Snow and smog hits Tianjin
I turned into a massive kid when Tianjin experienced it's first snow a couple weekends ago. I had been snuggled up in bed, none the wiser until a fellow teacher messaged to say there was snow on campus. I couldn't quite believe it, but I drew open the curtains to find this...
Snow on campus!
Cue Christmas music! Normally, I'm pretty anti-Christmas-anything-pre-December. But I think I can make an exception this year, simply for the fact that I won't be having a normal Christmas anyway. I put Mariah's All I Want For Christmas Is You on full blast and couldn't wipe the smile off my face.
All the snow in Tianjin gave me another good excuse to go shopping for cosy jumpers and winter accessories. Although I'm pretty kitted out with clothes to wrap up warm in, the novelty of snow didn't last forever. My body just isn't cut out to deal with the cold for long periods of time, let alone a standard -6 degrees everyday. I'm also relatively clumsy so it was a bit of a miracle that I didn't suffer any major injuries walking across sludgy snow.
The snow stuck around for about a week and a half but recently, we've been hit with pretty high levels of smog and pollution - as has been reported a lot in the news. It's probably been the worst I've seen it in Tianjin so far, so much so that you can pretty much taste a kind of metallic-ness in the air. I don't suffer from asthma or breathing issues, but I definitely felt a difference in my chest when the smog was at it's worst.
#nofilter - no seriously. No filter.
Weekend in Qingdao
Last weekend, I went to visit Charlotte who is a fellow-ELA teaching English in Qingdao for some belated birthday celebrations. It was a lovely chilled weekend where I went for my first bus ride, first trip to the cinema and first Indian dinner in China. We saw the latest James Bond film, which I actually ended up quite liking despite a lot of my friends and family back home telling me it wasn't all that. Sure, it was cheesy, but it still had its 007 charm.
I wasn't too fussed about cramming in all the tourist-y things to see in Qingdao because I'm certain it won't be my last trip there. I'll more than likely visit when the weather picks up again and check out the beaches Qingdao has. But overall, my first impressions of the place are pretty good and Charlotte is massively content living there. For me, it was nice to do some more travelling, as well as head somewhere with a little warmer weather than what I was experiencing in Tianjin at the time.
We did take a little visit to May the 4th Square and got some good photos by the sea front.
For her actual birthday celebrations, we had dinner at a local Indian restaurant along with the many friends Charlotte has made, all of whom showered her in gifts. It was so lovely to meet some of her friends!
After a night of bar hopping, Charlotte took me to Kiwi Cafe to have brunch before I was due to catch my train. Of the few things I miss from back home, regular brunch dates is definitely up there on my list, so I was so pleased to get a fix of eggs benedict. I also ordered some French toast which was equally glorious!
Overall, a sweet little weekend away!
Writing
As some of you may know, I've recently got involved with writing and editing for a local magazine called Tianjin Plus. It's a free magazine publication aimed at expats in Tianjin, giving them the latest updates on what's going on in the city. I've also written a few articles for it's sister publication, Business Tianjin. Hooray for being published!
Sometimes it's a bit difficult to fit it all in with my teaching schedule and everything else I do to fill my time, but I'm enjoying it so far. It's been a good way to get up to speed with all that Tianjin has to offer in terms of restaurants, bars, education, business and more. It's also been a good opportunity for me to interview some important people and get their perspectives on life in Tianjin to compare with my own.
Writing articles and such isn't something I'd say I was massively great at, but as they say, practice makes perfect and I'm grateful for the opportunity so far.
Teaching
I'd realised that so far in this blog, one thing I haven't mentioned much is how teaching is actually going (definitely something I'll focus more on for future posts). Becoming a teacher was never the main motivation for me to come to China, but three months in and I can say that I actually quite enjoy teaching.
For anyone wondering, I teach Junior 2 and 3, which is China's equivalent to Year's 8 and 9 in the UK. In total, there are about 400 students I have to remember the names of - which is still a struggle for me even at this point of the year. Luckily though, the vast majority of my students are absolutely lovely and very well behaved. Having heard a couple stories from other ELAs about what they have to deal with in their schools, I count myself very lucky for how easy it is to teach my kids.
My school specialises in foreign languages so along with learning English, all students also take on an additional language with a choice between French, Spanish, German or Japanese. As a result, the students I teach are accustomed to learning a new language which makes my job quite easy.
In terms of what I actually teach, I'm given a fair bit of freedom. I find the most interesting lessons are ones in which students discover something completely new - whether that's English idioms or English history. I also do my best to always put a fun twist on lessons because I would say my teaching style differs completely to what other teachers at the school do. And who doesn't want to be the 'cool, fun teacher'?
Learning Chinese
One question I get asked on a regular basis is how my mandarin is coming along. My answer is pretty much: "Slowly, but surely". Each week, I take at least 2 hours worth of lessons which cover HSK 3 content. I have an lovely teacher called Grace who is always keen to mix up lessons by teaching us useful day to day conversational phrases, as well as terms that Tianjinese people use specifically.
Still, I'm not sure that what I've learnt in the time I've started taking lessons is enough. One thing that I would say is of a disadvantage to me at the moment is that I don't spend nearly enough time testing out my newly learned Chinese because the majority of my time is spent teaching in English. I'm hoping to dedicate a little more time to learning in the coming months so that I feel more confident with being able to communicate whilst I go travelling during Spring Festival.
In the mean time though, I have discovered a lovely little cafe close to Tianjin Foreign Studies University, where my lessons take place. I tend to set up a little corner there before lessons to review my homework (didn't think I'd be saying that again at the age of 23).
An ideal set up indeed!
What's next?
Admittedly, I don't have much planned for the next few months as I'm cutting back on eating out and travelling on weekends in order to save as much money as possible for Spring Festival. I have a million plans to visit places both in and out of China as I have about 7 weeks off for holiday.
I am very excited however to say that I'll be spending Christmas in Seoul, South Korea this year! I figured Christmas will be strange enough not being around my family for the first time ever, so I might as well do something really different and just head to a different country. Although I'll be waking up in a hostel on Christmas day, I'm super excited to be spending Christmas abroad this year!
That's all for now!
No comments
Post a Comment