DoReMi

Being a foreign teacher, it is an unwritten rule that I'm a walking advertisement for the school. From time to time, I have to subject myself to complete and utter humiliation through "performances by the foreigner." Think of a freak show. Yup, that's what I do. On the 26th of June, my students I were tasked to sing "Do Re Mi" (Doe a deer a female deer. Ray, a drop of golden sun...) from "The Sound of Music" in front of a crowd that had gathered... I don't even know where that was. Anyway, here are the pictures to document our embarrassment.

My Adorable Kids

I know I'm not supposed to play favorites, but this is my favorite class. And because I know I'll miss them so much, I took these pics.

HSK Celebration

Because I passed the HSK, I decided to invite a few friends to dinner and celebrate. After dinner, we decided to go to a KTV. I don't know what exactly happened but I ended up not paying for anything.

Breakfast with Edward

Just before class, Edward and I looked for a place where we can have breakfast. We found a tiny place (just the space you need to put a table and some chairs and a small cooking area) inside a compound. We were so full for less than 5RMB.

fear of the unknown

Tomorrow is the last day of my contract. It also marks my 11th month in China. It's been barely a year but I feel so much older. I think I've grown up in more ways than I ever expected myself capable of.

In a week's time, I'll be on my way to yet another journey. There's a part of me that is deathly scared of going out there trying to find another job. I have no idea what I'll find

This is familiar. This is safe. This is comfortable. Yet I know that if I stay I'll forever be thinking of all the other places that I wasn't able to experience living in. I have to go. There is really no choice but to go.

HSK Result

The suspense is over. After almost two months of biting my nails, I finally got my result of the HSK. While I was searching for it on the net, I was silently praying, "Let me pass. Let me pass. Please let me pass". Nothing could be more humiliating than failing a test. Of course that's not true but that was what I was thinking while filling in the information form once I found the site. When I finally saw that I passed, my first thought was, "I only got Level 3?" Because I took the Elementary-Intermediate Exam, Level 3 is the lowest passing level. Level 3 is the highest in the Basic test. I looked at the breakdown of my grade:

Listening Comprehension 53
Grammar 46
Reading Comprehension 45
Cloze 39
Total Score 184

But what really makes me want to pull my hair is that Level 3 is from 152-188. I was this close, this close! to Level 4! Aaaaargh!

For more information on the grading system and the HSK
Elementary-Intermediate Exam, click here: http://www.hsk.org.cn/english/intro_hsk2.aspx

Of course people around me are comforting me by telling me that I already did well as I had only been in China for less than a year. But still! This close! *sniffles.

Conversation with Andy over the phone last night:
A: Hello?

JC: Hello.

A: Ni gang gang da dian hua ma? (Did you just call?)

JC: Shi. (Yes.)

A: Wo zai toilet. (I was in the toilet.)

JC: Oh. Ok. Wo zhi dao wo hanyu shuiping kaoshi de result le. (I already know my Chinese Proficiency Exam result.)

A: (said something that probably means "result")

JC: Wo passed. Dan shi bu gao. (I passed but not that high.)

A: (said something that means "passing is already good")

JC: (whined)

A: (said something more of the same thing.)

JC: (whined some more)

Conversation eventually turned to other things. Fortunately for him.

BTW, this is my first entry using my new toy. Just thought I'd mention that. And because my Windows and MSOffice are in English, I can no longer type Chinese characters. Can never have everything, can we?

Sweet Smell of Solitude

I moved again. Two weeks before my contract with the school ends, the landlord decides that he wants to live in his apartment. Again, I had to pack my things and scurry back where I started from: the old house. I must say I have become good at packing. I've gotten quite efficient. Less than a 24-hour notice and I was out of the house and settling into the old/new one. Not to mention that while I was packing, I was also following step by step instructions on copying and installing MSOffice from Sachin. And believe me, that was not easy.

Coming back to this house feels oddly like coming back home. I remember telling Lynn that it reminds me of being away on vacation for a few weeks and then finally getting home. The smell, the sound, the sight, everything just seems so familiar and well, homey. Even random voices from the street sound like something I didn't realize was missing until I heard them again. It's almost frightening, knowing that I'll be leaving in a few weeks.

