Happy Belated Thanksgiving!!

How was Thanksgiving for everyone??

Thanksgiving in China was not much different from any other day.  I spent the day teaching 5 English classes, and of course, shared the American Thanksgiving story with them:D  That night my feast was composed of bite size waffle-like things and tofu on a stick.  I have yet to see a turkey in DaoXian.

After dinner Liana and I grabbed her violin and my flute from our apartment and headed over to our friend Lanny's apartment.  We sat in her cold apartment gathered 'round lit candles, playing our instruments (Lanny plays guitar), singing, and chatting about teaching, China and things we missed back home.  And of course it wouldn't have been thanksgiving without food, haha: oranges, cake and pastries, and Aaron's infamous hot cocoaUM!

On Friday I receive a call from Liana saying that our foreign teacher friend Anthony, who is also from American, was in town for a visit.  I told my kids that I had a surprise for them; someone was coming to the class for a visit.  They all shouted out with excitement saying "Who, who, who!"  At that moment some of my students looked out the window and saw Liana and Anthony coming.  They went bizerk!!  I have never seen such an excited class in my life.  I was waiting for another teacher to come and scold us for being so loud lol.  Part of the reason for there excitement is that Anthony is VERY tall and has blond hairo of course all the female students thought him to be very handsome.  He answered their questions and had them all laughing.  At the end of class the students swarmed him, asking for his signature and phone number haha.  You'da thought he was a celebrity.

On Saturday our English-Speaking gang all hung out in the morning.  Liana headed out early to buy oranges and then returned to make fresh squeeze mandarin juice.  Her and Lanny cooked up a yummy brunch of French toast (using honey instead of syrup), scrambled eggs, and coffee.  It was sooooo nice to have an American-style breakfast.  Later on we played ping pong with the students at Aaron's school, which was a blast (other than the fact that I had a cold so I was out-of-it).  We then went out to dinner together before heading over to the only American restaurant in town (called Macros, similar to McDonalds) and had ice cream and coffeemmmmm!  The night was topped off by watching School of Rock at Lanny's apartment.

Hope you all are warm and well!

Pro & Cons

I watched "Must Love Dogs" the other day, and, gosh, they were all speaking English so fast!  Seriously, I think I'm going to go through reverse culture shock when I come home.  Back in Yangshuo, during our visit, we saw many Westerners.  It was sooo weird to see people that WEREN'T Chinese.  I found myself doing double takes.  wow  For once I could actually understand the conversations of the people walking by meol.  So just as my myspace quote says, my younger bro tells me "We are going to have to teach u the vernacular again."  Hahaood 'ol Josh James hope not.

Time is quickly approaching the three month-marker of my adventure here in China.  It seems like I've been here longer though.  In honor of this occasion, I figured I'd steal an idea from a friend's blog and write some PRO's and CON's about my stay here.

PRO

1. The people here are very friendly and sooo generous.  I have gotten so many offers to help me with shopping and various other tasks.  They make sure I'm not taken advantage of during shopping (which I've been able to pick up a lot better in recent times).  The people have REALLY made my stay here worth while.  THEY are what make Da Xian I love my students!  I only wish I could help them more.  However, with 60 students in one class and me having a total of 1100 students to teach a week, one-on-one time with the students is difficult to find.  *sigh*

CON

1. The pollution here is awful.  The first week I was here I had finished a snack and was looking for a place to dispose of my cup.  An elderly lady, whom I have befriended, motioned for me to just toss it in the street.  I looked at her like she was crazy and she motioned again.  I find myself dusting several times a weeknd that still is not enough.  And when blowing my nose'm not even going to go thereol  The streets are not only heavily littered with garbage, but children squat down and go whenever they feel the need, wherever they care to do so.  The air is thick with exhaustea

PRO

2. The food is amazing!  Most of the food is homemade and cooked from scratchhich I think is much better than the processed foods we eat at home.  Some of the best food I have EVER tasted, I ate here in China.  Though, REAL Chinese food is different from American Chinese food.  By different I mean BETTER!  There are fresh fruits and vegetables out in the market everyday, so all I have to do is walk up the road 5 minutes in order to buy what I need.  Learning how to cook is excitingspecially when I can pull a good meal offol

CON

2. Everybody stares at us like we are from another planet.  Some people here, especially the elderly, have never seen foreigners before.  Oh, and their stares are not subtle glanceshey are an all out stop-dead-in-their-tracks-with-their-head-following-your-every-move-as-you-walk-by kind of stare.  There are about 600,000 people in this "small" towno we have quite an audience at times.  When I'm shopping, the shop workers huddle around me asking me questions in Chinese, which I cannot understand.  "Ting bo dong" ("I don't understand") is my most overused and clich?phrase at this point.  Not to mention I don't like being watched when I shoput everyone seems to like watching me.  It doesn't make me want to stay in one place for too long.

On sunday, we met up with two Austrailians who are teaching English at a school about 40 minutes from ours.  We arrived at their school only to be met with a BIG surprise...

At the entrance of the school we were greeted with warm smiles, lotsa "hellos," and bouquets of roses, lilies, and carnations.  We were then paraded between two rows of hundreds of students that wound through the school campus (our mouths stuck open in surprise).  We weren't even teaching at the school and they welcomed us like celebreties!

To top the day off we out for dinner and ate...

...not dog, not cat, not frog...

...hornet (jumbo yellow jackets!).  They were surprisingly juicy, but freaky to eat 'cause I've had some bad experiences with some of their kin.

I find the people here are soooo generous.  They will give what little that they have to make us feel comfortable and welcome.  The other day I was ordering breakfast at a nearby shop and before I could even pull out my money, a young student had paid for it.  I tried to give her money but she woudn't take anything from me...I felt bad

Well, time for me to go make a banana and coconut milkshake...mmmmm lunch!  (...but no, not at all chinese)

Things been going well here in Dao Xian.  My schedule seems to just be getting busier and busier.  Between classes, teacher meetings, talking with students, being invited out for meals and learning how to cook Chinese, I find that I have a lot less free time.  It a lot of fun to be busy though never bored!

Last Sunday we went to the countryside with Mr. Cao (our foreign affairs director) and a few other English teachers.  The countryside is absolutely gorgeous nice change from the crowded, polluted city of Dao Xian.  We walked around through the rice paddies looking at  the surrounding mountains, creeks and fish ponds, and farmland.  We also took a tour through a famous historical cave called Lou Tian.  The view was spectacular!  {Check out my slideshow to see for yourself}

The food is SOOO incredibly goodhough very oily.  Ie learned how to make pumpkin, sweet potato leaves, an eggplant dish with tomatos and eggs, a spicy beef dish, and the infamous Chinese dumplingsmmmmmm so good!!!  I must add that Chinese friend eggs are incredible.  I think Il be cooking a lot of Chinese when I get home;D  As for the more exotic dishes?/SPAN>so far I have tasted/eaten duck, tofu, frog, snake, donkey, snail, pig liver, donkey and rabbit.  Doesn it make you want to come and try some?!?  This town is known for its hot foods, thus, there are hot peppers in EVERYTHING.  Soooooo good?/SPAN>

Time to work on lesson plans, wohoo!