After teaching classes every day, we get a ride on the school bus to the fruit stand where we then switch over to a bus that takes us back to Kaiyin. Sparky, our dear bus driver at Bond, was playing some pretty sweet tunes today and it made me think of two things. First of all, I’m going to be socially awkward with music in June when I get home. I’ll be like those missionaries who hear a song on the radio and say something like “Oh this is new, I like it,” and then someone has to interrupt by telling them it came out six months ago. I could keep an eye on the billboard charts to stay updated, but I don’t think I really like that kind of music enough to spend the energy on that. Which is when the second idea popped into my head…I should just follow the billboard chart for China. So, I am currently at my flat, having a little cultural lesson. On top-40charts.com.
This brings me to my next point; the namesake of this post. Party in the USA by Miley Cyrus is the #1 song in China right now. Sad enough that the chart topper isn’t in Chinese, but to add to it, it’s about America. I just don’t like that. I don’t know why. Isn’t it enough that American teenage girls are being ruined by our society to not try and ruin Chinese girls too? I’ll get over it eventually.
We started teaching at Bond Kindergarten yesterday! It was a little bit terrifying. The kids are insane and pretty loud, but I’m already trying to figure out if I’ll have enough room in my luggage to smuggle one home with me. I don’t think I could even decide which one I wanted though, I love them all. I try to avoid it, but of course I already have a few favorites. Scott, Matthew, and Honey just melt my heart. And Honey is a boy, just to clarify. Alice is also adorable and always clinging to me. Magnolia is probably up there too. In my home room, I have the “babies” or the pre-schoolers. There are only three but they are a handful. Lisa and Joyce are pretty good about participating (when Lisa isn’t crying so hard she can’t breathe, which happened this morning) and Rain is adorable, but he won’t say anything. He also threw a pretty good sized tantrum this morning. He cried so hard he threw up. I’d be completely embarrassed telling you this if it were caused by my poor teaching, but they came to my class in this state, so I tell in the hopes that it will invoke sympathy….maybe? Ok maybe not. It really hasn’t been too much to handle yet.
After Sparky dropped us off at the fruit stand today, Abby and I decided to go to the One Plus One Supermarket instead of going straight back to Kaiyin. I had to buy a few things for lessons this week so I decided to try and ask someone to help me find them instead of just wasting time browsing. The first was powdered milk. I asked one employee on the far end of the market, we ended up on the other end, surrounded by ten other female employees who were all either trying to help us or just watching for entertainment. My guess would be the latter. They would laugh every time Abby and I opened up our mouths to speak English or Chinese. We finally got some powdered milk but it was in a huge container so I told her “wo yao yi dian dian,” or I want a little bit, and I ended up with a smaller bag, but it was for women. At this point I tried to explain that I am a teacher (wo shi lao shi) so I needed it for children (nan hai zi and nu hai zi). It worked! It was stunning.
We then worked our way to the second floor of the market, where we were hoping to find peanut butter. I ended up getting a hair dryer with some pretty amazing translations on the box. A man asked if he could help us at this point. He asked us where we were from, said we were beautiful, and then covered his face because he was giggling so much following that remark. He wasn’t able to help us find peanut butter.
The bakery was calling as we left the market, so we figured we’d check for some coconut bread. They didn’t have any so we got a loaf that had almonds on it. It was very good but not what we had been hoping for. Unfortunately we ate the whole loaf on the bus ride home. That’s the disgusting part. We will definitely be running later tonight.
As we awaited the bus, we decided to start speaking in Italian/French/Spanish gibberish because we wanted people to think we were from Europe and not America. Safe to say no one there spoke any of those languages because no one looked like anything was weird as we mumbled mashed-together phrases like “Je ne sais pas,” “dove il duomo,” “quanto costa,” “Je t’aime,” “donde esta el bano,” and many other phrases we didn’t understand and/or were probably made up. It was great fun.
Till next time…
My hairdryer box:
“The Quiet Sound Function. Convenient operation, ingenious design, strong power hair dryer. To make your hair more shining, smooth.”
“Water soaks into the core of hair, the hair will be moist all day long. Make your hair smooth and shine with gloss.”
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