The project at Nguyen Dinh Chieu school for the blind was probably the most challenging of all the projects we ran in Hanoi. The school is used to foreign visitors who come in to work with the musically gifted children. This fact was actually the thing that made the project so difficult, as the students found it hard to warm up to us. Furthermore, we lacked huge amounts of musical talent and so found it hard to connect with the children whose whole lives were centred around music. To give you some idea of what its like, the school was never silent: there was invariably a melody from a flute or strumming guitar chords eminating from one of the dormitories.
Our program for Nguyen Dinh Chieu was very similar to the one we used at Friendship House, combining some basic English lessons with creative activities and games. The English lessons were hit both by ability problems (like Friendship House, there was a large ability gap) and also problems trying to make what we were teaching relevant. The bottom group seemed to enjoy the animals lesson (preceeding as it did a trip to the zoo). The middle group, composed mostly of teenage boys, seemed completely uninterested in everything, until we decided to teach them 'How to get a girl.' This lesson, a brain child of Nat and Shaz, involved the hilarious spectacle of a class of 10 students diligently chanting question and response style:
"Did it hurt?"
"What?"
"When you fell from heaven."
The creative activities on the whole worked really well, especially the clay modelling, which appealed even to the profoundly blind students as well as the visually impaired. The games however were almost invariably torpedoed by problems arising from having two groups of students, one fully blind and the other visually impaired. The visually impaired students could with little modification take part in most of the games we had planned. The blind students were limited in as much as we were told they would feel uncomfortable doing any game which had a particularly physical element. As such we had constant difficulties (and arguments) arising from trying to find sufficient games which would work with them. Annoyingly, even games we had planned and agreed as beign suitable were later decided to be unsuitable often on the point of delivering them.
As in Friendship house, we took the students on a day trip, more or less mid way through the week. We were able to take them to Thu Le zoo, which they all seemed to enjoy, not only for the chance to go somewhere beyond the confines of Nguyen Dinh Chieu (most of the blind students live in the school), but also because it gave the students a chance to sit down together with a picnic and sing and dance with each other (accompanied by guitar or Binh's unforgivable party mix!!) After the trip, the students began to warm up to us much more than they had initially. In fact on the first day, we had unwittingly been victims of a practical joke by one of the students who managed to dodge having to speak by feigning an impediment and storming out in a mock tantrum.
The other two activities different from Friendship House were a recording session and a careers talk. The former, we had spent time planning, preparing dialogues, exercises and stories for an oral cassette only to arrive the morning of the recording and be told to read from a picture dictionary. The latter involved us doing short presentations on various inspirational blind figures. We hit on a winner with a brief biography of David Blunkett. One of the students had followed his career with great interest and was able to fill in the blanks of our account. I had to say I felt rather sorry for this guy at the somewhat embarassing recent conduct of his chosen role model.
We finished the week's program with a variety show comprising a rather embarassing OCEP performance of We Go Together with some very talented music performances by the school band and some rather more tone-deaf English songs by the students.
I'm sure reading this, I must sound very negative about this project. I have to confess to feeling that we were unsuited to this type of project. The students at Nguyen Dinh Chieu would have benefitted much more from a musically oriented program. I also often felt that we lacked the experience and training to tailor our acitvities to the blind students. I discovered sometime during the project that the YGCP member who had made the initial organisational arrangements and who had worked at Nguyen Dinh Chieu as a volunteer for sometime, had had to leave the project, so we were missing a valuable resource to help us interact with the students. Despite all this, by the end of the project we had managed to bond with the students and had come someway towards getting to know them a bit better.
Sunday, September 03, 2006
Monday, August 14, 2006
Frienship House 4th July-9th July
The project at Friendship house began on Tuesday with mandatory speech making and by the staff from Friendship House and the British Council. We then started working with the children by doing morning exercises led by the YGCP and some somewhat chaotic ice-breaking games including the mandatory OCEP Hokey-Kokey. The morning session was an exercise in stringing out material and improvisation as we quickly rushed through what we had prepared and found ourselves at a loose end. The second session of the day we spent teaching basic English lesson covering the standard 'About Me' questions.
Once the day had finished we were invited back to Binh's house for dinner and Bia Hoi, where we played several English drinking games and logic puzzles!
