Popcorn

There are a lot of things I could get in Changzhou that I can't get out in Alaer. That includes a lot more Chinese things than I would have thought as well. But there are a few things that I can get in Alaer which I never really saw in Changzhou. I've written before about the bagels but recently I found a great popcorn place. Slav noticed the place originally but the problem was that they only did that weird sweat popcorn that people in China seem to like. I've gotten sort of used to it but it's far from ideal. I noticed two things about this place though. One, they had actual butter. It took a while to find out where we could get some but we now have honest to god butter. Second, I thought that since they were just making it sweat by adding a spoonful of sugar couldn't we ask them to use salt instead. We finally did and they actually had some salt around and obliged us and made regular popcorn. With real butter and slat it actually came out great. So there's something interesting. I couldn't usually get real popcorn in Changzhou but in Alaer it's right down the street.

Poppy

It's 4am I'm sitting in the dark listening to the Yankees and thinking about my grandfather. In his life the Yankees won a World Series almost every three years on average, and while he was only two the first time I feel he probably heard that one as well. He sold insurance to one of the players on some of the great Yankee teams and had a ball signed by the 1961 Yankees, the same year Roger Maris hit 61 home runs. I don't know how many games he watched in an average year but if someone told me it was more than 100 I wouldn't be surprised.

I also think that in all his years watching baseball he never once found a game, a player, or a coach, he entirely agreed with. If the batter swung he should of held up, if he held up he was too cautious, and if he hit a home run he should have listened earlier. I think he would have made a great sports columnist since he could find fault with any baseball decisions. Watching a game with him I didn't need any of the TV commentators since he would tell you exactly what should be happening and why. Telling this to other people may have been superfluous as well.

I am thinking of him because I was going to call him this morning to chat about the game, and hear what the Yanks could be doing better, but last night he died. Listening to the games it can be easy for me to feel like I'm right back in American in the stadium, but when this happens China might as well be on the moon. E-mail, cell phones, video chat bring me right back home, but not really. I'm told he passed away soon after last night's game, and it was a good one. The Yankees were down five runs almost immediately and their pitching seemed erratic. But somehow they held on, the bullpen didn't give up anymore runs, and in the 8th they scored five to go ahead and win in dramatic fashion.

I know it sounds like this is all about baseball, but it's not at all. I don't know how to describe my grandfather. He was married for more than 50 years, he was a veteran, he was a school teacher, I think he like that I was teaching in China, he had four kids, and nine grandchildren, he was a good person, and he liked baseball.

Tiger

I've finally gotten most of my classes down but my beginner Oral English class is giving me nightmares. I tried to do a game I thought was pretty easy. I broke them into groups and asked them a few basic questions all about sports, we'd talked about sports in a few classes. It was going OK not great but mostly people were trying to talk and were giving some sort of answer when called on. Then I got to the last question, "Is it better to be fast or strong?" I don't think this question is particularly difficult especially as I spent some time making sure people understand that the students understood what "strong" and "fast" meant. But when I asked people for their opinion one answer was simply, "Tiger." I'm not sure what exact lack of understanding confused them enough that tiger seemed like an appropriate answer but I'm sort of at a loss for what to do. Slav joked was that at least they were thinking outside the box, the problem is we as a class can't seem to locate the box.

The listening class with them is going better since it's more structured but this class is more free form which makes it a lot harder. In another class with them I tried to have them write dialogues, something they understood but it was just hell trying to keep people focused on task and working. And I'm worried that since we ran out of time half the groups will not have their dialogues with them next week when they are supposed to perform them even though I tried to stress that. The class has really three different compounding problems. First, despite being college aged they have about as much English training as some Chinese students get in primary school or middle school. Second, honestly they just aren't great students the number of people trying to surreptitiously look at their cell phones or sleep is higher than any class I've ever had, and I just don't have that much practice enforcing much stickier discipline. I got annoyed when I was trying to take role one day and everyone was just talking so I couldn't here who was there. I ended up having the class sit quietly for four minutes to practice "being quiet." Finally, it's a really big class 41 student is a lot when trying to get people to pay attention and make sure people are on task. Well mostly I just needed to rant. I wasn't sure what to expect when coming out to Alaer but having the most trouble with classes really wasn't it. I feel like all this focus on classes is making it harder to really see how Alaer is different from Changzhou which is really why I came out here.

