Bob’s Blog

The Gas range in this apartment has renewed my interest in cooking… I forgot how much better it is to cook on Gas vs. Electricity. Everything heats up so quickly & cooks very evenly. The ventilation hood is better than most I’ve seen in the states, it actually sucks up the cooking smells…

Cooking time for most of the stuff I make (stir-frys, soups, etc) takes usually 5-7 minutes, it takes 2 minutes for water to boil on a gas range ☺.

I’m not sure what I’m going to do when I get back to the states with an electrical range…I might have to get a propane gas range and cook outside

After talking with another teacher earlier this week, apparently (part of the reason) why my classes are starting so late is that incoming freshmen have 2 weeks of Military Physical training/Boot Camp before coming to class.  If they don’t make it through the university, they have to do military service (since the public is paying for their education).  I guess this is to partly scare them into being more serious about school (not that most probably aren’t already).  This seems like a pretty good deal…Free education (and I think free room & board as well, not books though), just don’t mess up or you’ll have to join the army

Observed teacher #3 for 2 classes. Both classes were “privately funded” (one was an active class, the other not so much so). Apparently in China, as long as you score well on the entrance exams, you can attend college for free. However if you didn’t score well, or you want to attend a different college you have to pay, (Private Funded). Supposedly, these students/classes are a bit slower/less motivated than their peers who are not privately funded. This is just a generalization however; I’ve noticed many students of this status are actually better than some of the Publicly Funded (guessing on the term) classes. Doing my now standard introduction thing (45 sec self introduction, followed by calling up everyone to ask their one or more questions they have written down), I’ve found that it is best to avoid bringing up Taiwan (saying that I’ve visited there or that my Mom is from there) & to somewhat dance around the topic of what is the difference between China & America (schools, general life, etc). Talking about these topics in too much detail seem to bring the “rabble rabble” (ala southpark) out of the students. Most if not all students are in the common thought over here of Taiwan is part of China & I don’t really want to get into too much of the differences between the 2 countries (besides my notes of traffic & cleanliness being different), since that will mostly likely eventually get into political things that you just don’t want to touch while over here :-p.

In these classes, the teacher had them do debates in one and an act from Romeo & Juliet (converted to modern English). The debate topic he picked out for the in-class debate, was a pretty controversial one: “It happened a long time ago, so Japan should not be required to apologize for what she did in China”. Needless to say the half of the class picked to defend this statement had a hard time coming up with arguments, while the other side came up with a pile of statements to challenge it…as oral English practice, it seemed to be fairly effective though. Hopefully I’ll figure out how to put video on here and you can see an impromptu performance of the scene from Romeo & Juliet

To get my work visa, I needed to get a medical exam. I was surprised how detailed it is… Chest X-rays and Ultrasounds & EKGs oh my :-p. Luckily the school paid for it (520rmb…apparently its gone up several times in the last few years), and I even got a Medical kit out it(that included an english page detailing the drug vials that are in Chinese)

On the way back from the medical place, talking with the Foreign affairs guy it seems American TV is really a big hit over here. Namely: Prison Break, 24, Heroes & Friends. Somewhat suprisngly, these shows are only available on Bit-Torrent (or the acronym actually used here in normal conversations - “BT”). Shows are subtitled (in Chinese) & available on Bit-Torrent within 12 hours of the airing in the states by dedicated fans. It seems as though Bit-Torrent seems to be a very prominent link to the west here. I wonder if the government is happy about this (the ability to get any information/data that has not been previously reviewed by censors)…probably not…wonder why they haven’t blocked Bit-Torrents ports…

The Foreign affairs guy wasn’t available to help me get my ATM card, so he wrote me a letter to give to the bank:

When I flashed this note to the teller, at first he had this surprised look on his face (maybe he was thinking this was a hold up), then I got my boring ol’ ATM card…nothing noteworthy :-p Just a reminder that I really need to get working on my Chinese (mandarin) down…

I observed another foreign language teacher’s (sophomore) oral English class today. Well actually 1.5 classes (sat in for the first half of a second class, doing my introduction thing). The teacher suggested it would be a good idea for me to ask everyone to ask me a question as part of my introduction. After doing my 45 second intro, I instructed the students to write down a question to ask me, after which going down the list of students calling them one by one to ask me their question. The most asked questions (guess either no one was paying attention when these questions were asked by the previous student(s), or they just didn’t understand my answers) were:
- What are you hobbies?
- What was your study in college?/What were you doing before you came here?
- Why are you here?