The second day we ran rotating lessons, teaching Animals, Household Items and Body Parts, using a string of prompts, cues and games. We had also learnt from the problems of day 1 and were able to divide the classes up into 3 based on ability. The top class cut through the prepared lessons with ease, whilst the lower classes still sruggled somewhat. We were however able to drive home the material with the lower classes and by the time we returned later, the younger students were still able to recall all the different animal names!
In the afternoon we had scheduled a team challenge style activity. This turned out to be an exercise in phenomenal quantities of faff, as we disagreed with the YGCP over how best to organise the afternoon. What should have been a simple rotating games afternoon was split into two parts so that some of the teams could compete in relays against each other. Inevitably groups finished some activities quickly and others took ages, resulting in some teams sitting around with nothing to do whilst others had scarcely started. We finished the evening off by reviewing over coffee.
The 6th July we had planned a day trip to Ho Chi Minh's mausoleum and his stilt house in the grounds of the presidential palace. Despite the stresses of keeping 25 children together in bustling crowds and sweltering heat, the day out was a complete success topped off by taking the children out for ice-cream after the visit. We returned to Friendship House at lunch and in the afternoon we started the children making models from clay. The kids loved this and the activity remained sane and controllable as they enjoyed the novelty of modelling and moulding the clay.
The day after our excursion, we returned to the usual combination of English lessons and activities. The activities included painting the clay form the previous day and decorating the childrens dormitories with materials supplied by the BC.
The final day of the project was a manic string of activities starting at 8AM and only finishing at 8PM. In the morning we taught a clothes lesson which was met with delight by all the students as we got them to put on clothes whilst naming them, and played clothing relay races. The afternoon was dedicated to preparation for a talent show to be held in the evening. The students were split into groups and each had to prepare a song, dance and dress up a child for a fashion show. They were also to compete in an English quiz/race testing them on the week's lessons. Despite tears during the preparation as one of the models became vastly dissatisfied with her dress, the show itself ran smoothly and everyone, including the BC staff seemed to enjoy it!
Once the show was over, we were fed dinner in the orphanage (we had also been taking our lunches there). Once we had eaten, we all gathered with the students in the yard outside and to counter the heat someone made the foolish error of dowsing themself with water. Before long bottles appeared and massive water fight broke out from which no body emerged dry! Finally at about 8PM, we ordered a taxi and dripping left Friendship House.
Leaving the house was a traumatic experience as we watched the kids pressed against the railing tears streaming as we drove away. A sorry sight which was duplicated when we visited them after the end of the camps.
Sunday we had as a day off (and to prepare) before the project a Nguyen Dinh Chieu.
Once the day had finished we were invited back to Binh's house for dinner and Bia Hoi, where we played several English drinking games and logic puzzles!
The second day we ran rotating lessons, teaching Animals, Household Items and Body Parts, using a string of prompts, cues and games. We had also learnt from the problems of day 1 and were able to divide the classes up into 3 based on ability. The top class cut through the prepared lessons with ease, whilst the lower classes still sruggled somewhat. We were however able to drive home the material with the lower classes and by the time we returned later, the younger students were still able to recall all the different animal names!
In the afternoon we had scheduled a team challenge style activity. This turned out to be an exercise in phenomenal quantities of faff, as we disagreed with the YGCP over how best to organise the afternoon. What should have been a simple rotating games afternoon was split into two parts so that some of the teams could compete in relays against each other. Inevitably groups finished some activities quickly and others took ages, resulting in some teams sitting around with nothing to do whilst others had scarcely started. We finished the evening off by reviewing over coffee.
The 6th July we had planned a day trip to Ho Chi Minh's mausoleum and his stilt house in the grounds of the presidential palace. Despite the stresses of keeping 25 children together in bustling crowds and sweltering heat, the day out was a complete success topped off by taking the children out for ice-cream after the visit. We returned to Friendship House at lunch and in the afternoon we started the children making models from clay. The kids loved this and the activity remained sane and controllable as they enjoyed the novelty of modelling and moulding the clay.
The day after our excursion, we returned to the usual combination of English lessons and activities. The activities included painting the clay form the previous day and decorating the childrens dormitories with materials supplied by the BC.
