Post 2 of 2.  Pictures from my Hangzhou break.  We went to Xiaoshan and saw a lake there where they had found an archaeological site from 8000 years ago.  Very cool stuff.

This cool guy was at the museum

The archaeological site

River by the museum

Hot Pot!  This is about a quarter of what we ate...

Noodles for breakfast

The view from Xiaoshan Lake

Pretty pagoda on the lake

Marriage hall with Alice

Near the Tea Plantation

Amazing lunch.  So much food.

Sampling tea with Sadaf and Alice

Elvin and his wonderfully hospitable family and friends

Drying the roots and vegetables

What a great break!  I'm back to teaching today, although I've been moved from morning classes to evening classes.  I'm psyched cause I can sleep in again but a little worried that my students will be fried by the time I get to them.  We'll see tonight!

So on the break, I didn't end up going to the Thousand Island Lake or the Stone Forest.  This is China!  No plans!  Miscommunication galore!  :)  Despite that though I still had an awesome time.  We ended up going to this other lake in Hangzhou that was very beautiful and relaxing.  We also ended up at a museum and our Chinese host, Elvin and his family, took us to a tea plantation owned by a family friend.  We also went by a place where they make dried pickled vegetables and we got a ton of free samples (Christmas presents anyone? ^^)  I slept in a real bed and ate so much good food.  It was truly lovely.

First pictures are of my class from last Friday morning and then me and the girls out in Hangzhou at West Lake.  I'll post the rest later.  I've got to go get food and uploading takes a while.

My first session class!

My awesome and wonderful TAs

Heading to West Lake

Beautiful art on the walk there

Merry Mabel looking lovely as usual

Water Lily Garden by West Lake

West Lake is Beauuuuutiful

Walkways and buildings in the middle of West Lake

Neat limestone rock for you rock people

Hanging out with Sadaf and Alice

PIZZA.  NOM NOM NOM.

Light show at West Lake

More pictures from the break to come!

Hi Folks.  Sorry for the lapse in updates.  Things have been busy, moving from one semi-crisis to another, planning lessons and teaching classes.  Semi-crises include a broken toilet, no water, and a water cooler that overheated and almost caught on fire while we were sleeping.  A real crisis involved spending over ten hours in two Chinese hospitals with my roommate who wasn't doing well, but I'm happy to say the second hospital was able to help and she is doing better now.

I am so ready to take a break!!!!  I have to teach tomorrow morning, but then we will be off on our three day break and I will finally be able to get out and see all the beauty of Hangzhou.  We'll probably do West Lake tomorrow afternoon and then I'm off with a couple of the girls to see the Thousand Island Lakes and the Stone Forest.  Really looking foward to it.  It's good that the session is ending.  The students were really starting to get fatigued and I can't say my energy was staying up either with everything going on.  But the break is almost here and it'll be nice to take a breather.

Anyway, I'm off to do the exciting task of laundry. 

This shining beacon calls to me.

Oh yeah, this hits the spot.

Other camp food, purchased for 5 kwai (about a buck)

It was ok.

Alice, teaching a student how to dance during activities

Borav, Alice and Alice planning more activities for the students

The view of the street from the school

A little street by the KFC

Timea and Christina

I finally managed to break free of the school grounds with a band of other teachers last night and make our way down the road to a Chinese restaurant.  It wasn't bad, but it wasn't great, and Mabel and I have been thwarted twice now from getting on the bus and going down to the KFC.  Don't boo me.  You'd want KFC too if you had to eat this camp food.

Teaching is still going well.  We keep getting these packs of roaming American exchange students coming in on a daily impromptu basis, and so far the kids love them and it has really helped to pad my class material (day 4 and I'm almost out of videos?  UGH).

The other teachers are starting to make their plans for the first session break and while many of them have exotic ideas about Shanghai and Beijing and Hong Kong, I think I'm going to stick with the ones who want to stay here and see the temples and museums.  The ones going to Shanghai keep talking about the night life, and let's face it, I don't want to be the old lady lagging behind.

Starting to feel better about things and some semblance of settling in.  I think I've even managed to figure out the Eastern toilets for the most part.  I was able to get cash from an ATM too, so I can pay back the other sweet teacher assistant who lent me money.  Nicest people I swear.

A typical camp meal: vegetable, meat, rice

Another typical camp meal: vegetable, meat, rice

A pretty view just outside the school along the road

Out with some of the teachers, not a great pic.

Salaf (who is from Kenya) and the boys, Keyon, Dirk and Boraf

Fried green bean with salty meat stuff.  Yum.

Someone ordered turtle.  I did not partake.

Someone also ordered stinky tofu.  I also did not

partake and have no regrets since they were miserable

complaining that they could still taste it today.

The best part of the meal.  It is so hard to get cold food here.

Mabel on the left is the most cheerful Irish lady ever.

Love her!

Also Christina, Timea and Mitch (from left to right)

My student chatting with an American exchange student

One of my smart boys happy to be talking to an American girl

Some of my shyer students

Freak rain storm that knocked the power out

So I've started teaching and so far things are going well.  I have students who know a lot of English and I'm actually struggling to come up with lesson plans that can challenge their ability.  There is one student who is so sweet and funny and very interested in studying in America.  I hope she can achieve her dream.

Sleep is getting better.  Food is the same, but I'm forcing myself to eat a little more at the meal breaks (it's just so hot!).  We were moved to a different room with a Western toilet (YAAAAAAY) and so I am happy about that. 

I still have yet to get off the campus yet, but hopefully I can remedy that in a day or two.  For now here are some pictures.  Still of the school.

Yaaaaaay!

The toilet had a huge window looking out on

 the little boys dorm so I MacGuyver'ed up a curtain.

My castle in the sky

My class playing a game

My other coteacher Boraf

One of my best students

The market at the school

Chinese capri sun