Thursday, May 17

A full day of sunshine—the 4^th floor view, from the school, of the harbor and sea was mesmerizing!  I took photo after photo today, in different lights (morning, noon and afternoon) because it changed so often and was continually beautiful.  Sailboats all day, as well as enormous tankers on the horizon.

Morning sunshine on the mountain

A view of sailboats from the school

School fields and tankers on the horizon, visible on this sunny day!

After school, Julia and I walked the boardwalk down to May 4 Square, enjoying the sun and wind and waves.  All along, there were people walking, fishermen, and blankets spread with merchandise for sale.  Julia succumbed to a turtle made of small shells, with glasses and a purple hat!  For 3 yuan or about 50 cents.  She named it Gertrude, for a Marquette turtle!  We’ve seen big seashells for sale several times; do they really come from these waters? They are spectacular!  Someone was drying starfish on the slanted bank of the boardwalk.

Beautiful colors and shapes!

Starfish

The design is a wide flat walk with a slanted wall that levels out to a narrow flat walk right above the sea.  We walked on the narrow walk, which was pretty well populated.  We even met two families from my class down there walking and shopping!

The view was fabulous; blue water, sailboats in the distance, tankers far away, greenery on the edges and skyscrapers 40 feet away.  Lively city life right up to the edge of the sea.  There was a wonderful crane kite flying above the May 4 sculpture.  It’s fantastic to have the sea so close, to a city of 8 million people.

Cityscape right next to the water 

The narrow walkway along the water

Julia didn't only stay on the walkway!

The great crane kite and May 4 sculpture

I had the curious experience of naming a child today!  The families all choose English names as part of the English-focus of the school.  One little boy, relatively new to the school, hadn’t gotten named yet.  The mother asked me for suggestions—auggh! What a responsibility.  His name is Han Zhe.  So I suggested Henry, for the H. and David, matching the ‘a’ vowel sound, and Samuel, for the two syllables, and Jack because it is so popular in Western culture at this time.  She chose Henry, and we commenced calling the little boy Henry today.   Wonder how long it will take for that to mean anything to him!

One family, which has lived in Qingdao for more than 7 years, speaks at least 4 languages—she is French, he is Italian, they have all acquired Chinese, and they have promoted English as well.  The kids are 10, 7 and 3.  The lack of necessity has resulted in most Americans being embarrassingly limited in this area.  What a cultural benefit another language provides.

Julia voluntarily ate school lunch today; progress!  Watermelons are everywhere, including today’s lunch.  We won’t have watermelon at home until August!  There are strawberries in the markets, and lots of tiny cherries; the TA said the mountain is covered with cherry trees and natives climb up for their morning constitutional to pick cherries.  The view out our window was lovely this morning, the mountain in clear view, with two cats stalking in the bushes below the apartment.  But, the view at 6 pm, when we returned home, was even better—late afternoon sunshine on the tops of the mountain made it glow. 

Evening sunlight

We headed toward the city shopping, via the boardwalk, today after school in pursuit of a scooter for Julia; it is hoped that she will more willingly cover long distances if she can scoot!  I consulted with a teacher (Ms. Alice) and my main resource for information, Maggie, about where to go.  We’d seen scooters at Jusco, an anchor store in a shopping mall.  I knew Maggie likes Jusco, and she confirmed that she thought the quality of a scooter at Jusco would be reliable.  But she and Ms. Alice both thought it would be cheaper at Carrefoure, our go-to store.  I had intended to grocery shop at Jusco as well—I am just about out of tea, a crisis!—but Ms. Alice was firm that groceries at Jusco would be ‘expensive.’  Since things are generally so cheap, this was amusing to me.  On the other hand, why buy 5 yuan (80 cents) beans when you can buy 2 yuan (50 cents) beans?  So, we headed to Carrefoure, and, with persistence, located a boxed scooter at last.  We lucked onto a salesman putting together a bike who pulled the scooter out of the box and tightened up all the screws etc.  Rejected the first scooter in fact, and tweaked a second for us.  What a nice guy!  We paid a big $20.00 for the scooter; it’s worth exactly $ 15.75; we’ll be lucky if it lasts through the 7 week stay!  But, it has a kick stand and padded handles, so Julia is plotting to bring it home.  One advantage is that it is so light, she can pick it up and carry it over curbs and down stairs—that’s because it’s made of tin, I believe!  And the kickstand is made of aluminum foil.  But, it’s red.  She scooted through the store and down to Subway, for her 3^rd “Spicy Italian” sub since landing in China.  Cooking doesn’t seem to be part of this adventure.