The final day of the project was a manic string of activities starting at 8AM and only finishing at 8PM. In the morning we taught a clothes lesson which was met with delight by all the students as we got them to put on clothes whilst naming them, and played clothing relay races. The afternoon was dedicated to preparation for a talent show to be held in the evening. The students were split into groups and each had to prepare a song, dance and dress up a child for a fashion show. They were also to compete in an English quiz/race testing them on the week's lessons. Despite tears during the preparation as one of the models became vastly dissatisfied with her dress, the show itself ran smoothly and everyone, including the BC staff seemed to enjoy it!
Once the show was over, we were fed dinner in the orphanage (we had also been taking our lunches there). Once we had eaten, we all gathered with the students in the yard outside and to counter the heat someone made the foolish error of dowsing themself with water. Before long bottles appeared and massive water fight broke out from which no body emerged dry! Finally at about 8PM, we ordered a taxi and dripping left Friendship House.
Leaving the house was a traumatic experience as we watched the kids pressed against the railing tears streaming as we drove away. A sorry sight which was duplicated when we visited them after the end of the camps.
Sunday we had as a day off (and to prepare) before the project a Nguyen Dinh Chieu.
Saturday, August 12, 2006
Arrival in Hanoi 27th June - 3rd July
I departed from Heathrow for KL on the 27th June, having met up albeit briefly with Tom Peachey (one of the OCEPpers in Hanoi) in the departure lounge. The flight was overnight to Kuala Lumpar and then on to Hanoi a few hours later. During my stopover, I discovered from Thao Nguyen, the director in Ho Chi Minh City, that she would not be able to direct, something that had been on the cards for a few days but had taken this long to confirm. The plane for the second leg was delayed by a few hours giving me a little time to explore the confines of KL airport.
I arrived in Hanoi a few hours later than expected and was taken to Classic Hotel where the BC had put us up for the duration of the camps. Everybody else had arrived previously and were already more or less settled. Minh, our Vietnamese manager met us at the hotel and took us out for Pho on the south side of Hoan Kiem lake.
Pho is a traditional Vietnamese breaksfast dish that like favourite breakfasts the world over can be consumed whenever and whereever. It is basically a broth with rice noodles, meat, bean sprouts, veg and mint leaves, seasoned with lime juice. A delicious combination- definitely one of the better bits of Vietnamese food I've been introduced to.
The following day we had to go down to the BC offices, situated in a very plush annex of one of Hanoi's 5-star hotels. The BC have a language school, library and net cafe downstairs, all adorned with posters and pictures advertising the UK, whilst upstairs they have a UK style office floor.
This was our chance to meet the YGCP volunteers who were making up the Vietnamese side of the project. The YGCP is a Glocbal citizenship programme run by the BC (and curiously and regretably, I believe, now abandonned), which aims to equip young people with skills in working across cultures. The YGCP had put in a lot of effort planning and executing the leg work for the community projects which were to make up the first two weeks of our time in Hanoi. We spent the morning getting to know each other (YGCP and OCEP) and starting to work through the plan for the Friendship House Orphanage. We were taken to the orphanage itself to look around and help with the planning.
This meeting involved sitting round a table exchanging pleasantries and smiles across the language barrier. The Grandmother of the house welcomed us, offered us tea and explained about Friendship House and the way the orphanage worked. Basically they have just over 20 children in the house ranging from 8-17years old. They are composed of orphans and children whose parents have been jailed, often for drug related crimes. They are in turn cared for by a number of Mothers who also come from difficult backgrounds. The mothers live in the orpahange and constantly work with the children. Friendship house has an astonishing success rate in as much as several of its alumni have subsequently gone on to univsersity and have found jobs in business and- one hopes- a place in the world.
The 30th June was spent similarly, visiting the venues for all our activities, meeting the important people who need to be flattered and planning some of the materials for Friendship House.
The projects ran as follows:
1st July we spent planning the remainder of the time at Friendship House and Nguyen Dinh Chieu. In the evening, however in a fever of excitement we went off to one of Hanoi's ex-pat bars, Jaspas, to watch the England match. The place was packed to nursting point with ex-pats, the majority clad in some for of England regalia, down to the St. George cross faces being painted at the door.
Sunday was spent recovering and Monday was a final planning day to polish off all the preparations before we began.
I arrived in Hanoi a few hours later than expected and was taken to Classic Hotel where the BC had put us up for the duration of the camps. Everybody else had arrived previously and were already more or less settled. Minh, our Vietnamese manager met us at the hotel and took us out for Pho on the south side of Hoan Kiem lake.
