Sports Days (11-15)

Sunday was April’s birthday. I had asked if she wanted me to cook or if she wanted to eat out. She chose eating out and really got into that. She looked up restaurants online and found a groupon for a seafood dinner for 8. So the six of us and the student who helped her purchase the groupon went out Saturday night. The fixed meal included 14 dishes, mostly various kinds of seafood—squid, fish, crab, shrimp, mussels, clams. There were also a couple soups, two meat dishes (April had exchanged some dishes for those, since one person doesn’t like seafood.), a couple vegetable dishes, and steamed buns. The food was quite good even though most of it was covered with red chilies. They were dried chilies and didn’t affect the food too much; so I was able to eat all but a few dishes. Needless to say, we all ate well and enjoyed the special meal.

After dinner, we returned to our neighborhood and went to a karaoke place. April and Chrystal sang in Chinese while the rest of us used English. The guys mostly chose songs I don’t know, but it was fun to hang out there for a couple hours.

The celebration continued on Sunday, as Wang Cheng invited Dale, April, and me to have lunch with his family for April’s birthday. He took us to a really nice restaurant here in Wenjiang. I purchased a cake for the occasion as a way to contribute to the meal, since we knew they wouldn’t let us contribute to the cost. This meal, too, was delicious, of course, since we had local people to order special food. Many of the eight dishes were special Sichuan dishes, which surprised us because they weren’t full of chilies. Wang Cheng explained that a couple of the dishes traditionally don’t have chilies, and April explained later that they had emphasized that the food should not be spicy. 

Our favorite was a dish of vegetables in a ginger based sauce.

After eating, we went to a coffee shop to eat the cake and have a drink. We had a nice corner area with a low table and padded benches. It turned out that, by chance, I had selected a cake frosted with April’s favorite color—purple. She was thrilled. And she was especially happy to have a cake. This was her first birthday away from her family.

The coffee shop is in the new mall across from Floraland that Megan and I had walked around in July. So, after the family left, April, Dale, and I walked around a bit. There are more stores open now, and more people were walking around. The area near the water park was decorated with Styrofoam pumpkins. “Scary”  music was blasting from the speakers. I’m always amused at what other countries do to celebrate Western holidays and how they often leave them up much longer than we do in the U.S.

Wang Cheng and Peggy both mentioned that November 11 (11-11) is Singles’ Day in China. I’d seen a sign advertising a Singles’ Party, but, of course, the rest was in Chinese; so I didn’t know any details. Both mentioned that there are a lot of sales on this day. Peggy compared it to Black Friday. She said people were hustling to make Internet purchases to take advantage of the big discounts.

One day when I was sitting on a bench outside the library, as I do sometimes, a student joined me so she could communicate with me. (They always say “communicate,” not “talk.”) When she looked at the book I was reading and noticed that it was about China, The book is about a woman’s experiences volunteering in an orphanage from 2003-2007. When she didn’t understand the brief description on the cover, I explained that uneducated people, especially in rural areas, sometimes gave up their girl children because they wanted their one child to be a boy. She said that her grandparents don’t like her because she’s a girl, but her parents love her. The grandparents also don’t like her mother. We talked about how younger, educated people have changed their ideas and don’t always follow the old traditions.

Wednesday evening I went to yoga class with thirty students who I realized are 45 years younger than I. That’s hard to imagine. A pleasant surprise when I arrived is that the teacher speaks English well. I hadn’t thought about language when I signed up to join the class. (I did this on the day when various clubs were recruiting about a month ago.) She included instructions in English for me occasionally, which was quite nice. The music playing when we arrived sounded like music I’ve heard before in yoga classes, and it felt comfortable to have familiar music in the room. The class was good, and I was pleased that I was able to do everything they did even though I did shorten the time a few times. Participating in a class stretches me. I’m glad I went and will return each week.

Thursday and Friday were Sports Days; so no classes those days. Teachers’ events were on Thursday. Yang had invited us to sign up, and I signed up to do the 30 meter run carrying a tennis ball. She thought that meant carrying the ball on a plate, but I learned Thursday morning that the tennis ball is carried on a racket. 

I went to the opening ceremony to see how they are done in China. It was very formal with groups of students wearing various outfits marching in step into the stadium. No costumes like in Thailand. Interestingly, after the opening ceremony, they all left and didn’t stay for the competitions.

When the competitions started, I went down to the field and enjoyed watching and chatting with some of the teachers who were in my class last year. Many students greeted me when they saw me, which was also nice. It was a good visibility opportunity. I also took photos for the other foreign teachers and Peggy. Fortunately, the temperature was a little higher than it had been for a couple days; so standing around outside was pleasant. My event was after the lunch break. I was happy that I made it the whole 30 meters without dropping the ball. Then I decided I’d watched enough sports and returned home.

Friday was essentially a day off. I thought about going to see what was happening in the afternoon, but April went in the morning and reported that the events finished at 11:00. For many students both days were days off, as they didn’t participate or go to watch the competitions. Back to full weeks of classes next week—for four to six weeks, depending on when they decide we will have our final exams.