We were up bright and early so that I could
be in the place that I needed to be to catch the shuttle bus that was supposed
to take me to the Baotuquan (aka the West) Campus. I made it to the spot that I had seen
teachers waiting at last term. I decided
to try and ask some of the people waiting there, but the question was, who to
ask? The two men who look like teachers
that would be more likely to know but may not speak English, or the students
who might speak English but may not know about the shuttle bus?
I opted for the male teachers and showed
them my trusty card with the Chinese characters on it. They were indicating that I would have to
take the city bus #75. I was confused,
so I asked a girl student next to me and she asked the men. She said there was no bus to the West Campus and
that they said to take bus 75. Now what
do I do? Bus 75 is about a twelve minute
walk from the campus. I know that bus
#K55 will also take me to that campus and is a three minute walk from the campus. I still don’t know why there isn’t a shuttle
bus from this campus to the West campus.
I start to walk out the gate and try to talk to the guard, again showing
my card and indicating a bus and he
points that it should be where the others were standing to catch the shuttle
bus to the far away “Software” Campus.
I start to walk back to where all the people
are standing and there was a gray-haired woman standing there and looks at me
and asks if she can help me. She spoke
very good English! I know my confusion
is showing all over my face, so I tell her.
She then explains that the administration decided to stop the shuttle
buses to the campuses that were in the city and just run shuttle buses to the
out-lying campuses. I thank her and
hurry on to try and catch bus K55 and hope that I can make it to the West
campus somewhere in the first hour of my class.
Where this woman came from and why she was just standing on that corner,
I don’t know, but I get a very strong feeling that she was sent there for my
benefit this morning.
I had to wait for about fifteen minutes
before a K55 bus came and then it had so go through some very heavy traffic. I don’t know if the bus 75 would have gotten
me there any faster, but I will try them next Monday. Eva had called me because I was supposed to
text her when I got on the bus (she is a mother hen to us!), and when I hadn’t
texted her yet, she called. I told her
what had happened, so she called to the other campus and they sent someone into
my class to tell them that I was coming.
I like both of these classes that I met
today. The two new classes that I have
are sophomores and they still have this strong desire to learn. We had a fun time in the activities we did and
I think we are going to have a great time!
I took bus #75 home because of two
reasons. One, I only had one Yuan left,
the rest were all larger bills and the buses don’t give change, and, two, I
wanted to see if it might really be quicker on Monday morning. It might…
David met me at the bus stop and we walked
home, had lunch and then took naps. We worked
on stuff for classes this afternoon.
David had met two of his new classes this morning, also, so we had lots
to do. I was too tired still to make
dinner, so we went to Yon Ho for a quick supper and then came back to finish up
for tomorrow. Long day!
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