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(Hopefully, I’ll have pictures inserted throughout this long-ish post soon.) The first stage of cultural exchange is commonly called the “honeymoon” period, the time when baby expats get moonstruck by being in a brand spankin’ new place. But when I first got to China, I didn’t feel particularly excited. It could have been a [...] Our genealogy is a little more convoluted than it needs to be, and our last name probably can claim partial credit for that. “What, your last name is Dutch?” people repeat after I tell them. “Are you Dutch, then?” I say no and watch them flail in further confusion. It can [...] The English office doesn’t have a printer. I’m not really sure how an entire school functions without ever printing anything out, but I’ve gotten used to it. I keep all my lesson plans and notes in digital files, or I scribble them out into a notebook. Saves trees and ink, I guess. But [...] I always liked the word “interstitial.” It used to pop up occasionally in my critical theory books in reference to abstract in-betweens that post-structuralist theorists liked to expand on so very much (evidently the world’s demand for abstract concepts is beginning to outstrip supply). I always thought it had surgical-Tim-Burton-esque connotations too. [...] Having two weeks off before I begin traveling around China to see family is nice in that without morning classes to worry about I can get out of my corner of Shenzhen and make sure I’ve actually become familiar with this place and how it works. They say Shenzhen doesn’t have “culture,” but surely [...] After my last class of the morning I decided to go exploring. Heck, it’s a nice sunny day and I need to get out. An easy option was to look around the Sea World area, a few miles south of my neighborhood. As all Shenzhen expats know by now, our Sea World does not [...] 1) Wait for grandma to leave hong kong (done) I went to play badminton at the school courts today. Whenever class finishes, the back yard of Yucai Third Middle becomes a teeming crowd of basketball players (mostly boys), joggers on the track (mostly girls), and badminton players (mostly teachers). On the way to the badminton court I even saw a few people [...] I’m sad to report that there will be no hip hop dance lessons after all. “We opened the class last week and nobody showed up,” said Mr. He at the fitness club I go to. “You can try 健身操 (fit aerobics) though.” I looked around and struck up a conversation with the [...] For the first time, in picture format! ….Except this still isn’t the way I wanted them…Ryan, can you tell me sometime how you embed your Flickr photo albums into your blog posts? |
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