Today was so tiring…first of all, I talked to my mommy last night until like 12am, and this morning I had to wake up at 7:45 to meet for training at 8am. Not fun. I was so tired this morning that I didn’t even hear the alarm clock go off, and Joanna had to wake me up by saying my name like 50 times.
Anyways, we met at 8am with all the exchange students and all the Chinese university students to go through training for the migrant school project next week. So we basically sat through like…3 lectures on the organizations that are involved w/ this projects and the history of these projects. Then Dan gave us a lecture on these students, how to teach them, and how to design our lesson plans. Basically, for these students, their most prominent emotion is fear – fear of the future, because their future is so uncertain. They don’t know what they will be doing in the future, but if they don’t receive a better education and gain confidence, they will most likely work in the fields like their parents do. He told us that when we teach these kids, we need to be teaching them not to be afraid and to have confidence in themselves. We need to teach them how to be self-sustainable, and not to depend on anyone else. In order to do this, we need to empower them and teach them in a way that seems like we are here to bring out their potential and the confidence in themselves, not in a charitable way that seems like we have all the knowledge and we’re just sharing it with them. I really liked this point, because I think a lot of times when people volunteer, we volunteer thinking that we are doing a good thing for other people by sharing our resources, privileges, and knowledge with those less fortunate. But we need to keep in mind that, yeah, these people may not have as much as we do, but that doesn’t mean they AREN’T as good as we are. It just means they have less resources. But they aren’t any less capable or intelligent or have less potential than us. Studies have shown that these migrant school kids have the same IQ as the children in public schools, but because they don’t have confidence and are overcome with fear, their learning is depressed and they tend to show vigilance or resistance. Also, these children lead very hard lives because they get poor nutrition and always have a lack of sleep. These factors also make learning hard for them because it becomes harder to pay attention. But we need to teach the children that they are just as smart as any other child, and they can achieve the same things. The thing is, we label them as “underprivileged children” and make it seem like they’re handicapped when in reality, they’re not. Just because they have less doesn’t mean we should expect less. So I’m definitely going to have to keep that in mind ALL the time I’m there. It’s kind of like what Dan was talking to us about 2 days ago about valuing people – we can’t label these kids and treat them accordingly. We should treat them like any other student and expect them to learn like any other student.
So anyways, after this series of lectures (it was 4 hours long…), I ate lunch with my team (well, sort of. We ate lunch with another team, so it was like two teams meshed together). The Chinese university students took us to their cafeteria and I had some rice with spicy chicken and cucumber salad-type thing. It was pretty good. Oh and I got this really good green tea-type drink w/ green beans and other beans in it. It was SO good. Better than last night’s drink. I LOVE drinks w/ stuff like beans in it…but I like it not so milky, which is why I liked today’s better because it wasn’t milky. Anyways, we ate there, and then we all hung out and sat around and played this game called “Sculptures.” It’s one of those ridiculous games where you try to guess the rules of the game, but it ends up being a stupid rule that is TOTALLY obvious once you get it. It was HILARIOUS though. There were 12 of us, and 5 of us didn’t know how to play. The 5 of us were me, Michelle, Nikki, and Alex & Chris (The Chinese university students). So we started playing, and our job was to guess what the rules were. It was really funny…for the first like 2 minutes, we were all CLUELESS. We didn’t get it AT ALL. But after a while, I started noticing some patterns and they gave us a few clues here and there…so I figured it out. And then Michelle and Nikki figured it out. Alex and Chris were the last ones, but it was SO funny. I felt like it was kind of mean, because for the people who don’t know, it seems to make NO sense at all, but for the people who do know, it’s HILARIOUS so they just keep laughing. I feel like if I didn’t figure it out, my self esteem would be completely demolished by this game. But it was all in good fun. Alex & Chris were both hilarious and didn’t seem too bothered by the fact that they couldn’t get it at first. So anyways, we just started making it REALLY obvious and then they figured it out. Hahaha the Chinese university students are SO funny…I really like hanging out with them.
So after that, just my team went to go plan for our week next week. So we’re teaching 4^th grade students, so we planned mainly just to play a lot of games with them, which will help them break out of their shell & gain confidence. So hahaha this session of planning was actually just a lot of US playing the games. The Chinese university students and cultural exchange students have been hanging out for a week now, and so they planned some of the games already. So me, Nikki, and Michelle needed to play the games to understand them, since we weren’t there this past week. But yeah, hahaha it was SO much fun because I felt like a little kindergartener again since we were playing kid’s games.
