Back To Qian Ling Park.

Sunday 9th September 2012

Today was a chamily day. This morning we went to Qian Ling Park again. It is breathtakingly beautiful. We got a lift half way to the park with BD's, one of the boys, dad. Seven of us were crammed into is five person car. Really legit. I felt so safe...

 Sam and his mother met us outside the park, and then we paid, well Chum paid for me, the equivalent of 50p. It is definitely worth that! After being in the park for less than ten minutes, some random old man came up to me and started speaking to me in fluent English. I was bombarded with questions, and he presented me with a music sheet. He wanted me to sing in front of at least fifty people. This was not going to happen. Unfortunately he was not taking no for an answer, and he started getting a bit angry with me. I didn't know what to do! Luckily, at this point my chum saw my distress and told him where to stick it! Well she said something in Chinese that made him leave me alone!

From left to right:
Lory, BD, me, Sam, Linda

We then had another trauma; I stubbed my toe. Well, I didn't realise I stubbed my toe, I just happened to see it was bleeding! I asked Lory of her mum happened to bring any plasters with her it really wouldn't stop bleeding, to which everybody started acting like I needed my toe amputating! They bandaged me up with tissues, which did nothing, but it's the thought that counts right? I was just worried that the monkeys might be feral and the scent of my blood will trigger a group attack! I'm not even joking, that was a genuine concern of mine. 

We managed to find an area where they had a few rides, like in Hebin Park. We went on the bumper cars again. I was driving, and Lory was holding on for dear life. I don't think she could handle my extreme speed...

We carried on walking up the path and eventually we spotted some monkeys! It was so weird to see them in the wild, just like we see squirrels running around Bournemouth Gardens. Crazy! Loads of people were feeding them, you can buy little packets of nuts for about 10p from various stalls dotted about the park. One old lady had bought a bottle of water and fed a monkey like it was a baby!

We then continued up some steps where we found to casual camels just chilling at the top. China is very random. You could pay to sit on them and have a photo, but they looked flea ridden and just generally ill, so I didn't want to get close enough to touch!

Lory then asked me if I wanted to feed the birds. I thought why not and let him do it! I felt like the lady from Mary Poppins! The birds were landing on my hands and even my head! It was such a weird experience, but pretty cool! Loads of random people took photos of me, it was weird I felt like a celebrity! A couple of people even made me have photos with their children! Apparently it's good luck for a child to have a photo with a westerner or something... 

We then continued up the mountain to a temple, there were so many Buddhas, it was absolutely stunning. Unfortunately, you are not allowed to take any photos in the temple area, but I took some before and after I went in! At the back of the temple, there is a wall where you close your eyes and have to stick your hand out in front of you and try and touch the metal circle in the middle. If you manage it then apparently you have good luck for the rest of your life! After a few tries, I managed it! Yay!

That's the wall I was chatting about.

 

We then went to Dicos for lunch, before going home for a nice two hour rest. Not that I needed it! Lory set me up a 'QQ' account, which is China's equivalent of twitter and Facebook. It is all in Chinese, but it's retry similar to twitter, so I could just guess what I had to press!

We then went to the cinema to see Batman, obviously my chamily are fond of superhero movies! Lory bought popcorn, and it was genuinely the nicest tasting popcorn I have ever had in my life.

Chad then came and joined us I hadn't seen him since the welcome ceremony day!, and he took us down a really dodgy looking street, where Lory told us we were getting food. There were a lot of super dodgy looking street food stalls, that I felt like you could get food poisoning from just looking at them. Thankfully, we went into little restaurant, so tucked out of the way you would miss it unless you knew it was there! 

In this restaurant, you basically picked the meat and the vegetables you want, and they bring it all out in separate bowls. You then have a cooker in the middle of the table and use chopsticks to put in what you fancy and you cook it up yourself! It was a lot nicer than I've made it sound.

You Are My Sunshine.

Tuesday 6th September 2012

When I got to CC English school today, we stayed as a whole group which made a nice change! However, we were told we had to introduce ourselves to a group of over 100 teachers who were here for the teacher awards ceremony. This was the first we were hearing of this. Underprepared was an understatement. It was embarrassingly awkward, we all stood on stage in a long line, said our name and had to say a fact about ourselves. Then we stood there in silence for a while before William bailed us out and we left the stage! Not the best start to the day, but never mind!

