Open House Surprise

Well, I was hoping that this next blog would be about the Chinese firedrill that occurred two weeks ago, which I videotaped extensively...however, China is being very uncool about youtube. I realize that the government is trying to hold onto power amid this camera phone/instant upload generation, but it is clearly a losing battle. If the government wanted to solidify some "political capital" among their increasingly unemployed and angry masses, maybe unblocking the internet--all of it--would take the economic downturn edge off.

But, I digress, as usual. This entry is about the surprise open house at my school today, in which the parents of all 600 plus of my students, came to worry, criticize and shop around for future teachers/tutors. Surprise being the key word. Today, which is my longest day of classes (7 plus english corner), I walked into what would normally be a crowded room of 40 students and two teachers (sometimes there aren't enough chairs and the chinese teachers share a seat with a student...yeah creepy), to find it jam packed with domineering parents and anxiety laden students. This was going to be a good day...

Getting the students to even utter a sentence in front of their watchful parents gaze was as difficult as getting a clear yes or no answer out of my "helper teachers" (for example yesterday's question was, will there be parents in my class today? NO was their response.)

Although tangential, when preparing next week's 11th grade class, I encountered something peculiar: Only one of the three Chinese dictionaries I used had a translation for the word "fact". Even the online ones came up with zero search results...now that is telling of this country.

I made it to lunch, and was greatful for a peaceful meal of unidentifiable meat with veggies over rice, when I noticed a lady was blatently staring at me. I burried my head in lunch, but soon enough it was gone, and I was stuck face to face with this lady. She began starting speaking to me in broken english, asking if I taught her children (which I don't) and then proceeded to offer me a job. I wonder if she actually has students here, or is just trying to steal away some foreign teachers.

Thankfully, english corner was about to start, so I excused myself and went back to the school. On my walk back, I quickly realized that there was a reason the unidentifiable meat dish was so abundant in the dining hall--it was Chinese exlax. However, on my run up the stairs, I was stopped by more students, teachers and parents and was forced to eek out a miserable 15 minutes with them before I could run and grab some TP. (Yes in China, almost every bathroom is lacking of toilet paper, which means BYO TP or well...)

Sparing the gruesome details, lets just say that Chinese toilets are essentially holes in the ground, and using them is only comfortable for people who've grown up as baseball catchers (in fact, I don't know why China has yet to produce a MLB catcher). Anyway, I do my best to live like a Chinese person, but seriously, there is nothing more demeaning than balancing over a stanky hole with your pants around your ankles, when your 10th grade students and one of their fathers comes in...and starts talking to you in Chinese. Anyone else would have properly read the look of anguish on my face to mean "Leave me the fuck alone", but no-not here.

God a hate bring your parents to school day.