Things are looking up!

This afternoon I made it to my class and back to the bus without getting lost or wandering around. I also didn't spend all the time on the bus wondering whether I was on the correct bus or whether I was going to end up some strange place and not know what to do.

You may ask why I was teaching classes on Saturday. Next Wednesday is National Day and so the University has a whole week without classes. However, there is a catch. Monday and Tuesday aren't part of the National Holiday so all the Monday and Tuesday classes got switched to the Saturday and Sunday before. Therefore I had two classes today. Following is a picture of the flowers planted at one of the University gates because of the National Holiday.

Last night Bob arranged a birthday party for me. Three other couples went with us out to a French restaurant called "Les 5 Sens" for supper. The food was very good and they even had salt and pepper and napkins on the table.

The University Administration Building

Convocation Hall

The original classroom at the University of Nanjing

This building contains the offices for the Faculty of Law

The building where Bob's office is located is now posted on his one entry on this blog.

Tomorrow we will be leaving for our "Silk Road Trip" so we will be away from our computers for a week. We may find an internet cafe somewhere along the way - who knows!

Dr. Pepper in Nanjing

Bob walked over to a store that carries foreign goods and found some Dr. Pepper and some American chocolate bars. Ummmm

It has cooled down!

Last night was the first night we have had the windows open and a cool breeze blowing through the apartment. Yesterday we only had the air conditioner on for a few hours in the afternoon. We have had quite a bit of rain - mostly during the night. Two nights ago we had thunder and it was loud, loud loud.

We now have our work visa and are legal in the country until July 30. We just heard today that one couple in our group got to Beijing and was sent right back to the US. They had to go through the visa process all over again and just got back to the PRC this week. I am not sure if I understand the problem, but it might have been that they didn't have a marriage certificate with them.

This week I got the rest of my teaching assignment. I have six two hour classes per week: History and Culture of the British Isles, one class of "Oral English" and four classes of "Listening and Speaking". I am not sure that I understand the distinction between the last two.

National Day Reception

Wednesday evening all foreigners in the city were invited to a reception to celebrate the 59th anniversary of the founding of the People's Republic of China. The university took a bus load of us out to the Friendship Hotel for the reception and it was a posh affair. I even liked the food. Did you know it is possible to eat jello with chopsticks?

The decorations were amazing. There were ice statues in the shape of birds and melons made to look like birds. Notice the pointsettas all along the stage.

I see my mother in the above picture.

These were three of the waitresses in their fancy uniforms.

Trial by Taxi

Last Tuesday evening Connie and I took a taxi out to meet with a group of ladies. The taxi driver spoke no English and we spoke no Chinese. We did have a map and the taxi got us as far as a hotel 2 blocks away from where we were going and the doorman at the hotel explained to him where we wanted to go. The driver was in and out of lanes, came up quickly behind other vehicles and jambed on the brakes and stopped inches away. I wonder how many accidents there are in Nanjing.

What about that myth about clothes hung out to dry on the line - they smell good? I had forgotten how wrinkly the clothes get when they are hung out to dry. I have even taken to ironing the sheets off the bed. Has anyone else ironed a fitted sheet?

This week in Nanjing

The roof in the picture is quite fascinating. It is made from logs which are bent upward towards the bottom. It can bee seen from our bedroom window and is the conference center and maybe a hotel for the University of Nanjing.

Pedestrians do not have the right of way in China. Bicycles, scooters, cars and buses have the right of way. The bigger the vehicle the more of the right of way it has. Buses just nose out in the middle of traffic and go. I've seen pictures of people standing on the line down the middle of a city street and today I experienced this. People cross wherever on the streets. It is a scary feeling.

We went to the police station today to get our work permit so we can stay in China. Our visas expire at the end of the month. They kept our passports and will get them back to us in about 5 days. We hope we get them back in time to go on our Silk Road Vacation on the 28th. Our friends had to go to the US consulate in Shanghai today because her passport didn't have an empty page for her visa and they wouldn't give her a work permit. They took the train to Shanghai. It took two hours but the consulate put more pages in her passport and they got back with no problem.

We got paid. The university opened a bank account for us and deposited our pay into it. I went to the bank machine to withdraw some money and the bank machine I tried to use was broken and it took my card and I couldn't get it out. A kind young man who could speak some English went and knocked on a door and got me some help and eventually I got my card back and was able to use it in a machine that was working. Luckily there is a button labeled English, so I had no problem figuring it out.

I have an office on campus

Friday night at the banquet for the foreign teachers I was given the key to my office, The office is located at the other end of the campus and is in an old building, probably about my age. I'll have to go and see what my office looks like some time.

This the the building that my office is in - room 203

Long Week-end

Today (Sunday) is Mid-Autumn Day and because it falls on Sunday everyone gets a day off on Monday. It is like a combined FamilyDay/Thanksgiving.