Anyways, each day that we’re teaching (we’re teaching for a total of 4 days next week) has a theme. The first day is just an introduction day, so we’re playing a lot of games. The first game we’re playing is a game called Concentration to learn names. Basically you have to clap/snap with the rhythm, while saying your name and another student’s name. Then that student has to say his name and another student’s name. And etc…It’s just so people can learn your name and you can practice other people’s names. The cultural exchange students said that most of these students won’t have English names, so we basically will give them a list of common English names (eg. Sarah, Michael, John, etc) and the students get to pick. So this will help them learn their own names too. The second game we plan to play for Day 1 is called 1 yuan- 5 jiao. So basically, 1 yuan is 1 dollar and 5 jiao is 50 cents. So the boys are worth 1 dollar and the girls are worth 50 cents (I know, it’s really sexist…but this is a game that all the Chinese university students grew up playing, so they suggested we teach the migrant school kids). So basically we (the teachers) say a value (eg. 5 yuan) and the kids have to form groups of that value. So, for example, if we call out 5 yuan, the kids can form groups with 5 boys, or 4 boys and 2 girls, or 3 boys and 4 girls, etc. So that will be a good way to teach them how to count and think quickly. After that, we’ll play a game called “draw a nose”? I don’t really know how to play this game…the Chinese university students said it’s something like Pin the Tail on the Donkey, because you try to draw a nose while closing your eyes. I guess it makes sense… I dunno, we didn’t play that to try it out.
For day 2, the theme is to teach kids basic survival skills (I guess in the case of natural disasters or something) and teach them basic English words. So we’re going to teach them the song “Head, shoulders, knees & toes.” And then we’re gonna teach them some things like brushing your teeth (we’re going to try to brnig them the free toothbrushes & toothpaste we get from the hotel…), washing your hands, what to do in a fire, and how to tell the compass directions (north/east/south/west).
Yup…the cultural exchange students who did this program last year told us that the kids REALLY like to play games, so we’re just going to have a lot of games involved. Apparently they really liked playing a game called “Big Wind Blows.” Basically, one person starts in the middle and says, “Big Wind Blows…” and then says some characteristic. And everyone who has that characteristic has to get up and move to a different chair, and the person in the middle has to sit down too. So one person is left in the middle and then they say “Big Wind Blows…” I think I’ve played this before, but it wasn’t called Big Wind Blows. But it was SUPER fun. Me and my team (we’re a team of 9 people) played it for like…45 minutes. HAHAH and we only stopped because one girl needed to go pee. But otherwise we would’ve kept playing. It was so funny…the Chinese university students didn’t always know the English words we used, so they’d be very confused…it was funny. One girls said, “Big wind blows…everyone who has eyebrows” (so everyone w/ eyebrows gets up and moves to a different chair), but one Chinese student didn’t know what eyebrows were, so he was really confused and moved very slowly and ended up in the middle. It was hilarious. I quite like the Chinese students…they’re relaly really friendly and so open to learning, even though their English is really good. I just wish I could speak Chinese so that I could practice with them.
Anyways, that’s all we planned because we were so busy playing games. We were “planning” for about 3 hours, and I got back to the hotel room at 4pm. This week is supposed to be pretty free…we just go to the migrant school in the morning and then plan if we want to at night. We have no classes or excursions or anything, so we’re pretty free to do what we want. Dan hinted that it was a good time to catch up on our reading…yeah…that’s not happening. I still haven’t started reading, and I think we’re supposed to be halfway done with the first book already. It’s just so much reading, and I have SO much to journal about already without reading that I am not motivated at all to read.
On a completely random note, I went to the convenient store today and bought this REALLY good drink with stuff in it (I already said this, but I LOVE drinks with stuff in it). It’s like a green fruit drink with like coconut cubes in it. But it doesn’t even taste like coconut…it tastes more like lychee. So I’m thinking maybe they just got the two mixed up. But anyways, it’s like lychee cubes in a green apple flavored drink. It’s DELICIOUS J
OH, on another completely random note, I wanted to talk about Nancy’s website. So Nancy is a grad student here who is at Stanford, and she flew over with me and Joanna on the same flight, so she was one of my first friends here. So basically she is heavily involved in volunteering and working in East Asia, because that’s what she feels her calling is. So she co-founded this website calledeastvillagers.org that’s used like facebook, except it’s a non-profit organization specifically designed for people to share their experiences about volunteering and a way for people to find causes to volunteer for. It’s a lot like facebook, but for causes in East Asia. Anyways, the thing that impressed me most was that if you become a member, everything you do on the site gets you points. Like uploading pictures, or writing a blog, ANYTHING gets you points. And then you can donate these points to your favorite cause and every Thanksgiving, the Ping & Amy Chao Foundation (Ping Chao is the other co-founder of the website) donates $10,000 to the top 15 organizations with the most number of points. And each organization has a website with its members, posts, photos, description, events, videos, etc. It’s like a Facebook event, except on a larger scale. It’s not just one event; it’s the whole organization. Anyways, I think the reason I’m most excited about it is because I want to make a page for my mommy’s organization, Living Stones Village. I think it’d be a really good way for them to publicize and, if they can, raise money by getting the Thanksgiving points. So I will definitely see if I can get that started when I get home…Nancy presented this all at the 4-hour lecture this morning, so that’s how we all learned about it. I think it was just launched 2 months ago, so it’s still in a pretty early stage and they’re still kinda testing it out. But I’d still like to try it. Anyways, just wanted to advertise a bit and get the word out for it. But I don’t know a lot of people who volunteer, so I don’t know if you (whoever’s reading this) would like to use it.
