A week with no internet!

Well today was a good day. Two students took us to the internet cafe so we could check our facebook etc.. we have been living with no internet for a week, and if you know me thats a brutal thing for me. I am slowly adjusting to life in China, or at least day to day life. Teaching is alright. The kids just talk all the time!! Its hard because they try to push our buttons to see how much they can get away with. When I walk by the other classrooms no one is making a sound, but my classrooms they are constantly talking. I hate to yell at them, so i have found that slamming the desk door keeps them at a dull roar. For their benefit though, it is a coversation class, if they would just speak English it would be ok cause then i could understand when they are learning or when they are just chitchatting with their partner! Its also hard because each class is at a different level of english it seems. We have a different textbook from the chinese english teachers that is supposed to be all oral english, but we are not supposed to TEACH them new things, just practice what they have learned. And to tell you the truth, they learn stupid stuff. Things that they wont have to use. How to write an advice letter for example, but not how to talk in complete sentences, or write in complete sentences. I feel like i should be the one TEACHING them the English. Oh well.
On to the living situation:
Our FAO has been very slow at getting things done. For example, Megan has mold in her room, our washing machine is broken still etc.. He kept saying maybe tommorrow the internet would be fixed, then last night he tells us a month! Not acceptable at all we told him. The good news is is that our companies people are comming to check things out at all the schools where we are at. We told our FAO that and I think he's nervous! Its hilarious. Thats the great thing about Buckland (the company I work for) they back us up with anything we need! Im hoping that with them comming tommorrow everything willl be fixed. If not we can leave anytime, and Buckland will send us to another school, no problem. they want us to be happy so that we stay.
Today it rained for the first time since Ive been here so it actually is bearable outside. Otherwise its been in the 90's all week! Too hot for this girl.
This week i am teaching seven days straight then its the national holiday and get a week off. My mon and tues. classes are on sat. and sun. yes they have classes 7 days a week! Megan and I are going to meet up with some other teachers in Xian (northern china) so we will take an overnight train, which should be an experience in itself. It will be good to see the other teachers and have a NoRMAL coversation in English.
Hope this finds you all well!

First week of teaching in Yongzhou

Hello all!
Well today is Wednesday. I am into my second day of teaching. It has been a rollercoaster that is for sure! The first class, once i got over my nervousness was awesome. You really get a high from teaching! They speak pretty decent english, they just cant understand me because i am not chinese and have a totally different accent. I have to keep repeating myself and the directions alot. They are very enthusiastic about learning english though. There are some kids however that just sit there, just like in America. They are interested in learning about me and America as well. They giggle alot and repeat everything that i write on the board in perfect harmony, its hilarious. They have been trained as a group for sure! The second class was more wild and didnt understand half of what i was saying im afraid, half of the class is me explaining myself! I will have to recondition my vocabulary into simplier terms ive decided. lol i never thought i spoke to challenging!!
We finally got our washing machine working and our hotplates (which is what we have for a stove) after we had our FAO over to explain them. Everything is in Chinese!! There is no dryer, noone has one. THey use too much electricity I guess. So we have a closeline in our hallway and since its so hot, it doesnt take long to dry our clothes. We havent had internet for over two days so thats why ive been a little slow on the pictures and updates.
Take care everyone!!

Trip to our city Yongzhou and our first day here

Well we made it to our city and school. Our city is Yongzhou and it is in the Hunan province in central eastern china. It is only about 4 hours away from where we were before so that is nice in case there are problems our company is close to us. The bus ride was an adventure as always. We had a person come with us from the company to make sure we got on the right bus etc.. he told the driver where we should get off. That was nice. However then we got a flat tire and had to sit in this hot bus for an extra half an hour or so in the middle of nowhere. Then we were told to get off soon after. However the bus station did not look very safe, nor was it open! As soon as we got off we were mobbed by taxi drivers, and when i say mobbed i mean MOBBED! It was pretty scary, no one spoke English of course. The FAO (foreign affairs officer) from the school who is like our "go to" person for everything was nowhere to be seen! So we managed to find a phone and called him, but we were in the middle of this circle of men! It was scary. so we ended up walking to the other end of the parking lot so they would leave us alone, finally they did. Then the FAO showed up and said he was told we didnt get in until 6pm. He even called the bus driver and yelled at him!!
Then we were taken to the school. I believe that we are teaching in an inner city school for sure! Its really run down and pretty gross. But our apartment is huge and i think Megan and I will be sharing it cause the other one is gross, and has been set up for an office etc... Or first night we had to kill a cockroach and a big spider! Lets just say it was a restless first night. Also our first night (which was sunday night) All the department heads took us out to dinner. Lets just say it was really awesome food, but we didnt understand a thing,. and we were the only women obviously.
Monday morning we went with the FAO to get us cellphones. They are prepaid cellphones and if you call me then its free for me, but not you. I would suggest getting a phone card if anyone wants to call me. Here is my phone number 15574602042. Im not sure how to call international yet. When i get my address i will put that up here as well.
I have my first class in the morning and will be teaching Senior 1 which is like juniors in high school. They are pretty excited to see us, everyone is saying hi when we walk by the classrooms. I will be teaching 16 classes a week in 45 min increments., mostly in the evenings which will be nice.
We also attempted shopping by ourselves today! We went to the supermarket and it was interesting. All we got for food was rice and soy sauce!! Thats all we could figure out. We also got other things like cleaning supplies and toilet paper. I am happy to report that we have a western toilet in our apartment!! Thank goodness!!
Yongzhou is a very big and dirty city, not like quiet Yangshou where we were. Lots of cars and smog, i think the population is around 360,000. We are one of 8 foreign teachers, four of whom we know. other than that we are the odd ones out, which is fun. People came up to us to say hello, but thats about all they can say! Yongzhou does however have a McDonalds, which we havent found and a KFC and Pizza Hut. We had the KFC today it was alright.
I should get ready for my class tommorrow! Wish me luck!! There should be about 60 to 70 kids in each class!!

Today we went to our first hosptial to get our physical for the working visa. Let me tell you it was not an american hosptial by any means. We didnt get bandaids for the bloodwork(yes we got our blood drawn, the needle was fresh out of a package, we made sure) we got a chest xray, urine test and eye test... and we had to pay for it, which was about 50 US dollars. I was kinda upset because they didnt tell us ahead of time, but oh well its done with. Last night the president of our company took us out to a nice authentic dinner and it was fun!! We went up to the mountains and ate looking over a rice field looking up at the moutains. It was way cool. We got there by taking this makeshift traveling bus with no doors, quite the adventure with the ways way that they drive over here. For the afternoon now we are going to watch the other half of our group present their practice lessons that they created to an actual chinese english class. I do my presentation tommorrow, on Friday. I am kinda nervous but once its over it will be fine. We decided on the city that we are going to. The city is called Yongzhou in the provience of Hunan in central eastern China. We should leave this weekend for our school. I will have my own apartment etc.. which will be fun i think. The pictures that i put up were from our travels through Hong Kong, which was just a quick bus ride. It takes awhile to upload pictures here so bear with me till I get the hang of it.

Pictures of Hong Kong