Pho is a traditional Vietnamese breaksfast dish that like favourite breakfasts the world over can be consumed whenever and whereever. It is basically a broth with rice noodles, meat, bean sprouts, veg and mint leaves, seasoned with lime juice. A delicious combination- definitely one of the better bits of Vietnamese food I've been introduced to.
The following day we had to go down to the BC offices, situated in a very plush annex of one of Hanoi's 5-star hotels. The BC have a language school, library and net cafe downstairs, all adorned with posters and pictures advertising the UK, whilst upstairs they have a UK style office floor.
This was our chance to meet the YGCP volunteers who were making up the Vietnamese side of the project. The YGCP is a Glocbal citizenship programme run by the BC (and curiously and regretably, I believe, now abandonned), which aims to equip young people with skills in working across cultures. The YGCP had put in a lot of effort planning and executing the leg work for the community projects which were to make up the first two weeks of our time in Hanoi. We spent the morning getting to know each other (YGCP and OCEP) and starting to work through the plan for the Friendship House Orphanage. We were taken to the orphanage itself to look around and help with the planning.
This meeting involved sitting round a table exchanging pleasantries and smiles across the language barrier. The Grandmother of the house welcomed us, offered us tea and explained about Friendship House and the way the orphanage worked. Basically they have just over 20 children in the house ranging from 8-17years old. They are composed of orphans and children whose parents have been jailed, often for drug related crimes. They are in turn cared for by a number of Mothers who also come from difficult backgrounds. The mothers live in the orpahange and constantly work with the children. Friendship house has an astonishing success rate in as much as several of its alumni have subsequently gone on to univsersity and have found jobs in business and- one hopes- a place in the world.
The 30th June was spent similarly, visiting the venues for all our activities, meeting the important people who need to be flattered and planning some of the materials for Friendship House.
The projects ran as follows:
- - Friendship House
- - Nguyen Dinh Chieu school for the blind
- - Chu Van An school English Camp
- - Viet Duc school English Camp
- - V-Resort Outdoor Camp
1st July we spent planning the remainder of the time at Friendship House and Nguyen Dinh Chieu. In the evening, however in a fever of excitement we went off to one of Hanoi's ex-pat bars, Jaspas, to watch the England match. The place was packed to nursting point with ex-pats, the majority clad in some for of England regalia, down to the St. George cross faces being painted at the door.
Sunday was spent recovering and Monday was a final planning day to polish off all the preparations before we began.
Wednesday, September 03, 2003
Arrival in China Sept '03
Day 1: We arrived in Beijing at about 2 PM local time. The airport is very much like any other international airport. Shiny and enw with marble floors and stern looking men in uniform. We left and crossed Beijing in a coach to the offices of the British Embassy Education division. There we were lectured about the many things the British Council does to promote English learning in China. By this point, I was exhausted from a long flight and running on a strange high with the aid of sugary cakes and coffee with extra sugar! Finally to grab our attention they introduced us to a teaching game called English Taxi. Its very much like Grand Theft Auto meets a language lab comprehension. Still this entertained us for a good while. After this we had our first taste of Chinese Chinese food. This was a very iffy affair. The food was either, cold greasy and slimy or contained lots of Chili. One of our number destroyed his mouth when a show of Chilli eating bravado backfired. Not even 2 pints of beer could sooth the combined damage of 5 whole chillis! With the banquet finished we went to the hotel and I fell on the bed and went straight to sleep.
Day 2: Up at 8:30 to leave at 9 for Tiananmen square. The sqaure is huge and so very busy. It dwarves Heroes' Square in Budapest. En route we were taught the most useful mandarin phase bu xiexie: no thanks. Useful since as soon as we got off the coach we were swamped with peddlers trying to flog us postcards for $1 and little red books for $10. The only item truely worth purchasing was to be found amongst the fake Rollexes. This holy grail is called a Maolex. It is a wodneful watch with Mao's beaming viasage on the front with him waving to mark the seconds! The pollution in Beijing is so bad that one side of the square is obscured from the other. Anyway, next we went over into the forbidden city. The palace complex used by the emperors and out of bounds to anyone who hadn't sacrificed their manhood, contains 9999 rooms (with nine being a lucky number). The whole city extends in a chain of massive courtyards for hundreds of metres. Lunch for the 2nd day was sadly no improvement on the firsdt meal, being in a rather unwhoseome Shangdong restaurant. At least there was rice! Afternoon was happily passed in the Summer palace which even larger, centred round a huge artificial lake. The lake is filled with row boats, dragon boats and pedlos. I went in one with three other girls and I'll swear I was the only one peddling most of the time. The evening meal was spent at a slightly better restaurant in Beijing. Now there were a few dishes that I could in addition to some rice that didn't have bits of egg in it. In the evening we were taken to an acrobatics show. Despite being cheap and tacky the stuff they were doing was still impressive. It was just disturing how willing they are to pervert Chinese culture just for the tourists. In the evening we found a street bar that served us beer at 25 pints for 75yuan. Truely marvellous.
