More China

Nothing too exciting has happened over on this end of the world so I haven't had anything good to blog about.  Life has been pretty normal around here.  I go to class, try to teach a lesson, students end up crying because of who knows what, and no one participates or even listens to a word I am saying.  Don't feel bad for me.  It's normal.  I'm pretty sure there have been less than five times I have gotten through a class without at least one person in tears at sometime during the 40 minutes.  Sometimes I just try to ignore the tears and the sobs but that never works.  Some student always runs up to the front of the classroom to grab my arm and tell me, "Teacher.  Her sad" pointing to the student crying.  I tell them that I already know but they don't seem to understand those words.  They won't stop pulling on me or saying, "Her sad" until I go over and assess the situation.  I ask why and the proceed to tell me, in Chinese, what happened.  Of course, I don't understand.  Then the charades begin.  Let's just say, I challenge any willing participant to a game of charades when I get back because I am now a master at this game.  The crying usually stems from someone punching or kicking them or someone stealing their pencil case.  If I could just confiscate everyone's pencil case and throw them out the window, life would be so grand.

Emma and her family are so nice to us.  They are always inviting us to do things with them.  Of course we always jump on those offers.  Last weekend she took us to Forest Park for BBQ.  Chinese BBQ's are strange but so good!  It was fun to eat food that was grilled even if it did have Chinese taste to it.  The park was beautiful!  It was full of my favorite flower trees.  I could have stayed there all day.

Friday Shelby and I wanted to do something fun so we set out to try to find another park we had heard about.  Well, remember how we can never find anything the first time we try?  Yeah, same situation.  We never found the park.  So instead we wandered around and ended up at the mall.  Emma then called us and wanted to know if we wanted to go to her friends house with her to have sushi.  She came and picked us up at the mall and took us with her.  I am not the biggest fan of sushi so I knew that this was going to be a challenge for me.  Turns out, I did just fine.  I didn't gag and have to spit it out like I did the last time I tried to eat it.  And I might even venture to say that I kinda enjoyed it.  Just kinda.

Saturday was a fun day.  Emma picked us up and took us to an English competition that some of the students were participating in.  It was so fun to see our students outside of school and with their families.  They are adorable!  They all did pretty good in the competition, some better than others.

After the competition we went to the cinema.  Our tickets were bought by Emma's husband and we had a little bit of time to kill before the movie.  Obviously, you would kill this time with food.  Emma took us over to a place that had really weird food so we pleaded "not hungry" and moved on.  Apparently her husband won't take that for an answer.  I came back from the bathroom and her husband had bought me a "fruit dish".  I was thinking, "okay, I can handle this."  It wasn't fruit.  I don't know what it was.  I looked at Shelby and asked her how she got out of eating one.  She just laughed at me because now I had a huge bowl of who knows what in front of me and she didn't.  Joke is on her.  A few minutes later, she had one too.  According to Emma you have to eat everything that is ever placed in front of you because there is "no wasting in China".  Good thing this "fruit dish" was actually not too bad.

After eating whatever that was, we went into the movie.  We gave the person our tickets, got our 3-D glasses, and were entering the theater when I turned to Shelby and said, "I don't think I have ever gotten this far into a movie and not known what movie I was seeing."  Yep, it was happening.  I had no idea if I would be able to understand the movie but I was just going with the flow.  Right before we walked through the door Emma told us that we were seeing, "America's Captain".  Ah, Captain America.  Yes!

After the movie we met up with two more friends and took an elevator ride to Thailand.  Thai food is delicious!  I love it.  They had the best mango juice that I have ever tasted.  I think I might go back and just order that mango juice.

After dinner we then found ourselves at KTV once again.  Of course it was a good time.  Is it sad that the only songs we can sing without the artist singing with us is Backstreet Boys??  I haven't listened to them in years but apparently my heart is still with them because I haven't forgotten a single word.

(This fruit tray is a stable at KTV and I love it!)

(Selfie.  Shelby and I have mastered the Asian fingers.  She is still working on the eyes...)

Oh, as I was going through my pictures, I found this gem.  I was able to watch one of my classes do a play this week.  I have no clue what was going on but one of my students dressed up like a girl.  It was hilarious.  Should I be concerned that he played the part really well?