Christmas in Zhangzhou...

...has been pretty amazing. My phone has been going off non-stop with Merry Christmas wishes from students and teachers. I've been getting messages on QQ and e-cards from students and teachers...and each class presented me with a small Christmas gift.

I'm about to head into town to have dinner with a friend...a good ending to a great day.

Speaking of immune systems...

My mind's immune system has been winning the battle against second languages, it's been fighting tooth and nail to prevent me from learning Chinese. I haven't seriously studied in what, 2 months now? I gotta find a way to get over this hurdle.

False alarm maybe?

Maybe it was just a false alarm, I feel ok today. The ol' immune system must be on high alert after that last cold. I guess I'll find out in a few days.

Not again!

Oh I'm so lucky! Cold number 2 has arrived. Either that or my immune system is overreacting to some minor irritant.

My students say the darndest things

I was giving my students the speaking exam and I asked one of them what she planned to do when she was finished with school. She told me, "I don't know because I haven't learned anything."

Well kiddo, at least you are honest!

Noise

It's really loud here.

Stopping is so easy

Once you have a good method it's actually quite easy to learn another language. The hard part is stopping. Well, I should say the easy part is stopping because it's just easier to stop than to keep on going. The trick is, you have to make it part of your everyday life like eating and sleeping. So I guess you have to make it more than just a habit. Make it part of you.

I can almost convince myself...

...that I am ok living here, but the feeling only lasts for a few moments. The reality is, this is an extremely harsh place. Adjusting to life here is almost impossible. I can't wait to leave.

Sick..

Got my first cold finally...took long enough!

Normal?

Why can't I just find a "normal" job where nothing weird happens? Yes, it's related to the previous post about "why".

Question of the day...why...

...unfortunately I can't say more than that...until I leave.

Pictures?

I have a lot of pictures, but the desire to post them is less than the effort required. Hence, no pictures for now.

Accidents

I think I realized why I haven't seen any cars completely smashed up. It's because you can't drive fast enough to make a big impact.

I got my first "fuck you"

I was walking around Gulang Yu Island in Xiamen with a friend and a group of 3 middle school boys walked past us. When they were about 15 feet behind us one of them turned around and said "fuck you" in our direction. It was quite funny, and we both had a good laugh.

Teachers

Whenever I meet other teachers at my school the subject of teaching always comes up. After the usual questions I get asked 50 million times, they ask if I like teaching. Yes, I do (even if sometimes I don't). I ask them the same question, and I have yet to get a yes answer. Every teacher at my school always says they don't like teaching. Which again, begs the question, then why are you teaching?!

Which, is exactly what I'm contemplating at the moment.

To leave, or not to leave...

...that is the question.

My students...

A while ago a student came up to me and said, "I'm sorry teacher but we are very lazy". A few days ago a student said, "I don't like to speak English". When I ask them why do they go to school they say because it is better than nothing. On the contrary, it is EQUAL to nothing.

Graduation rate

99% of the students who go to my public 3-year college graduate. 99%.

Hahahah!

I go to class this afternoon and nobody was there. So, I called an admin and asked if classes were canceled. Yes, I'm sorry I thought someone told you, she says. Second time everybody in the school knows classes were canceled except me. Yay! This is fun! I was wondering why people were giving me funny looks more than usual as I walked to class.

Even the weather sucks...

In September I asked one of the admins in our department when will it cool down. She looked at me with a straight face and said November. Of course I thought she was kidding but I guess she wasn't. It's finally cooled down the past couple of days. It went from summer to winter in the span of 1 day.

This place sucks...

Zhangzhou will chew you up and spit you out, don't come here alone.

Internet

When a webpage will load through the great firewall of China, but loads faster through a proxy, you know something is seriously messed up.

Don't get me wrong...

...I still intend to study Chinese and all that, but I just don't really want to live in small town China anymore. I've seen enough. I just have to decide where I want to go next. But, I won't leave until my contract is finished in June 2009.

Something is different...

Something is different about my students this term. Even the students who are normally very active and interested have changed. I'm not sure why but it's really starting to suck. I'm ready to go home now, just have to wait for my contract to finish.

Nothing...

Nothing to report.

Study

I don't study enough. That is all.

Ohh, another analogy!

Learning a second language to a native level is like losing weight. It requires a long term sustained effort which is unbelievably easy to quit. How many people do you know who have lost weight only to gain it back? Maybe they lose it, it comes back, they lose it again, it comes back etc, but it never stays off. It's just like learning a language. From day one you can't stop, ever, or you start all over again.

Had to restart...again

So, at the end of the summer I'm cruising along with my hanzi 汉字 learning characters like there is no tomorrow. Then, on a whim, I decide to try the Heisig method of learning Chinese characters. Granted he did it for studying kanji which are Chinese characters used in the Japanese writing system, but its the same thing basically. Anyway, I download an excerpt from his newest book Remembering Simplified Hanzi, and I do 50 in one day. I couldn't believe it! The most I had done my way was 20. But I did 50 easily, and the only reason I didn't do all 94 in the excerpt was because I was so pissed that it was so easy! Here I am busting my ass doing it the traditional way for 2 months and then I come across this method. It destroyed my motivation to study characters. Then, I went to Shanghai for a week and didn't do my SRS repetitions so when I got back I had like 200 reps to do. Today, after much agonizing, I decided to delete over 350 characters I entered over a 2 month period and start from scratch using only the Heisig method.

