Walk on Soles that are Made in China
September 13, 2008
School’s started so here’s the run down of the past week.
On Monday morning I woke up at 6:30am and got out of bed when my phone alarm chimmed in at 7am. Have been doing this everyday since. It gives me enough time to shower, eat breakfast and get ready for the day. I then get the bus. On Monday the bus was awfully crowded much the same as the stereotypes about over-populated Asian countries; bodies pressed against bodies and people pushing each other onto and out of the bus. The same, applies for the subway as well. In fact the subway is worse and kinda gets scary when you see people getting jammed in the doors. I’ve also seen officers that tell people where to stand – the centre of each doorway needs to be clear, passengers board from the left and right. These guys occasionally help with pushing and also stop people when they can’t fit.
The Line 1 is the “main” line in ShangHai and it is always crowded, although by midday things have cooled down a little. I have to interchange between two lines (totaling one bus, two trips on the subway and some walking) and this process of interchanging is equally frustrating. At each stop there are usually stairs and esculators. Almost everyone shoves their way onto the esculators so in this case I get the stairs as I get up faster. Sometimes though thre are only stairs in which case, you take things one step at a time and try to not fall over from the people pushing from behind.
As you can imagine, all of this is very stressful and I actually find that the shoving and tight spaces make it difficult to breathe, it strains my heart a little sometimes too which is not too good.
At least the transport is convenient in that it arrives every 5-8 minutes without fail. They also hand out free newspapers at the station. The PA system on the subway is bilinguial in both Chinese and English – not sure why though since I still don’t see many foreigners. The seats are all made of hard plastic and in general the conditions of the vehicles are clean and sanitary. Probably better than Australia. Furthermore there are TVs on the public transport which play advertisements.
So I got to school early and was put in my class. Our classroom had a table and 5 chairs and was no bigger than one of the University study rooms which you can loan out (Australia). I guess this meant that my class really would be small, just like Mrs Hua said. I was the only one around and spent a few minutes looking at a map to see how far I’d just travelled. I should also note that the class I am in is the highest that the school offers.
Eventually another guy arrived; Marcus, a Phillipino-American who had lived in LA for most of his life and spent 10 years in a Chinese school. In America he works as a retail consultant telling rich people which areas to invest their money. He is 37.
The other two students arrived and I forget their names. Both female. One of them looks about 32 (wouldn’t say age) and is from Korea, she speaks little english and I find her accent hard to grasp. She is very friendly but I find her intimidating. She is studying for the HSK test so she is quite good at Chinese.
The other is from Egypt, she wears Islamic clothes (the head-scarf and all) and is also quite apt at Chinese. She has been studying at the school for 3 years and is 23 herself. Her father works in China as well doing tourism.
The teacher arrived and began with some formalities, she said that she wasn’t really prepared and it seemed that way. I can’t remember much about her actually since she only taught us for one lesson and then got replaced with a much better teacher.
Lemme give the rundown of our classes. I have 4hrs of Chinese classes a day (9am-1pm), two of those hours are for general classes and the other two are for either listening or speaking, they alternate every second day. I have one teacher for the general classes and one for the other two. Meaning that I get two teachers for two hours each, everyday.
The teacher who teaches our main class, is a spunky, super enthusiastic young lady – I think about 28yrs old. She is just plain awesome and always makes our classes very enjoyable, never discouraging us but she still manages to straddle a lot of hard work out of us. I mean seriously, while classes are enjoyable, she is always pushing us a little harder so it’s very intensive.
The other teacher is less exciting but still interesting nonetheless. She is also young (maybe 25), a little more quiet and typical. Her teaching style is similar to the other teacher’s.
In the general class we usually begin by running through vocab. The teacher gives a short introduction to each word and then we are asked to make a sentence on the spot. We discuss and implement X amount of vocab and then conclude with reading a few paragraphs from the main text which utilize the previously learnt words. In and out of this routine we do exercises, either from the text book or just ones that the teacher makes up. For example, answering questions from the text, paraphrasing the text etc with the book closed and using the new words and grammar. So on the whole we get a thorough understaing of what it is we’re doing. Even though we do all of this routine stuff, we also spend a good deal of time going off track. For example if I don’t understand the meaning of a word, the teacher will then dicuss the meaning and usages of the word or they’ll get my classmates to explain it to me. So we are always jumping onto new words and grammar seperate from the classwork. With this we also spend a good deal of time discussing the topics of the text. We probably do more taling in this class than the spoken language class.
