I have heard from a number of people curious to know what exactly a typical day consists of here. The majority of my writings have rambled on about the trips I’ve managed to squeeze in in my time away from Shenzhen, so I suppose explaining a ‘normal’ day in China could be of interest to those of you on the other side of the world. I should begin though by noting that though I have a schedule of classes, this is usually the only set piece in my day, and that change (particularly last-minute) is a part of daily life in China.

As usual, I woke up at a time far later than anyone with a real job would have and cursed the hour. It has become a pseudo-college environment in that sense, where the late start times have pushed me toward later nights knowing I can get away with them. Today we had to teach only two classes, starting at 10.35 and going through til lunch at noon. The kids, at this point, are all pretty comfortable with us. And I with them. But I also feel an appreciation/sympathy/mourning for the junior high teachers of the world. These kids can be ridiculous. I feel like Andrew earns the brunt of the bad behavior, but mine also enjoy talking a lot during class, which annoys me, and doing homework, which I usually don’t mind because then they are at least quiet.

Our position at the school and our teaching assignment is similar to walking a tightrope at times. We are barely skilled enough to be in the position, our main qualification being our native English speaking ability. This is of course countered here by the fact that the kids barely speak enough English (though they have improved) for all-English instruction. Add to it that we do not grade them, cannot give a teacher their Chinese name if they are a troublemaker, and have little-to-no disciplinary power past our 40 minute class period and I wonder (and hope against) the students figuring all that out and just wreaking havoc without restraint.

So with that said, today was an easy day. I only had to stop my two classes about 5-6 times to get them to be quiet, and only moved one kid from his desk. And its always the boys that need to be moved. I didn’t have to throw out anyone today. At the same time, I am able to see all the talking, note-passing, and general tomfoolery that abounds in the classroom and it makes me wonder what my own teachers endured knowingly for lack of wanting to disrupt classroom rhythm. Basically, Fridays amount to a countdown toward lunch, after which the day is usually free.

Of course, surprises pop up in your path. As we were leaving the school to come home, we were stopped by our students, who asked for help with decorating the two fake Christmas trees that had been purchased for the school. Of course, we obliged and were thus ‘responsible’ for one tree each, especially in regard to the decorations at the top that the students cannot reach. After this we were treated to a dress rehearsal of ‘Cinderella’ from class 3. It was fun to watch, but they are crazy. Loud, all over, turning the back to the audience. They are practicing it for the Christmas eve performances the classes are all doing. Christmas itself is widely celebrated here, with a festive if gaudy build up, though I am told by the Chinese that they don’t actually do anything on Christmas. A little odd.

After all the Christmas-related excitement I was afforded a break in the day, going home to catch up on the world as seen through my computer screen.  I have found the firewall here to be interestingly selective, so that I can, for example, see articles on democracy elections for president in the rebel province of Taiwan but am not able to look up portfolios for a Portland development company.  Sometimes the whole thing, much like China, can seem quite random.

Over the evening Andrew and I went out to get dinner.  Restaurants and noodle houses are one of my favorite aspects of living here, because a cheap, filling meal of good quality can be had for under a dollar.  The selection for tonight was a Sichuan restaurant, a province widely noted for its spicy food.  Typically this is more than alright, as I like spicy food and my taste for it has only grown since coming here.  Only on one occasion, when I was treated to the mouth-numbling ma la spice, was it too much.

I have not expounded much on my neighborhood here, but it is a wonderful little world unto itself.  Mostly residential and self-contained thanks to its geography (hills on 3 sides, Hong Kong border on the south), it is one of the few places I’ve been in Shenzhen that feels truly like a self-contained neighborhood, and it is nice to know that the stares I once got on my way to school have faded as I have become old news, though I still occasionally stop a toddler in their tracks as they drop everything to stare up at the mysterious laowai (foreigner).  On the way to and from the noodle house we ran into no less than 4 Chinese people whom we know, and such encounters make me feel much more a part of our little village of Lian Tang, as it is affectionately known.

This Friday was atypical as it involved a late-night run out to the border at Huang Gang in the Futian district.  Andrew has a pair of friends visiting over the holidays, so in addition for us getting to entertain, we also get to show off what we know of the city, people and the language.  So far, it has been fun.  His first friend arrived into the HK airport at 10ish at night, so we had set it up to meet at the bus station on the mainland around midnight.  His friend, Ben, is good with his directions and met us at the precise time, from which we dodged the beggars and price-inflators to get a taxi ride back home.  I’m not sure who has seen Blade Runner, but speeding along the elevated highways through skyscraper canyons reminds me of that.

So that in sum is the basic day.  One can swap out evening adventures fairly regularly, as dinner may instead be playing pool out in the streets with some beers or walking over to the Donghu reservoir up the road.  Thursday involved a special foreigners dinner in honor of Christmas that we were only informed of the morning of and which naturally ended with red-faced Chinese singing karaoke, although in this case they were pretty good at it.  One of the great things about living here is that new and interesting experiences are constantly offered and I have found that as my Chinese has progressed it seems that more parts of the culture and people are opening up to me.