big deal. I think my attempts at the vegetarian language have been futile as I have either been making ridiculous statements or saying obvious things. Nevertheless, I haven't gone hungry so we must be doing something right.

2 things that I found surprising here is that the Chinese eat a plethora of potatoes and that there are large Muslim populations in China. I wasn't expecting potatoes to be a popular thing here as I never really ate alot of potato dishes growing up. Also, people around here really do eat dog. My friend Jenny last night enjoys it and eats it a few times a year.

Random Jilin Stuff

This catholic church, (Tianzhu Jiaotang) was ransacked during the Cultural Revolution and reopened in 1980, definitely sticks out of amongst the Chinese building along the Song Hua River. Along the river are various statues (fishies and bikers) and animal bushes such as the pictured Squirrels and mushrooms, which I thought were pretty funky.

Its been cloudy for the past few days, which has been dreary, but it has a nice effect along the Song Hua River. I'm pictured with Kevin, who likes to eat a plethora of Kabobs.

Kevin, Matt and I went into an outdoor type market, in doors, where a crowd gathered around Matt. He speaks Chinese the best amongst the three of us. Its actually pretty hilarious because all the Chinese people come up to me and ask questions about my 2 companions, but most of the time I have no clue what they're saying. So I turn to Matt, who is able to converse with the curious people. You have to have a good sense of humor because lots of time people talk amongst themselves and then laugh, most likely at you. So I just laugh along, blissfully ignorant about what they just said about me or to me.

Friendship Hotel

I'm residing in a foreign dormitory called the Friendship Hotel. Its amazing the diversity of students living here. On Thursday night, we went to a birthday party for a girl from Dominica (NOT the Dominican Republic), its an island near St. Lucia. I made the mistake of asking her about the DR and was immediately handed a map. Anyhoo, there are people from Mozambique, Liberia, Russia, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, Korea, Japan, and Somalia. Before coming here, I never thought that there would be such a random assortment of nationalities here.

Saturday was an adventure in my apartment and out and about downtown. First on my to-do list was laundry. Luckily I have a washer in my apartment, but everything is in Chinese Characters! I managed to figure out what the settings meant through pictures, but still I had no clue what was going on in my bathroom.

Afterwards I headed downtown to explore and came across this performance on stage with this little boy grooving along with them. The city is mildly overwhelming. All of my senses are stimulated, as the streets are bustling with people, kabob and other food items.

The shopping here is immense. There a plethora of clothing, shoe and sporting good stores. This makes me pretty happy and its fairly inexpensive. Some of my college friends took a course aptly named "Great Ideas" which was basically Physics for Arts majors and was a running joke for a while. Anyhoo, I was in a mini-mall which had a great idea! Free lockers were provided for your items and you pushed a button which gives you a receipt with a bar code on it. When you return, you just scan the bar code and it opens up your locker!

For dinner, 2 Japanese teachers invited us out to a Japanese Restaurant. Prior to the meal, I was a bit skeptical about eating Sushi in Jilin, but I figured that I'd judge the quality of food based on the appearance of the eatery. Plus, my family in HK were adamant about me not eating any type of raw fish unless it was at a 4star hotel. But I figured if the Japanese people trust the fish here then it must be alright. There were 12 of us, a mix of Americans, 1 Canadian, 3 Japanese teachers and a few native Jiliners. We had a feast. We ordered the buffet and we housed a good amount of food. It was a fun night because we made some friends outside of school.

So its been a week since I've arrived and so far so good. The Canadian woman (who incidentally has a penchant for punching people in the back) had mentioned that the 'Honeymoon' phase for her lasted several months, when she arrived a couple of years ago. Thus, I think that I'll be pleasantly surprised by Jilin for a while, but that might cease with the arrival of the friggin' cold weather. I think I was in denial about how cold it would get here. Everyone was telling me its extremely cold here, and I kind of blew them off, but now I'm beginning to realize that I'm in for a long winter!

14 students!

2nd day of class = 7 times more students than on Tuesday. Most of the class thought I would not be arriving until next week, which is why only 2 appeared 2 days ago. Thus, I went through introductions again. I had them introduce themselves, where they're from, their speciality, why they chose medicine, etc.