Day 3: Needless to say there were many hungover faces at breakfast. We were up and out early again to go to the great wall. A bad morning (tired and droopy eyed) suddenly became a whole lot worse when on the two hour trip to the wall we were bombarded with Britney! When we got there, the sun was just starting to burn off the layer of mist that seemed to be all present anywhere near Beijing. The wall itself has been pretty much reconstructed from the ground up to allow tourists such as ourselves to go and trample all over it. That said its still a fantastic sight. The wall is incredibly steep with guard towers dotted at regular intervals. I believe I managed to walk to the 5th tower. After this we were taken to a Friendship store for a "shoppatunity." Friendship stores are governemnt run shops that tours take punters to so that rich American tourists can offload all their precious dollars on a wide variety of tack. The only upside was that the store had a fantastic restaurant which served the most amazing food. After all this we were driven back to the hotel and I slept for 2 horus and after anopther fantastic meal in the hotel I was even smiling again! We returned in the evening to the site of the previous night's revelery. This time everyone was a little more wary of the cheap beer. Especially since we all had to be up at 5:30 the next mroning.
Day 4: It was the strangest thing having to say goodbye to everyone in the group knowing that you would never see some of them again, despite best intentions to arrange a get together. Even worse was the realisation that the people you were just starting to become friendly with were going so very far away. Our flight left at 1200, so we spent a good deal of time kicking around Beijing airport like lost luggage. We arrived into Kunming airport at about 1600 and we met with some education officials before having a Yunnanese banquet. The cuisine of Yunnan is reasonably hot (not as bad a Sichuan though) but still very tasty. I even discovered an agreeable dou fu which tasted a lot like Blue Danish. Finally we were bundled in a car and whisked to Yuxi. We'd scarcely been unpacking for half an hour when the phone rang and a girl called Shark asked if she could come round and see us with some friends. Minutes later she appeared with 3 friends, Anita, Jack and Rainbow. We talked for a little and we were asked random questions including what our star sign was and what blod type we were. (I susbsequently discovered that the Chinese believe you can find things out about someone's personality via their blood type).
Day 5: We met the headmaster at about 10-o-clock. He told us valuable we were, what a good job the other 2 pairs of gappers had done, and generally made us feel welcome. After that we were taken to the supermarket to stock up on various necessaries. I spent some time cleaning the firdge whilst Tim wrestled a bottle of water for the bubbler. For lunch, Shark appeared and offered to take us to the dinning hall. Linda also came to escort us as well (our first double booking). The dinning hall food is passable but far from pleasant. In the evening Shark took us out again for Dumplings in town. So far I had only sampled the boiled variety. It was a suprise to discover that they came steamed and fried as well. They ware truely delicious and the meal for 5 of us cost only 20yuan (about 2 GBP).
Day 6: This time we lunched in the Jiang Brother's Across bridge Noodles restaurant. Across Bridge Noodles is the traditional Yunnanese dish. You are given a boiling soup covered in a layer of oil. You then add a variety of raw slivers of meat etc into the soup. Once in the soup they cook very quickly. The result is tasty and delightfully spice free! For dinner Tim and I went out on the markety and sampled some kebabs. The lady on the stall dipped them in Chilli! Our mouths will never be the same again.