I was really getting burned out on learning Chinese after this new discovery. Other things occupied my time like teaching and what not. So, for a while learning Chinese was on the back burner. But, another weekend in small town China with nothing to do has cured me. It's back to learning. I think the reason most people don't learn a second language to a native level is simple because they give up. Either they reach a point where they are satisfied with their ability, or they realize the enormous effort just isn't worth it and stop completely. So, to prevent this from happening I got rid of over 350 character's that were really pissing me off and ruining my fun. Starting over sucks, but it's not like I'm deleting knowledge from my mind, just a computer program I use. What I have learned will stay with me as long as I keep on going, and don't stop.

The other thing I have been thinking about lately is that I don't seem to be getting any better. I still can't have a real conversation, just say a few words and sentences. But, I think about it like this. When I was a kid I'd always ask my mom to measure me and see if I'd grown any taller. I did this every day. And eventually I realized I wasn't going to see changes every day, it would take months and years before I could notice any difference in the marks on the wall. It's the same with learning Chinese. If I compare myself to 1 month ago, there isn't much difference, but when I compare myself to when I first came, there is a huge difference. I just gotta keep it up...

Studying Chinese has really changed the way I teach

Before studying Chinese my prep work before classes was pretty poor. I was the kind of teacher who winged it most of the time. These days, I am planning a lot more and trying to use more visual aids. I've also insisted on using the microphone so everyone can hear me clearly, and power point so students can read what I say. I think it's definitely helped the students focus more.

The other cool thing is, I've gained a lot more respect now that students can send me simple messages in Chinese and I can respond to them. I still have a lot of trouble with speaking and listening but reading is getting better. Just think, 2 months ago I could not understand a simple text message in Chinese. I have learned a lot in a short period of time, but I have a long way to go.

I have been slacking with my studies more than I should be, listening to English music a little too much, watching a DVD here and there in English. But, I try to stay on track by reminding myself it's just a waste of time. I already speak English, so what's the point?

Learning a foreign language in a classroom doesn't work

I told my students our second class that learning a foreign language in a classroom doesn't work very well. They didn't believe me. It's a good thing for my bank account, but a bad thing for them. It should be obvious after 5 or 6 years of study and they can't even put together a simple sentence. Instead, they blame their teachers or themselves for not being good enough. How sad. They don't even realize it's the fact they are trying to learn English in the classroom that is the problem. Then I proceeded to tell them how to teach themselves. I had to simplify it a lot since their English is at such a low level. Hopefully, they will try some of the things I suggested, primarily listening and reading 24/7, non-stop, ALL DAY LONG with a good dictionary in hand.

...

I have nothing to say right now.

My obvious realization of the summer...

If I don't spend so much time doing nothing, I can really accomplish a lot.

I'm alive...

...just busy. I love my job and my students.

Jackpot

Just found a great firefox add-on. It translates simplified and traditional characters for you. A great way to learn new words.

Pera-Kun

My method of study

I've been reading how other people study Chinese, and it's very different from how I'm doing it. Usually people will delay learning the writing system, or not push it that hard in fear of burnout. I am doing the opposite. I'm not actively studying words, grammar, or sentences just individual characters. After learning enough characters to read everyday material, then I will get serious about words and sentences. I think reading is the best way to learn the rules of grammar intuitively which is needed for near native fluency. You simply cannot learn the rules of grammar and then force individual words through a grammar algorithm. Computers can't do it effectively, and neither can we.

The other thing people do is listen. However, most people refuse to listen to things they cannot understand. I have been listening to Chinese constantly, whether I can understand it or not. I have noticed an improvement in remembering Chinese words after listening to Chinese constantly. My mind is becoming so familiar with the sound of the language I don't forget a word 5 seconds after learning it. I can also pronounce new words correctly after the first or second try instead of having to say it over and over again. The other cool thing that's been happening, I'll hear and word over and over and I can say the word perfectly but I don't know what it means. Then I'll be reading something and come across the word and *bang* it's instantly locked in my memory from hearing it repeated 10,000 times.

I used to completely block out the sounds of the Korean language when I lived in Korea. My mind simply did not want to listen to it. I did the same thing with Chinese initially, only listening to English music and watching English DVDs. Now, my mind craves the sound of Mandarin. I have no desire to listen to English music anymore, I just want to hear Mandarin, even though I can't really understand it.

I think there is a lot to be said for complete immersion, even when you can't understand the language. For the record, I'm still a newbie in Chinese. I can't hold a conversation and I can only use a few words here and there. I'm only up to 390 Chinese characters, but I've got my method down and time will take care of the rest.

Overdrive

My brain has been on overdrive lately. I've been cramming my brain full of Chinese characters, making it adjust to new contact lenses I bought with the help of a friend, and forcing it to learn Zhangzhou style Mahjong. Needless to say, it's pretty tired. For the record, I'm up to 335 characters. I only have 1 month left to reach my goal of 700 before the school year starts.