Interestingly, most of the doctors went into medicine because their parents chose that career for them. I'd like to think that I ended up in medicine through my own volition, so it was fascinating to hear answer after answer be "my parents." Nevertheless, this is probably common in the US too.

Its strange to me to be teaching older people, and on top of that they're already doctors! There are cardiologists, gynecologists, etc and I feel that I am being patronizing when I go through how to pronounce different body organs/parts. The students' English varies but most of the class is right at intermediate, I think. So I'm excited to help them improve their English, and to use medical terms!

First day of Teaching

Yesterday, I had my first teaching class with doctors. I arrived to class 15 minutes early so that I could get situated and make a seating chart. I was sitting down when 2 women walked in and they were shocked to see me sitting at the front of the classroom. And then, no one else came. *tear* I only had a pair of students for my first class ever.

I made the best of the situation, quietly discarding my prized seating plan, and started off with trying to clear the confusion about why a "youngster" was teaching them medical English. After that road bump, the class turned out great. They introduced themselves and then I went into my life story.

My original lesson plan was based for...well, let's just say, more than 2 people. So I jumped into anatomy and practicing saying all the different body parts/organs so that they could practice their pronunciation. From what I gather, they want to be able to teach in their respective fields to English speaking medical students. Also, there are more than 2 people enrolled in the class, I think more will show up tomorrow.

For lunch, Kevin, Eric (Chinese guy who speaks English well, studied abroad in Alabama for 2 years), and I went into Jilin downtown for some homemade noodles (la mien). We each had a big plate of food with drinks and it came out to be 20 RMB (a little less than 3 dollars!)! The cost of living here is super cheap.

The bus ride home was a bit disturbing, we passed an overturned motorcycle with a huge crowd surrounding the rider, next to a mini-mac truck with a shattered windshield. I think the guy was still alive with massive injuries, but Kevin thought the guy probably died. Either way, this is a testament to the chaos that ensues on the roads here. People go ridiculous speeds to pass on the road, there are cars trying to cut in, pedestrians are playing "frogger" with the cars, and they definitely do not have 'the right of way.'

Jilin

L-R: Matt (a 'nova grad too!), Jim, and Kevin

My 3 companions and I had an extended voyage from Hong Kong to Jilin. We flew to Beijing, had a 3 hour layover, flew to Changchun, and then took an 1hr van ride to our destination. We left the house at 7am and arrived at 11pm. But we made it safe and sound.

The four of us have our own apartment, which are surprisingly nice. In fact, its nicer than my first apartment in Burlington, although, it has less character:

Living Room Kitchen

Bedroom (with a queen sized bed!)

On Sunday, we got our teaching schedules, books, and ventured out into Jilin downtown.

One thing that I noticed immediately, was that it is cooler here than in Hong Kong and no humidity. Its been nice to be in a more temperate environment, however, I think this foreshadows an extremely cold winter.

Our jaunt downtown was pretty comical. I do not attract much attention because I virtually look the same as everyone who lives here, but my friends, on the other hand, definitely have people's attention. On the bus ride down, my friend, Jim was sitting next to an elderly woman who was staring at his hairy, blond arms. Eventually, she started picking at his arm hair, almost to the point of petting his arm. I was standing by the window watching this spectacle and started cracking up. It was pretty hilarious and we all had a good laugh about it.

We are teaching at Beihua University:

I will be teaching a class called "Forensic English," which means covering basic readings on things such as tort law, intellectual property law, etc. I am actually interested in teaching this course because its something that I can learn from. Moreover, it'll help me navigate Law & Order. Also, I will be teaching a class "English for Medical Professionals," which I am looking forward to, actually it starts tomorrow.

I had my first day of Chinese class today, which was very exciting. I had about 6 hours of speaking and comprehension. I was pretty burnt out by the end of the day.

Just some thoughts to leave you with:

- Kevin ate donkey dumplings and beer tonight, which he immensely enjoyed.

- I went running today and almost sank in mud.