[a couple hours later]
I just had dinner with Laurie, one of my sister’s friends who moved to Shanghai. She’s been living here about 3 ½ years now, and she’s known me since like…I was 10. But anyways, we ate dinner with Joanna at a restaurant in the French concession. Anyways, it was this cute little restaurant and had reallllly good food :) But I’m so full now -__- I really am getting fat. Anyways. Having dinner with Laurie was REALLY good for me, I think. It was really good to get to know Laurie, because I haven’t seen her since I was 10. She went to college at Boston University, and then moved to Shanghai, and I was too young to really know her back then. She was just another one of my sister’s friends to me. But at dinner today I got to know her a lot better and I think it was really really fun. Me and Joanna both had a really good time with her and our dinner lasted from 7:30pm til now (it’s like almost 10:30). We talked a lot about like what we’re doing here, and what she’s doing here, but I think the most important thing I did was talk to her about my faith. I didn’t realize this before, but I realized as I was telling her and vocalizing it, but G did some pretty amazing things in my life in this past WEEK. Insane, actually. And I didn’t notice it until now. Basically, I was completely lost in my walk with G when I got here, and she asked me what G has been teaching me this week. So I told her about how at SCF last week, me and Nikki were in tears and broke down because it felt like the pastor’s message was directed at us..and I realized that if Nikki wasn’t there next to me, cocmpletely broken like I was, I wouldn’t have broke down so much. I probably would have pretended I was okay, tried to hide my tears, and not gone up to the altar to have them pray for me. And what are the chances that out of the 20 something people we went with that day, I ended up sitting next to the ONLY one who broke down with me? And then, definitely the whole thing with Michelle, giving me relief that I’m not alone here in how I feel. And then also, the fact that I’m roommates with Joanna, who I definitely feel the most open and comfortable with, so I feel like I could tell her anything. And then this dinner with Laurie, who just happened to ask me about my faith and I felt comfortable enough to tell her because I am definitely a really distant person and I BARELY open up to anyone. I mean, I barely open up about my faith to my family, let alone to Laurie, who in a way I just met for the first time. It’s just so weird that all this stuff happened, and it’s definitely not a coincidence. It’s just way too much to be a coincidence. And then there’s also the fact that I didn’t even want to be here for this course in the first place; I had only wanted to come for the language course next month. But Dan told me that there wouldn’t be very many people in the language program and they weren’t even having an orientation for it, so if I want to connect with the students and get the most out of my experience I should take this course too. And look at how much has happened in the past week of my being here – the amazing things G has done with me, the people he’s put in my life, and all of the knowledge I gained about my identity. I definitely feel like my identity has broadened here, within this past 7 days. In America, I feel like my identity was just so narrow; I was just an American and I was a student, and yeah I looked Chinese but wasn’t really Chinese. But here it’s like, I’ve learned so much about myself (especially the Chinese part) and G and I’m learning and practicing how to be more open and extroverted, which is something I really need to work on. It really is kind of amazing how all of this stuff happened and how everything turned out…Laurie and Joanna were pretty amazed too. Just goes to show how incredibly awesome our G is.
OH, and ANOTHER weird coincidence (HAH, yeah right…totally not a coincidence). Laurie is affiliated w/ PESI, so remember the professionals dinner we went to last Sunday (the one where I was jetlagged and wasn’t paying much attention)? Yeah, well, Laurie is one of the professionals. HAHAHAHA. It turns out that she goes to the dinners every year and talks and meets with the students of the PESI programs. HOW STRANGE. And we have another professionals dinner tomorrow, and she’s going to be at that one. So even if I hadn’t met her for dinner tonight, I would’ve seen her anyways tomorrow. HAHAHAHAHAHAH. Oh gosh…I can’t get over how weird that is.
Anyways, me and Joanna are really proud of ourselves. On the taxi ride back to the hotel, Laurie wasn’t with us (she just told the taxi driver where to go and he drove us back), so it was just me and Joanna who don’t speak any Chinese with the taxi driver. And he was listening to American music, like Usher & Britney Spears, and stuff like that. It was so funny because all of the music was American pop music that we listen to back home in the States. And it totally gave us the opportunity to talk to him, so me and Joanna tried to strike up a conversation with him using the VERY limited Chinese we knew. So Joanna was trying to say I like your music, but she only knew “I like…” and she just pointed to the radio. But he understood what we were talking about and turned it up. So then he tried to talk to us, and showed us the CDs he had in his car. He had some Kenny G and Paul Mariot (???) and he said something about Tchaikovsky and stuff. We didn’t really know what to say…so we just kept saying “Hao, hao :)” (hao = good). Hahaha. It was really funny. And then he tried to talk to us more, I think he was asking us if we were students. He said something, and opened his hands like a book, so we assumed he meant are you studying? And we said yeah. There was just a lot of “I don’t understand”s back and forth, but we made it work. It was really fun…and I’m really glad we mustered up the courage to try to talk to him. A lot of the cab drivers here are bitter and give just one word answers because they don’t really wanna talk to you. But I’m really glad we got this one, because he actually tried to speak back with us. It was a really fun cab ride, and I can’t wait to start the language program so I can have more stuff to say!! :) :) :)
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