We then went back to a classroom with Sunshine, who was to be our trainer. This is probably a good point to note that we were told that the Chinese people were  allowed to choose their own 'English names', rather than using their real names, or a direct translation. Most of the people we met picked either a celebrity's name, or something that they particularly liked. Obviously Sunshine was rather partial to hot weather.To start off our session, Sunshine made us all sing 'You Are My Sunshine' with actions. Luckily this was a group activity so nobody was singled out and made to sing on the spot yet! 

We then were taught a game called 'Blow Wind Blow', in which a group of people stand in a circle around one person. The person in the middle says 'blow wind blow', the others reply 'blow what' and then the person will say something like 'blow on the boys' or 'blow if you have black hair'. If you are or have what the person in the middle says, you have to swap places with someone else in the circle who also has what the person in the middle says, and the person in the middle has to try and get in a space. If you are left in the middle, then you lose that round and it is your turn to say 'blow wind blow' but if you are left in the middle you have to do a forfeit. You can choose what you want to do, however it has to be a form of dancing, singing or acting. I realise that probably doesn't make any sense at all, but it's really hard to write down how you play the game, it's much easier to demonstrate... but I'm not doing that! I had a couple of close shaves, but I didn't have to do a forfeit thank goodness!

I was then chosen to be the facilitator, and I had to teach the game to everyone! Luckily, I explained it better than I have done in the previous paragraph. And it also helped that everyone else knew how to play anyway. 

We then split into two teams to do a photo scavenger hunt.  A few of the things we had to do included sliding down the slide in Kindergarten, doing a handstand, dressing up in CC uniform and standing behind the main desk. It was good fun!

After this, we were taught a dance to the 'Cupid Shuffle' which is pretty basic and very repetitive, but quite fun! When we had learnt the dance, we were told by William that we were going to perform it at the teacher awards ceremony in the afternoon! No pressure... Georgia and Hamish were selected to do a solo bit at the start of the dance, however Georgia couldn't cope with the pressure and I had to take her place doing it! Thanks a bunch Georgia! Being a great choreographer and all, William thought it would be a brilliant idea if I took Hamish's sunglasses, walk across the stage and put them on his head, and, to top it all off, give him a high five. Wow. I felt like I should've had an award or something.

By this time we were absolutely starving, so we went into the restaurant on the floor below and ordered the Californian beef noodles. Unfortunately for Emma and Hamish, their order went wrong, so they had to wait until after the performance to get their food! 

The performance went better than expected, none of us really did anything wrong in particular! After we did our dance, Sam, Ollie, Georgia, James, Ben and I had to read out sentences about the TIP camps the the teachers would have the opportunity to attend. My card said 'Walk and talk keeps you speaking English whilst walking'. What a tough line. 

We then went back to the restaurant so Emma and Hamish could finally have their meal! When they had finished, we had to do 'momo', story reading and reflection. By this point, I thought I had lost my iPod touch. This was particular stressful as it had all the photo's I had taken on it so far. I kicked up such a fuss about it, I can be such a drama queen,  that  some random CC English staff member took Georgia and I back down to the restaurant to look for it. Thankfully, Georgia found it underneath the table we were sitting at. I would seriously lose my brain if it wasn't stuck inside my head. By the time we got back, the training had basically finished, so I didn't really have a clue what we were supposed to be doing!

We finish dover an hour early, so we decided to have a look around the city for a bit to get our bearings. Hamish and I went on a hunt for proper toilets, as my legs aren't up for continual squatting, I need comfort! We came across a massive hotel with a posh shopping centre attached to it, selling designer makes that were well out of our price range. So much for things being a lot cheaper here!The toilets were amazing. They were seats, and they were clean. I never thought I would be so grateful to see a toilet before in my life. 

When I got home to my chamily, by now they trusted me enough to get the bus on my own. I'm such a big girl. We had dinner, and went to Qian Ling Park, which we ended up referring to as 'the monkey park'. I was very excited about this, as a couple of the others had been there and said they saw quite a few monkeys just chilling in the wild. However, as it was quite late by the time we got there, Lory told me that it was because the monkeys go up into the mountains to sleep when it gets dark, so I wouldn't see them. But they promised to take me again in the day! Yay!