Day 1. First day of teaching program.

After managing to wake up at an ungodly hour, we had breakfast at 7 in the morning. Awful time. Too much time to spare when we could be in our cosy beds dreaming of marshmallows.
There was soya bean milk, which didn't have any sugar.
And chinese food.
I am getting lazy, not describing food in detail, it is so unlike me.
Actually, we had a cabbagey dish which was spicy. And buns which you could not tell if they were sweet or savoury. My little pet hate. I want to know if what I eat is going to be sweet or savoury. Imagine biting something that looks like a strawberry and tasting tomato puree instead.
There was also some noodles, which was spicy, and oily.
It shocked me to see that people continued to put chilli oil on the food.

Into the school we all went, I remember the traffic scared me a lot, even though we only had to cross one road, which was a zebra crossing with traffic light. But like I said, no one follows the rules in Zunyi.

We climbed six flights of stairs to the auditorium, where there was a panel of important people (officials from the government and educational board, and the main leaders of the teaching program). They made a few speeches in Mandarin Chinese, and I could not understand a word. I nodded a lot, and amused myself by looking overly interested. My grandad was on the panel, saw me, and gave me knowing wink.

The 'panel' of important people.

All the trainees (120 of them) and the trainers (19 of us) and a few of the officials trampled down the stairs for the beautiful group photo.

(Photo to be inserted later perhaps?)

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And ridiculously, although this was an English training program, not a fitness one, we had to all seperate into our classrooms... which meant for most of us climbing flights or stairs again.

I have a decision now of making up what happened, saying something believable, or admitting I genuinely don't remember what happened. Not the exact details anyway.

We went for lunch at some point.

And then back to the school.

More speeches and stuff were made.

Ah yes I remember now. There was a pre-movie briefing for 'The Sound of Music', which we were going to watch the next day.

And we went through the rough plot and characters... and then I got my moment!

I read the lyrics, with my 'cut glass' accent. They loved my British accent. I grinned a lot inwardly, my friends in Britain always made fun of my accent. But I guess they do not need to know that.

I had to restrain the urge to burst into song when reading out the lyrics, I had to remind myself, if I did burst into song, they would not join in like High School Musical, but I would look stupid.

Everybody clapped, probably because my Grandpa and some of the other trainers looked enthusiastic at my reading. And the trainees were pretty much forced into listening to me again.

Supper:

We had our lunch and supper in the same place everyday, with the 19 trainers split into two tables. This is a picture of some of us, with Candy trying to kiss my hand.

First day, done.

And much needed sleep again, in our hotel....

Day 0. Part 2. Hello Guizhou.

After an hour and a half flight. we arrived in the capital city of Guizhou, a province in China. In the airport, I was reunited with my dear friend, Candy, who had I not met for around 4 years.
She ran up to me, and held my hands, then started talking excitedly in Mandarin Chinese.
Unfortunately, instead of gabbling back excitedly and happily to see her,
"I'm so sorry Candy, I still don't speak Mandarin..."
Which is a pity, ruins the novelty of seeing your good friend again after a long time.
There was also Lily, Candy's mother, who always looks ever so elegant.
Steely, who to me looked a little like a typical uncle you would find in a Japanese cartoon. Even though I don't actually watch much Japanese cartoons at all.
And Shawn, the one who I was told by my grandad was the 'tall and handsome' one. I can't say I disagree.
We took a smallish coach to Zunyi, which meant we had to sit with all our baggage. Which made passing peanuts and cakes around the bus a little harder. It was quite a long journey, over two hours. I tried to be touristy and take photos out of the windows. But I have a bad habit of bringing bad weather with me wherever I go, so of course it was pouring with rain.

The School in Zunyi we were teaching in.

We visited the school we were going to be teaching in for the next two weeks, and to my sarcastic pleasure, our main operational base was to be up six flights of stairs. Our main concern at that moment was dear Diana, but kind Candy led  her gently up all the stairs. I was not as kindhearted, nor as patient to help.
My grandad, looked at all the classrooms, and demanded all the technological equipment were to be in place.
Quite honestly, I missed the meeting in Hong Kong, because I had just got from my flight from Wales, so I didn't actually have a clue what to do. I stood about making conversations. (It gets better, honest, I actually become of some use later on.)
After hanging about (I hung about, adults did stuff), we finally went to supper.
We had food.
And Shawn brought buns and stuff from his hometown.

This is when my memory starts to fade away.

You know I'm tired when I cannot remember what food I had.

