Fun Times and Huangshi High....

NEW LIFE, NEW FOODS....

So every time our friend Diana takes us out to eat, its always an adventure. Last week she took us for Korean BBQ...can't say I've had that before! For the most part it was pretty good besides the salty neon green apples. Anyway I had to document the fact that I ate octopus for the first time!!! Thats right, tiny little squishy sea creatures! They tasted pretty good but I just couldn't get over the texture and the fact that I was eating tentacles...yuck! 

A close up of the bbq'd octupus! Diana is taking us for lunch again tomorrow! Can't wait to see what I'll be trying next!

I NEED A PUPPY!!!!

Every Saturday, theres a puppy sale on one of the streets by our house so of course this is where I will be every Saturday for the rest of the year! In this one area there were probably 50 or so puppies of all kinds and they were so darn cute, I just couldn't resist petting them all! I even got to hold that fluffy, cuddly white one! I was so in love my I thought my heart would burst!! Poor Camille has had to listen to me whine about wanting a Chinese puppy for days now! Its kind of sad though because there were so many and I don't know what happens to them if no one buys them! There were some adorable tiny kittens too!

We also got to hang out with some students for the first time this past weekend! One student, Cecilia took us site- seeing and bike riding around the lake. It was such a beautiful, sunny day...a rare thing amongst the cloudy smoggy days in China! It was so much fun biking, exploring, floating in giant bubbles on the water! Sorry there are no pictures of that one, just use your imagination! There were also opportunities to bring up IMPORTANT topics for the first time, something I've been itching to do for weeks but had to patient and wait for the right time! It was nothing big, but its a start, a foot in the door, and it was all the encouragement I needed to keep on going for 9 months.

Camille and I with one of our students, Cecilia. She took us back to her house after biking so that we could meet her parents and her cat and then they took us out for dinner! She is such a sweet girl and is so excited that we hung out with her, that she made me the background picture of her cell phone! 

Camille and I with Cecilia's parents! 

THE JOYS OF TEACHING! 

This past week I brought my camera with me to school to take pictures of every student with their English name because I am determined to know every single one of their names....all 500 of them! This is one of my Grade 1 classes (class 5), probably the most fun class that I teach! 

This is the other side of the room for Class 5! I told them to be silly and this is what happened! 

This is one of my favorite students! His name is MJ for Michael Jackson and he is the class clown! When I brought my camera, he asked if he could take a picture with me, which a lot of students have asked before, so I said sure! But he meant on my camera so that I could have it! How sweet of him :)

Some of my students on the day I took their pictures with their English names. It is funny because they are shy and usually tried to cover their face with their name, completely defeating the purpose of my pictures! If I was able to get them to lower the paper, they would usually turn their head away or fall into uncontrollable fits of laughter! Some of them also have very interesting English names like Zin (who is awesome at English and helps to translate a lot for me in this class), Belieber (for Justin Bieber of course),  Bloody Toxic, Monkey d. Luffy, Seventeen, October, OhYe, Kobe Bryant, Lebron James,  James Bond and the list could go on and on. Lester turned out to be a very popular boy name, because it can be found in their english books on a lesson about how southern people talk differently! I love it because Lester is my dad's name and they get so embarrassed when I tell them this! 

Two friends named Moon and Sky. 

More of my students who asked to take a picture with me on my camera. These boys are smart and are pretty good at English but sometimes are my troublemakers!! Their names are Raymond , Super Man, Spider Man, and Vernon.

Who doesn't love receiving mail?

So Last week Camille and I received four packages from home, from our mommys of course, and it was like Christmas day in our apartment!!! We were freaking out over granola bars, macaroni n' cheese, pop tarts, American candy, and other necessities like deodorant!! It got me thinking.....maybe some of you would like to mail me a letter or something because I would love that!!! So old school and what a fun surprise and pick-me-up from all the people I love in the States! So just in case you get bored one day and think of me, here is my school's address where you can send letters!



