Final Exams, Engineers, Shopping, Gifts, Shopping, Tests

 Monday was a busy day for David and me.  This was our last Monday class, and we finished up finals exams for them.  David had a really crazy schedule because he had a bunch of students that had to cancel the time that was originally set up for their finals, so he scheduled them for later Monday.  He also had some students that needed to make up for their individual presentations because their journalism teacher scheduled a special speaker for their presentation time, and they had to attend that instead of English class.  It was rather frustrating for David.  He came home for lunch and then had to go back to his classroom to finish things up.

I went to the hospital for Sister J’s appointment.  Things were not much better than the week before, so they had to increase her medications, and then they talked about when to have her come back for another appointment.  The next time will be after I am back in the US, so we will see what happens then. 

David had the engineers class in the evening.  This group seemed to have a little better skill in speaking English than the last two classes that he had, and it made it a lot more fun for him to be a part of it.  It kept him busy, but he felt like his time was worth it.

David's engineers class.

This is the "Fruits and Vegetables" PPT that we developed to help them improve their speed in recognizing words as well as learn vocabulary.  It is a game played in teams.  All our classes have loved playing this game!

David is helping some of the engineers to know how to take the orders of the other students in a restaurant activity that we do.  Some of the engineers wanted David to sign their textbooks on the last night of the class.

Tuesday was a full morning of finals.  What I like best about the oral final exam interview is to experience the growth that they made.  There were still those that struggled almost as much as at the first of the semester, but for the majority, we can tell there has been improvement.  As with anything, practice will pay off.

After lunch, we headed to the grocery store for our last shopping trip.  We only had a few things to get, yogurt being one of them.  We stopped by the refrigerated dairy section to pick up the yogurt.  One of the workers there was trying to tell me about the special they had going on for the yogurt.  If I scanned the QR code for the brand (it’s a brand that we like) then the store would give five yuan off if we bought four of them.  I thought that was a pretty good deal.  Of course, all of this is being done with gestures, a little bit of Chinese, a little bit of English and a lot of laughter!

The grocery store ladies that were trying to help me understand and then get the QR code to save 5 RMB.  

I had wanted to go back to one of the markets for some specific items that I had seen there.  I had tried to go with Eva last Friday afternoon, but our trip to the police station for our new residency permits took precedence.  I asked Kayce if she wanted to go, because I wasn’t sure that Eva would be able to go if she had meetings, and I didn’t want to put if off again and not be able to go.  The Chinese like to schedule their departmental meetings on the spur of the moment it seems.

Kayce and I had a fun time at the market and found the items that I wanted.  She was even able to find the last item that she wanted to get, so we were happy.  We made it back to my campus just in time to dump my stuff at our apartment, get David, and head over to the canteen for lunch with Eva.  After lunch, Kayce and I headed to the bus stop, so that she could go back to her apartment, and I could go to my painting class.

David doesn’t have classes on Friday, but I do, so he usually heads out to do different errands.  This Friday, he was off to find the lady on the street that does sewing repairs, so he could get his sandals fixed, buy some bread, and check in on the bank account.  My 8 a.m. Friday class has been a small class of twelve students that are all art and music majors.  Because it is such a small class, I had been able to do things with them that were not possible with my larger classes.  We developed a strong bond. 

My Friday 8 a.m. class.  From the left: Kevin, Eric, Lyric, Sophia Jiang, Isabella, Zoe, Grace, Zina, Hayden, Sophia, Tracy, Blake, and Dominic.

Friday morning, they all came in at about the same time and I’m sure they listened in closely to each other interviews.  As each one came up, they each had a gift for me.  Some were small and some large, but it was so thoughtful of them!  I have had certain students give me gifts, but not the whole class before.  It was very touching.  Here’s the part where David comes in… I needed help to get all the gifts back to the apartment! 

Beautiful and delightfully smelling bouquet from Hayden.

Hand painted fans from Eric and Blake.  The dragon's head was made by Eric.

Dominic drew this from my photo on my professor WeChat account.

Tracy is from Weifang, home of the International Kite Festival.  She brought me this beautiful display box for me.

Book mark from Isabella, wooden comb from Sophia Jiang, key chains from Zoe.  Grace gave me a bottle of drinkable yogurt, a brand that is really good.  Sophia gave me two packages of zhongza, a special food to celebrate dragon boat festival.  

We had lunch with Eva at the canteen.  We waited there for another teacher that was going to help us get some boxes of things sent off to the US.  Ms. Yu came to our apartment after we were finished eating and helped us take things down to the shipping store.  At first, we were going to have the company come to our apartment to help pack things, but we decided to save a little money and just take things to the store.  Between Miss Yu and Eva, we were able to get it all taken care of. 

Saturday, Eva wanted to take us shopping again.  She wanted to show us where an outlet shopping mall was in the north part of Jinan.  We rode the bus to a stop near her home that would take us to the mall.  It was almost a 45-minute ride, thank goodness we were on an air-conditioned bus. 

We had a fun time shopping and talking with people.  It is rather fun to have those that know a little bit of English want to talk with us.  Eva helped me bargain and get the best prices. 

When it was lunch time, we went to a local buffet restaurant.  When we walked in, every eye in the room was honed in on us.  There were very few tables open, but one was just being cleaned off.  The employees told Eva to take us to get our food.  After we got our food, we started to look for a table.  One employee ran over to Eva and told her there was a table that had been saved for us!  After the employee had finished cleaning the table, he sat there and kept it open for us to use!  It was good food, too.

I have been trying to capture this picture ever since we were here four year ago!  This is a family van, Chinese style.  Two kids and the parents on a scooter!

This bathroom takes a lot of courage for us Americans to want to use.  Little to no privacy.  At least there was a separate men's and a women's.  

David and I had been invited to a movie night at Kayce’s apartment to watch, “Mom’s Night Out.”  Aaron and Deneice were there also.  It was a fun movie, and we had a great time.  It is hard to think of being in Jinan again next year without Kayce there.  She is a fun person, and we will miss her.  I’m sure we will be seeing her when we are all back in the States!

The last two weekends, there have been some big national tests conducted on our campus.  These are the parents waiting outside one of the classroom buildings for their students that are inside. The tests are a big deal because they will determine what, if any, college you attend, and what major you may take.

It was interesting to see all these parents standing around to support their kids taking the tests.  While we don't agree with how much pressure is put on the children to take these tests, it was interesting to see the parents supporting their kids.   In America, we will support our kids in all their sporting and extra curricular activities, but do we really support them this  much in their education?