First week of real classes down!

Though I have been here for almost a month, this was our first week of real classes. Last week we had Foundations week which was mostly a week full of pronunciation lessons (learning to say all the sounds in Chinese-a lot of repeating!) and then tutoring in the afternoon. It is good to have that pronunciation practice so get a strong base but we were definitely ready to be starting classes. The week before that was just orientation-talking about what things would look like, getting visas and such, ways of learning language (the iceberg effect!).

So, this week we started classes. We are in class from around 8 to 12 every morning. I have two different Chinese teachers and a few American teaching classes like Characters and a Practicum class. I was very happy to be finally starting classes! Because I had studied some in Harbin before, the vocabulary and grammar are mostly review for me right now but it is good because I am working on learning to write the characters we are learning! (This takes a lot of practices because I have to write them over and over to be able to remember how to write them-recognizing is much easier!) I thought I would give a little day overview of this Thursday to give an idea of an average day.

6.00ish Wake up, go to shower to take a shower with dripping water pressure (we dont always have a ton of water pressure here!)
7.30 walk to school

8.00 arrive at school, classes start

11.45 go to Ron's import store to pick up some cheese-I have been craving it since I got to China so I finally splurged! climb the 7 flights of stairs and eat a quick lunch

12.45 my tutor arrives 15 minutes early (I think this is going to turn into a normal thing for her). We have tutor time: pronunciation work, review today's lesson, dictation (I write from memory today's vocabulary), preview tomorrow's lesson, call my landlady about when she is going to come to fix my washer, go over flashcards of words I have learned the last two weeks in tutor time not related to school lessons, work on reading "Meggie Moon" (Chinese-English children's book), write out new vocabulary from story, have our 15 minutes of English time and then she leaves at 3.00

3.00 Check emai and clean up around house

3.45 Go to the gym with pat and amy, two other students

5.15 Climb stairs and arrive back at home, shower, and get ready for dinner

6.00 Go downstairs and finally try the mi xian restaurant on the first floor of my apartment building with pat and amy.

7.30 Climb stairs (still 7 flights!!!) and study for a while, call parents

10.00ish Go to bed-totally worn out from the day


That is a little view into a day of a language student!!