Today was my first and last day at the other kindergarten. My boss had a friend who also runs a kindergarten not too far away and had promised to lend me for one afternoon a week. I was picked up by the principle, Annie, and taken to her place. It was about half an hour's drive in the direction of the painting street, she was very impressed with my knowledge of where I was when I pointed it out. It turned out her mother lives on painting street and she grew up there.

This kindergarten was a nightmare. There was over 25 kids per class and they had me for 3 hours in which time they wanted me to take 6 classes! Get your money's worth or what. I had half and hour with each group and although they were ready for me and well practiced with the text book I quickly came to realise that they had simply learnt the book. They knew 'Dad drives a car' perfectly but when I asked 'who else drives a car?' they went silent and blank. When I dared suggest 'Mum drives a car' they all said 'no' even though I know many mothers dropped them off that day. Obviously they had no concept of any of the words, they barely related 'car' to the picture of a car and had no idea about what 'drives' was. I sang 'the wheels on the bus about 100 times and they eventually got it and loved the actions. With the larger class they had learned the four seasons so I did a game Vincent had suggested and named each wall a season and then called them out making the kids who went to the wrong wall 'out'. This was also a hit. The only problems were that this was a poor cousin of my lovely kindergarten. They had no heating and as usual had left most of the door s and windows open. I had nearly lost my voice by the time I left. The other thing was the toilet.

Apparently it is common in China, I was just lucky with my kindergarten, for the toilet to be just a channel in the floor with a rail to hold onto so you don't fall in. That would have been bad enough (no flush, I'm not good at crouching and not falling etc!) but this one was in the corner of the main class room and had no door!! I waited until I got back to my kindergarten several hours later. On the way home Annie gave me a painting she had done herself! It was beautiful and of plum blossom in the winter, what I had said was my favourite. It was just an old one, she said, but I thought it was lovely.

I felt really bad as I knew I wouldn't be going back there and they were all so nice, but if I am to get paid by Eden then I will have to wait until the day before I leave, when I get my wages, before telling them I'm going. I have found a replacement and planned out the rest of the term for them. It's the best I can do.