For the first question, Im not sure they knew what SCUBA Diving & Kiteboarding are, its not like they are common English words - I’ll have to remember to bring in magazines to illustrate what they are next time I do this. For the second question, Im not sure they understood the title of my major; “Telecommunications & Networking” & my last job in “I.T./Information Technology”…next time I think I’ll just say I was in Computer Science & “worked with computers” as my answers for the next time around :-D. For the third question, I guess they were paying attention, as they asked it in different ways…ie: in ways of the job now, not really matching what I was doing before, how’d I pick the city/campus (told them I picked it, because it looked nice :-p), etc….

Introductions took around 30 mins, the teacher seemed happy – less class for him to teach :-D. In this class, the teacher had the students stand up when speaking & often asked them complicated questions. This seems like a good way to reinforce English speaking skills, but wonder if my first year students will be able to handle it…. maybe I’ll wean them onto it in the second semester :-).

Well anyway, two teachers down, one more to go….

I am very happy that I do not teach until the 19th - Observing how an Oral English class is taught is different then how I thought it would be. The teacher I was shadowing had me introduce myself, the students just had this weird look before I said anything, then they just had saucer eyes (bold statement for asian folks :-p ) when I started talking. I did Q&A for the first few minutes while the teacher stepped out. First questions were Are you Chinese?, Do you speak Chinese?, Where you born in the China? (obviously did not pay close attention to my introduction for that one ) After I gave the answers to each of those questions, the classroom started buzzing with talk amongst the students…

Teaching this subject (at least at this school) requires a lot of prodding, in terms that virtually all the students do not volunteer to do speaking roles (even though its their major) – you have to somewhat call people up or nicely force them to do it :-p . Much of the class time was used for discussion/analysis amongst students on topics about movies & the short story read today. Role-playing of the short story was also very interesting, as it was all improv dialog. It was somewhat difficult to get volunteers for the first round, but it was a very good performance, the second/last round, I think the teacher spent more time prodding students to volunteer than the actual presentation It seems the guys are a lot more shy than the girls – that and it seemed their english in general wasn’t as good as the girls…

Ideally I hope to observe the teaching styles of the other 2 teachers and come up with my teaching plan this week.

From the front page of my school’s english website:

http://web.usts.edu.cn/english/index.htm

Received a call from the teaching assistant this morning… Apparently we are back on the same track of me not starting to teach until the 19th (Actually start on the 18th, but I have no classes to teach on Thursdays
)…I was told the students came back today, but are not ready for classes until then…So I guess *hoorahs* are in order…

Well just got a call from the teaching assistant (yes at 10:30pm) that I will start teaching tomorrow (instead of the 19th)… He apologized and said he should have to me earlier today…uh-huh….

I was planning on observing another Foreign Language teacher do his thing, but I guess it’ll be straight to the pool for me…  Well time to make a lesson plan and hope it works :-p

After my horrid first attempt to go around to see Suzhou, I’ve decided to try again today. Got a little stir crazy again This time around I hailed a taxi to take me to the Humble Administrator’s garden 拙政园 (though Suzhou is know for it’s gardens & canals, I would think this would be less crowded than Guanqian Jie). There were other things close to this destination; other gardens, museums, etc.