Study method

I've tweaked my study method slightly. I've started listening to Chinesepod podcasts continuously over and over and over and over allllll day long. I've broken them up into groups of 5 episodes, each between 8 to 12 minutes long. Each day I listen to another group of 5 episodes and absorb what I can. It's kind of amazing how well it works, sometimes I don't even pay any attention to it but it's playing in the background and I still pick up things. I even listen to it when I sleep.

The other thing I have to start doing is adding complete words and sentences to Mnemosyne. Ideally, I should just power through all 6000 individual characters but I need to learn actual language for my survival. So, I'm jumping the gun a bit by starting this phase while only knowing 220 characters.

QQ

I finally got QQ to work on my English XP machine. I followed these simple instructions.

1. Start -> Run -> Intl.cpl
2. Switch to Advanced Tab, and choose "Chinese (PRC)" for Language for non-Unicode Programs and click OK.

What is QQ? It's an instant messenger program used mainly in China. It's use outside of China is pretty limited. But, if you live here you're pretty much going to need to use it. My friend had to get a QQ number (screen name) for me because the sign up page is in Chinese.

So this is what it takes...

...for me to learn a language. The idea of learning a foreign language is so huge in my mind that I would rather do just about anything than try to learn one. But, I have finally found out what it takes to actually do it. Some people can just make a decision to learn another language and they do it. They can become fluent while not even living in a country that speaks the language. I am not one of those people. The only way I can overcome my resistance to learning the language is to put myself into a situation where it becomes necessary for survival.

That's kind of sad.

Past 4 days...

...I haven't done much. I haven't learned any new characters, words or sentences. But, today my motivation is back. On Tuesday my new Chinese teacher asked me to go to KTV (karaoke). She invited 3 other teachers from our school and after singing for a few hours one of the teachers asked me to go play pool with her. I've come to the realization that unless I learn Chinese my chances of a decent social life are pretty slim. She asked me the dreaded question every male expat is asked, "how long will you stay here?" The question is impossible to answer but this is the best I can do..."If I'm just by myself I can't stay long because it's too boring, maybe just 2 years. But, if I can learn Chinese and make a lot of friends I'd like to stay much longer."

So, yesterday I was too busy brooding over my terrible social life to study Chinese when it hit me. I've got to try harder. So, today my motivation is back and the studying has resumed.

Mnemosyne

I'm just starting to appreciate the power of the program Mnemosyne. First of all, I can spend just a little bit of time learning a single character because I know once I put it in Mnemosyne I'm going to see it again tomorrow, and probably the next day, and on and on until it finally sticks in my mind. It takes time to learn this way, but the effort required is much less than writing it out a billion times. The other cool thing is that it knows which characters I have trouble with, and it'll show me those characters more often. The characters I know very well, it will show me less frequently. I don't need to worry about keeping track of thousands of flash cards since it's all computerized. All I need to do is use the program every day and I'm all set. I'm up to 140 characters.

It's back to 10 a day

I don't know what I was complaining about, it's not like I have a busy schedule right now. So it's back up to a minimum of 10 characters a day. I bought some English books in Xiamen the other day, one of which cost 99rmb. Can you say rip off...only good thing about the trip is I now know where all the bus stations are and my Chinese is good enough to get me there and back.

Chinese language

I'm only up to 120 characters so far. I've been slacking big time. I'm going to have to cut it down to 5 characters per day for now because these bad boys just don't stick in my head the way I want them too. But, 5 characters per day is about 1800 in one year so that's not too bad.

Today, it's off to Xiamen for some shopping and site seeing. The vacation has begun, all two months of it.

Beijing?

I've been reading a bunch of articles lately that talk about how tourism is down in Beijing. Being so close to the Olympics tourism should be much higher. It got me thinking...personally I am afraid to go to Beijing during the Olympics. I have a friend there now who invited me to go and visit her but I just gave her the "maybe" answer. I've been reading all kinds of articles about police sweeps in bars and apartment complexes where foreigners live looking for visa violations, it scares me, and I'm completely legal with all the proper paperwork. Now, imagine someone who has never been to Asia before reading these same articles, do you think they want to go to Beijing?

Not leaving...

Got an email the other day. It's my decision if I want to go to Nanjing or not. I decided to stay here. In the long run Nanjing would be better, but when I think of leaving things become much more complicated.

Nanjing?

I might be moving to Nanjing in September. Ironically, that's where I requested to be placed initially. I got a call today and was asked what I thought about moving there. At first I said no, but after thinking I changed my mind. Nanjing is a much bigger city, the school is better, and Zhangzhou isn't so great. So, we'll see what happens.

Characters

I've been doing well with my daily repetitions on the Chinese characters I already know. However, I've been quite lazy with adding new material. I'm embarrassed to admit that so far I only know 110 characters. I've had enough time, but not the motivation to cram more info into my brain. I should be doing about 10 characters a day, but I've been doing about 10 a week. If I actually do 10 a day in 2 months I'll know an additional 600 characters for a total of 710. Well short of the 4000 I need to learn. At 10 characters a day it'll take me about 14 months to learn 4000. I have a feeling I won't reach near native fluency in 2 years.

