The end of the week...

Wow, the holidays seem like an age ago! It was so nice to have that break, but hard to get back into school - I think the kids feel that way too.

Tonight we had our second Chinese lesson - Belinda from the school takes our class - she works in the finance office so it's good to be friends with her :) We learnt numbers tonight and it was quite fun to be at the school at night - some of the older Chinese kids saw us there and were all looking into our classroom to see what we were doing. After class, at 8pm, we noticed that the Grade 5s were in class, so we walked past. Cookie (one of the Grade 5 teachers) invited us in to a class as it was just about to end and we just talked to the kids. That's absolutely the most enjoyable thing we have done at the school since we got here - the kids appreciated us dropping in and that particular class absolutely loves Andrew - they wrote his name for him in Chinese and they were all standing around him - I wished I had the camera!! (Pity they are not like that when we are taking their classes!!). Then the bell went and they still had one more class to go - I can't believe that Grade 5 kids are still working away at school at 8.30pm. No wonder they are restless in our classes. I definitely think it would work better if there was a Chinese teacher in all our classes and we somehow worked in conjunction with each other.

Andrew is still battling away with his classes in a computer room that has heaps of broken computers - the funny thing is that there are 2 Chinese computer teachers and they have fantastic computer rooms with all sorts of capabilities - like being able to shut down the students' computers from the teacher's computer etc. So that has been very frustrating - for the kids as well, because they know that the computers are falling apart - and that there are other much better computer rooms. Most of Andrew's classes he is running from one computer to another trying to fix some problem or other - like keyboards that have letters that don't work, or a mouse that doesn't work, or a computer that is just dead!!

Anyway, enough about school! Yay, it's Friday tomorrow - our best day, as we both have only 1 class each, and then I look after 5 Grade 5 girls for a couple of hours and then our week is over.

As you can see from the photos, I emerged from the hairdresser without the need to resort to a hat! I went to a pretty flash looking hairdressing salon - and it was great. 50 Yuan (less than $10)!! There was a funny young guy working in the salon - he had bleached blonde hair and was so vain!! He kept looking at himself in the mirror. Then he disappeared and came back with blue hair!! The lady doing my hair said something to him and he went and washed it out, and then he came back and sat down in one of the chairs and blow dried his own hair. He must have been bored - a quiet day in the salon maybe.

Oh, and there was a comment on the blog from someone coming to Dongguan - I don't have your email address so will just write what I know here! We've only been here a little while, so I don't know anything about Chang An. We are in Nancheng and that's a pretty good area - there are restaurants around here and some good apartments (sorry I don't know what the rent is as our accommodation was supplied). Dongcheng is also another good area - it has heaps more restaurants and grocery stores - we go there all the time and it's about 25 Yuan by taxi. I think I read in a magazine that it's more expensive to live in Dongcheng though, but it is a nicer area. There is a website that might be helpful too : http://www.thatsdongguan.com/

Anyway, bye for now,
Ruth

written by  arterra on October 11, 2007 from Dongguan, China
from the travel blog: China Adventure
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