An American Expat in China

It has been raining pretty much all week.  With that has come cooler weather.  The sidewalks get slick, the soil gets muddy, and giant invasive African land snails emerge and creep around. I had made plans with one of the women from last Saturday who I had shared contact info with.   Our plans were originally for today (Sunday 11/6).  She seemed really eager to hang out and contacted me on Tuesday and asked if I would be willing to go on our date early.  Which we did, but it did not really work out.  She showed up in sweat pants and a t-shirt and I got the impression she considered the encounter more casual than romantic.  We did not get together again today.  She is going to keep going to the hash, we will see what kind of signals I get from her going forward.  From the signals she was sending it might be she was more interested in hooking up than dating.  There will be more dates to come with other women and it did not hurt to try...

There were a couple lockdowns this week that indirectly impacted me.   Any building can be placed in lockdown at any time if someone in the building tests positive.  Although I have been fortunate to not be directly impacted by any lockdowns this last week, they did indirectly impact my schedule.  On Wednesday, because of a lockdown in one of the apartment complexes that houses teachers, there were five teachers absent and I was called to sub at the last minute.  Today, because of a lockdown in one of my bandmate's building, we ended up canceling band practice.   Halloween celebrations have been underway all week despite the lockdowns.  My school had spirit this week. So throughout the week children and staff were dressed in a variety of festive attire and costumes. If I were allowed to I would include pictures of the adorable little kids in their costumes, but because of privacy concerns I cannot. Friday night I worked late, had dinner at a Frien...

This past week practically flew by.  On Monday I was brought to the Civic Center to take care of some important stuff relating to my visa, residency, and work permit.  I had to submit my passport which I will get back soon.  I voted by mail from China.  It cost me about $57 to mail it through a courier service.  I hope it gets there because the next US midterm election is a big one.  What I love about teaching here is that I am able to experiment with many of the ideas I have had over the last four years.  I have already talked at length about the negative aspects of teaching in the US.  Those issues are far worse in urban settings.  It was rare that I had enough consistent attendees, or students who cared enough, in class to even execute what I had planned.  I am now in the fortunate position to use much of the plans that I have accumulated over the last four years.  This means that I never need to come up with anything on the spot...