Day 7: Shark took us out for lunch again to meet some of Anita's friends from the teachers' college. We had an exceptioanlly hot variant of spaghetti bolonaise. These friends, 2 Americans and a Dane, were an odd bunch who had arrived in Yuxi at more or less the same time as Tim and I. In the evening we were to go to a banquet with Sally, an English teacher who had arrived with a large part of her class in our appartment two days earlier. The banquet had a disturbingly large amount of sea food for a land locked province. There was however a very nb\ice sweet pie thing which I was able to use to soak up the wine that the quick witted waitresses kept pouring in our glasses. At lunch Shark had insisted that wecome and see her dance in her class party: later she rang to say that she would hold her 'act' until we arrived. So I had to make polite excuses to leave Sally's class party to go and find Shark and see her dance. I got lost... After 20 mintures of wandering round the second grade classrooms I finally made someone understand that I wanted the 3rd grade class rooms and soon I found them. I then had an agonzing wait as the Head master delivered a few stirring words to Shark's class and shook my hand. I waited through two performances, saw Sharks dance (which was exceptionally good). And slunk out to get back to Sally's class party. I ran most of hte way back and as soon as I arrived panting, I was forced to play my tin whistle in front of everyone. It was an utter disaster. The notes I did get out were broken and out of tune. The rythm was poor and the fingering was down right awful. Then I had to play musical chairs with the students. I managed not to win (to avoid getting a second box of mooncake (Tim had won one already)). However as penalty for losing I had to sing Twinkle Twinkle Little Star in front of everyone. I was so exhausted and nervous I even got the words wrong. Then Tim and I were made to sing, we choose the Red Dwarf theme tune for want of anything better. We even tried to explain Musical statues to them but it didn't work. Finally after aa dance of the penguin galato song, I was presented with the box of mooncakes that I'd skillfully avoided winning and we were allowed to go. Sometime after we got back Shark rang up. a surreal evening became so much more surreal when she asked if I wanted a Chinese Girlfriend.
Day 8: Today we've sat and done very little, save getting a key copied. I suspect that last night's banquet may have disagreed with us... I hope the Yuxi plumbing is prepared.
Day 2: Up at 8:30 to leave at 9 for Tiananmen square. The sqaure is huge and so very busy. It dwarves Heroes' Square in Budapest. En route we were taught the most useful mandarin phase bu xiexie: no thanks. Useful since as soon as we got off the coach we were swamped with peddlers trying to flog us postcards for $1 and little red books for $10. The only item truely worth purchasing was to be found amongst the fake Rollexes. This holy grail is called a Maolex. It is a wodneful watch with Mao's beaming viasage on the front with him waving to mark the seconds! The pollution in Beijing is so bad that one side of the square is obscured from the other. Anyway, next we went over into the forbidden city. The palace complex used by the emperors and out of bounds to anyone who hadn't sacrificed their manhood, contains 9999 rooms (with nine being a lucky number). The whole city extends in a chain of massive courtyards for hundreds of metres. Lunch for the 2nd day was sadly no improvement on the firsdt meal, being in a rather unwhoseome Shangdong restaurant. At least there was rice! Afternoon was happily passed in the Summer palace which even larger, centred round a huge artificial lake. The lake is filled with row boats, dragon boats and pedlos. I went in one with three other girls and I'll swear I was the only one peddling most of the time. The evening meal was spent at a slightly better restaurant in Beijing. Now there were a few dishes that I could in addition to some rice that didn't have bits of egg in it. In the evening we were taken to an acrobatics show. Despite being cheap and tacky the stuff they were doing was still impressive. It was just disturing how willing they are to pervert Chinese culture just for the tourists. In the evening we found a street bar that served us beer at 25 pints for 75yuan. Truely marvellous.
Day 3: Needless to say there were many hungover faces at breakfast. We were up and out early again to go to the great wall. A bad morning (tired and droopy eyed) suddenly became a whole lot worse when on the two hour trip to the wall we were bombarded with Britney! When we got there, the sun was just starting to burn off the layer of mist that seemed to be all present anywhere near Beijing. The wall itself has been pretty much reconstructed from the ground up to allow tourists such as ourselves to go and trample all over it. That said its still a fantastic sight. The wall is incredibly steep with guard towers dotted at regular intervals. I believe I managed to walk to the 5th tower. After this we were taken to a Friendship store for a "shoppatunity." Friendship stores are governemnt run shops that tours take punters to so that rich American tourists can offload all their precious dollars on a wide variety of tack. The only upside was that the store had a fantastic restaurant which served the most amazing food. After all this we were driven back to the hotel and I slept for 2 horus and after anopther fantastic meal in the hotel I was even smiling again! We returned in the evening to the site of the previous night's revelery. This time everyone was a little more wary of the cheap beer. Especially since we all had to be up at 5:30 the next mroning.