It takes me quite a while to learn 10 characters. Basically, I learn the pronunciation and the stroke order for each character. Then I write the characters down 10 or so times each until I get the hang of it. I put the characters into Mnemosyne and go do something else. A couple hours later I go back to Mnemosyne to see how well I remember what I learned. On the question side I put the definition of the character. Once I see the definition I write out the character and pronounce the word out loud. If I get it correct I mark it as a two and Mnemosyne reschedules it for repetition. If I don't get it correct I mark it as a one or zero and redo it until I get it correct. This process takes quite a while. I've found that if I just try to memorize what the character looks like without learning to write it, it doesn't stick in my memory very well.

I could go the lazy route and just learn speaking and not reading and writing, but whats the fun in that?

Class is canceled, but don't tell the teacher...

I went to class this morning and I go to pickup the key to the room. They couldn't find the key so they gave me another one but that classroom was already spoken for so I had to go back and grab another. I finally got an empty room with about 5 minutes until class began, and I still don't see any of my students waiting for me outside the old classroom as they usually do. Fine I think, they are tired today they will filter in late. The bell rang and still no students. I called one of them up and she told me the class was canceled today. So my question is, why do all the students know class is canceled but I don't? Waste my time much?

The ATM and the bus ride

A couple days ago I went down to the ATM machine but I forgot my pin. The machine wouldn't give me my card back. I wonder if it's a security "feature" or if something was wrong with the machine. I ran back upstairs grabbed my pin and came back so it was no big deal.

The next day I went to Walmart and didn't realize I forgot my money until I got there. I was starving too, so I was planning on eating at one of the restaurants nearby. I'm just glad I brought enough bus fare because it would have been a long walk back home. I wasted an hour and a half of my valuable time.

This is actually a good sign because, if I'm comfortable enough to be forgetful, then I'm probably adjusting to life here.

The semester is almost over!

I can't wait! Just a few more weeks and the summer break begins! I haven't been posting pictures for a couple of reasons. First, I don't always feel comfortable taking pictures around here. Second, I've been busy studying Chinese. Over the summer break, I plan on posting pictures instead of text.

Job comparisons

My job in Korea:

Location: Suwon. It's about an hour from downtown Seoul by subway and half-hour by bus. Not much to do in Suwon. But there were a few nice places to take a walk.
Expat community: The expat community was small, but at least once a week you would see a foreign face on the streets. It was however, full of very strange characters.
The stares: A few here and there, not too bad.
Days per week: 6 M-Sa
Classes per day: 5
Teaching hours per week: 30
Work hours: 2:30-9:30 with a 1 hour lunch
Class length: 45 minutes
Student ages: 8 to 16
Class size: 10 to 25 students
Vacation: 10 days plus national holidays.
Health insurance: None
Pay: Not bad.
Food: Cheap and outstanding.
Housing: One room, with a kitchen and bathroom. Small, but livable, very clean and modern.
Internet: Unbelievably fast.
Weather: Not bad, except for winter.
Korean co-workers: So-so. Most were very friendly and helpful, a few were almost bursting with dislike for the foreign teachers.
Foreign co-workers: Nice on the outside, but not people I wanted to spend time with.
Students: They were forced to learn English by their parents so it wasn't very fun to teach them. Only a few were truly interested.

My job in China

Location: Zhangzhou, Fujian Province. It's about an hour away from Xiamen on the coast. Not a single thing to do here. This is a very small Chinese city that is in the process of developing. The old city is currently being torn to pieces and high rises are being put in its place. There is no place to take a nice walk and it's a high stress place to live.
Expat community: There is no expat community. I know of 7 other foreigners who live here. None of us ever get together and do anything. I've only met 4 of them.
The stares: Everywhere I go I'm the center of attention. On good days it's great, on bad days it sucks.
Days per week: 4
Classes per day: 4
Teaching hours per week: 16
Work hours: Varies, either 8 to 11:30 or 3 to 6:25
Class length: 45 minutes
Student ages: Young adults
Class size: 50 to 60 students
Vacation: 10 WEEKS, plus national holidays
Health insurance: Expat health insurance
Pay: Below poverty level by western standards, way higher than local wages.
Food: Cheap and so-so.
Housing: Rough around the edges. Big apartments though.
Internet: Unbelievably slow, with most ports blocked.
Weather: Not bad, except for summer.
Chinese co-workers: Outstanding.
Foreign co-worker: Normal, but hasn't adjusted AT ALL to life here after one and a half years. Very negative about his entire experience and life in general.
Students: Failed so miserably on their national college entrance exam that our program is their only hope. Half are completely uninterested, the other half at least make an effort to tie their own shoe laces.

