TIC-This is China

1. I have killed two cockroaches in my apartment since being here. I have cried about it both times, but at least I'm facing my fears of them instead of screaming like a two year old and standing on top of my bed until someone comes and kills it for me. 

2. Today, I took my kids to the circus for class! We talked about the different animals there and made noises. And then we talked about clowns. And I had each kid draw one part of a clown face. While it was a BIG hit with them (I've never heard kids laugh so hard) I'm convinced I'm going to have nightmares tonight. They liked giving their clowns bloodshot eyes, pig noses and sharp teeth. 

3. I also popped popcorn for each student to try, because when we go to the circus, we eat popcorn, right? While they were super excited about getting to have a snack, they were surprisingly MORE excited to have the germ-x I had them all rub into their hands before I passed out the popcorn. After I gave them a little squirt, they each said: "THANK YOU TEECHA!" and rubbed it in and then sat there smelling their hands.

4. Our first vacation wasn't supposed to be until the first week of April, but we just found out today that the school is giving us next Thursday and Friday off. Also, the school decided that every Friday will be early release, so all of the kids leave at 3:30, which means I only teach for an hour and a half on Friday. Basically, the school throws crazy things like this at us all of the time. 

5. Whenever we encounter something weird or different or just down right funny and crazy, my roommate and I look at each other and say: "T.I.C!" or in other words, This is China! And as we walked up to the cafeteria after a long afternoon of meetings and teaching, we stopped to watch this giant pomegranate-red globe of a sun drop down over the yellow sea....and as I watched it slowly sink into the horizon, all's I could think of was: "I love China."