The Meanderings Of A Muggle.

So I’ve been in Xi’an, China, for a week now and well it’s felt like I’ve been here for a lot longer than that. In someways that’s a good thing and in others, not so good. 

Most of Friday - Sunday of last week I spent getting adjusted to life in China, and over coming the objections I had to eating street food. By which I mean small vendors out and about on the street. I also noticed how foggy the city was… ha! fog… right! So naive…

The supermarkets here make a lot of sense in some ways and absolutely no sense in others. For instance, when you walk in there is a large area between the doors and the tills - there’s also a bag check in, as you’re not allowed to take you own bags in with you (unless it’s smaller than a backpack). Which I quite like as it’s a good theft prevention method, and also when you leave the tills and enter the no-mans land as I call it, to pick up you bag, you have to get your receipt signed. However, the ordering of products makes no sense… at all. You can be happily browsing through snacks and suddenly have a shelf of socks, then rice and possibly some toiletries, before continuing with snack foods. It’s kind of like the store assistants are playing Tetris with the stock.

Obviously Chinglish runs repent here, for instance I spotted this today. It’s a packet of crackers with “Something delicious be with you” I mean, what does that even mean? I’ve also seen T-shirts with random words jumbled on them - for instance one that I nearly bought out of sheer comedy factor read “Happy, T-Shirts, Yesterday, Mine” - crazy!

The Monday morning was interesting as I got to meet another teacher, called Steven, I managed to observe two of his classes and one of my friend’s and another class too. It was also on the monday that I found out that Xi’an isn’t foggy - it’s Smog from all of the pollution. 

Taught my four classes on the Tuesday which was hell, I wasn’t prepared for four hours of babysitting 10 year olds. Found out later though that the school I had been to that day is commonly known as the bad school.

Wednesday’s lessons went much better, also tried Leang Pe (that’s what it sounded like anyway) which is cold noodles with peppers and spices, and it was very yummy! I Also got to see a bit more of Xi’an as I was driven from school to school. 

Thursday’s lessons were even better and managed to have a couple of really good lessons. Got home though to find that there was a power cut, that lasted until 11.20pm. So needless to say me and my friend were both freezing and very hungry.

I’ve been really shocked at the state of some schools over here, some seem to be pretty decent (I.E a projector in the room) where as some I couldn’t see being allowed to be open in the UK as there is no heating in class rooms and the general up keep of the school is shockingly bad.

Today, well today has been a weird day. Got a phone call at 7.10 to say there had been a mix up on the schedule and me and my friend were being picked up at 7.20. Luckily I was already ready and John was already in the shower. Went to a very nice school - the staff room actually had heating and the classrooms had a computer in them - I was very impressed. My first two lessons went alright except for a few students we’re verbally rude and some also ignored me all together and decided they’d do homework for other subjects all together. Spoke to the other English language teachers between my second and third lessons about it, and they both suggested either taking and ripping up their homework, or taking it and bopping them on the head (not in a agressive way, or a way to cause pain - just a jokey “don’t do it again” kind of thing)

So I went into my next lesson all geared up, and the first sign of misbehaviour I was on it like a boss! Managed to confiscate a couple of books and a massive pile of books from this one girl at the back of class, which I did with a jokey shaky of my finger and a stern “No”… -sigh- I carried on my lesson regardless but noticed her from the corner of my eye chatting to the other students a lot, so when my word game began I went to the back of the class room and sat on the table next to her and gave a brief “Hello”, and went back to observing the students have fun finding words in my grid game. I was hoping my presence sitting near her would stop her from distracting other kids, and it kind of did - however she did ask if I could step outside for a second to talk to her…. (cringe worthy time)

Upon stepping out of the classroom, I noticed this girl was not a girl at all! She was a woman, in her late 20’s / early 30’s… and despite her smile she didn’t look very pleased. I nearly died when she announced her self as the class’s regular teacher - and those books I had taken from her was her marking! Apparently she thought she’d sit in on my class and keep the kids from being too loud.

I FEEL LIKE A COMPLETE DICK WAD!

I tried to apologise and invite her back in but she made it clear she had more important things to do with her time. ARRRRHHH! I keep cringing from the embarrassment from the whole situation. My friends/colleagues have all taken much amusement from the entire situation and telling me again and again that I will forever be know as “That one guy that kicked a teacher out of their own room”.

Went for tea with John and Faith at our local, which John told Faith all about my mess up with much glee. Spent most of the night just chilling and trying to keep warm. Also seemed to have had some kind of allergic reaction to the smog, my lips have all gone very chapped and the skin around my lips has gone very sore. 

Traffic in China is a scary but entertaining business, it’s very rare to get in a car and it have seat belts. Also car’s seem to make up their own rules on the road, luckily they rarely drive fast - so even if they did crash a seat belt wouldn’t be much use. 

I’m still not used to being stared at, I wouldn’t mind so much but it’s not like a quick glance, it’s a full on stare - where they don’t look away until you are literally out of eye sight. They rarely smile at you either, which just makes the whole situation even more uncomfortable. 

I’ll see what the next week or so brings. I’m not sure if I like life in China or not, it’s completely different from everything I know and in many ways it’s good for me to be experiencing it but I don’t know, I get the feeling that once my time is up in China, I doubt I would ever return - that may change though :)

My only wish is that my bed was little more comfy. It’s very hard and you can’t really get comfy on the mattress becuase the springs are so hard hahaha

Anyway I’m off to listen to Adam Newey’s radio show on Radio Warrington and feel comforted somewhat by the sounds of home.