Zunyi.
The city was dirty, and busy, sides littered with beggars with deformities. Spitting casually, pushing rudely were the pavement walkers. Shops and buildings were lit up in fancy modern lights, broadcasting loud and unwanted music.
The roads and roundabout were invaded by cars with no concept of laws nor the ways of traffic lights.
At night, the city is lit up to illuminate the blackness of the sky.

Day 0. Part 1. Entering Mainland China for the first time and meeting people.

We left the flat in the morning, in Hong Kong, my grandad and I, and we made our way to the train station. This is where I met my first friend from the training team.
His name was Turbo.
I don't kid you, its not a nickname as such, but his genuine English name. Turbo.
Nonetheless, my grandad introduced us to each other. I gave him what I thought was a charming, polite, friendly smile. But I don't think thats what he saw. Hoping he would talk to me, because I'm one of those who feels more comfortable when people are talking (preferably I'm included in these conversations), I smiled at him and tried to talk Cantonese to my grandad to show him I could.
I gave up soon after, most of the time my effort was put into trying not to yawn too obviously and explicitly.
Within half an hour, three or four stops later, our train pulled up at Lok Ma Cheu, where we would cross the river (by an indoor bridge with cool moonwalking flat moving walkboard things) to Shenzhen, in Mainland China.
It was a special moment for me, walking on the bridge, knowing within a few footsteps I would be in China.
Unfortunately this was the time Turbo finally decided to talk to me. Quite honestly I would rather let the feeling of walking into a new country run through me without disturbance, but its too bad the timing was bad.
Immigration went pretty smoothly, the unsmily man told me to sign some forms, which insisted that as someone who only entered China with a visa, I was referred to as an 'alien'.
Next we took a taxi to Shenzhen airport, the taxi was in quite a state. The passenger seat was stuck and broken at an unkindly angle, the childlock looked as if it had been ripped apart, and the remain left was a loop was silver wire.
I took many photos, but they all look like I was taking pictures of the same seat in a common taxi again and again with slightly different views outside the winbdow. When  I saw the views, it was a great sight for me, as it was a new bright city. However, I don't think the camera was able to capture that special feeling as my eyes were.
When we got to the airport, grandad was immediately on his phone again, trying to gather the numerous amount of people together, which is not as easy as one would think.
I met Mr Mak, who seemed very nice, and talked to me about places I have never been to.
Cecilia, lovely lovely, kindhearted, caring and hardworking Cecilia, with the funky little hat with a large shade.
Jacque bounced along, shouting 'Mr Bun, Mr Bun!' (my grandad is called Ben), with her cute little run. She was to be my head teacher, and she was passionate and motivated.
Then came along Darwin and Patrick, the two guys who were nearer my age. They were already friends with each other, and talked a lot, and seemed charismatic, so I wanted to be friends with them.
My clever technique, once again, was to linger and smile.
Patrick introduced himself first, even if only out of courtesy. But soon after things weren't done out of courtesy only.
And about 20 minutes later, so did Darwin.
It was the first step I guess. We talked about things, such as how long the plane journey was from America with Darwin, and Hong Kong with Patrick.
Basically, I really wanted to sit down by then. I hate standing on still grounds for too lengthy a time, and being impatient I just wished the others would show up.
I also met Sophie for the first time there, a little lively spirit with an adorable hat. I don't think she got my 'British accent' at first.
I asked her, 'you're Sophie?', and she got a little confused. But after spending over 3 weeks together later, she got used to my voice, and me.
Susanna/ Auntie Susanna, was there too, but she already knew me since I was pretty much born.
And then Diana. Dr. Diana King.
What a character, the first time I 'met' her, was when everyone was panicking that we 'lost Diana'. And suddenly, there she was wandering towards us in bright 80's pop colours in her own little dreamy state.
The lovely couple Frank and Dorothy arrived soon after, with the 'cool' and silent Terence, who may or not may have been wearing sunglasses.
I went in for a hug, with the large and warm Frank, and to my delight I got two kisses on the cheek, along with his Santa-beard.

So finally, half the gang were gathered together, let the first flight to Guiyi begin.

China diaries coming out soon

I have just finished my 23 day adventure in China, teaching, exploring, playing, meeting new people. I will be writing all about it on this blog in the few weeks to come, blogger (and Facebook) is blocked in China so I was pretty cut off from the Internet I know. Right now I should sleep as I have to be up early for badminton tomorrow. Will be writing. Bye for now!