(Drew)Thrusday we woke up a little late but thats ok me and mark always make good time in the morning. My host mom always makes a delicious and fairly large breakfast for me and mark so that we start the day well. We also ride bikes to school, which gives us an advantage over Cady,Nick and Em haha... oh wait nick gets driven in a car to school woops. So after another class of chinese calligraphy which went well we took our 20 minute break to go get hot chocolate with oreos. Team China has grown quite fond of this drink which i will take credit as the original founder of this unique blend. Calligraphy for characters is very difficult, our teacher Mr. Yang makes it look so easy. It takes a lot of skill with the brush and a lot of patience. The past two days all we have done is work on basic strokes because anything more than that would be beyond our current abilities. Our second class was Hangzhou History which was more of a modern day look at hangzhou through tour guide pamplets. We looked at the layout of Hangzhou and all the places of interest so that the group had a better idea of how to get around. We also located where we all live on the map of Hangzhou. Nick lives so far away! Its too bad because sometimes he can't do things with us because if he wants to come to this part of Hangzhou he needs someone to drive him.
Lunch was delicious as usual. Each day we get a completely different lunch and the chef is so funny. Everyday the chef comes in to see us and see if the food is alright he just laughs as we point and give him the thumbs up and will come up to me and nick and give us hard pats on the back. After lunch it was time to shadow our host brothers and sisters again. Class gets a little boring unfortunately, but its nice to have a lot of free time to draw, read, write or do whatever we need to do for that day. I sit at the back of my class so my activity goes unoticed most of the time. Im making new friends in my class though, everyone is so nice but they are very nervous to speak with me because they are not confident about thier english.
I know many peope around school now which is nice, i get lots of hellos and seeing familiar faces is nice. Some students from my class and the kids who show up for english corner after lunch are always friendly. One senior at hangzhou, his english name is michael, comes to english corner frequently. He is studying hard to come to america for university. He takes a lot of extra classes so that he can score well on the tests he must take to be able to attend school in america and on the SAT's. He told me that the vocabulary for the SAT's is 15000! I take for granted that i already know most of those, it would be so difficult to take them as a foreigner.
I ran again after school even though it was cold and drizziling. I told myself that if i did a good workout i would go to my favorite bakery "Free Morey(sp?)" afterwards (hehe maybe it makes me run faster). Unfortunatly while running i hadnt noticed but i had been kicking mud up onto my school uniform that i was going to wear the following day so i spent about an hour thursday night cleaning off my uniform.
Going home is always so relaxing, i can take a shower put on my PJ's and slippers and curl up reading harry potter until dinner time. I have a new favorite dish that my host parents make. Its simply strips of potatos and carrots that i mix in with my rice and its delicious, maybe ill tell my real mom about this secret recipe so i can enjoy it back in America, of course ill need to keep chopsticks around the house from now on it just wouldnt feel right eating it any other way. We always have other assorted vegtables and meats on the table. Thursday we had clams dipped in vinegear, i actualy prefer the fresh fish that we usually have but it was still good. The most important thing is that i have a full belly at all times, frightfully easy to do. Harry Potter is almost over though im so sad i will be finishing it within the next couple days. Ill have to go to the local international book store and buy some english books to keep me entertained while i curl up in bed. I hear they have the Dan Brown books i never read.
My host family is too nice they feed me so much. Sometimes ill just be sitting down and a plate of fruit drops in front of me, i feel like i never left my house back home. Back in America i have a personal chef (my mom) who knows exactly when i am hungry and always has food ready, nothing has changed. They bought me new slippers because the ones that i had been wearing around the house did not fit, my feet were hanging off the end by a good 2-3 inches. When Mrs. Viz told me that the host families in China are too nice after i had told her about my fears of going to China, i still felt skeptical. Im so glad that she was right (of course she was right its, Viz...).
Ok well my thoughts about Hangzhou so far, sorry about being a little late on this entry. I do have to say that KTV on friday was so much fun even though im not supposed to talk about friday this is a thursday post :) but i really want to go back.
Lunch was delicious as usual. Each day we get a completely different lunch and the chef is so funny. Everyday the chef comes in to see us and see if the food is alright he just laughs as we point and give him the thumbs up and will come up to me and nick and give us hard pats on the back. After lunch it was time to shadow our host brothers and sisters again. Class gets a little boring unfortunately, but its nice to have a lot of free time to draw, read, write or do whatever we need to do for that day. I sit at the back of my class so my activity goes unoticed most of the time. Im making new friends in my class though, everyone is so nice but they are very nervous to speak with me because they are not confident about thier english.
I know many peope around school now which is nice, i get lots of hellos and seeing familiar faces is nice. Some students from my class and the kids who show up for english corner after lunch are always friendly. One senior at hangzhou, his english name is michael, comes to english corner frequently. He is studying hard to come to america for university. He takes a lot of extra classes so that he can score well on the tests he must take to be able to attend school in america and on the SAT's. He told me that the vocabulary for the SAT's is 15000! I take for granted that i already know most of those, it would be so difficult to take them as a foreigner.
I ran again after school even though it was cold and drizziling. I told myself that if i did a good workout i would go to my favorite bakery "Free Morey(sp?)" afterwards (hehe maybe it makes me run faster). Unfortunatly while running i hadnt noticed but i had been kicking mud up onto my school uniform that i was going to wear the following day so i spent about an hour thursday night cleaning off my uniform.
Going home is always so relaxing, i can take a shower put on my PJ's and slippers and curl up reading harry potter until dinner time. I have a new favorite dish that my host parents make. Its simply strips of potatos and carrots that i mix in with my rice and its delicious, maybe ill tell my real mom about this secret recipe so i can enjoy it back in America, of course ill need to keep chopsticks around the house from now on it just wouldnt feel right eating it any other way. We always have other assorted vegtables and meats on the table. Thursday we had clams dipped in vinegear, i actualy prefer the fresh fish that we usually have but it was still good. The most important thing is that i have a full belly at all times, frightfully easy to do. Harry Potter is almost over though im so sad i will be finishing it within the next couple days. Ill have to go to the local international book store and buy some english books to keep me entertained while i curl up in bed. I hear they have the Dan Brown books i never read.
My host family is too nice they feed me so much. Sometimes ill just be sitting down and a plate of fruit drops in front of me, i feel like i never left my house back home. Back in America i have a personal chef (my mom) who knows exactly when i am hungry and always has food ready, nothing has changed. They bought me new slippers because the ones that i had been wearing around the house did not fit, my feet were hanging off the end by a good 2-3 inches. When Mrs. Viz told me that the host families in China are too nice after i had told her about my fears of going to China, i still felt skeptical. Im so glad that she was right (of course she was right its, Viz...).
Ok well my thoughts about Hangzhou so far, sorry about being a little late on this entry. I do have to say that KTV on friday was so much fun even though im not supposed to talk about friday this is a thursday post :) but i really want to go back.
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