Here are a few other videos from last weekend.
These guys are setting up a for a game of Mahjong. This is a very popular game in China, you can see people playing it all over. There are tons of rules and different regions play with
I have no idea what they were saying or talking about although they sound kinda mad.
In writing todays post, there are a number of things I ought to fill you in on in order to better make sense of my work in the writing center.
- UIC is a radical idea here in China. It is a division of Hong Kong Baptist University, and considered by many to be the first liberal arts college in mainland China. With that said, it still has some constraints -- not all ideas are topics for discussion.
- Nearly all of the Classes are taught in Enlgish (and require class work to be completed in Enlgish). Which creates problems as 95% of the students are Chinese and their english skills are not all equal.
- The greatest problem for UIC is plagiarism.
During the last few days I have had many people ask me to tell more about my job. Up until yesterday my schedule was shifting around so much I really didn't feel like I could full answer that question. I will spend the next few blogs explaining some of the things I spend my time on.
I spend at least 5 hours a week in a writing center helping students with their papers. 95% of the work is grammar related 5% is intellectual. Initially this was somewhat of a let down but I ought to have known that most of these students would need help with their grammar, not with their ideas.
As I noted above, the largest problem is plagiarism. Professors stress the importance of citing sources but sometimes, as I have seen, a students paper is taken directly from Wiki. The second biggest problem is internet translators. Students type their paper in Chinese, go to a translator like altavista.com, and translate it into Enlgish. Some of the papers I have been working on with students end up looking ridiculous because the amount of red ink required to fix the errors created in a simple translation.
The professor in charge of the writing center used the following metaphor:
If you give a man a fish you feed him for a day,
if you teach a man to fish you feed him for a month.
We can't just fix their papers for them, because the student's won't learn to avoid/correct their grammar problems. On the other hand, some of the time - the students don't understand our explanations. In such a case I have taken to using a highlighter instead of a pen so I can highlight the area of a problem and instructed them to speak with their professor or a classmate. Because the students are at different levels in their english skills, it is helpful to work through papers in a small group. Generally one student understands what I am talking about and they can pass it on to the other student in Chinese. Sometime next week we will have a sheet of chinese translations for common errors.
Vocab:
tai gui le - Too expensive.
I used this last night to buy something for 2/3 the marked price. I probably still was ripped off but it's pretty good reinforcement.
Ah! Fresh air from the countryside. I made sure to take a bunch of pictures and videos to capture the moment and was able to have a great time in the process.
On Friday night all the T.A.s headed out to a nearby island, and had a dinner with a few of the profs. Of the entire group, two older professors and another T.A. and I were the last to show up due to a combination of bad directions and tenacious individuals. Anyways, we made it to the dinner in time to pick the bones of a fish, eat a bit of eel, and gobble down enough rice to quell our stomachs churning. I then parted from my group with Ryan (another T.A.) and called it an early night... Don't get me wrong -- we had to.
On Saturday morning at 8am, 24 UIC folks piled into a large van/small bus (it was far from sufficient) and drove 4 hours to a village of lepers. In hindsight the visit was quite similar to the visits I have done in the past to nursing homes and the likes. But on the bus ride there I was getting pretty nervous. We stopped a long the way to pick up food from a market so we could cook for ourselves over the weekend.
The village was great! They evern had a volunteer wing for all 24 of us to sleep (on beds like the villagers - two sawhorses and plywood streched on top). MmmmMmm. I slept about 2 hours as the mosquitoes were bothering the crap out of me and my bed tent appeared to be doing nothing.
Well anyways, a blog with out pictures is like a fish without fins -- so on to the good stuff.
These guys love their dogs, and their dogs love them too. Sometimes the dogs would be picking on each other and they would run by these old guys for protection. Other times the old guys would grab them forcefully by the scruff and get them in the "Don't make me stand like a human pose" and beckon us to snap photos of them. The dog would writhe but the old men would just grin away.
Ugggg. I went home sick from the High Table Dinner last night halfway through.