The winner is:

Location: Suwon
Expat community: Tie
The stares: Suwon
Days per week: Zhangzhou
Classes per day: Zhangzhou
Teaching hours per week: Zhangzhou
Work hours: Zhangzhou
Class length: Tie
Student ages: Zhangzhou
Class size: Suwon
Vacation: HAHAHAHA, not even close. Zhangzhou.
Health insurance: Zhangzhou
Pay: HEHEHE, not even close. Suwon.
Food: Suwon
Housing: Tie
Internet: Suwon
Weather: Zhangzhou
Korea/Chinese co-workers: Zhangzhou
Foreign co-worker: Tie
Students: Tie

Korea job: 6
China job: 9

I will say this about Korea. It's much easier to adjust to life there. At the end of my year in Korea, I was calling it home. It FELT like home. I wonder if I will ever feel the same way about Zhangzhou? Learning Chinese is certainly helping me adjust, so maybe I will.

Tutors

I'm up to 3 tutors now. They take turns teaching me for 2 hours Monday through Friday. They are all teaching me the same material and coordinate their lessons so it's pretty nice. Everything I learn I put into Mnemosyne to help me remember. I am learning so much that without it, I would only remember about 10% of what they were teaching me.

The other thing I'm doing is listening to as much talk radio as I can. I can't understand it right now, but my ear is starting to pickup individual words, sounds, and tones.

Earthquake

The thing that bothers me the most about this earthquake is the number of schools that collapsed. I couldn't imagine something like that happening to my students. I hope this will force stricter building code enforcement.

I hinted that there were problems at my school in an earlier post. I guess I will let the cat out of the bag. According to my students and an administrator, the last president of my school was accepting bribes from a construction company. In turn, they were using sub-standard building material. When the government found out they arrested the president and condemned the building. I wonder how common this is?

On an unrelated note, I am moderating comments so if your comment doesn't appear do not worry. It will appear eventually.

Earthquake

A pretty big earthquake hit China today. I was inside at the time and didn't feel anything down here in Fujian Province.

Promotional video?

A girl I know asked me to go to her company tomorrow and be in a promotional video, for free...

Um...no?

I've been exploited enough already thank you very much.

I'm not here to teach.

I came here to teach, but I have lost interest in teaching. It's not very satisfying anymore. My sole purpose for being here is to learn Chinese. Of course I'm not going to tell people that, but it's true. Teaching these students is pointless, and quite frankly boring. They don't want to learn English, just like I don't want to learn Korean. So, why does the school force them to come to class? I have to take attendance every day and the kids get punished if they don't show up, how stupid is that? Just let them learn the hard way what happens when you are uneducated.

My plan

Ok, so now that I've taken the first step, after a few stumbles, I am now ready to share the first draft of my plan for learning Chinese. Most of these ideas I got the website All Japanese All The Time.

Step 1 attitude, environment, commitment, the goal.

Learning another language is probably the hardest thing an adult can learn. So, if you really want to learn another language and not just complain that you wish you could learn it, then you must be prepared to bust your ass every single day of the week for hours on end.

You must have the motivation to put in the hard work. Without the motivation you will not succeed. Sounds so elementary but it's the key to learning anything. As an ESL teacher in Asia I am intimately familiar with the inability to force someone to learn a language if they don't want to learn it. For some reason parents love to force their kids to learn English, but it NEVER works.

You must be willing to give up your native language. In the next few weeks I am going to wean myself from english movies, english books, english video games, and yes, english music. This is the hardest part for me, having to give up everything English. But, if I am not willing to take this step, I will never reach my goal. Ask yourself this, how bad do you want it? Are you willing to give up everything for it? If not, then don't waste your time.

Obviously I plan on keeping my blog in English and talking to my family in English because those are necessities, without which, I will lose my motivation to study.

My goal is to achieve near native fluency in 2 years.

Step 2 the method and the tools.

Right now I am meeting a tutor twice a week for two hours. That is not enough. I am going to ask my tutor to help me find more tutors so I have a tutor 5 days a week for 2 hours each day. Additionally I plan on studying 3 to 4 hours a day on my own. In the summer time I will have to increase my self study because I will have less tutors.

I am using spaced repetition software to help me learn the 2000 most common Chinese characters. Once I feel I have learned the majority of them, I will work on memorizing 10,000 sentences using the same spaced repetition software. I will try to get the majority of these sentences from Chinese movies, books, magazines, and songs. This way I can learn slang, useful language, and I can pick up more cultural cues. Learning from CDs is worthless.

It will take time, and a lot of work, but I feel it's worth the effort.

False starts

I've had a few false starts with my Chinese studies. I think the hardest part is finding the most efficient method to learn. I gave the program supermemo a try, but the user interface is unusable. It's just not worth it. Luckily, I have found another program called Mnemosyne. The user interface is actually usable, and it's free. Right now I am working on the 2000 most common Chinese characters. On the other side of the equation I am working with a tutor. We have been focusing on pronunciation and writing. She is a very patient teacher and is thrilled about my enthusiasm and dedication to learning Chinese. My teacher will not be in Zhangzhou during the summer, but she promised she would help me find a tutor for the summer.