The proud new scooter owner

More good luck—we crossed under the busy street to catch our standard bus on the other side of the street.  As we emerged from the underpass, the bus pulled up, and we hopped on, scooter and all, in rush hour.  It was crowded, and we have an open scooter, but no one frowned.  In fact, several people tried to offer Julia their seat; one lady simply stood up and gently pushed Julia into the seat.  Actually, Julia would like to stand, but there’s no gainsaying this communal concern for children! And indeed, she’d have been pushed down the aisle by the waves of new riders.  So, we squeezed ourselves into the space of her seat and my allotted aisle.  The lady tried to talk to her; slowly, she understood that this Chinese child does not speak Chinese.  She had dropped her purse onto the purse of the other woman sitting in that 2 seat row; they chatted several times, clearly about Julia.  Soon, a 10 year old boy got on, and the same lady directed him to her standing spot, with a good railing to hold onto.  Then, the woman sitting next to the standing boy got up and offered her seat to the boy’s grandmother.  It was remarkable really, the communal caretaking going on.  With no fuss, no pushing, no raised voices.  It is just a given that old people and children get the seats.  Julia will find this a continual challenge, since she wants to strap hang!  And, as a final note, I realized that the kind woman who gave Julia her seat was not actually traveling with the woman who held her purse for her until her departure.  When one got off and the other didn’t, I began to realize the extent of courtesy going on here.  One stranger held the purse of another stranger so that a strange child could have a safe seat.  Sie Sie (thank you).

When we get off the bus at our stop, we are across a main 6 lane street and up the hill from our community.  Every significant intersection in the city has a seconds counter, huge, above the street.  The cars know to the second how long the light will be green; crossers also know exactly how long they have to cross the street.  At this bus stop, people start crossing about 20 feet away from the crosswalk, angling to get across the 6 lanes before the mass of cars break through the light and hurtle down the slope (we are on the downside of the mountain).  Turning cars push right up to the pedestrians, technically breaking the rule of pedestrians first, but not actually threatening anyone.

Many pedestrians crossing the busy street - and more sunshine!

Once we get across, in the evening, we thread our way through a dense assortment of sidewalk hawkers, none of whom is there in the morning.  They are selling hair things, backpacks, clothes, shoes, jewelry, and foodstuffs.  It’s a wide array and there is an active business going on.  I wonder if the things are new or used; this is clearly under the table selling.  Today Julia scooters through the masses; she points with pride to the care she exercised when she gets to the end of the run!

Careful navigating

She was very focused!

Julia was ready to get home and do her homework (and eat that sub!), so we didn’t linger on the main thoroughfare, the paved sidewalk lined with shops, that is a perfect scooter runway.  But she did make an extra couple of loops, since some children were out and scooting as they are every night, a major impetus for this purchase!  We did make a brief detour into a quick shop to get some candy to share with the bus stop kids tomorrow (Dove chocolate, right there!).  At the top of the hill is the vegetable shop where we are getting our bananas; we tried to buy a watermelon tonight, but the earlier shopping had left me 10 yuan short on a 28 yuan watermelon; that is, about $3.50. 

Julia zooms down the hill!

I feel good about the dynamic in my classroom.  There was so much potential for tension, since the two TAs (Subrina and Mia) have been holding down the fort with a changing cast of temporary teachers for several months now, and simultaneously were given about 6 new students, several of whom are among the youngest in the room with the least amount of English.  It’s been a real challenge, and they are to be commended for the good job they’ve done.  But the Montessori flavor of the room is all but gone.  The best they’ve been able to do is maintain a good day care environment, which is a lot to accomplish, actually!  So, how would they respond to yet another temp, one with some fancy labels from the US, but still, an interloper.  It took about a week, I think, for them to see me as an asset.  I have come to class every day this week with new songs to sing at circle time and with a ‘lesson plan’ for circle time.  These kinds of details give the message that I am thinking about what’s going on, and able to implement some practical techniques for making good changes.  We put into action “work plans” for each kid, a standard Montessori Kindergarten tool; we’ve greatly simplified it for these younger children. The goal is to get the kids refocused on the idea that there is a Montessori way to do things, and that the works are the point, not a pretend game they’re inventing.  It all looks good! And actually, the kids have already responded to it.  There is a different feel in the room, more quickly than I would have guessed.  It’s not anything like an Early Childhood classroom at Marquette Montessori! But the environment has definitely moved in a positive direction.  Next week, I am going to do a presentation I stole from Mr. Fickett, the mystery number box.  These kids need some new works, and I am grateful to have a few to create for them.  Every day I talk about ‘my daughter’s school,’ and I am repeatedly grateful that I got to observe in 4 Marquette EC classrooms—I learned so much, including that there are a number of ways to structure an effective Montessori classroom—many thanks to those wonderful teachers!

Children in the early childhood classroom, called the Montessori Children's House

Busy workers!

Julia took her birthday party invitation in to Maci today—and was asked by Jessica and Sunny if they can come too!  It’s better to have too many rather than too few invitees for a party!

Home at the end of a busy day