For I Have Known Them All Already

I know over the course of my years here I've talked about this a lot but I think it's one of the most common, most annoying, most different, and most uniquely Chinese things. I, of course, am talking about things changing at the last minute. After that whole big thing yesterday about classes changing and having to work all weekend, today Fish comes up and asks if I can be a question master during the competition. He said it wouldn't add on any more time so I say sure. But not two hours later I get a call form him telling me that they no longer need me to do anything. I have no idea why this is happening, and no explanation was offered. It's just China where plans made one second can be unmade one second later. I'm reminded of T.S. Elliot's line "In a minute there is time for decisions and revisions which a minute will revise." Also I have no idea if there will be an English corner tonight or where it might be. I actually felt bad when one students asked me and I had no idea.

I'm Not in Changzhou Anymore

I always knew that the hours I worked in Changzhou were crazily low even for teaching in China, but I've been a lot more busy than I thought here. This week was odd since after the end of the holiday last Thursday I worked Friday and then the weekend. My schedule started out as 17 hours a week, with more on some weeks and less on others, but after taking another class at the request of Fish I was up to 19 hours on average. This week I also agreed to judge some contest, I don't really understand what it is, later today for an hour, and speak to one of the other teacher's classes for an hour tomorrow. Lake came to my apartment yesterday and asked me if I would judge some really big contest they had this weekend. He offered some extra pay for it but I really didn't want to since next week I have 22 hours of class, and I need to get a bunch of lesson planning done over the weekend, and I've agreed to do a bunch of extra things for the school already. I especially was ready to refuse when it conflicted with a Yankees game on Saturday. Finally he offered to have me judge half, which is still about six hours on Saturday and Sunday, and said I could take off Monday and Tuesday next week as compensation. This doesn't result in less classes since I end up doing 20 periods with each class no matter what but I finally agreed. I just hope the school remembers how far I'm going out of my way for them. I think they basically just don't ask Roy and Olga since they jut say no.

Chess with Ersen

During one of my first classes I asked students to tell me something interesting about themselves. A lot of students didn't really know what to say and I just got a bunch of the same stuff about where they were from but one student Ersen in my beginner Uyghur class mentioned that he played chess. I though at first he meant the Chinese version of chess which I see so many older people sitting around playing but he said that no he played western chess. After I got my schedule more figured out I arranged to meet him to play a little chess. I've never been very good at chess but I've been learning some based on a computer chess program which has a really nice learning program. I don't have a chess set here but Ersen had one and we met at my apartment to play.

Ersen is a nice guy and he tries in class but just trying to have a conversation with him showed just how little English he has. We could talk a little about chess pieces and the words for them in English. I learned that he had learned chess from his family and that a lot of people where he was from played chess. People often ask me a lot of questions about the Uyghur students but with many of my Uyghur students have so little English it can be hard just to talk to them. I won the first game against Ersen with pretty much one good attack when I was in a tough position he won the next two games without too much trouble though so I think he's definitely a better player than me but at least we're close enough to make it interesting.

It's All About Timing

Things in China have a habit of breaking at the worst possible moment. I know there is a tendency for people to ignore any time something works and just remember the times it doesn't but it seems amazing how often the only thing I need doesn't work. We got cable recently but the school told us it was only temporary and if we wanted more we would have to pay for it. Well I get up at dawn this morning to watch the first Yankee playoff game and low and behold the cable isn't working any more. I asked Ma Ming to get it working again but god only knows how long that will take. Of course it was working just fine last night, but now nothing. Well at least the Yanks won. Tomorrow's game is at 6am and I don't have much hope of getting the TV working by then.