I am not interested in learning survival Chinese. I am aiming for near native fluency. This requires a long term commitment but I think in the end, the effort will pay off. I have been scouring the internet on the best methods to learn languages. One of the best websites I found was All Japanese All The Time. The author claims to have attained near native fluency in Japanese in 18 months. While this claim must be taken with a grain of salt, I can't help but hope this is possible. He suggests trying to learn entire sentences instead of single words. If you can memorize and understand 10,000 sentences in the target language, then your brain will be able to make connections it otherwise would not if you just memorized individual words. I think it makes sense. Just because you know 1000 words doesn't mean you can put them together in the correct order. You could study grammar, but then you have to think about the grammar rules while you are trying to put together your sentence. Too see how ineffective this is, go to South Korea.

The author of the website strongly advocates using the spaced repetition system for memorizing. This method is used in the supermemo and Mnemosyne programs. While supermemo is a terrible program and costs money, I still think the idea behind the program is sound.

My current plan is to continue meeting my tutor twice a week. Once I have learned 1,000 characters I am going to switch to memorizing entire sentences...10,000 of them. Ambitious? You bet your ass.

My health

My health has been great lately. I haven't been sick the entire time I've been here. I'm quite surprised at this considering I was sick every single month in Korea. A few weeks after I'd get over a cold, another one would hit. It probably has to do with the age groups I'm teaching. Primary and middle school students are little disease spreaders, while young adults are usually more healthy.

Lay's

Italian Red Meat Flavor....they didn't taste very good.

Racism and xenophobia

Two very ugly words and something you need to learn how to deal with when you do not look like the people who live around you. Today was the second time I had to deal with racism and xenophobia in China. I have, however, learned the magic trick. Smile at them and say hello.

I was in a restaurant minding my own business when three men about my age walked in and sat down across from me. I noticed right away they kept looking at me, pointing, and laughing. I have learned that it's important to not assume they are purposely being mean. On the contrary, they could be talking about something completely unrelated to me. After a few minutes it started to bother me, so I broke out my secret weapon. I waved and said hello. It worked because a few moments later two of the three men were looking down at their ice cream cones with shamed faces. The third was determined to keep them riled up but the other two had lost interest in the foreigner. By not engaging in a staring contest or escalating the situation I showed who the mature person was. Never ever assume the legal system or bystanders will ever side with you when you are in a foreign country.

Unfortunately for foreigners, and China, anti-foreigner sentiment has been rising lately. I hope it doesn't ruin China's image to the world.

My first Chinese lesson

I had my first Chinese lesson today with one of the administrators in our department. It all started because I asked her if there were any schools in Zhangzhou to study Chinese. She asked a student who was also in the office and unfortunately there are not. So, she offered to teach me. At first I was skeptical because these things usually turn out in one of two ways. First, either she will turn it around completely and I'll end up teaching her English. Or, she is looking for a boyfriend and little language learning will take place at all. This happened to me all the time in Korea (usually the first one). Anyway, I decided to show her how serious I was about it and asked her how much she wants for the lessons. She said it would be free. A few days later I went to her office and found out she had bought me some books and supplies for our class. At this point I knew she was just as serious about this as I was. She ended up buying me two children's books for writing and simple vocabulary. Yes, I am now a Chinese child. We spent two and a half hours practicing sounds and basic writing.

Learning Chinese

In Korea I was always struggling with the motivation to study Korean. I had books, plenty of online resources, plenty of willing teachers, but no time. I worked 6 days a week and was exhausted and the last thing I wanted to do was study. Besides, I knew I wasn't going to stay there much longer, it's just such a difficult place to live.

In China I have plenty of motivation to study Chinese. This isn't the type of country you want to live in without knowing the language. Many people do live here 5, 6 even 7 years without learning Chinese. However, I find one of the big regrets people have is not learning the language. The problem I have here is, how do I begin? I have a book and some audio, but my study habits are horrible. This is going to be really hard to explain so bare with me. I need structure outside of myself to force me to study. I want to study, I REALLY do, but it's SO much easier to not study. Path of least resistance. I need to go to school, but this city is too small so I can't go to school. I want to make flash cards but then I have to go hunting for them and take the time to write them up. My only option is to use some kind of computer software. Well finally I found it. It's called supermemo. I can create my own vocabulary lists and it schedules repetitions for me. All I have to do is click on the icon and sit in front of the computer. I will need some help with pronunciation so I'm also using a website called chinesepod. Plus, one of my co-workers agreed to help me study Chinese. We'll see how that turns out. But, the good news is I have the motivation, and now I also have the structure to begin my study. My current vocabulary list has about 80 words.

I've been in China 2 months now and I was in Korea for 1 year. I already know more Chinese than Korean.

Graffiti

Graffiti that just recently appeared in an alley near my school.

The mythical laowei

Damn the mythical laowei sounds like a great blog title. Anyway, I want to tell you about 4 recent sitings of the mythical laowei, known in English as "the foreigner".

Today in a Zhangzhou KFC, a young boy around 9 or 10 years old spotted the mythical laowei eating food in his natural habitat. What was the boy's reaction? He stood literally 2 feet away from the mythical laowei for approximately 5 minutes while the laowei tried to quickly but gracefully finish his food.

