China: YEAR TWO!

Lesley Goes to China: ROUND TWO!

Hello dearest friends and family! I am back in China full swing for year two. I can’t believe its only been 2 weeks so far. We have been so busy these days that it feels like much more than that!

Mostly, we have been trying to get settled in and readjusted to life here, but it has been crazy from the very moment we landed in China. First off, on our flight from Shanghai to Wuhan, Camille and I wound up sitting next to the only other two foreigners on the plane and guess where they are from! Just guess! They are from Louisiana! What are the odds? They are both studying in Wuhan and were returning from their summer home in the states just like us! This kind of thing happens to us all the time, we are strangely always running into people from Louisiana and it is always such a Blessing to us!

We landed at midnight and our wonderful boss, Diana, picked us up from the airport and drove us back to Huangshi, a two-hour drive. Diana insisted on taking us to get something to eat when we got back so we ate street food at 3 in the morning! I couldn’t even make it one night without Chinese food and my stomach did not appreciate such a fast switch into China mode!

At the Lafayette airport wearing our panda neck pillows...those are cool in China, I swear! There were so many tears this day. I'm sure people were confused why these two girls were crying so much just to go to Dallas, only the first stop of many to get to China! 

All of the wonderful family who came to see me off for year 2!

I think that this year will be a lot easier than last year, because I have learned so much more about the culture and language since moving here. But there are still many changes. One of the biggest changes is that our school has moved. I am still teaching at the same school, it just has a new name (Huangshi No. 1 High School) and a new location. The school is brand new and incredibly huge, but it is out in the country about a 25-30 minute bus ride from the old school. The school is still under construction, and several parts of it are not ready, including the gymnasium and teacher apartments.

Because the school is so far from the city, and our current home, the school has provided a student dorm room for all of the teachers to use while at school. This means that during the lunch break, I could take a nap there or if I have early classes, I could just sleep at school. Pretty nice, right? Well, don’t get too excited yet! Camille and I have a dorm to ourselves, complete with 6 bunk beds that have a wooden mattress. Did you catch that part? Yes, I mean a literal plank of wood as the mattress! And the bathroom is located outside on the balcony, with a standard eastern style toilet, meaning a squatty potty. But is ok, we are used to that now. The outside bathroom should be pretty interesting experience in the wintertime, eh? I know it sounds pretty rough, but honestly once I got used to it, it really wasn’t so bad. Because I have early morning classes, I usually take the bus at 6:25 or 7:10 in the morning. I'm starting to fee like a real teacher, with these early mornings! I think this week, I will try spending my first night at school to get a break from the bus. I’m actually kind of excited about it! Maybe I’ll just think of it like going to camp!

Camille resting on her uber comfortable wooden bed!

This is our room, but this is exactly what the students' dorms look like. 

Outside bathroom.

SQUATTY POTTY!

Class wise, Camille and I are teaching Senior 1 classes and only the top 3 classes of Senior 2. We are quite disappointed about this because we were hoping to continue teaching our students from last year that are now senior 2.  We really love them and are currently pushing to get a few more classes put on our schedules! I have high hopes that it will happen! This will be my second week of teaching and it was exciting to meet all of the new students. Our former students are used to us now and treat us like normal people, which is fantastic, but the new students who met us for the first time last week were a wee bit excited. They clapped for us when we walked into class and I had to pose for tons of pictures and answer endless questions! The Senior 2 class that I taught last week was so excited to have me as their teacher again, that they lined up in the hallway before class so I would have to walk through them all as they clapped for me! haha it was so funny and slightly embarrassing! But I love them SO MUCH!

One of our offices, on the 5th floor of the teaching building. We actually have TWO offices, not that we need them, but the other one is in the admin building far from the classes. I don't have a picture yet. The school is so big that I hardly use the other office because I get tired of walking across campus. Plus, there are NO elevators so my legs are exhausted from climbing all of the stairs. Most days, I walk up about 30 flights of stairs!

View from my office!

Another from the office. This is library, but it is still under construction.

The gymnasium. Isn't beautiful out here?

The brand new track and field with stadium seats. This is by far the most beautiful campus in Huangshi!

This is an unused classroom. The school is so big that they don't even have enough students to fill up all of the classrooms. 

An unused science lab. They are hoping to have up to 5,000 students here in the future!

A bamboo ladder in the hallway, just a normal sight.

The teaching building where my office is.

Oh you know, just a temple on the mountain right behind the school. The usual!

Floor 1 of the cafeteria.

Floor 2. I will have to show pictures of what it looks like when thousands of students are all in here at one time! Its a zoo!

When we arrived at school for the first time this year, our old students were so excited to see us and we were just as happy to see them! A few students that we had a close relationship with even gave us hugs, which is unusual for Chinese people! Camille and I were thrilled at the display of affection and felt truly loved by the people here. We had both had such a rough time saying goodbye to all of our friends and family for the second time and these hugs made me feel like it was all worth it!  Even amidst all of the craziness that comes with daily life here – the noise, the language barrier, the crazy teaching schedules and bus rides – I still love this place. I know that this is a love that  can only come from the One who sent me here and it fills me with trust for His plan for this year and me! I can’t wait to see what happens! 

Another post coming soon about the day trip we went on with our boss's family!