Top Ten Reasons Why Siping is the Place to Be

Let's try this one more time. :) I have a webblog now (a few weeks ago I began one and then China conveniently blocked the whole website-- figures :) ), so if you want to hear China stories in a more up-to-date version, feel free to read and leave comments here. I affectionately call this site The Story of My Journey.

Top ten reasons why Siping is the place to be :
10. It’s never boring in ol’ Siping. With a large team of 10 adults (plus one honorary member) and three children, there’s always stuff going on- hanging out with the guys at Korean barbecue or Chinese hot pot, or studying with the girls, or watching movies with the gang like “Akeelah and the Bee” (a must-see for all you feel-good movie fans- this spelling stuff is hard!), or watching Sonny and Robb play Scrabble with more intensity than I’ve ever seen… :). This week we began placing our bets on March Madness, which, according to Seth is the best sports team event ever and according to Sarah is just dumb. We have made our predictions and placed our bet (an entire $1.25, ya'll!!) and after the first round I am winning! Sorry, Duke.
9. Creativity of the students. Especially in their writing. I am teaching Creative Writing this year (Hooray!). Teaching paragraph formation and how to write research papers can be boring (yes, we all had to go through that back in the day) and mafan 麻烦(troublesome), but creative writing, now that’s something to write about… :). Stay tuned for some of their published entries!
8. When it snows here the “man power” comes out. Even horses help. Everyone just grabs a shovel and starts clearing the highway. There are no snow plows here. Not in “dry” Siping. Spare shovel, anyone? Now the snow is melting and we have rivers (yes, rivers) of mud here :).
7. They speak standard Chinese here (meaning their Mandarin is easiest to understand). Apparently, the most standard speakers in all of China! I can actually understand what the screaming fight at the market is about! Still can’t understand most of what people are saying, but “Hakuna Matata!” Instead of learning a local dialect (because there’s not really one), I can concentrate on Mandarin—with added Norwegian, Russian, Korean, and Japanese words (for my colleagues). :)
6. Benefits: Fridays off from teaching! (and Saturday and Sundays too), we have a maid who cleans our floors and brings hot water to our door every morning, and we are treated very well by the waiban 外办 (foreign affairs office). The other day he (the waiban) stood with me at the police station for 2 hours (!) helping me get my resident permit! They would say it is just their job, but it’s so much more than that! Also, you can take a taxi anywhere in the city for only 5 kuai!!! (60 cents)
5. Probably the nicest train station I’ve seen in China! I nearly fell over when I saw that at the train station they made people stand in line single file when waiting to get their tickets checked! People just don’t do that in China (which isn’t bad cuz they’re cool about it). Now they have “voluntary stand-in-line day” on the eleventh of each month. They even have mascots in Beijing that run around saying “stand in line, stand in line” to encourage preparation for when all the laowai 老外 (foreigners) come to town for the Olympics. Which I think is funny :)
4. Lesson planning together. Even after four years of teaching, I still don’t know what I’m doing. At all. We have little groups. For example, those who teach Creative Writing meet in a group, plan together, delegate responsibilities (one person makes the worksheet, another makes all the copies, etc.) and are all on the same page. At first I though this would kill my individuality, but no, no. It just allows for me to be a better teacher.
3. The endless supply of things, like from Mary Poppins: Seth’s endless supply of coffee and energy, and Jonny’s and Sonny’s (you’d think their names would rhyme, but they don’t—funny thing about English) endless supply of funnyness on situations, as well as Josiah's endless request for "funny stories" (he's 5 and apparently our stories aren't funny enough).
2. Playing “Twister” with the Chinese students was one of the most delightful things I’ve ever done! Hee hee! Left hand green, ya’ll!


And the #1 reason why Siping is "da bomb!"--
There’s central heating!!! Oh, you have no idea! No more writing on the board with gloves, no more heated blankets at night, no more torturous trips between the bedroom and the hot shower, no more five layers, no more hot chocolate (okay, we have to keep the hot chocolate because it's chocolate!), no more dropping chopsticks because our numb fingers cant' get around them, no more...well, until April when the central guy who controls the central heat turns it off. Snowing? No matter, heat goes off in April. Blazing hot in October? No matter, heat comes on. I'm not one to understand it, but I'm warm now :) :) :).
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Haven’t had a chance to meet many students yet, but when relationships begin to happen, I know that they will be at the top of this list. They always are.