Day in Day out

Wed Aug 15th
Went to NY bagel for dinner with Katherine and Robert, then Katherine and I went to see the Bourne Ultimatum. I love Matt Damon. And what I saw of the movie was pretty good. What is it with these directors using handheld cameras for everything? Even K was getting queasy by the end.
School was fine. Half days are my favourite. And my kids are actually starting to show some progress. But I don’t know how much of it is them learning, and how much is my Chinese teacher telling them the answers. Time will tell, I guess.

Thurs Aug 16th
Today started well. The kids were bright and happy and participated. Then one by one they started being replaced by misbehaving pod children. By the end of the day I was ready to throttle them. But I restrained. And tomorrow will be better. It has to.
I had my first Chinese lesson tonight. It was really interesting. We started with theory and we discussed some of the main differences between English and Chinese. For instance, Chinese only has one verb tense. No past or future, only present. Then I learned how to say the numbers 1-10 and Yvonne wrote them in Chinese characters for me. She did say that people mostly use western numerals now, but still, just in case.
Yvonne’s moving to France on my birthday, so lessons will have to stop then. But I figure I can still get 6 weeks of lessons in before she goes and that’ll be a great foundation. And also, my birthday’s in 6 weeks!! That’s so close.

Wed Aug 22
Well. Seems my updates have begun to slacken. I guess that comes with the settling in. Everything isn’t quite as new and exciting as it has been in the past. Also, I’ve been introduced to a website where I can find almost any tv show known to man, so that’s taking up a bunch of time. But here’s a quick rundown of last week:
Fri - Everyone was gearing up for a typhoon to hit. My kids were cranky, but did some cute things. One girl dried another kid’s tears and one boy parallel parked the toy cars. Had dinner with the regulars and watched the Simpson’s Movie.
Sat - Typhoon. Talked to mom in the morning, during the worst of the storm. (It’s actually raining harder right now than it did during the whole typhoon). Around 5, I ventured out with my roommates for dinner. We ate at the 24 hour restaurant around the corner. Read 3 books over the course of the day.
Sun - Brunch with Katy and Michelle at a western style place where they had a fabulous molten chocolate cake. Ended up at a bookstore where 2 books were purchased. Came home and read one of the aforementioned books.
Mon - Nothing of note happened. Regular school day.
Tues - Kids were fussy and I was in no mood to deal. My stuffy nose may not be allergies, because my meds have stopped working. Fell asleep around 5:30pm. Woke up at 6:50am. Eastern Time. But my body felt like I had slept through the night. It was only when I was eating my "breakfast" and couldn’t find the baseball game to listen to that I realized it was still night time here. I watched a couple of episodes of Alias and went to bed, where I tossed and turned for a long while and then woke up at 6am. My time.
Today- Knew I was officially sick when mention of cake failed to stir my appetite. But it’s not in my throat, for which I am thankful. I’m very stuffy and it’s taking me ages to put together a coherent thought. Luckily it’s a half day and the kids were good. Had lunch with Diana and Katy. I am now relaxing, although concentrating for this long has made me a little dizzy. And my nose is raw because I can’t find tissues with lotion here. (I am so spoiled at home!)
Before I get 9 million emails re: my illness; yes I have meds. Yes I am taking them. And yes I am drinking plenty of fluids and getting vitamin C. But when you work with little germ factories, a.k.a. children, you get sick every once in a while. And I’m not missing anything because it’s storming so much that I wouldn’t want to leave my apartment even if I could.
In terms of general interest, my students have started groping me. 2 of them have done it now. At least, only 2 have actually grabbed the boobs. Most of them at one point or another have accidentally hit my bum while we’re playing. It’s sad when the only action I’m getting is from a 3 year old. Apparently it happens to foreigners all the time, because the Asian women don’t have much in the way of breasts, so even my small ones are fascinating.
That’s about all I’ve got for now.