Hmmm, nothing really to blog about today, but I thought I’d do it nevertheless, because I feel like talking. Oh, like talking to yourself? Yes, that’s healthy.
Moving swiftly on. Last night I met up with K and her friend, the Talker. I guess she hooked up with us because last week I sort of invited them both out to dinner. I was hoping the Talker would have forgotten, but it’s unlike Chinese to forget dinner invitations.
The eating was non-eventful, but it was in a new location. Somewhere I’ve not been to before. We went to eat Huo Guo, steamboat, because the weather was a bit cold and rainy and you have to wait for the weather to be cold and rainy before you can eat steamboat. A social affair as everyone sits around this soup bowl on a gas flame and it gets quite hot.
The two of them were speaking mostly Chinese all night, and I didn’t really feel like chipping in. I occupied myself with eating and drinking beer, which oddly enough, had me almost as pissed as sharing a bottle of wine and bia jiu did the previous week. And we only had 3 bottles between the three of us. I guess I drank the most.
Afterwards we again went to the most expensive coffee place in Central China and had some fruit and what could have been waffles had it not been frozen, defrosted and re-heated in an unspecified way, leaving it rather tasteless. But the atmosphere makes up for any shortcomings the food or minute servings of coffee may have, and I sat next to and close to K, so I was happy.
I continued listening to them speak Chinese, training my ears to the speed of native speakers, which are blindingly fast. I caught some phrases here and there, but by the time I could decode what they said, the conversation had already moved on so far that I couldn’t string my bits together to form anything coherent.
This weekend will be quite busy. Hopefully I will get a chance to go out alone with K. The reason for all this going out is that her mother, the one who is so strict about her seeing me, has gone on holiday to some far-away city.
Tomorrow there is the first heat of the semi-final English Speaking competition, which is a big deal, but in which our school, I suspect, might not do too well. Sure, this is a foreign language school, but the emphasis is not really on speaking English. There are several kids who are capable, but at the competition last week, it was aparent that they are mediocre. This whole week they have been drilled… unfortunetally by non native speakers, and they have improved little.
I spent some time with some of the kids, and then while they are with me, they speak and pause and stop as the text requires, but after a day being drilled by their Chinese English teachers, they relapse to their particular way of speaking. So, what to do?
On Sunday we have the Spring Sports Festival. King and I have been roped into running a 100m race with one of the teachers, as well as take part in a 4x100m and 20x75m relay race. Last year, I do believe it was the Autumn Sports Festival, we also took part, and I beat the pants of King and another teacher in the hurdles.
And that’s it really.