Day 6 ~ Tuesday 8/1~ Classes & Gorilla!

It's 1.30 in the afternoon and we are on break between teaching this morning and activities this afternoon. Wow! It was great ... There are 12 classes with 20 students each and my teaching group (Sherrie, Carey & Beryl) taught class #10 at 9am and we taught class class #9 at 10:45. We have a "sister" teaching team (Ryan, Elizabeth & Emily) who taught class #9 at 9am and class #10 at 10:45 ... so if you followed that, it means that my first class went to Ryan for their second class while Ryan's first class came to our class for their 2nd one. This is the system for all of the teaching teams. Our second class was surprised to learn Ryan was my son and many of the girls exclaimed, "He's soooo handsome" ~ it was so cute!

The students are all excited to be here and learning ~ they are the best kinds of students to teach ~ bright eyes. Their english is sooo good and they are so grateful for the opportunity to practice speaking. All of the teachers are having the same "top-of-the-world" experience and it is incredible.

This is Carey, Hilary's husband, proper British, my co-teacher.
Carey & Hilary have been studying Chinese and teaching English at the university level in Chengdu for two years. He brought a great deal of insight into our classroom and had thought through many issues on how to connect with the Chinese mind ...

This next picture is Beryl from Toronto.
She has two grown daughters and I would explain her as "Just like me, but wrapped up in a Canadian Chinese body!" Our hearts connected instantly and I love her dearly. She lived for many years in Hong Kong and has been in Toronto since she attended university. She reads traditional chinese characters and speaks cantonese as well as beautiful english ...

This next picture is Katie, our teaching assistant / translator ~
Lovely inside and out!

A classroom shot of our first hour (class 10)...

Two classroom shots of our second hour (class 9)
along with students practicing the name and introduction dialogue ...

After our two classes, we eat lunch at the school. They serve delish spicy Sichuan dishes on our round tables with lazy susan's, but the rice comes from the big bucket. How big you ask? Big!

Sickness report ... We have:

1 - given benydryl to Tyson for a rash on his neck (we're now thinking it is prickly heat)
2 - given one round of imodium AD to a band member with the runs
3 - given some anti-inflammatories to another band member who has twisted his ankle
4 - bandaged a deep thumb cut on Dennis (the student we met Sunday morning who was hurt Sunday evening) with benzocaine & bacitracin
5 - bandaged divots on the forearms of Lance (a student in class #9) injured yesterday playing

As you can tell, we are in pretty great shape! We boil our water each night to bring in our nalgene bottles the next day, plus we are given plenty of bottled water. The food is GREAT! Oh my, oh my - we will so miss the food. Brown outs are common so we lose power fairly regularly, but today is a bit cooler and much easier for all of us, so we are thankful. Perhaps only 2 showers today?

Now I must run ~ we'll be catching the bus in a few minutes for our short ride back to the school for activities. 1/5 of the students will do sports (Ryan's group), 1/5 will do board games (my group), while the other 3/5s will be divided among drama, singing, and line dancing. The students will rotate each day through the activities. The teachers are all so abuzz, we can't wait to get back for activities and interact more casually with the students.

~~~~~~~~~ Afternoon & Evening Update ~~~~~~~

Here are pictures of board game activities with students:

And these next shots are from the evening activity
when we taught the students how to play Gorilla, Man, Gun ...
It's a full-body game like Paper, Rock, Scissors and was an absolute hoot!
The first picture is the "square" that we played with the
Admin building in the background.
The next pictures were taken from the steps of the admin bldg ...

The gorrilla beats the man

The man beats the gun
The gun beats the gorrilla
You tie - You die
One, Two, Three
JUMP

Katrina (one of the special students Ryan & I shared in class 9-10)
was the big winner of the last round of Gorilla!

After the game, we had great time to interact with students, share pictures,
talk about families, and let them know why we came to China to be with them!

With Ryan ...
BACK: ____ & Christina
FRONT: Danielle (loves basketball!), Ryan, Stephanie & ______

With Sherrie ...
Bill, _____, Sherrie, Dennis, _____, Si Si, and Creamy

Last night after Gorilla games ~ Brittany, Megan, Steve (from Grace) and Kevin (from the band) went on a walk and found a gathering of about 1,000 with jazzercize type dancing in the square, like we had seen in Beijing, children all about, and a team watermellon eating contest. Brittany & Kevin competed as did an 11 year old girl that pulled Steve to join her. Their story of being cheered, appreciated, and encouraged by the Chinese would bring the biggest smiles to your faces and joy to your hearts. We are all very welcomed and cared for here ~ whether formally at the hotel and school or informally by the people on the streets who are anxious to talk to us, practice their english, and just interact. What a joy!

And before bed, Ryan and I had a time together and I was anxious to share with him some of what I was feeling and for him to share back his perspective for both this trip and his 3 previous mission trips. I said, "Ryan, I am extremely happy ... I've been this way since we arrived in China and all of me - spiritually, intellectually, emotionally, and physically - is stretched and engaged. What has been your experience?"

"Yeah Mom, I'm that way too, just so happy. That's what mission trips do to you... China, Mexico, Costa Rica ... it's always been that way. And you'll be that way when you get home, too."

So Dave, Drew, Trey & Sean ~ not only do we miss you, send our love, hope to share this with you on a future trip, and give you big e.hugs from China ~ but we also can't wait to bless you with some Extreme Happiness throughout the house upon our return. And Robyn, Darold, Julie & Harp, we are looking forward to cheering Robyn on for the 10k swim on our return.

And we send much love from China to all of our family & friends.

With great happiness, joy, stretch, and love ~

Sherrie