Orientation

So it has been a while since my last blogpost because I have been so busy with orientation. I am now packing to get ready to move to the city where I will be teaching which is called Liuyang. I have been trying to provide you with pictures so you can see some of what I have seen.

I guess I will start at the beginning of Yangshuo. Eun (see photo below) was the first person that I met here. I was soooo scared when I first got here that I couldn't even eat. Eun is the driver here at Buckland. It's also his job to make sure all the new recruits are comfortable and settled here. Without him and others on the Buckland staff I probably would have left China because of homesickness.

The actual orientation has been packed full of TESOL classes. Everyone here is awesome and my fellow new teachers and I are having a blast. The only bad part is that we are now going to be shipped off to other parts of China but hopefully we will keep in touch. At the end of orientation we each have to teach one lesson plan to a group of local students. I did my lesson on hobbies and had a great time.

Tomorrow I take a train to Changsha and then a car to Liuyang. My teaching partner's name is Aimee and I think that we will get along pretty well. My city is 45 minutes from Changsha (which means it is about 1 mile because of Chinese traffic) which is the provincial capital. Changsha = McDonalds! I will be teaching at a primary and middle school which is a bit younger than I had hoped but the McDonalds will no doubt help that.

Last night we had a huge party with Owen, the owner of my company. I got wasted off of baijo (see dopey smile in the photo below) but Owen did too so it was all right. Then it was time for some KTV (karaoke).

Today I went to the river one last time. It was incredible. The water is so warm and the Chinese tourists so excited to see some Lao Wei jumping off the bridge. This little girl was shooting us with water so when her bamboo raft came up to the bridge we all cannonballed into the water near her. She was soaked and started screaming, "you are evil". We may have started another world war.

I am sad to say goodbye to Yanshuo but I am ready to start the next chapter of this adventure.

Oh ya, I bargained with a lady at the market but did so entirely in Mandarin. Schwing!