Day 4: It was the strangest thing having to say goodbye to everyone in the group knowing that you would never see some of them again, despite best intentions to arrange a get together. Even worse was the realisation that the people you were just starting to become friendly with were going so very far away. Our flight left at 1200, so we spent a good deal of time kicking around Beijing airport like lost luggage. We arrived into Kunming airport at about 1600 and we met with some education officials before having a Yunnanese banquet. The cuisine of Yunnan is reasonably hot (not as bad a Sichuan though) but still very tasty. I even discovered an agreeable dou fu which tasted a lot like Blue Danish. Finally we were bundled in a car and whisked to Yuxi. We'd scarcely been unpacking for half an hour when the phone rang and a girl called Shark asked if she could come round and see us with some friends. Minutes later she appeared with 3 friends, Anita, Jack and Rainbow. We talked for a little and we were asked random questions including what our star sign was and what blod type we were. (I susbsequently discovered that the Chinese believe you can find things out about someone's personality via their blood type).
Day 5: We met the headmaster at about 10-o-clock. He told us valuable we were, what a good job the other 2 pairs of gappers had done, and generally made us feel welcome. After that we were taken to the supermarket to stock up on various necessaries. I spent some time cleaning the firdge whilst Tim wrestled a bottle of water for the bubbler. For lunch, Shark appeared and offered to take us to the dinning hall. Linda also came to escort us as well (our first double booking). The dinning hall food is passable but far from pleasant. In the evening Shark took us out again for Dumplings in town. So far I had only sampled the boiled variety. It was a suprise to discover that they came steamed and fried as well. They ware truely delicious and the meal for 5 of us cost only 20yuan (about 2 GBP).
Day 6: This time we lunched in the Jiang Brother's Across bridge Noodles restaurant. Across Bridge Noodles is the traditional Yunnanese dish. You are given a boiling soup covered in a layer of oil. You then add a variety of raw slivers of meat etc into the soup. Once in the soup they cook very quickly. The result is tasty and delightfully spice free! For dinner Tim and I went out on the markety and sampled some kebabs. The lady on the stall dipped them in Chilli! Our mouths will never be the same again.
Day 7: Shark took us out for lunch again to meet some of Anita's friends from the teachers' college. We had an exceptioanlly hot variant of spaghetti bolonaise. These friends, 2 Americans and a Dane, were an odd bunch who had arrived in Yuxi at more or less the same time as Tim and I. In the evening we were to go to a banquet with Sally, an English teacher who had arrived with a large part of her class in our appartment two days earlier. The banquet had a disturbingly large amount of sea food for a land locked province. There was however a very nb\ice sweet pie thing which I was able to use to soak up the wine that the quick witted waitresses kept pouring in our glasses. At lunch Shark had insisted that wecome and see her dance in her class party: later she rang to say that she would hold her 'act' until we arrived. So I had to make polite excuses to leave Sally's class party to go and find Shark and see her dance. I got lost... After 20 mintures of wandering round the second grade classrooms I finally made someone understand that I wanted the 3rd grade class rooms and soon I found them. I then had an agonzing wait as the Head master delivered a few stirring words to Shark's class and shook my hand. I waited through two performances, saw Sharks dance (which was exceptionally good). And slunk out to get back to Sally's class party. I ran most of hte way back and as soon as I arrived panting, I was forced to play my tin whistle in front of everyone. It was an utter disaster. The notes I did get out were broken and out of tune. The rythm was poor and the fingering was down right awful. Then I had to play musical chairs with the students. I managed not to win (to avoid getting a second box of mooncake (Tim had won one already)). However as penalty for losing I had to sing Twinkle Twinkle Little Star in front of everyone. I was so exhausted and nervous I even got the words wrong. Then Tim and I were made to sing, we choose the Red Dwarf theme tune for want of anything better. We even tried to explain Musical statues to them but it didn't work. Finally after aa dance of the penguin galato song, I was presented with the box of mooncakes that I'd skillfully avoided winning and we were allowed to go. Sometime after we got back Shark rang up. a surreal evening became so much more surreal when she asked if I wanted a Chinese Girlfriend.
Day 8: Today we've sat and done very little, save getting a key copied. I suspect that last night's banquet may have disagreed with us... I hope the Yuxi plumbing is prepared.
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