Mid-autumn Day- Lunar Calendar, August 15th. i.e. September
15, 2008 
This day is also called the Moon Festival. The moon is round,
so it symbolizes the reunion of a family. A time for family
get-together.

When families are separated the members wherever they are look at the moon to remember each other. So family members, please look at the sky on Sunday night! We'll be thinking of you all. Mid-Autumn Day is also a time to be thankful for the harvest.

Friday there was a meeting for all the new foreign teachers. We were given a little background about the University and a member of the police department came and talked about laws that affected foreigners in China (e.g. visa regulations) and gave tips on how to be safe in China. There are foreign teachers from the US, Columbia, Germany, Korea, Japan, Russia, and Australia as well as other countries.

Saturday we were taken on a tour of Nanjing - another long Saturday. That morning a bus picked us up here on campus at 8:00 a.m.

We first went to Zhongshan Mountain National Park, a huge park right in the middle of the city. We only went to two of the sites in the park - Dr. Sun Yat-sen's Mausoleum and the Ming Tomb.

Dr. Sun Yat-sen led the 1911 Revolution which defeated the Qing Dynasty. Dr. Sun was from Beijing, but the mausoleum site was recommended to him by the abbot of Linggu Temple for its good omen and he wanted his remains buried here.

This site consists of a gateway, tablet pavilion, memorial and the tomb vault built up the "mountain" connected by 392 stairs. Here is a picture of Bob and me at the gate. (We won't show a picture of how we looked after the 392 stairs. Actually I didn't go up the last hundred steps because it was so hot and humid and I preferred to rest.)


Here is a picture of the top.


We then went to the site of the Ming Tomb. We never did get to the tomb itself, but saw the Square Castle tablet pavilion, now roofless, which has a huge tablet on the back of a dragon. The tablet extols the virtues of the emperor. Only the bottom of the tablet is showing in the following picture.


We also walked the Sacred Way before time constraints took us back to our bus. All along the Sacred Way (the walk that led to the tomb) were various statues of animals and people. Each statue had significance in protecting the Emperor. There were four of each animal. Two of each kind were standing and that meant they were on duty. The kneeling ones were off duty.


Lunch (again a fancy banquet) at the best seafood restaurant in Nanjing followed.

The next stop was the Presidential Palace. Some of the occupiers were rulers in the Ming Dynesty (600 years ago), the Viceroy of Jiangnan and Jiangxi during the Quing Dynasty, the headquarters of the Taiping (about 1850) and in 1949 the PLA occupied the building complex.


And here is a view of modern Nanjing taken from the Presidential Palace.

Here is a picture of the library:

Between 1366 and 1386 a wall was built around the city of Nanjing. Most of the wall remains today. Some of it is as high as a five story building and was 33.687 kilometers around the city. These days it is a tourist attraction and a fee is charged for anyone to go up the wall.

Top of the wall

A view over the wall

We visited one more place but by then I couldn't take in any more. It was a temple in the middle of a shopping district and I think we saw half of the 8 million people who live in Nanjing.

The day ended with supper at another restaurant. I don't know how many dishes they served, but it was far too many!

Maybe I could mention the difference between Peking Duck and Nanjing Duck. Peking Duck is roasted and Nanjing Duck is salted. They make a big fuss about serving Nanjing Duck.

Campus Views

This is the gate to the courtyard where we live in the light coloured building. The building to the left is the reception area to our building. If we come in after 10:oo pm we have to wake up the night watchman in the reception area to let us in. The pink building is outside of our courtyard.

Yesterday we attended our BYU Sunday meetings. We meet in a hotel basement just outside the campus wall. There are only a couple of families that live here permanently. There are four couples on the BYU China Teachers program. There were about 70 people there. Many are students on the BYU student program and will be here for three months. Some are on a program from the US called the Flag Program. There was a group of girls who are teaching at an elementary school a couple of hours away and they were able to get here.

Today was my second class of History and Culture of the British Isles. I managed to get to my classroom with no problem. One of the boys suggested that history is boring and we needed more culture such as football (soccer) and music. I guess I will learn something about soccer.

When I left my class and tried to get to the bus I got totally lost. I wandered around the building and couldn't find my way and finally I went outside and walked around the building. It was pretty stressful, but I finally found the bus just in time for it to leave.

Today it was 29 degrees celsius, but the humidity is very high and it seems like you are in a steam bath when you go out. By the time I got home I was feeling sick, tired and hot, so I went to bed and after a few hours I felt fine again.

I am now on vacation for two weeks. Next Monday is the Moon Celebration and classes are cancelled. I only have one class until the first years finish their military training and I won't know for a while which classes I will have when they get back to regular classes.

I don't know what the Moon Celebration is about although they are selling moon cakes in the stores now.

