跟上课有关系

(related to class)

I love my Chinese department class teacher. She definitely keeps me smiling. She is always telling us things to do to stay healthy. Today she spent a long time talking about how there are a lot of colds going around so we need to make sure to wear plenty of clothing. This is a very Chinese thing to be saying as well. She has told us to make sure to eat plenty of green vegetables to keep us thinking better and smarter (including telling Korean students that even tho almost all Koreans hate cilantro, they should still try it because it will help them study). She also told us this story of people being killed by being hit by a car by the main gate of our school and ended with “注意安全”　-be mindful of safety!

We have this one student who only comes to class half the time and when he is there he is usually falling asleep. At first the teacher was so concerned, asking him what he did the night before, to drink water, to get more sleep, go in the hall and walk around a bit. Then we started to make sample sentences about him when he was asleep and repeating them in rote. Pretty funny and slightly awkward. Today she just started to say "wake up" 起床 which is usually what you say when you wake up in the morning. The kid just kind of smiled awkwardly. It's like there is no shame.

Monday we were reviewing the four seasons in class. My teacher asked my Japanese student what season it was. He replied, "winter." This would be the logical answer seeing that the high is below freezing and it was in the teens that day. However, of course he was wrong-it is spring. In China, seasons have very specific days. She proceeded to tell us that we can start shedding layers the first of May. Pretty much we are supposed to put on long underwear the first of October and take them off the first of May. Conveniently, there are also national holidays these days.

Unrelated to class-below is a picture I wanted to share. This is after our Saturday small group last weekend. Just goes to show-some things don't even change when you move to the other side of the world...

...boys love video and computer games