I went to the "beach"

May was a good month. Not much going on, just living day to day, taking it easy. My students are growing more and more nervous because soon they will be Grade 3, and that means classes all summer and then the dreaded Gaokao (their SAT on steroids) this time next year.

Our school is a testing site for the Gaokao, so from June 6th to the 12th Grade 1 and 2 teachers and students get a week off. Then I have two weeks, and I am off to Spain to chill for two months with a super cool family, who picked me as a nanny because they have an adopted daughter from China. It will be strange going from 1 billion Asian faces to just one.

This is going to be my face when I step off the plane
and see more non-Chinese people than Chinese.

Shortly after Mother's Day Nikki, Dionne, and I attempted to go to the local beach. We made it after taking several modes of transportation, rickshaw, bus, private bus, country bus, and taxi. There is no direct route to anything in China, ever. So if you come here and you want to go to a site or something, be prepared to take at least three modes of transport at all times no matter how far or close you are going.

Example: Where I tutor, I have to take a bus to another bus to a boat. And it is just 20 km away.

Anyways, this "beach" was on Dongtou Island far enough away that we had to make our way to a closer island first. It took us a long time to find it. And I was so excited. I miss laying out in the sun. And I was ready to see the ocean that no one talks about even though we are 2 miles away.

We really loved this guy chilling in his underwear and socks.
People swim in anything here.
The women were fully clothed in super nice dresses, dresses that shouldn't be in any water, let alone whatever that smelly water was.

The place was really crowded. And there wasn't sand, just mud. Mud that was littered with so much crap like I've never seen. Trash was everywhere. It was horrible. People were also tripping over themselves to get a picture of us, too. I was kinda upset, I just wanted a beach day, and I felt bad for dragging Nikki and Dionne with me to this disgusting place. But we just had to laugh about it, and I should have known better. The Chinese are just Chinese and I shouldn't have expected a nice beach!

I've been here long enough to know better.

Mei Nu to the third power!

In other news, the lessons I've been teaching have been fun. I had an I Spy lesson, where students had to write down everything they see, then write a story with all the things they listed. I loved tricking them, because I'd show the picture and I'd say: WRITE AS MUCH AS YOU CAN!! And then they get all excited and wrote a ton of stuff. Then the next slide on my powerpoint was:

And I told them they would have to write a story. 

Their moaning and groaning was music to my ears.

I got lots of side eye.

VICTORIA. WHY.

But I was just like:

Long hur, don't cur.

The week after I had an Indy Car lesson, and told them about the international drivers, including the Asian ones, and how this is what my home is known for. Then we played a racing game where they passed around a ton of little cars like hot potato. I showed this video which always brought a bit of moisture in my eyes:

Indy is such a great city, we literally have every sport. 

Which is really cool.

And finally the past week we played Mad Libs. It was awesome. They loved it. I had the whole class rolling. I told them to number their papers, and each number I told them what thing to pick. Like for #1, choose an adjective, #2 a verb, #3 a food, so on.
This is the one we used:

Their favorite line was: They should have the body of ______ and the ____ of a ____.

I made them choose a celebrity, then a body part, then an animal. Some kids have some really hilarious combinations. My favorites that I remember:

They should have the body of Lady Gaga and the fingernails of a bee.
They should have the body of Lee Min Ho and the eyes of a dog.

And my absolute favorite!!!!!!

They should have the body of Justin Timberlake and the hands of a panda.

I don't know why, but hands of a panda killed me. I was laughing so hard. 

The kids that wrote it were laughing just as hard though. 

The rest of the class was like this though.

Also, I took a short jaunt with some teachers to Shanghai to watch an open class, which is all the rage here. They are always taking trips to see other schools and take me with them.

We always take a picture like this. When I asked why,
they said it was to prove we are said where we said we would be. What.

Nancy and I were clearly paying attention.....

And this creepy chalk painting is from one of my classes.
This month murals had to have some sort of safety theme to them.
And this was their interpretation...

As class is winding down, but I try to still get as much fun as possible. Next year is going to be hell for them, so I want to make sure they have some good times to reminisce, ha.

So until next time, I leave you with what I like to now say when a Chinese person takes me to dinner to meet their friends to show off how important they are since they know a white girl: