Part 2

So being very hungover from our karaoke night Mr Lui woke us up to show us the school and give us our textbooks and keys to the office. Before even having a chance to buy a bottle of water and having the worst dry mouths ever we traced up around the school and then met the rest of the group at 9.30am to begin our TEFL course with Carmine to prepare us for teaching the following week. We went through the teaching techniques and the difference in culture compared to home. China schools differ very much from English schools; they can have up to 50 hours a week of lessons, let alone private studying time, and for some receive a lot of pressure to succeed from their parents. The classrooms are quite small, cramped and hot and lessons can have up to 60 students at a time. The seats are wooden and very uncomfortable as we found out.

These classes gave us the opportunity to really get to know the other foreign teachers who will be teaching at various schools across Hunan province.

Nick and Amy we already knew from Uni will be based in Changsha only an hour away with two Amercians from Kansas Jay and Zach who find it very difficult at times to understand us but we laugh at the different slangs and use of language we both have. We met Nat from London, very bubbly, Richard from Brighton who's always coming out with witty jokes and making us laugh, Sam who went to University in Manchester who's a lovely down to earth guy. Blair and Lindsey from Sctoland who both have very strong Scottish accents. We met Dan aka the sweat Monster (oj Dan though your muscles in your arm must be getting big from the fanning action lol). Sharmilla who lives near Plymouth was our main raving buddy on our night outs. Alex aka Aladdin will be based in Xiangtan (our city) with Evan the lovely greek who can down a ridiculous amount of petrol like alcohol and Alice who seems to have done a lot of travelling for her age. Carmine, our teacher, also told us how to get our VPN's sorted to bypass the no social networking rule in China and finally got back on Facebook.

Tuesday we missed afternoon lessons as Mr Lui wanted to take us out again. After meeting Mr Luis wife and children at the karaoke we were greeted to lunch by his girlfriend who we had to greet as Miss Lui lmao, we were later told that Mr Lui often cheats on his wife and gets drunk a lot. We were offered this black thing that you chew which Mr Lui says gets your sprits high we asked Mr Lui where we should put it after chewing, bearing in mind we were indoors, and he said to just spit it out so we gave it our best shot much to our amusement. We later found out that this is the main cause of mouth cancer and the reason why Chinese people teeth are so black so it's safe to say we won't be trying that again. After lunch we were taken to this little room where everyone was gambling for large amounts of money, we got the impression that Mr Lui was a gangster figure, Chris later confirmed this saying that he's pretty high up in the gangsta ranks in Xiangtan.

Except for our apartments which have a western toilet everywhere in China is just a hole in the ground which is going to take some getting used to (good for the leg muscles though). Some of them don't even have doors as we found out at the police station toilets (trying to sort visas) when we walked in on a Chinese girl squatting in a hole where we both then had to do the same (very funny experience lol). Tuesday night we spent in the hotel with Nick, Amy and Jay playing Chinese snap which Emily won.

Wednesdayy = Niki'ssss 21sttt Birthdayyyy Yayyy!!! :D who was greeted to cards off her family and a photo frame which Emily had brought along which was an amazing surprise to have! :D We started the day however at 6.30am to drive to Changsha to get our medical forms completed. When we got on the coach everyone had written in a card which Nick had brought with him and sang Niki Happy Birthday at 7oclock which is 12olclock midnight in England so officially her birthday! At the hospital we then went through a number of rooms where various doctors and nurses poked, prodded took blood and ultra sounds to make sure we were STI and baby free and fit and healthy to teach. We passed phewww.

No more lessons today (or if we did we skipped them) and waited for Go Karting at 5oclock which is in our local park and as we have never done it before we were both very excited. At the park we met an American girl who teaches at the University in Xiangtan . She told us about the foreign community and gave us a link to the group on facebook which lets us no what's going on. She also asked us if we could sing and said as we were blonde we could be part of her act because they would love us even if we couldn't sing. She performs around China so were thinking we might get in touch .. never know we could become famous :D. After Go karting we arranged a house party at Nik s apartments. Alcohol in the shops here is ridiculously cheap Nik picked up 2 600ml of beer and quarter bottle of petrol type sprit (58 %) and a bottle of coke for 2 pounds (20 yaun). A few "bottoms up" and drinking games later drinks were being spilt left right and centre. A few of the gang were kind enough to get Nik a cake and a massive bottle of petrol type drink which we made everyone do a shot of. We then all took taxis to the Xiangtan SOHO bar and raved it up until the lights came on in the club and we were asked to leave! Very drunken night as you can see from some of the videos we made.