Just as I'd always lived in this house alone (except for a few weeks when my little sister stayed with me to practice her English), I'm once again roommateless. Sigh of relief here. Much as I was entertained by F's company, nothing compares to waking up to my own mess and getting to use the bathroom (and computer!) whenever I want. This smell that I find so familiar might be the smell of solitude.

So now I'm ticking the days before the 26th. I'm giving myself a week or two after that to rest, meet up with friends that I might never see again, and psych myself up for another journey, both physically and figuratively. I can sense a nostalgic entry coming up very soon. Not yet though. In the meantime, I still have classes to teach.

Today's Independence Day!

108 years ago today, Gen. Emilio Aguinaldo waved the Philippine flag on his balcony in Kawit, Cavite to mark the end of the Spanish occupation. I just thought I'd remind everyone since I almost forgot myself. And I still haven't finished reading El Filibusterismo. Is it just me or is Noli really more interesting?

It turns out that my foreign expert certificate will expire on the 26th, not the 29th. Thus, I have only two more weeks before my independence. My headmaster has been trying to convince me to renew my contract, or at least work parttime in his school. I would be very likely to say no but it's nice to have options.

My friend Troy who lives in Beijing has very generously offered the spare room in his house while I look for a job. *cartwheels. I won't be homeless! I won't be homeless! Independence from the fear of being homeless! I took it too far, right? Anyway, let's hope that I won't be jobless for long. Never mind that I've never met Troy in person. Sometimes, you just have to trust people. Uh, Nuna, can you leave that piece of information out if you plan to tell Akoh about this?

My laptop, which is still nameless by the way (we can take a poll here), still cannot connect to the internet. I have at least three people trying to solve it, none of them successful yet. After they've made dozens of phonecalls, these are their solutions: 

1. Andy1 wants us to go back to Shenyang and have the people there fix it. I think he feels personally responsible for it because he was with me when I bought it and he was the one making the negotiations and whatnots. Plus he also assured me that it would be easy to download MSOffice in English, assuming of course that we have an internet connection.

2. Edward wants me to take it to his house, try to use his internet connection and then from there he'll try to figure out what's wrong with it. He has tried fixing it in my house but failed.  Oops, he just called. Said he'll be here in about an hour. Him and a solution for this, I hope.(Which reminds me, there should be more stories about Edward.)

3. Lynn wants me to remember or try to find out a number used to connect to the internet from this house. This is a long and complicated story. Nobody knows this number. Nobody remembers this number. She said then maybe I can ask Edward if he knows anyone from the internet company so we can find out the number because that's the only way they'll start moving. This is one reason why I have to improve my Chinese. So I can start yelling at stupid and lazy people working at internet companies who refuse to cooperate in making my life better. (Not complaining here. My life's good but it could always get better.)

4. Piao, my student, wants to come to my house and install a software that can translate Chinese into English. That would be interesting. Except that I can't bring myself to be excited about it yet because there's a bigger problem to be solved.

If more people know about my new computer, I suspect more people would come up with what they think I should do with it. Who would've thought owning a laptop in China would be so complicated?

My New Toy

I finally bought a laptop. TCL, 1.5Hrz, 516MB, 60G. Less than 6000rmb. The Windows is in English. MSOffice is in Chinese though (气死我了!). I'm still trying to find someone to change it to English. In the meantime, I play Minesweeper.

Duan Wu Jie (Dragon Boat Festival)

We cheated. These aren't the real finished products. These were bought from the store around the corner. Compare how much better these look than the ones we made (in the rice cooker).

About a couple of weeks ago, two reporters from the TieLing TV Station came to my house to interview me on what I think about Duan Wu Jie. Duan what?! Google, once again, I thank you.

Duan Wu Jie, as it turned out, is celebrated in honor of a poet who threw himself into the river when his beloved state was occupied by a more powerful state. This was back in the time when China was not yet a unified country. It was said that people threw zongzi and other food into the river so the fish wouldn't eat the poet's body. Now we eat the zongzi, much like the fish of long ago :p.

Unfortunately, I wasn't able to watch my big TV appearance because I had English corner the night it was shown. I'm still under the process of twisting arms and legs to get myself a copy of it (The TV station is asking for 100rmb for the edited copy! 你有病吗?) Hopefully, I'll be able to get myself a copy without having to pay that much although I'm a little doubtful. And then maybe I can upload it to my videos! :D