teaching in china can be many things... but boring is definitely not one of them

So this weekend we have to teach to make up for the 3 days holiday we will be taking next week. We were told last week that Saturday and Sunday would be Monday and Tuesday's lessons... fine by me as this would mean I only have to teach two lessons as they have agreed to let us leave early to get our train on Sunday. Yesterday evening however I find out (by accident) that we actually are teaching Tuesday and Wednesday.... meaning I have two full days of teaching that I was not at all prepared for... And no one had thought to tell us earlier that this had changed! Apparently our school has missed the memo that we are not telepathic. So today has been a day filled with lesson improvisations and many worksheets.

The school also neglected to tell us with due warning that we were meant to be performing at this mornings Grade 3 English Stage. Which meant a very shaky performance of 'Baby' by Justin Bieber in front of 300 ecstatic students (they really love Justin here).

Other than our school being useless at telling us things, this week has been pretty average. One of my Grade 1 assistants practically begged me to stay a second semester as apparently I 'teach them well', which made me happy. Well, happy until the students formed a ring around me in the playground and started chanting 'yellow head' at me.... I am really going to miss all those little weirdos....

Also had an interesting conversation with Sherry (or maybe Shelly, we aren't too sure), one of Iris' assistants today. We were telling her all about our onward travels and she said: 'maybe for you foreigners, travelling is important, but for us, work is always more important'. When I asked her if she wanted to travel, she said 'of course, but I don't have the time, I have to work hard'. This kind of response is pretty typical from Chinese people on the subject of travelling, they can't just take time off work or take a 'gap year' like Westerners generally do to see the world... in fact most Chinese people haven't even been to the next province over from them. It makes you think how lucky we are to get to be given such amazing opportunities... so if anyone at home has the opportunity to travel, just do it!