The oral language classes are basically the same but will have less new words and grammar, and a script for us to play out. Listening is just as you’d expect, we listen to a text and answer questions, reiterate the story, link back to new vocab and grammar etc. We also have smaller listening exercises.
The textbooks appear to be on par, perhaps a step up from what I’d been doing in Australia. The classes though feel like a slogging. Mainly because we ONLY speak Chinese. Even when we are defining meanings we only talk Chinese. I find it strange then when my teacher speaks english as I’m not use to it. So all of what I just said, is all conducted in Chinese and it’s hard and fast. The other students are all accustomed to this and do fine. I’m not quite as apt though and putting up with this for 4hrs really empties my energy tank.
The homework is also significant, maybe another 2+ hrs a night. At least for me, since I need to refine some of the stuff that was a little hazy when used in oral conversation.
Basically that’s my classes.
So anyways, Marcus, having spent the last week trying to find a room (and also working in real estate) wanted to help me out with finding a place closer to the school. So afterwards we went out to lunch to talk about it. Also another guy, who reponded to a room mate request from Marcus tagged along, although Marcus had already found a sweet deal and had to refuse the guy.
The other guy is Andrew, he looks young but is probably older than me. He’s from Indonesia and does 3D modelling, wants to get into games actually. Seems like a lost soul in China – a lot of people seem to be like that.
Together we walked down to a small cafteria like restaurant. On the way Marcus was descriving how time in Shanghai had been a string of coincidences which eventually got him a cheap, posh apartment with his landlord and how he’d met this lady which he’d been going out with. Marcus had basically already dug out the idea that he was getting on (in life) and wanted a women badly. Poor guy.
At the restaurant I had a huge bowl of hot noodles, beef and black bean. It was fantastic and only about $AUD2. We all talked for a good 30 minutes at least. Marcus said that he’d get me the contact details for some good agents. Andrew introduced himself and what he’d been doing the past year in Shanghai. He seemed into games and noticed that I recognised the software he uses for modelling so we eventually got talking about games criticsm. No surprise, he had know idea what I was talking about (despite enthusiest status).
From there the three of us headed back up to the station and departed ways. On the way back I got lost, again and this time caught the bus at the wrong side of the road. After getting off the bus and crossing the road (to get the corresponding bus back to where I’d started) I couldn’t find it and had to ask a bunch of barmy old people who just ended up yelling some indecipheable Chinese at me. Eventually a young dude helped me out and we caught a bus back to the subway. This guy lives in Yangpu but works in a 60 storey hotel in the PuDong, can speak a little english.
We got off at some hospital and from there I got on the subway again, back to where I’d started. I finally caught the right bus home (after 3 failed attempts). Once I got home, I was too late to see Mrs Hua to ask her about some canteen stuff. Went to the internet cafe and then squeezed in a little homework. I think that I also received some calls as well from my family and Xi.
I had more free time on Tuesday afternoon since I didn’t go out to lunch or get lost again. So I got my student card figured out and could now use the canteen with little fuss. I also called ShanShan in Beijing who was super-estatic to hear from me, that was nice. After that I did some washing and then a few hours of homework to stay afloat.
On Wednesday, our trio went out again for lunch. Marcus had also dropped down to a lower class leaving the 3 of us. This time we ate at a chicken place which I wasn’t very fond of. The chicken was cold (must have been intentional as it wasn’t even warm) but my noodles were fine. From there, I had to sort out some phone troubles then homework and internet.
On Thursday Marcus had got me the details of agents so I called both of them. None of them could find me a suitable place, near the University (within 20 minutes). Not so good.
On Friday, I was the only one in class for the first 1hr and then was joined by the Korean student. So only two of us that day. Oh yeah an old lady and her hsband offered me their seats on the bus, I told them that they ought to sit instead. Like the day before I headed home early, got stuck into some work for the weekend. Went to the internet cafe to download a bunch of trailers, blog posts and news as well as check online for some more places to rent. I have found 5 good apartments and will hopefully make some calls today.
Otherwise I have just been doing homework and writing this on Saturday morning. I have also been playing a few short bursts of indie games over the past few days. Not too much though.
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