None of us can believe how quickly time has flown! How is it already November? The past few weeks, and really the past month, have been filled with so much busy-ness that it's been hard to even think straight. A few weeks ago, an ELT Edge team came for a week to teach and spend time with students here at our university. After they left, the other teachers and I had to prepare and organize a big Halloween party for our students/school. Now, thankfully, we finally have a bit of breathing room.
I have been recording people and experiences in a journal as much as I can, so I do have many stories to share with you. It is my goal to start doing a "Flashback Friday" every week, posting something from the past that I haven't shared yet. This Friday I will be writing about our Halloween festivities and all of the fun therein. :)
This past week/weekend I was finally able to hang out with and reconnect with some students. On Thursday of this week I had lunch with a couple of my sophomore students after one of my classes with them. We ended up discussing some tough issues, such as lack of direction and passion in life, and how to deal with not knowing what you want to do after college. I was struck by how some of my past experiences were very similar to what my student is going through. It was one of the deeper conversations I've had since arriving here and I felt very encouraged that we had the opportunity to talk about these things.
On Friday we hosted a pumpkin carving night at my apartment for a few of our students. For many of them, this was the first time they had ever carved a pumpkin before. But they really loved it and made some really creative pumpkins!
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| From left to right: Elaine, Angel, Gabriella, Cindy, Luke, Blue Sky, and Rita |
Luke and Rita (if I haven't mentioned before) are the two other teachers from our ELT Edge team that are here with me at our university. Another teacher, Brittany, just arrived this past week from the States (not part of our team). So our university now has four English teachers total.
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| Pumpkins! |
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| Batman! (I haven't carved a pumpkin since 6th grade. But it was fun!) |
On Saturday, I was able to have lunch with one of my sophomore students. She is probably the most vocal of all my students, and very confident in her English abilities. And her English is really good, probably one of the best if not the best of any of my classes. Talking with her is very natural and I don't usually have to slow down or explain anything to her. I wasn't sure what to make of her at first, because her personality is very unique, but now that I've been able to hang out with her a couple of times, I'm beginning to understand her more. She seems almost American in her opinions and way of handling things. Or at the very least, not traditionally Chinese in her attitude or beliefs. And she is very intelligent and driven, with self-discipline and personal goals planned out to her 30s. I admire her quite a bit for that.
Saturday evening I got together with another sophomore, Doris. We had spent time together before, and she had mentioned weeks ago that she liked knitting and DIY projects. So I finally asked her if she could re-teach me knitting (sorry, Grandma, I apologize that no matter how many times you show me, I always need a refresher!). She showed me a shop on campus that sells yarn, then after dinner we spent a couple hours at a coffee shop knitting, drinking coffee, talking, and playing Jenga. She had never played Jenga before; for some reason it was just sitting on the table at the coffee shop, so I taught her how to play.
Sunday lunch = donkey burgers. We had gone together once during the first few weeks in the city, but I hadn't been back since. It was even more delicious the second time 'round. Donkey meat looks and tastes a bit like ham.
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| Soup and sandwich (and a Coke). The closest Chinese food equivalent to a Panera Bread. |
On Sunday afternoon, one of my students (Elaine, who had also been to the pumpkin carving) came over to teach me how to make pumpkin "pie" and Coke-fried chicken wings.
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| Coke-fried chicken wings |
The chicken wings were delicious, like a sweet barbecue flavor. Hopefully I'll be able to recreate it on my own!
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| Pumpkin "pies" (apologies for the photo quality, not sure what happened) |
She said pumpkin pie, but in essence they turned out to be little pumpkin pastry-like things. Very cute, but not a strong pumpkin flavor. I think I may tweak the recipe, but we did have fun making them. Though cutting, dicing, roasting, mashing, and mixing five pumpkins was quite a chore. Now I know why most people use Libby's Pumpkin in a can. Real pumpkins are way too much work.
Luke has a movie class every Sunday night. This week he showed Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring. Not only my favorite movie of all time (along with the other two LOTR movies), but watching it on a larger screen surrounded by students who had never seen it before made for an awesome experience. Their reactions were priceless and it almost felt like watching it for the first time again.
We were inspired by a lesson plan we all did with our students that related to filming moments to show the beauty of a few seconds. So, we've started making our own compilation of moments from our lives here. This video contains moments filmed by Luke, Rita, and I for the month of October. Rita edited it together. Hope you enjoy!
