December 15th: the no-power blues and proper rehearsal
[ posted by mcdeviltoast ]
Day 89
Woke from decent sleep, realized it was because everything was quiet. The power was out, so the white noise of my heater and bathroom fan were nonexistent. Good side effect: better sleep. Bad side effects: no shower, no computer, no music, no coffee. My morning routine was fucked.
I tried to brush my hair into a managed chaos and wandered over to the canteen, got some vitamin cakes and two little cans of cold coffee drink which were so sweet I needed a sidecar of insulin.
I tried to croak out the song lesson, myvoice would have greatly benefited from a hot beverage. Rose said electricity would resume at 6pm. As I wrote the words on the board in one class, a student asked me toturn the lights on because he couldn't see. I kind of snapped:"I can't! No lights! No computer! No projector! No hot water for Mr. Willis's coffee!"
After lunch, I read for a bit in the sunshine by the basketball court. I got mobbed by primary kids, all showing me their jian zi (Chinese hackeysack using a weight and feather). They asked, "What do you like?"
"I like many things." This one kid had a sweater that said "Rock" in twin stacks of block letters similar to that "Love" design in the 70's. "I like that sweater! Where did you buy?"
They do have the coolest sweaters here. I'm dying for one I saw that had a picture of an apple, with "apples man" under it. It's doubtful it would be in my size. Their energy and pulling on my sweater was a little much, so I walkedup to the gate to check mail.
Boxes still hadn't arrived, but there was a card from Jenn's mom. I showed it to my last two classes to the catch-all comment of "Oh, very beautiful." (say staccato with anunciated T) I need to teach them synonyms for "pleasing to the eye." Everything from pictures of my friends, to my clothes to my beard has been described as "oh, very beautiful."
Before fourth class I rode into town bent on getting big yellow paper to make a submarine, Rose stopped me at the gate, handed me a very important-looking invitation. It's for the Christmas dinner to-do in Nantong next week, at the behest of China's government, all foreign English teachers from Haimen and Nantong are invited. It's a formal affair, so I may have to buy a shirt and tie this week. My posse from Dongzhou will be going, too, and I'm glad I met them already in non-formal environs.
I tried riding out again, but my back tire desperately needed air. I pedaled up the "lower east side" and used bike chap's there, realized I had no time to go all the way to the paper shop, but since I was off-campus I decided on the secondary objective of getting a phone card.
At Kedu, the mobile phone girl and her friend pointed me to the kiosk across the street. I obtained a 50 yuen card and pedaled back. I parked my bike by the juinor block, went upstairs to Harry & Monkey's class. "You are late!" they said. The other teacher stood in the doorway beaming and I told them "No, class starts at 3:25, yes?" I looked at my watch, and it was 3:25. The teacher disappeared. I was late. That whole "ten minutes early" business threw me off. Oh well. In my contract, twenty minutes is the punishable time, so I was still in the clear and it was an honest mistake.
The power came back on halfway through class so I used the overhead to show the Christmas card. We sang Rudolph with the "American kids repeating" words added, took my bows at the bell, left.
I rode out again to the paper shop, picked up some construction paper for Erin, found some big stiff yellow paper, but couldn't figure how to ride it back to the school. It couldn't roll up, you see.
When rehearsal time came, I handed the student list to the girls and they went and collected them for me. I made all of them practice both songs because I'm not sure which grade is doing which song. Jingle actually has an interesting chord progression. It's the arrangements over the years that have made that song nauseating.
I chatted online with Lindsey for a while, tried to drink some of that awful white wine, although even watering it down didn't help. I poured it down the sink, blogged, joined the unconsciousness club.
Woke from decent sleep, realized it was because everything was quiet. The power was out, so the white noise of my heater and bathroom fan were nonexistent. Good side effect: better sleep. Bad side effects: no shower, no computer, no music, no coffee. My morning routine was fucked.
I tried to brush my hair into a managed chaos and wandered over to the canteen, got some vitamin cakes and two little cans of cold coffee drink which were so sweet I needed a sidecar of insulin.
I tried to croak out the song lesson, myvoice would have greatly benefited from a hot beverage. Rose said electricity would resume at 6pm. As I wrote the words on the board in one class, a student asked me toturn the lights on because he couldn't see. I kind of snapped:"I can't! No lights! No computer! No projector! No hot water for Mr. Willis's coffee!"
After lunch, I read for a bit in the sunshine by the basketball court. I got mobbed by primary kids, all showing me their jian zi (Chinese hackeysack using a weight and feather). They asked, "What do you like?"
"I like many things." This one kid had a sweater that said "Rock" in twin stacks of block letters similar to that "Love" design in the 70's. "I like that sweater! Where did you buy?"
They do have the coolest sweaters here. I'm dying for one I saw that had a picture of an apple, with "apples man" under it. It's doubtful it would be in my size. Their energy and pulling on my sweater was a little much, so I walkedup to the gate to check mail.
Boxes still hadn't arrived, but there was a card from Jenn's mom. I showed it to my last two classes to the catch-all comment of "Oh, very beautiful." (say staccato with anunciated T) I need to teach them synonyms for "pleasing to the eye." Everything from pictures of my friends, to my clothes to my beard has been described as "oh, very beautiful."
Before fourth class I rode into town bent on getting big yellow paper to make a submarine, Rose stopped me at the gate, handed me a very important-looking invitation. It's for the Christmas dinner to-do in Nantong next week, at the behest of China's government, all foreign English teachers from Haimen and Nantong are invited. It's a formal affair, so I may have to buy a shirt and tie this week. My posse from Dongzhou will be going, too, and I'm glad I met them already in non-formal environs.
I tried riding out again, but my back tire desperately needed air. I pedaled up the "lower east side" and used bike chap's there, realized I had no time to go all the way to the paper shop, but since I was off-campus I decided on the secondary objective of getting a phone card.
At Kedu, the mobile phone girl and her friend pointed me to the kiosk across the street. I obtained a 50 yuen card and pedaled back. I parked my bike by the juinor block, went upstairs to Harry & Monkey's class. "You are late!" they said. The other teacher stood in the doorway beaming and I told them "No, class starts at 3:25, yes?" I looked at my watch, and it was 3:25. The teacher disappeared. I was late. That whole "ten minutes early" business threw me off. Oh well. In my contract, twenty minutes is the punishable time, so I was still in the clear and it was an honest mistake.
The power came back on halfway through class so I used the overhead to show the Christmas card. We sang Rudolph with the "American kids repeating" words added, took my bows at the bell, left.
I rode out again to the paper shop, picked up some construction paper for Erin, found some big stiff yellow paper, but couldn't figure how to ride it back to the school. It couldn't roll up, you see.
When rehearsal time came, I handed the student list to the girls and they went and collected them for me. I made all of them practice both songs because I'm not sure which grade is doing which song. Jingle actually has an interesting chord progression. It's the arrangements over the years that have made that song nauseating.
I chatted online with Lindsey for a while, tried to drink some of that awful white wine, although even watering it down didn't help. I poured it down the sink, blogged, joined the unconsciousness club.
---
[ posted by mcdeviltoast @ 12/15/2004 08:54:00 PM ]
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The dumbtronica act Montana & McDeviltoast, along with their friends, keep each other updated on their activities. Much fun having by all, and Pockys fear for their lives!