The Humble Administrator’s Garden 拙政园 as detailed by Lonely Planet China (2007 edition):
“This rambling garden (Zhuozheng Yuan; 178 Dongbei Jie; admission off peak/peak Y50/Y70; 8:30am-5:30pm) is the largest of all the gardens and considered by many to be the most impressive. Dating back to the early 1500s, it’s a luxuriant five hectares of zigzagging bridges, pavilions, bamboo groves and fragrant lotus ponds; an ideal place for a leisurely stroll. There’s also a teahouse and a small museum that explains Chinese landscape gardening concepts.”

Well, this is peak season, so my fare was 70rmb. Upon entering the main entry way I was greeted by a bio-mass of 4-5 busloads of tour groups (could make out 4 different tour group flags), then what felt like one person per square meter in the actual gardens…To sum up my impression of the garden, I thought it was really over-rated. Most of the flora looked wilted/trampled/dying, not much worthy of taking photos of. Then again it could be that among this garden packed with people, many didn’t read the signs about not stepping over the rails, trampling stuff and not touching the specimens that led to this lackluster presentation. Because many people have recommended this garden, I might try this place again in the off-season, if I have guests to entertain

Looking for the next stop – The Lions Grove Garden/Lion Forest Garden 狮子林 – I got offered a Gondola ride by a roaming street salesman. I kinda wanted to go on one in the evening, but forgot the bug spray, so thought going in the afternoon would be ok. After some bargaining with the guy – he wanted 200rmb…I dealed down to 120rmb for a boat to myself (about the same price as last time with the family, 6 people for 20rmb each) for a 40 minute ride. After getting in the boat the head canal tour’s lady said the boat will bring you back in 30, when I said I was told 40, she said 30 – I gave the sales guy who ripped me off a glare and said ok as the boat pushed off. The ride was pretty nice overall. When I asked the driver how long hes been doing this for, I could make out something along the lines of, that hes been paddling this boat up and down the canals since he was able and that the boat has been passed down from generation to generation. After the driver paddled up and down some canals, took a few pictures for me and sung a few songs (will upload the videos hopefully soon :-)), the ride was over. Sure enough the guy who ripped me off was waiting for me to offer me more things to do, he follows me around for bit until I do the universal “Go Away” message of putting my hand up to his face and saying “No” :-p

While still looking for the Lion’s Grove/Forest Garden 狮子林 I bumped into a FREE museum. Though it was really small, not that great, and didn’t really have any artifacts, etc besides some knickknacks it wasn’t that bad because it wasn’t packed with a tour group and of course because it was free

After some more walking around and constant prodding by peddle cabs & sales folk, I finally found the Lion’s Grove/ForestGarden 狮子林☺.

The Lion’s Grove Garden 狮子林 as detailed by Lonely Planet China (2007 edition):
“Near the Humble Administrator’s Garden is the Lion’s Grove Garden 狮子林 (Zhizi Lin; 23 Yuanline Lu; off-peak/peak Y20/30; 8:30am-5:30pm) constructed in 1342 by the Buddhist monk Tianru to commemorate his master, who lived on the Lion Cliff in Zhejian’s Tianmu Mountain. The garden is also associated with the 14th-century Ni Zan, who painted a picture of the garden soon after it was completed. The garden is most notable for its large numbers of curiously shaped rocks, meant to resemble lions, protectors of the Buddhist faith.”

This garden although very crowded as well, was very good. I just had to wait out between the tour groups & near closing time to get decent pictures of anything ;-). Though this garden is smaller than the Humble Administrator’s garden, I got lost a few times due to the maze of rocks at this garden. I would not want to visit this garden after a rainstorm though, many of the stairs & paths that are carved into the rock are slippery from the constant polishing of visitors steps. I guess if you squint your eyes a lot and had a few drinks, you could make out lions from some of the rocks, but overall I thought it was a very impressive display. Since the garden is predominantly rock, I don’t really see how this garden could have a bad presentation day/season, unless some guy came charging through with a bulldozer :-p. I would definitely take guests here to see this one, I might even go again to see it myself :-).