My apartment is freezing

So, I have been meaning to update the blog and have yet to get a chance. I guess I've been a little more busy than usual seeing as how the end of semester crunch time seems to be a world-wide effect. Our semester ends Dec 31st, but I also have off one day for Christmas, yippee! As such, this week I'm giving my final. It's a freaking cake walk for the kids too. I've definitely been teaching way above the books level and then I made the test on the books level and they've been having a breeze on it. In fact, this morning, I accidentally was asking my grade five class the questions from the grade six test and most of the students still knew the answers.

I will offer one defence for never updating the blog and it's that there is usually nothing to talk about. For example, this weekend I stayed in my apartment the entire weekend. Partly because I just wanted to kick back, listen to Christmas music and watch Weeds (I'm hooked!) but also because it was so freakin' cold. The high was 18 on Sunday and that seems generous. The thing is, I'm used to temperatures that low from living in Erie. However, what I'm not used to is the lack of insulation and airtight windows. While it wasn't too bad in most of my apartment, my kitchen windows did this neat thing where they froze shut. By froze shut I don't mean got a little ice in the seems and then was a little stuck. By froze shut I mean and half inch thick layer of ice formed over the entire window... on the inside! (Pic. 1) While cool, no pun intended, it was a little disturbing. When I asked a Chinese friend what to do, she said, 'Close your kitchen door'. Funny how a classic Jeff McFall solution appeared on the other side of the planet. When I woke up this morning the sun was shining and the freezing winds had subsided. In fact, when I woke up and felt the sunlight flooding in through my window, I thought, 'Awesome, now I can look out my kitchen windows... and mop the puddle on the floor..... wait a minute, sunshine?'

For those of you who remember, in order to get to Wanghai Primary School by 8, I need to wake up by 6... A second later my phone rang and it was the school asking me if everything was alright seeing as how my first class has started five minutes ago... without me. I told them I would be there is 30 minutes (which I knew was a lie as soon as I said it) and began to get ready. Oddly enough, I didn't run around like a crazy person getting ready, I sort of look my time. I mean, I didn't have my cup of tea or anything, but I certainly couldn't have cared less even though I knew I had effectively missed my first class and thus didn't give them their final. I get to see them next week, so it's no big deal really. The head teacher at Wanghai, who called me this morning, informed me in hushed tones (as if anyone could understand English anyway) that she had not informed my office or anyone else of my absence. I really didn't care, because it was an honest mistake (did one of those set the alarm for 6 PM rather than 6 AM idiotic mistakes) but if she wanted to keep it a secret, who am I to squeal.

I have other things to relate concerning the holidays. I have some pictures of the meager decorations I was able to produce for the season, most being cards from students, which I will include in the next post. I hope to get the holiday edition out Christmas day, which will be Christmas Eve stateside. In the meantime, I hope every one's holiday preparations are going off without a hitch, I expect cookies when I get home in July! Cheers.