Snow, Rats & The Art School

After my appearance at the Art School for the Senators visit a few weeks back I was asked to go back there and teach once a week. It is part of the same group as the Kindergarten and I now teach 2 lessons a week every Friday from 2pm - 4pm. I don't get paid any extra, but it's a refreshing change and it means I get a lie in every Friday, and I finish an hour earlier than normal, so I'm not compalining!!
It's really different to the work I do at the Kindergarten and I'm really enjoying it there. I don't have specific subjects to cover, I am just there to practive speaking and listening. This is done with alot of games (and the occasional bit of singing!!!!) and is really good fun! The ages range from 10-22 years old, and I am yet to teach the same class twice!

After a really lovely trip to Beijing this weekend to meet up with some friends, I returned home to find a rat ( the size of my foot, plus tail!!) on one of the sticky board traps I had put down weeks earlier. I had also put poison inside the radiator covers (as the rats that kept me awake were in the walls!) which seemed to keep them at bay for a while! I was beginning to belive, after weeks, I was finally rid of them! But No, not only were they still at large, but actually in my appartment! I spoke to the School the next day who told me they would send some workers to my appartment to sort this out as it was unacceptable! I took a photo to show them, and they were really shocked! I'm pretty sure before they thought I was over reacting or making it up!!But they said they would do everything they could to get rid of them! The next day they sent 2 workers into my apartment who did nothing more than put some poison down!! I could have done that myself!! That evening after a long day i was wathing TV when one of them decided to show his face casually scurrying across my livingroom floor (a rat that is, not one of the workers!!)! I threw a shoe at it and it quickly went back to where it came from. I know it's not the end of the world, and I have tried not to let it bother me ever since I arrived here, but I'm getting really sick of it now! I know they are living in my wardrobe, but I'm not brave enough to move it on my own, Mice, I would do it no problem, but these fuckers are huge! I will speak to the school again and ask them to remove the wardrobes from my room, although this probably won't solve the problem as it's getting cold outside and they can obviously get in somehow! I guess I will just have to stick it out for the next 7 weeks, I've done it for this long!!
It's a shame, apart from that everything else is great here! Apart from the weather, but that can't be helped! It's wet and very cold! Last Monday we had our first snowfall! It was really exciting! It was more than any snow we ever get in England, but is nothing compared to what's coming over the next few weeks!Because it gets warmer around midday it didn't stick for longer than a few hours, but still it made the cold weather alot more enjoyable!
Apart from ther above, life in shenyang is great! The time is flying by and I'm having lots of fun! I have been asked to judge an English speaking competition on 24th November (I will get paid about 100 Yuan for half a day and put up in a swanky hotel for the night!) and I'm really looking forward to it! Even if it's just a night away from the rats!
I have quite a bit planned over the next few weeks to keep me busy, but as every day flies by the closer I get to the end of my time here, which doesn't make me as happy as you would probably think after reading the above! I'm really going to be sad to say goodbye to this place and the amazing people I have met here.

written by

emmarogers85 on November 8, 2007 from Shenyang, China

from the travel blog: Teach and Travel China - 6 Months

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