Defamiliarization | "White-water" Rafting | American Holidays | Tutoring Grace | Four Things I've Learned | Dancing and Nanfang | Students | Being a Celebrity | The Bathroom | Coming to Terms | Random Conversation

Dancing, Vacation, and Nanfang Middle School

- Chanelle Chin

Boogying Down in China!
July 21--Yesterday was so awesome. We had a talent show/learn an American song yesterday. These Chinese kids like their Backstreet Boys and Titanic. They were so excited about learning the Titanic. We had an hour to teach them the song. So in between the teaching we would play more upbeat music from the Eagles and Bryan Adams and Micheal Jackson. During Billy Jean, I had them all stand up, cause I could feel their itch to dance. If not them, I wanted to dance. Then I started doing the twist, and they were like, "what?" looking at each other across the room.  I just kept trying to do some real popular dance moves that everyone in America knows. Only one boy in the back was dancing. He was snapping his fingers from side to side on either side of his body. It was sweet. Then slowly, another girl started copying what I was doing. And then they all started following. Once I got the entire group going, I taught them the "tootsie roll," "the robocop," "the disco moves," and the "cabbage patch." The same girl who started dancing at first started leading the Macarena.  That was probably the most fun I had teaching since hearing a bunch of Chinese kids screaming “take me out to the ball game..”

5 Day Vacation
Today is July 9th, and I had a wonderful day. We went rafting down a brown river, in which I fell into 2wice (hopefully I don't get pneumonia or diarrhea). We got into water fights with the Chinese people, and because we were unarmed, found a way to make peace by singing "row row row your boat."  The event turned into a battle of the boats singing contest between our American songs and the Chinese.  I also spent a whole day checking out the 3 gorgeous gorges in which we got rained on and made a few Chinese friends. I've never felt so stink, dirty, and gross in my life, but at the same time, never had so much condensed amounts of fun in a short period of time. I will no longer complain over beach bathrooms and am having so much fun learning how to enjoy every moment of life (as taught by my fellow teachers). The people here are so much fun, so willing to help and offer a "hello." I am also enjoying the food here.

Impression of Zhuzhou’s Nanfang School
Nanfang did a good job of keeping us busy.  So busy in fact, that I’ve been having such full days with little time to relax and keep for myself.  From the all day activity full camp schedule to the extremely hospitable home stays, I feel so happy and light to finally have nothing to do.  Sam commented on how well this summer job prepares us for real work life compared to other summer jobs where most interns are given menial work.  I agree with him thoroughly.  I don’t think I have worked this hard even in school.  Christina Li and I both concluded that teaching is a job of entertaining.  That is hard work.  Impress to teach, at least with the high school level.  But, I like it because it’s a challenge that I think is good for me in developing skills that will work for me in my future ambitions.  Acquiring knowledge and teaching (or sharing) it in an entertaining way is always useful.

The fondest memory I have of the Nanfang school is coordinating the festival performance.  The kids here are quite talented.  It was easy to teach them songs and understand them when they spoke because their pronunciation and motivation is great.  My class was given the task of memorizing and performing the United States Declaration of Independence.  As I watched them perform that night, I thought of the time when I had to learn the same words in high school.  These kids were adorable as they wore beards and acted out the name signing of our country’s “Founding Fathers.”  Talking with their Chinese English teacher, she said her students learned a lot of useful information from that experience.  I am glad that I had the opportunity to share this important part of American history with them.

Another fond memory I will have years after this experience is that of the students.  Their mischievous confidence using phrases and slang such as “piece of cake” whenever I would give an assignment was fun to see.

I also loved teaching and playing the game “darling if you love me…” in which a student would try to get the others to smile.  The looks some students gave from trying not to smile were hilarious.  Some of my students would fill air into their cheeks while others would break into prayer.  Overall, I hope that they enjoyed their time with me as much as I enjoyed my time with them.