After leaving his natural habitat the mythical laowei started his long journey back to his adopted home when a young mother spotted the elusive laowei and forced her very young kindergarten aged daughter to look at the never before seen mythical creature. Her eyes widened in shock and awe as she spotted the lone laowei while her mother quite forcibly pushed her little head in the laowei's direction.

Two other instances have recently occurred that require documentation. The first happened while the laowei was trying to cross the street without being killed. As soon as he made it across in one piece he found a father pointing straight at him not 5 feet away while his young daughter stared at him in fascination and fear. She will not soon forget the mythical laowei.

The last instance occurred while the laowei was shopping. One of his co-worker's friends saw him. She excitedly told the laowei's co-worker, "Look there's an elusive laowei over there!" The laowei's co-worker replied "Maybe it's one of the mythical laowei's at our school!" She quickly maneuvered to get a better vantage point. "Yes, that's a laowei at our school! His name is Kevin!", she reported excitedly. However, she was much to shy to approach him outside of school, even though they have spoken on numerous occasions before. She did however have the courage to report the incident to the laowei a few days later.

My job and students

I guess I'll tell you a little bit about where I work and the students I teach. The school I teach at is a very low level college. We have about 12,000 students and 700 teachers. If I were visiting different schools looking for a job, this school would be the last on my list based on appearances. It is currently a giant construction site, but when it is finally finished it should be a pretty nice school. There is one building on campus which is incomplete and construction has stopped. Nobody can tell me if the building will ever be finished. It has something to do with the last president of the school, according to rumor, he is now in prison.

The program I teach in has the lowest of the low as far as students. These are the students who completely failed the national exam, but their parents have enough money to buy them into our program. So, students are either in this program because they failed the big exam, or they are in it because their parents are forcing them into it. This doesn't make for a very good teaching environment. I'd estimate that one-fifth of my students are pre-intermediate level and are interested in learning. Another one-fifth are pre-intermediate level and are only somewhat interested in learning. One-fifth are beginner level and are only somewhat interested in learning, and the rest are completely uninterested in learning. Despite this fact I am still able to have fun when I am teaching them and enjoy my job. My philosophy is that if the students want to learn they will, if they don't want to learn they won't, but either way, I'm going to enjoy my life.

The class sizes are between 40 to 60 students. The maximum number of students recommended for the type of teaching I do is 25. Teaching 25 students ESL is challenging, teaching 60 is stupid. They aren't motivated enough to do pair work or group work, and only speak English when I talk to them. In one of my classrooms they decided to ban the teachers from using the chalkboard and computer/projector due to chalk dust damaging the computer. Oh yeah, two of my classes have no books. So, let's go over this for a second. Two classes back to back, 1.5 hours each, no books, no computer/projector, no chalkboard, all the students failed the national exam and 50 students on average for each class. All I can do is laugh.

Reflection

Reflection at Nanputuo Temple in Xiamen.

My internet connection is back

There are sweeping changes taking place at my school. We have a new president, new buildings, lots of construction, and they just changed some settings on the network. In order to connect to the internet I have to install and run a program called H3C Client. It authenticates to the network using 802.1x protocol. It's a windows only program, and it sucks. They used to have a generic login password for every computer, now they have a unique login and password for every computer.

Besides the fact I have to use windows on my brand new MacBook Pro, the internet is incredibly slow, and they are blocking almost all the ports. I cannot download torrents or anything else. It's like I'm living at my university again, except it's in a developing country.

My rhythm of updating my blog has been broken, but I will try to get back into the habit.

Spitting

Spitting is pretty common here and to tell you the truth it is REALLY starting to get on my nerves. I live next to an older couple who are probably in their 60s. One day I walk outside my door and see the old lady leaning slightly over the balcony on our sixth floor. She seems to be looking into the distance when all of a sudden she starts hocking up the biggest, nastiest lugie you ever did hear. Then she lets it fly, sailing over the balcony onto the ground below, while trying to see how far it went. Every morning as I'm getting ready for the day I can hear her come outside to hock up another one. It even happens in fancy restaurants. One of my ex-friends used to take me to her business meetings. One day we went to a super fancy restaurant with a private room and our own personal waitress. All of a sudden one of the super rich businessmen hocks up some phlegm, and without even hesitating, deposits his phlegm right onto the floor of the restaurant...

Think about that the next time you're eating pigs tongue and raw fish at a super fancy restaurant.

Bon Appetit!

An advertisement in Xiamen

Potato CHIPS

Tomato ketchup flavor potato chips, so tasty!

Starting a new business

This man is starting a business in Xiamen. He is burning fake paper money outside his new store for good luck.




Good luck on your new business!

Frosties!

After that appetizing entry, how about this? Directly from Zhangzhou Walmart! I like how they individually pack the cereal. Not only are they protected by cardboard, but they are sealed inside packets.




On an unrelated note, China Blog List is a website that lists over 400 blogs about China. I am currently listed as the #5 hottest blog on their website. I hope I can retain all the new viewers I am getting.

The sink on my balcony

Here is my sink on my balcony. In the corner you can also see my washing machine. Where does the water go?