Thursday we again skipped lessons as Mr Lui took us to a primary school to try and get us extra money teaching children there. It was the easiest interview we have ever done we just sat there while two people spoke in Chinese and negotiated terms ... lets hope our interviews at home goes as easy. After getting the job (Woop) we celebrated by yet another meal with what seemed like the Chinese Mafia. For the first time we refused beer with our meal Mr Lui was shocked by this. We were so hungover but used the excuse of having practice lessons in the afternoon to get out of drinking. The Chinese men cracked open a bottle of their byjo (petrol type sprit) and the smell was physically turning us it's lucky we didn't throw up all over the table although we probably did fall asleep. We were pleasantly surprised at this meal with the food as although Mr Lui told us it was rabbit we swear blind it was crispy duck and it even had the pancakes and hoisin sauce to go with it and when we ran out they were quickly topped up. When we came back to school everyone had already prepped for their practice lessons and were up teaching in front of their students. Some lessons went better than others but was good to get some ideas for different things we could use to teach. In the evening we had our last day of Chinese lessons which we have been having an hour of each day. As you will see from the video we will post it is a very difficult language which uses tones that aren't even in the English alphabet and despite our best efforts we were told we needed a lot of practice. However we are now mastering ordering our foods, asking basic questions to get us by and will try and pick up the language more when we're settled.

Friday was the last day of practice lessons and the final night out with the rest of the teachers who went to their own cities Saturday morning. We did a practice lesson together on a bunch of very hyperactive Chinese students and talked about their favourite animals. Though when we asked which animals are for eating we corrected them and said in England we don't eat dog. We think they liked us or rather our blonde hair which they are not used to. Having already organised a meal with everyone to say goodbye we were annoyed to be told by Mr Lui that we had to go for yet another meal with him and the leaders of the school. Despite our best efforts we couldn't get out of it, although I suppose it was a pretty important meal and we think that the head teachers liked us. We even made a toast to them to thank them for having us at their school but when we went in for the toast nik a little drunkenly knocked Emilys elbow which tipped her beer all over the food. They didn't mind (we are talking about people who spit their food out on the table so it was probably nothing for them though slightly amusing for us). At this meal we tried turtle, tortoise (Emily apologies to her pet tortoise Fred for this lol) and eel as well as some other meats we didn't even ask the name of. After deciding to take full advantage of the bottomless beer the leader provide (as it's rude to have an empty glass) we spent the meal downing our drinks before the head masters chauffer drove us to the restaurant everyone else was at. Having had a head start on the drinking we turned up already quite drunk and carried on with everyone else. We then went to a Karaoke bar where we had our own private booth and each sang a number of Karaoke songs while drinking large amounts of alcohol. This was one of the best nights we've ever had and fully enjoyed bellowing the lyrics to Angels, Wonderwall, Hey Jude, Don't wanna miss a thing, sweet child of mine and an endless list of karaoke classics. Obvs Nik had to get up and sing Westlife "when your looking like that" bringing a little bit of Popworld to China. It wasn't long before we were heading off to SOHO again and finishing the night saying bye to everyone.

We've already made a facebook group for all the teachers to keep in touch and I'm sure we will meet regularly at weekends and at various school holidays which were very excited about. Altogether we've had an amazing week in China it's indescribable and words can't really explain what it is like unless you experience it for yourself. Its definitely different from anything we've ever done before and we are looking forward to anything the experience throws at us. We're just taking everything with a good sense of humour and open approach.

This week we'll be starting our lessons but for now over and out!

Zaijian

Em & Nik

xxxxxx