There are minor things that cause irritation and of course I've had the odd moment when I just want my mom but all in all I'm having the time of my life. Work is fun and rewarding at times tedious and frustrating as well as draining but for the most part I love it. I love my students well most, I have one class out of 12 where I don't like half the class but that's not bad out of 500 students. I do more hours than most the other teachers but seriously I don't mind. It keeps me busy yesterday both my classes we're cancelled so I went shopping! I was in and out with in an hour and half seriously record timing. I had a budget and didn't even over spend. As long as you shop in small boutiques privately owned your winning. Anyway by the time I was back I didn't know what to do with my self. I cleaned my flat, I straighterned my wardrobe and I watched a hell of a lot of californiacation. I am conscious not to spend my spare time eating as much as I would in England. With so much free time and now being in the swing of things having food in and snacks it makes it easy to just eat for the sake of it. Although anyone who knows me will be proud I bought a block of cheese the day I moved in and still have some left. That block has been rationed mercifully!
It's not just me whose conscious about weight, but the most part of china. They spend for ever changing their appearance, I new about the whitening creams and centres to become paler, walking round with masks and umbrellas to never catch the sun, but little things that Iv seen that I find strange. You can by strips of stickiness to stick your eyes open! I'm being serious they are conscious of the one thing most the world associates china with. I have just realised this may sound vaguely racist I assure you it's not. Over here everything comes down to appearance. I have some students turn up for class dressed for a cat walk and the flip reverse side is they come dressed as 8 year olds. The diversity of my students ranges like their ability to grasp English. And I wholey understand the difficulties. English is such a difficult language to grasp, I can just about speak it let alone write perfectly. Being dyslexic makes me appreciate how hard it is, (I'm also hoping this year teaching others will help improve my own as I am now so vigilant about everything I write) I can't get frustrated with them even when I want to. I have one lad that can't for the love of god say smile he says "smell" his mouth will just not form the word and in all honesty I think that's exactly how I must sound when I try and speak Chinese. I feel like Joey out of Friends. I hear it, I know how to say it, I think it and yet it comes out something else completely. English may have all different tenses and words sounding the same but meaning different things, trust me there are way more than you think. One night me and Shaun sat up discussing them for hours lol! But in China each word means four different things dependant on the tone! This can be a serious problem! Because saying somthing slightly different can completly balls up a whole sentence. And the looks you recieve can be anything from deathly to hilarious.
Anyway what I was getting at is appearance. I am automatically classed as a good teacher because of my appearance. It's not even my looks it's purely being white. I have found the word beautiful has lost all it's meaning out here. Everything is beautiful, I am told I am beautiful everyday and as much as you may think that sounds lovely it isn't. In normal life I'm not someone that likes words that are used for the sake of it. I truely think you should only say things you really mean. So out here when beautiful is the only word they seem to associate with westerns it no longer has any impact or meaning. In England if someone other than my mom or a drunken sleeze told me I was beautiful I would more than likely go bright red and be overly touched, but here it's just a word. It has no meaning. The way it seems to work out here is the better looking you are the higher up in social order you go. On reflection I guess that's how it was in school. The more beautiful you we're the more popular you we're. And then we grew up and your social stance at school meant naff all. Personalities finally became important! Woop woop! But here I can't see that happening any time soon.
One thing I can see happening is a whole generation of Chinese people getting fat due to the mass influx of fast food restraunts everywhere! You can see it happening. No where in the world seems safe from KFC and Mcdonalds! And the quality of KFC here is horrific maccys is basicly the same as back home, although some only sell mcflurrys and others only sell chicken. It's very strange.
What I was getting at was even with everything I have just said I love it here. And with my mom coming out so soon it just makes it so much easier :) as well as Skype and then with the idea of 6 weeks off to go bask in beautiful sunshine I just can't comprehend going back to 9-5 in miserable weather! The big topic at the moment is so many people are already talking about staying another year. But for me there are 3 major complications. One my family and friends, I think Hayley and my mom may kill me if I stayed, two I have a job to go back to and 3 and I understand how ridiculous this will sound but if I ever plan to meet someone, get married and have kids I actually don't have that long left! Cringe I know to even think about such things. But it's true. Maybe I just won't have kids and spend my life bobbing around the world as a bachelorette Hmmm we'll see.
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