Onto the floor, around the leg of the sink, and into the drain on the left. Do you see that white hose? That's the drainage from my washing machine which also floods my balcony.




The "honey moon" is over. Now you will start seeing the gritty details.

Health Exam

I passed! Woohoo!

Because I'm going to live here longer than 6 months, I needed to get a health exam.

What did they find? Everything is normal! What a relief!

For the blood tests they looked for (and found nothing I might add).

Anti-HIV
Syphilis Serology
HBsAg
Anti-HCV
HBsAb
HBeAg
HBeAb
HBcAb

Google tells me the HB stuff is for Hepatitis. So is HCV but thats Hep C. I'm guessing 'Anti' means they are looking for antibodies against the listed infections. Why am I sharing all of this with you? I don't know, maybe it will shed some light on people coming to China on what kind of tests to expect. Actually, I'm just too tired to post any pictures so I had to think of something to write about.

Walmart in Zhangzhou

Zhangzhou has one Walmart in town. You can reach it from the college park using bus 11 or 25. There is also a McDonalds across the street and a KFC in the building. The Zhangzhou Walmart has two stories. The first floor is for food, and the second floor is for house stuff.

Here is a picture of their Sandiwch Silced bread, I mean Sandwich Sliced bread. Look closely at the picture if you don't get it.

A personal update about my life

So what have I been doing lately? Well, I met a new friend in Xiamen and she introduced me to a bunch of her friends, including her best friend Alice. She is Chinese but currently lives in Singapore while coming to Xiamen for business about once a month. You should look at the cost of living and immigration requirements to live there to get a ballpark figure about the kind of money she has. Needless to say she is a very successful business woman. This weekend I saw her again and she introduced me to a bunch of her business partners. We're talking about filthy, disgustingly rich people. These business partners of hers just recently bought a three-story villa for their new business. They also asked her to pay them 1 million yuan to join as a partner of the company. Thats about oh $140,000. She told them she doesn't have that much money.

It's really amazing what you can get yourself into being a foreigner in Asia. As far as Alice and myself, I'm not sure how long our friendship will last. To be honest I'm not too fond of her personality, and shes constantly traveling. Most annoyingly I had to explain to her that I don't like being shown off like a prize trophy, I had enough of that in Korea. I also explained how poor I am and how careful I am about who I pick for my friends. So I have a feeling this won't last too long.

But, damn it, you only live ONCE. You can never rewind your life, and you'll never have another one so be damn sure to follow all your dreams before your time is up.

I'll keep you up to date....maybe

Hong Kong at night

Here are some pictures of Hong Kong at night.

How I got to Hong Kong

The school had a driver take me to the Xiamen airport. Then I flew to Shenzhen where I took 3 buses to get to Hong Kong. The first bus took me to the Chinese immigration building. The second bus took me across to the Hong Kong immigration building, and the third bus took me to my destination in Hong Kong. I had a small, written guide on how to find my hotel and the Visa office.

On a side note, the internet here is severely messed up right now due to obviously reasons (read or watch news about China).

Hong Kong

So I was in Hong Kong for 3 days. The city is one of a kind, but to be honest I didn't enjoy it that much. Perhaps because it reminded me a little bit of Korea (although people were more friendly in Hong Kong), or perhaps it was the two and a half hours I spent standing in line to pick up my passport and visa. I'm not sure why they only had one window for collections.

I'm also pretty sick of traveling at the moment. I'd like to just settle in for a while and relax. Anyway, here are a couple pictures of Hong Kong during the daytime.

Hong Kong

I am leaving for Hong Kong for three days tomorrow. I will blog about it when I get back.

Multi-Care Soop

It's actually soap.

Xiamen beach

Xiamen is the Jewel of China. I know where I will be spending my weekends. It's about one and a half hours away from my home.

My apartment

My apartment is very big, but rough around the edges. Here are some pictures without showing the small, nagging problems.

I have a living room, dining room, kitchen, bathroom, bedroom, office and balcony.

What's wrong with this picture?

Hmm, I've heard of Puma but not Pmua.

Zhangzhou City

I played Tennis with a student and his friend today. Then we went to his friend's house for tea and then out to dinner. Before our dinner of duck blood soup and noodles with pig intestine they told me that 10 years ago there were no cars in Zhangzhou...

...think about that for a second...what were you doing 10 years ago? I was a college student at a community college in my hometown trying to figure out what the hell I was going to do with the rest of my life.

In my Beijing Hotel

Where does the water go?

Onto the floor.

It was fixed later that day.

Just a few more days

Everything is set for my trip to China. I will start in Beijing where I will stay for a few days to see the city and prepare for teaching. Next, I will head to my city in Fujian Province to begin teaching.

This time around feels different. When I went to Korea for the first time there was a lot of uncertainty and doubt about what I was getting myself into. I survived. Now it's time to experience another country for the first time (again) and I couldn't be more excited.

The format of this blog will be mainly photography, but also as a guide to anyone who will come to Zhangzhou after me. I will try to give directions to important places to make life a little easier. I will leave America on February 25th, wish me luck.