Tian Yuan Hotel Anshan

Today was our final day at the school; we drive to Shenyang tomorrow. In the morning, we visited he Haicheng Primary School. The children's orchestra sounded top notch! Students entertained us with dancing; a troupe of boys demonstrated acrobatic breakdancing and girls performed a traditional costumed Mongolian dance. We saw a class of students learning English using a fast-paced response method and an entertaining computer game projected on the screen. More classroom visits were ...

... danced to Aaron's mouth percussion.The high point was the sharing of Chinese painting, calligraphy and knot making, Each of us left with a beuatiful gift created by the students on the spot. We posed for pictures one after the other, but were glad to do so. All of us were overwhelmed by the affection. Spirits are still high for our students. No homesickness that I am aware of.

This weekend is a festival where Chinese pay respects and give sacrifices to their dead ancestors. Most government workers were off work today but schools went on. Juniors and Seniors are preparing for their university exams. We began our day at Haicheng Senior High School. Our students were exuberant about their host families. All had been given the royal treatment. We were taken by bus to Maifeng village, where the mayor and his staff greeted us in his office. Maifeng's ecomonic ...

When we got to the Shenyang airport, the groups were divided and taken to their respective schools. The Clay group will probably not see the Discovery group for several days, so I can only post news about our group. We were met graciously at the airport by the principals and other staff from both schools, and then taken by bus. The Clay group stopped in a town for lunch, which all agreed ...

... much. For example about 2 weeks ago the weather abruptly changed from about low 40's F to about 6 degrees F overnight. It went from nice and balmy to bone chillingly cold, that's 6 degrees is without factoring in wind chill. I, however, am capable of looking up the weather on my computer. Liu yi was worried i might not have done that though, so she called me at 7 a.m. to tell me to dress warmly and eat a warm breakfast because today was very ...

... her in Chinese. After our lesson I was taken to uncle Li's family's home for dinner. I met the whole family, aunts uncles cousins, grandma and great grandma, it was very interesting and fun, but slightly awkward as my Chinese is not quite up to a family discussion. its very lovely to have an adopted family here, being so far from home and with so few people who speak english around, its nice to ...

... steel, and not very beautiful. Mine falls into the latter category. It's big and green, there is no handle on the outside, only a key hole. My key is different from what we think of as keys, it looks similar except there are four sides to it, instead of two like a normal key. So if you look at the point instead of a line, it forms an X. From the outside its fairly easy to get in, put in the key, turn it all the way counter clockwise and push ...

... single class I had one or two students i just wanted to pick up and take home with me, they stole my heart already. I am optimistic that this year will be just as educational for me as it will for them, but I am also grateful to have Wednesdays to myself to recover...teaching takes a lot out of you, both mentally and physically. I keep bringing my camera to class then forgetting to take pictures....I promise I will have some soon, but probably ...

... for face washing and cleaning and kitchen use etc). I called Mario's and bawled to Lindsey and Gary as well, i miss my loved ones more than anything, and hadn't spoken to an American in so long...its amazing how quickly you can feel isolated. Katie called me and we talked for about an hour and a half, which helped cheer me up alot! around 1130 i decided to head downtown to buy new sheets and a new comforter....i had awoken that morning with about 20 bug bites, and was ...

Our day ended a little earlier today. It's about 8:00 pm here and I am thinking about the Pennsylvania primary just getting underway. No one in China is concerned. Today we visited schools in Taian, about an hour and half drive into the "countryside." On the drive to Taian, our translator Yue stayed behind to teach her class, so Lihua and I struggled to learn both English and Chinese. The term is "gongtong xuexi," or "learning together." The Chinese language has four ...