up at eight today, hot shower and straight hair, bit of mapping and then i was off on my trusty secondhand bike that i bought for 70 yuan last week. he's a fair bit rusty around the edges and only goes one speed, but there's a nice little basket and the brakes work when i need them so i can't complain. i biked to my chinese lesson, arrived 20 minutes early so had some amazing xiao long bao for breakfast (a type of steamed dumpling stuffed with minced pork - perfect with vinegar and hot sauce). i met up with my teacher, chelsea, for the lesson at 10 at this big mcdonald's situated halfway between our homes (20 minutes by bike for me). it's always empty on weekday mornings, the coffees are 7 yuan, and we can work in relative privacy.
today's lesson was vocab for renting an apartment, but before we got into the book she had me just relay some stories from the last week to her in chinese, which was such awesome practice. it makes me realize how little i actually utilize the mandarin i know, beyond conversations with shopkeepers and taxi drivers. i seriously need to stop speaking to my chinese friends in english!
so here are the exciting updates in chinese (Now with twice the tones!):
1. last week i bought a secondhand bicycle. boo-yeah! = shang xing1qi1 wo3 mai3 jiu4 de zi4xing2che1. tai4 hao3 le!
2. on saturday night i lost my cellphone in a taxi because i was drunk and stupid. = xing1qi1liu wo3 diu1 wo3 de shouji yinwei wo3 hen3 zui4 he2 ben dan.
3. i feel like i'm too busy right now. = wo3 jue de wo3 tai4 mang2.
after my lesson i did some groceries with as much scrimping as possible then came home and made a weird, super easy pork and pumpkin curry that somehow turned out okay. i was inspired by the bf's amazing curry skillzZz and his awesome thai red curry last night. anyway, recipe is as follows:
- sliced lean pork
- 1 cup coconut juice
- 1 1/2 tbsp curry powder
- 1/2 an onion
- 2 cups sliced pumpkin
- sliced ginger to taste (i used about the size of a thumb)
- 1 sliced medium hot green chili pepper
- pinch of chili flakes
- 1/4 cup of water
- 1 tbsp oil
oil in the pan, get it hot, add the pork and curry powder. when pork is golden brown toss in all the remaining ingredients and let simmer until sauce has thickened slightly and pumpkin is soft and mushy. dump it all over rice and eat it while planning your wednesday english corner. hooray!
Tuesday, March 24, 2009
Thursday, March 19, 2009
note to self: stop blogging when blue.
99% of the time i am incredibly happy, buoyant, flail my arms a lot and talk about two octaves louder than necessary. but occasionally when i'm either alone for too long or get stressed out it takes about two seconds for me to sink into a depressed mood, skulking sullenly around my apartment and drowning my sorrows in a cup of tea and woe is me text messages. earlier i texted a chinese friend in terrible hanyu saying i was feeling gloomy, and his response was actually really cool and a bit of a lesson in chinese for me:
"你要开心我也开心"
i'm a little unclear as to exactly what he was saying but badly translated it means "you want(? or must, or need?) to feel happy, i too feel happy". i'm assuming this was very sweet but the coolest part is the 开心, which literally means 'open heart', the first character being kai1 [to open] and the second being xin1 [heart]. i had to look it up to find out what it means and kai xin is the verb 'to feel happy'! i just think it's ridiculously cute. open heart = feeling happy. how practical and poetic.
i did my first english corner at a big english training chain school here in hangzhou on wednesday. it was terrifying speaking to a room full of adults as they don't shriek or randomly start dancing, but nonetheless the class went really well. i did it on movies, talking about genres, and focusing mostly on the language associated with discussing components of movies. it went over pretty well, lots of good discussion and a few laughs too. example - i was talking about setting/background, asked them to pick a movie they'd seen, then directed the where/when question at them. one guy's movie was Lost in Beijing, an allegedly sexy movie about a foot massage girl in...Beijing.
me: where does the movie take place?
student: IN THE BED!
amazing. anyway, tomorrow i'm repeating the lesson at the second school that the training centre has in the city so we'll see if that one goes just as well or flops miserably. it's only twice a week, an hour each time, but the money i get from it is covering the cost of my private chinese lessons (also twice a week) so it's a pretty sweet dealio.
between mandarin lessons, the english corners, my regular teaching job, AND the occasional freelance design work - on top of the ol social life - i am feeling pretty busy but it's definitely good for me. significant steps have also been forcing myself to cook and trying to take buses instead of taxis. i'm also attempting to learn the names of my a hundred and something students and actually plan lessons so yeah, hectic, weird, but made of awesome.
am feeling about 50 times better right now as per usual by the end of my posts, this time no t.i. but the sounds of traffic, the constant ding of received texts about open hearts and dinner parties, and the therapy that only masala chai can bring are good enough for now. zaijian!
"你要开心我也开心"
i'm a little unclear as to exactly what he was saying but badly translated it means "you want(? or must, or need?) to feel happy, i too feel happy". i'm assuming this was very sweet but the coolest part is the 开心, which literally means 'open heart', the first character being kai1 [to open] and the second being xin1 [heart]. i had to look it up to find out what it means and kai xin is the verb 'to feel happy'! i just think it's ridiculously cute. open heart = feeling happy. how practical and poetic.
i did my first english corner at a big english training chain school here in hangzhou on wednesday. it was terrifying speaking to a room full of adults as they don't shriek or randomly start dancing, but nonetheless the class went really well. i did it on movies, talking about genres, and focusing mostly on the language associated with discussing components of movies. it went over pretty well, lots of good discussion and a few laughs too. example - i was talking about setting/background, asked them to pick a movie they'd seen, then directed the where/when question at them. one guy's movie was Lost in Beijing, an allegedly sexy movie about a foot massage girl in...Beijing.
me: where does the movie take place?
student: IN THE BED!
amazing. anyway, tomorrow i'm repeating the lesson at the second school that the training centre has in the city so we'll see if that one goes just as well or flops miserably. it's only twice a week, an hour each time, but the money i get from it is covering the cost of my private chinese lessons (also twice a week) so it's a pretty sweet dealio.
between mandarin lessons, the english corners, my regular teaching job, AND the occasional freelance design work - on top of the ol social life - i am feeling pretty busy but it's definitely good for me. significant steps have also been forcing myself to cook and trying to take buses instead of taxis. i'm also attempting to learn the names of my a hundred and something students and actually plan lessons so yeah, hectic, weird, but made of awesome.
am feeling about 50 times better right now as per usual by the end of my posts, this time no t.i. but the sounds of traffic, the constant ding of received texts about open hearts and dinner parties, and the therapy that only masala chai can bring are good enough for now. zaijian!
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