A Long Saturday

Sometime last week the facilitator of the Faculty of Applied Foreign Studies called me and also called Connie, the other BYU teacher in the Applied Foreign Studies department at Nanju U. She asked if we would be willing to do a presentation on teaching English as a foreign language to some teachers. It was to be this past Saturday. We agreed and she asked if our husbands would also help. We were to do a presentation and then be shown some of the local sites.

Then she had the person arranging this presentation call to finalize the arrangements. It turned out that it wasn't here at Nanjing U, but at Gaoyou some two hours away and it wasn't only teachers but also high school students. We got together and planned what we would do and then were called again and our plans were changed. On Friday night it had been worked out that Bob, Connie, and I were each to do two one hour classes to grade ten and twelve students. Connie's husband was to do one class and then a presentation to teachers. Another teacher from Australia was also coming along.

We were picked up on Saturday morning at 6:45 am and driven to Gaoyou in a mini van .

We stopped at a rest stop along the way and I got my first glimpse of "squats". I did a quick walk through the ladies restroom and decided that I wasn't ready for that.

At about 9:15 we arrived at the school. It had a big front gate and a driveway up to the school. There were flags lining the driveway and a delegation of teachers and a sort of guard of honour made up of students. We were presented with huge bouquets of flowers and photographers were there to take our pictures. As we walked up the driveway we could see hundreds of students on the balconies of the four story school (all in school jackets). They were waving and cheering. Over 3,500 students attend that school. We were shocked at our reception.

When the photographers were finished we were taken to our classrooms. My first class went well. The students had prepared questions and were eager to speak. We were told that we were the first foreign teachers some of the students had ever seen. There were around sixty students in each class. It was amazing how well they spoke.

When the class was over I was conducted to my next class and it was a group of teachers. I protested that it wasn't me that was supposed to do this class, but they insisted it was. It was terrible as I was totally unprepared. I couldn't think of anything, so I did idioms most of the hour.

Bob had an interesting thing happen. A girl in one of his classes came up to him and told him she had a friend in Lethbridge who attends Mike Mountain Horse middle school. Most of the Chinese we talk to haven't even heard of Calgary or Banff. Some have heard of Niagara Falls or Vancouver or Toronto.

After the classes we were presented with fancy certificates written in Chinese so we don't know what they say.

We were taken to a hotel for lunch. They had arranged rooms for us to have a nap in. (People here close down their offices from noon to 2:00 pm and have naps in them.) We did talk them out of the naps and went right to lunch only it wasn't lunch. It was a fancy banquet. More and more food was brought in. The vice-principal of the school and some of the area education officials were there. The vice-mayor of the city dropped in. We were served such delicacies as turtle soup, crayfish, crab, jellied duck eggs. I had a very hard time as I don't like seafood. They did serve some good beef and delicious noodles.

Some of the dishes

There were many, many toasts and we continually had to jump up for these. Finally the food quit coming and we were able to leave.

We were then taken to a museum in a very old posthouse ( built in 1375). It was right on the banks of the Grand Canal (which was built to move wheat and other commodities between Beijing and Hangzhou). The oldest parts of the Grand Canal date back to the 5th century BC. Many barges are still in use on the canal.

This tower was built between the Grand Canal and the posthouse.

From Gaoyou we went to Zangzhou. They had several places they wanted to show us, but it was getting late and we wanted to get back to Nanjing, so we compromised and visited Daming Temple which was built between 457 and 464 AD.

We finally arrived back at our apartment about 8:00 pm. It was suggested to us that we make this a weekly event, but we thought that was a little much - maybe one day in the spring.

First Day of Classes

My first class was Monday morning at 8:00 am. - History and culture of the British Isles to sophomore students! We live on the Gu Lou campus and teach on the Pu Kou campus, which means close to an hour on the bus to get to our classroom (after a mile walk to the bus stop). Monday morning I left at 6:30 a.m to catch the 7:00 a.m. bus and got to class just in time. Luckily I still have jet lag and wake up at 3:00 am every morning, so six doesn't seem too early.

There were 24 students in the class and they all spoke English quite well. They know a lot about British History. I didn't have enough material prepared.

The classes are two hours long and once a week.

My other classes will all be for first year students, but they are away at military training and won't be back until the 25th September.

Our Apartment

The living room.

Bedroom Computer room - The internet connection is here, so we can't use the spare bedroom as a computer room.

Guestroom

Kitchen

I like the doors.

See our washing machine - a little taller than the tub. It works.

View from our balcony

There is a very small courtyard between us and other buildings. Everyone hangs out their clothes to dry on the balconies or on lines from the balconies.

Where is Nanjing?

Look left








We have been asked about the location of Nanjing. I thought everyone knew where Nanjing was, but probably I have only known the location for a couple of months myself.

Nanjing is close to the east coast of China on the Yangtze River. It is about two hours by train from Shanghai. ( about halfway down on the above map).

For all you want to know about Nanjing (and probably much more than you want to know here is a link: http://www.chinapages.com/jiangsu/nanjing/nj_intr.htm