15 T.A.s, 20 professors, and a handful of Minnesota private college representatives were invited to the "Western Style" formal dinner. A pianist played classical music while students and professors enjoyed a 4 course meal. We started with bread rolls, rye bread slices, and sweet butter washed down with a glass of great wall red wine. A creamy seafood soup, followed by fried chicken, steamed veggies, and mashed potatoes. The Mashed potatoes tasted artificial, and the veggies tasted like canning vinegar. I was not able to to stick around for dessert.
Anyways... Today was a very long day. I had a few classes, met a ton of students, and listened to an retired American diplomat speak about Barak's presidency and future relations between America and China. I also had a few hours of helping students work on papers like these kids below. 
Tonight at dinner me and a few others went to eat with some of the profs and I was let in on a Chinese medicine use to cure stomach problem. I have a vial and a box for purchasing more. It's dangerous because I am just itching to provoke my stomach to mess with me so I can test it's powers.
Our whole group has been sharing money like crazy during the past week. Our first pay check comes in at the end of the month, and we are waiting on our reimbursments so we are forced to be crafty as we deal with the ATMs. Every so often someone's bank card stops working and they are forced to borrow money until they can call the states and convince their bank they are legitimatly asking for their money. I called my bank before coming and told them I would be visiting China, and possibly travelling around south eastern Asia. They told me everything would be fine, and a few days ago my card stopped working and I received notice that VISA think's my card is stolen.
Yesterday I hiked up a nearby mountain again and watched the sunset while planning out a day trip up a giant mountain on the horizon.
Today I start my first day of classes - and tonight we have a special 'high table dinner'. When explainning what to expect from a high table dinner, we were told to think about the big celebratory dinners from Harry Potter.
-- Needless to say, I am expecting great things... I'll bring my camera.
Another great day in Zhuhai (pronounced joo-hi)!
Ben and I moved out of the hotel yesterday! We jumped into a van with our luggage and they brought us to the staff apartments! The apartment is a beautiful 4 bedroom place with a wash room (washer on a porch), kitchen, bathroom, HUGE living room (as seen below), and an awesome front porch.
As soon as we moved in, Ben and I noticed the giant bed located in one of the unoccupied bedrooms. We both agreed to flip a coin - to decide who would have claim to the king sized bed. Obviously I won (otherwise I would leave it out of my blog) and Ben is stuck in a room with a tiny bed.
After showing our apartment to our peers and feeling pretty lucky (as some are stuck in tiny dorm rooms with out running water) I went to sleep.
The next morning, after a terrible sleep I decided I ought to clean my room and found a bunch of dust and junk under the mattress and all over the inner bed frame. I spent the entire morning cleaning the dust and crud, while ben cleaned the rest of the apartment.
This is a picture of me thrilled to be cleaning the bed frame. I didn't want to keep my dust/mold inhalation to a minimum.
This is nasty, I promise my next entry will be a little more interesting to read. I will leave you with a picture of me on the mountain I hiked up yesterday with another TA during our free time.
Yey! I made it! Nearly a month and a half behind schedule I step off the plane and take my first breath of Hong Kong air - surprisingly fresh... compared to the airplane at least.
Our group of six left the airport and checked in to our hotel on Man Fuk Road at the YWCA. We went out to Lan Kwi Fong, a bar street which was jam packed with brits and aussis. There were lot of pink polos with popped collars. I was nervous that this was a taste of things to come.
The next day we met our boss who bought us our first family style meal of dumplings, 2 types of strong teas, egg soup, and fried noodles. We then boarded the ferry and crossed into paradise.
Palm trees, islands, sand, and highrises. We climbed aboard a charter bus and drove 2 hours though a few cities and finally arrived at our present residence - the international hotel.
It has taken me awhile to start blogging because the Chinese government has blocked a number of blog sites. This one appears to work so I will use it as much as I can.
Jia You!
I find myself on the 31st floor of a 1.5 million dollar condo in downtown Chicago. Carl's Aunt and Uncle were nice enough to let us spend the two nights leading up to our flight to China. We turned our VISA information in to the Chinese Consulate yesterday, and hope to be able to return to pick our VISA up in an hour.
Tonight Chicago is planning on hosting more than one and a half million people for Obama's acceptence party. We plan on taking advantage of the situation and finding a few deals on lunch and dinner tonight.
