Draw your dream home.

The prompt I gave the students: Draw and describe your dream home. Consider size, location, space, and what it looks like inside and outside.

Here are my three favorites from the recent assignment.

Exhibit A: Of course you should make your family walk up fewer flights of stairs. And, why not make your poor dog live in the chimney/attic of your four/five story house.

  
Exhibit B: She's not a crazy cat lady, she's my student: Her written response: 

"I want a house with a big garden. It doesn't need to be too big, but must have a big, warm chair and a fireplace. I want to live a place to be cold in winter, and can snow heavily. At that time, I can sit in my chair beside the fireplace with a cup of hot milk in my hands and a fat cat on my knees. The garden can be bigger, because spring. Both the cat and me need to exercise."

  
Exhibit C: Who doesn't want a tank with 12 windows and a dog with a very curly tail?

Performing in front of hundreds

Can you perform?

What day will the performance be? .... SCHOOL: We're not sure. ... There will be a practice tomorrow.

We have class and meetings. We're so sorry we can't come to the rehearsals. ... SCHOOL: Okay, you will just perform in front of the head of the department. He wants to make sure the performance isn't bad.

So, we performed for him. He tried to convince us we wanted background music so we could focus on dancing. After assuring him we would practice, he agreed to have our group of foreign teachers perform during a welcoming event for the freshmen. Little did we realize we should have actually practiced more than just once or twice. We didn't realize the caliber of performances that would be on display. On the day of the performance we were greeted by students dressed in suits who guided us to seats of honor (2nd row, right behind the heads of the department). All of our students were in the rows behind us. They were giddy in anticipation for the afternoon of performances to start (it lasted more than 2 hours .... we had the expectation the time commitment was about 20 minutes). So we settled into our seats, nervously drank some water from the bottles they handed us. My students shoved glow sticks into our hands and the performance began!

They were complete with over-dramatized renditions of Green Day's "Wake Me Up When September Ends", bubble machines, fog machines, flashing lights, synchronized dancing and short skits (think talk show).
 
I'll spare you all the videos and give you the one I thought was funniest. These girls are in my class, they performed an American Idol type skit with their roommates. This clip is from about half way into the entire skit. I hope you can get a good laugh!

And yes, we also did our performance. With some last minute changes (the addition of beat boxing and dancing for our stage entrance) the students really seemed to enjoy the performance. The teachers and students are a blast to work with. Check out Erin's blog for a video of our performance: http://tohaveasong.blogspot.com. It's also at: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jE9nOTq-jtg&feature=colike

Brr ... it's cold in here! It must be winter time!

Where did fall go?
I feel like lasted for maybe two weeks here. Granted, I understand it has also cooled down back in Kansas. I miss not being able to choose when I'll turn my heat on. Once again, I am learning lessons about how life is not about me!
 I don't want to put on my winter coat too early (even though our forecast this week is a high of 15 degrees C and the low in the mornings is -3 to 0 degrees C). My room has been about 11 degrees C (51 degrees F) all day. That is until we turned the air conditioner on! In the summer I didn't bother to use the AC because it was always blowing warm air. Now I am glad to have it so my room is 18 degrees C (64 degrees F). At least that's the temperature directly below the AC ... I don't believe it is accurate because I am still in three layers of clothes, with a blanket, hood and wool socks and feeling the chill. I am certainly grateful for at least some semblance of heat! When I am in the office I simply wear the same things I wear outside (no need to hang your coat up in our office!). It takes strategy to layer in such a way that all the sweaters will fit into each other and still allow for movement! I'm grateful to have brought my fingerless mitten/gloves so I can work in them!

When I sleep I must be careful to not knock the extension cord to the air conditioner and accidentally turn it off (I share a remote with Audrey who lives next door). The majority of our plugs are the equivalent of extension cords laid from one part in the room to another (moveable outlets!).  


On a warmer note, we heard rumor the heat will officially come on next week. I hear the radiator pipes gurgling occasionally so it is a welcome sound. In the meantime, we'll continue to hang out with students, coats and all!

Stay warm!

How to make a comforter in 30 minutes or less

Today we ventured to Fabric City (Market). The market is four floors packed tight with closet-sized "shops" that have little doorways for you to step in and see the purses, shirts or pants that hang from the the ceiling to the floor. (Think Peal Market in Beijing without the shouting!) We had been told you can get tailor made clothes. For two hours we shopped and finally found the fabric section. It was then we realized we probably should have measured our beds prior to coming to have comforters and duvet covers custom made. Luckily we had some students and my teammate Cathy there to help translate. 

After choosing my fabrics we watched them quickly produce a beautiful blanket.

Step 1: Select from hundreds of beautiful fabrics what you want to see everyday for a year. 

I hate making decisions especially when there are so many beautiful, classy, cute, simple, bright, plain, etc. fabrics. I finally choose one (half the time making the blanket was just me choosing fabric)!

 Step 2: Cut comforter fabric. Lay two layers of batting (which they also had me select) on top of the comforter that is inside out (right sides together).

I choose the simplest, cheapest fabric. We hadn't discussed prices (or if we had I hadn't understood)!

 Step 3: Lay a piece of plastic on top of the comforter fabric and batting. Fold over several times. My curiosity was peaked at this time. After having it all folded together they pulled the comforter fabric over (right-side out) then took the plastic out. It all happened in a minute or less. 

Step 4: Beat blanket with PVC pipes. This happened several times during production (to make sure everything was smooth??).

Step 5: Bast the comforter. (I wished I knew the Chinese to ask for a needle and thread to help in this step. It looked like so much fun!)

Step 6: The ladies put your finished blanket in a bag and give you the bill.

 Guesses on the final bill?

What would you pay for:

• Custom made light-weight (2 layers of batting) comforter
• Duvet cover (with zipper)

I estimated it would cost about 300-400 元 (yuan)  or $50-60 USD. 

I was pleasantly surprised when she showed me the calculator. 

Only 145 元! That's less than $25 USD! 

Excited to sleep with my new blankie!