We did laundry this morning and we had to hang around
because the washer is not fixed yet. I
have to turn the water on for the washer to fill and turn it off when it is
done filling or it floods the kitchen.
It goes through three cycles that I have to do that on, so for the 37
minutes that the washer is going, I have to be jumping up and down and
listening for the times to turn the water on and off.
When the laundry was done and hung out to dry, we went to RT
Mart for some groceries. I needed to get
some butter among other things. RT Mart was out of butter, so we stopped at In
Zone, a store that is next door to RT Mart, to get it there. It is a little more expensive there, but if
that is where I can get it, I’ll pay what I have to. They were having some special day there where
they had some young people (they looked about 12-13) who were wearing special red
sashes, and they were going throughout the store, helping at the cash register
and helping bag groceries among other things.
As I was checking out, one of the boys said, “Hi” to
me. I said, “Hi” back. He left and before I knew it, there was a
group of seven or eight of them behind me!
They had come to say, “Hi.” I
turned around and after I said, “Hi,” they were just grinning from ear to ear! I decided to ask them some things more in
English, so I asked, “How are you?” I
said it slowly and they looked at each other for just a moment to digest what I
had asked them and it was like the light went on in their heads all at the same
time and they said, “Fine! Thank you!” Then I asked a few of them their names and I
tried to repeat their names back to them.
The clerk was starting to want my attention at this time (interpreted
as: I needed to pay for my groceries), so I turned back to the clerk. One of the girls was taking pictures of me as
I was talking to the group. The looks of
awe on their faces was just precious. This is one of those times where I wished that
I had stayed around a little longer and talked with them, but we didn’t. One of the clerks at a counter was trying to
say something to us, I think making a comment about the students, but we just
don’t understand enough to know what it was.
David had a nap and then started working on the scholarly
paper that Wu Jun is trying to get published.
He was struggling pretty badly during the first part of it, trying to
clean up the “Chinglish” and understanding what it was she is trying to say in
some places, but he has it done now and he feels pretty good about it. I was working on my lessons for the next week
and also getting things planned for the last three weeks of classes. Hard to believe that is all we have left to
teach before we start doing finals!
Rachel also called to chat for a little while.
We left here at six to take the bus over to the Baotuquan
campus. I had been invited to be a judge
at an English Competition. I asked if
David could come along and they made him a judge also. Libby Clarke had been asked to be a judge,
too, so we were all there together.
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| This is one of the guards on the Baotuquan campus. I guess he sings to the students occasionally and they asked him to sing at the beginning of the competition. He did a good job and got a lot of applause. |
In this competition, they have teams of two read a poem in
English. These poems were written by Chinese
in English. Some of the sentences didn’t
quite make sense and some of the words were words that I had never heard
before. When the Chinese look for a word
that matches what they want to say, it comes in a wide range of definitions; many
that some of us have never heard before.
They did a pretty good job on pronunciation and you could understand
most of the words. We don’t know who won
that one.
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| These two young men are performing what is called, "Cross Talk." This was in Chinese, so we didn't understand a lot, but just by their actions and inflection in their voices, we were able to enjoy the performance. |
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| This is David, from my 8 a.m. class getting ready to perform the percussion for the a capella choir. |
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| This is the campus choir. |
The other part of the competition was singing in English. We had to judge the students on how clearly
they sang and if they put emotion and feeling into it. After all the singers had performed, they
asked David to get up and say a few words about all the singers. How do you tactfully put that most of them
could have used voice lessons? He did a
great job on what he said and didn’t offend anyone. They announced the winners in Chinese, so I
don’t know who won that one either, but Libby and I were asked to come on the stage
and give out the awards to the students who performed.
When the competition was over, they had several individuals
perform songs and a choir sang. The
choir had several of my sophomore students in it. They did a pretty good job singing an a capella
song. A boy from one of my classes was
the “drum” sound. We sure enjoyed listening to their song.
After the competition, we talked with Wayne and Libby Clarke
for a little while. Their son, Jonathan,
is here in China for his work and he is visiting them.
We weren’t sure we could get a bus home, so we took a taxi. It has been raining most of the day and the
walk from the bus would have been pretty soggy.
We had a Mother’s Day video chat with Caleb, Bethany and Aleeyah before
we went to bed.
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