August Update: Shenzhen, China- Part 2

I know everyone was so bored by the end of my last blog but I’m just enjoying the fact that I can communicate again with everyone at home!!!

We took a 25 hour train ride to Shenzhen China. This was probably one of the worst things I’ve ever done. We were in hard sleepers which meant 6 people in an open room…triple bunk beds on each side of the wall. The ride began around 8pm on Tuesday and ended Wednesday night around 9pm. We brought bread, peanut butter, fruits, noodles etc. for the long long long ride. The ride didn’t start bad, it was just when they turned off the lights and our air didn’t work did the night seem to drag and drag and drag!!!! I managed to sleep about 5 hours, but they were and poor Jordan maybe managed 3 hours or so. Throughout the day we played cards, read, and napped. The day definitely wasn’t ideal, but we made it. Oh I forgot to mention the nasty bathrooms that smelled like a port-a-potty and had squatter toilets. I know how glorious I’m making this sound…don’t you want to come visit?!? I PROMISE that I wouldn’t make ANY of you go through this!!!! =)

After finally arriving in Shenzhen (pronounced: Shin-Jin….remember these are MY pronunciations…) we were bussed to another hotel where we stayed for 3 days. We checked into our rooms, grabbed a quick snack, and headed to bed. We had to be up early Thursday morning at 7am for breakfast and then had to go to a Shenzhen hospital for a very thorough physical examination. This examination is required by the Shenzhen Education Bureau and makes it possible for us to get our work visas. We had X-Rays of our back, blood tests, height and weight checked, eyes, ears, and nose checked, a sonogram, and gracefully had to give our urine to China! Wow! What a day!!! When we got back to the hotel, we had to fill out visa paperwork which was very tedious, meet some of the members of the Education Bureau, and then given our placements for the following year. Jordan and I were placed in the Yantian (Yan-tea-ann) district at Yantian Foreign Language Primary School. *Quick fact: Yantian has the 4th largest port in the world and very quick access/boarder crossing to Hong Kong.*

Friday August 21st everyone was bussed to their district of Shenzhen and had to meet/be interviewed by the police in their district. Jordan and I were very pleased when we arrived in Yantian- gorgeous mountains surrounding us and the beach is only 15 minutes away!!! Friday afternoon we went out with friends to an electronic market nearby while others bought cell phones. We had to pick up new SIM cards…Thank you Caroline for the phone!!!! =)

The contract signing ceremony was Saturday morning around 10 am. Jordan and I met our contact teachers (each person in the program is provided a contact person to help them out with anything…). My contact teacher is Louis and Jordan’s is Eric. Both were very welcoming and excited to meet us! The actual ceremony was long…China loves ceremonies and banquets anytime they can schedule one…they introduced each one of us and the school where we’d be working. We were both presented each with a beautiful arrangement of flowers from our school. After the signing, we went next door to a large banquet hall and had lunch. During the lunch, our contract teachers told us that our living place was on campus, but it wasn’t ready because the school was getting a face lift (or they said construction, but when we saw what they were actually doing it was equivalent to a face lift). We were also told that classes didn’t begin until September 1st, so we’d have the next week off. Needless to say to hear we were going to be in ANOTHER hotel indefinitely was disappointing. We were just ready to begin our time in China in somewhat of an apartment. When the banquet was over, we had to stay at the hotel because our driver wouldn’t return until later…so everyone else left around 1 pm and we didn’t leave until around 2:30. On our way into Yantian, we had to stop at the police station for more visa work, got to see the outside of our school (which overlooks some of the water) and were taken to our hotel. They dropped us off and told us they would pick us up in about an hour to go meet our headmaster for dinner. At dinner we were accompanied by some of the other English teachers, some high rank school personnel, contact teachers, and our headmaster. Dinner was very interesting and somewhat long. It had been such a busy, slightly disappointing with the news of the hotel again day. We were in a private room- which many restaurants have in China with numerous dishes that were ordered ahead of time for us…one of which included boiled chicken feet that they practically forced us to eat…I kind of just put it up to my mouth (remember that all this is with chopsticks…) and acted like I ate some of it and put it down. I just wanted to crawl under the table and hope that our dinner would be better than this appetizer…which it was!! =) After dinner we shown another restaurant which a student from our school’s parents own. It was very close to our hotel and convenient. Laura, the student, took us for a walk and showed us some grocery stores and places along the street. She was very sweet and helpful and it made me excited about our students we would teach!

Whew!! I’ve rambled on again after saying that it would be short…please forgive me!