Huangshi Experimental High School
44 Tianjui Lu
Huangshi Gang District
Huangshi, Hubei PRC 435000


And if you want me to mail you a letter or a postcard from China, shoot me your address and I promise to figure out how to mail stuff asap! 

I'm a bloggin' slacker :)

Nihao friends and fam!!!
I have been living in China for a MONTH!!! Man, time really flies!

I know I am slacking on my blog...as a few friends were kind enough to point out this week! So heres whats happened in the last couple of weeks in the crazy life of China!

We celebrated my friend, Dawn's birthday. She is the very first Chinese friend I made when I moved here!! And she is one of the sweetest, most helpful, Father loving girls I have ever met! Seriously, Dawn is our go-to native to help us with things like ordering food and getting us gym memberships. She rocks and we were so excited to celebrate her! 

This is Dawn at her birthday party at the Randall's apartment! The Randall's are a foreign couple that live in Huangshi with three of their daughters! They are awesome also! Dawn did all the cooking for her own party because she is quite the amazing chef!! She even made pizza for us!

Oh yea!!!! Homemade birthday cake (decorated with fruit rollups and m&ms) and banana bread! so yummy!

Birthday girl in the princess crown opening all of her gifts! What a fun party! We sang happy birthday in English and then again in Chinese. Well, I just listened for the Chinese part!

WUHAN FRIENDS ACTUALLY CAME TO HUANGSHI! SCORE!

These are some fellow ZR teachers who live in Wuhan that came to visit us during National Holiday. Mandi, who is also from Baton Rouge, Nathan M., Melodie, from Texas (we really love having some southern girls on the team with us...we have a whole different lifestyle than other people!), Rebecca, who teaches with some of the ZR teachers at the university in Wuhan. She is from England/France, and Nathan T. 

While they were here we went to KTV for the first time!!!! This is karaoke and it was a blast! This is a shot of the girls being silly right before we went in to sing our hearts out! You get your own room and you can control the music yourself so we had a ton of backstreet boys, spice girls, katy perry....all the good stuff!

The boys being silly before karaoke time!

Chelsie belting it out all night! She was fabulous!

Camille and Melodie singing!! These girls were so entertaining!

Nathan M. and Aaron singing Backstreet Boys!! This was priceless! Tell me why......

Dawn and Kevin singing to High School Musical!

Paul actually singing! This was a once in a lifetime moment for us! Kevin wasn't really diggin all the loud poppy music! I think his face says it all!

We found a delicious waffle place close to our apartment for breakfast! After this, we had to take pictures with some of the workers!

Delicious food and strange toilets to sit on! What a great breakfast!

Rebecca, Chelsie, and Camille enjoying their waffles and toilet time!

Me, Melodie and Mandi! I don't even know!

Kevin and Aaron being silly!

CHINESE WEDDING!

The traditional wedding color in China is red. After the ceremony, when the bride and groom toast everyone, the bride changes into a red dress.

Chelsie, Camille and I got to attend a wedding last week for one of the teacher's at Chelsie's  school. It was quite an interesting experience and we were happy to be invited! Their weddings take place in the middle of the week because it only lasted and hour and a half and they served dinner. From what I understand, the couple gets married before and this ceremony is for friends and family to come together and celebrate the marriage. The wedding was more like a show than the kind of ceremonies we are used to with loud music, a host/mc/ ryan seacrest wannabe, bubbles, sparklers, and so many more crazy things! The videographer made us stop as we were walking in so that she could run up in front of us and film the foreigners' grand entrance. Then she proceeded to follow us to our table and get individual close ups of each of our faces! Those poor people don't even know me and I'm all over their wedding video! The music also switched to English when we walked in...how convenient! It was fun to see some of their traditions such as having their parents come up to the stage at the end and giving them tea. In return, the parents give them a whole bunch of money!! As everyone eats dinner, the couple goes to each table and toasts them, about 30 tables of toasts!