Be not afraid of growing slowly, be afraid only of standing still. - Confucius: Wheresoever you go, go with all your heart.

I think my heart has definitely been feeling a lot with Christmas and the holiday spirit around here. Although they don’t celebrate Christmas, the students know a lot about it and they made such a sweet effort to make us feel at home here. I received a few presents including an adorable stuffed panda, a fan for success, and a wooden Buddha for good fortune and happiness. Alethea got me a pair of cute music note earrings that I was eyeing the other day. But I also got a great deal of cards from the students. It is a big thing to talk about your feelings here, and many of them really wanted to share personal details with us and tell us how happy they are that we’re here. It really hit me what an impact I’m having on my students just by being here. They have had an idea of foreign people for their whole life and I have a chance to either make or break their image of how important English will be in their life. We talked about their goals and dreams in English Corner a couple weeks ago and a few of them have shared that they’re interested in managing companies with English connections, directing films with English actors, or being an interpreter. I generally see myself as a positive and happy person, but now I feel even more pressure to maintain this attitude so they won’t be turned away from English or western culture. I think of this as a good thing though, because I never want to let myself get too negative anyway and this is just more incentive to carry myself in an uplifting and optimistic way.

On Christmas Eve we met another English foreigner, Markus, who is living in Chenzhou at the moment. He taught in China in 2010 for about 5 months I believe, and is back again visiting his girlfriend here, Effy. Effy’s dad is a teacher at our school so her family thought it would be perfect for all of us to meet! We also went out for dinner with them the other night as well as a few of Effy’s friends. I love the students and teachers, but it really was great to have a chance to get to know some people our age who could speak English better. Markus is from Sweden, but also went to Australia for a while and had some Irish friends so his accent is pretty different. Effy is from Chenzhou, but worked in an area that has many foreigners that only speak English so her English is impeccable. They have a wealth of information about our city and are both very friendly and outgoing so I’m definitely glad to have met them.

The topic this past week in class was Senses and the one before that was Amazing People. It’s crazy to think that we’ve been here for 5 weeks already and we’re going on our 6^th soon. It was pretty good to see how excited they were about the people though. I like it when the topic is something that they enjoy and know a lot about because it gives them a chance to speak more. For senses, I let some students come to the front and smell, touch, see, or taste something out of my “senses bag” and describe it to the class. A few classes were shy, but for the most part, they really responded to this! They thought it was hilarious that I had someone secretly doing something in my bag and they were good at describing the different items. I had tea or coffee to smell, chopsticks or mittens to touch, toothbrush or newspaper to see, and candy or chocolate to taste. In English Corner, we talked about Christmas and Spring Festival and what the meanings of these holidays are. I had to stay away from religion as that is an unspeakable topic according to my company, but I focused more on the traditions and family time and the similarities and differences between the celebrations in Western countries and China. It was really interesting to hear about the Spring Festival (or Lunar New Year/Chinese New Year) and the reasons behind their celebration.

My lessons are going to be a little broken up next week as we have a 3-day holiday for New Years. The school puts on a concert every year on Jan 1^st called a “Dream Party”, and Alethea and I were invited to sing in it. I don’t know what mindset we were in when we decided this would be a good idea, but we signed up and we’ll be singing “Breaking Free” from High School Musical. We may go out with Markus and Effy after too. It will definitely be different—and quieter—than the usual New Year’s celebrations I’ve become accustomed to over the years, but I’m looking forward to a change in the norm. Anyway, I’ll get to Skype with my boyfriend the next day to join in the festivities at home and see all of my friends for when midnight hits in Ontario. Then our friend and roommate in university, Laura, will be heading our way for a couple days! She has been living in Dongguan, China for a few months now and we finally have found a time to meet up. Alethea and I are going to show her around (it will be interesting to see the students’ reactions to another foreign friend) and hopefully do some nice sightseeing around here. We are talking about the potential to head into Guangzhou again or maybe Dongjian Lake as Alethea wasn’t there when I went and I would love to go again!

Speaking of sightseeing—Alethea and I went to Guangzhou last weekend to check out Liurong Temple (or the Six Banyan Trees Temple) and to do some shopping around there. We were very excited to set out on our own to explore more and navigate on our own. We had help buying our train tickets, but other than that, it was just Alethea and I alone to discover China! The shops around the temple sold many beautiful trinkets; beaded necklaces and bracelets, figurines, incense (for prayers at the temple), and jade pendants. Alethea and I both got beaded bracelets and I am determined to find a cute jade elephant somewhere—keeping my eyes open! We also saw many people who looked like monks, but they were only out to get money from foreigners like us. One gave us a pretty gold card and walked away with a “God Bless You”, but proceeded to come back 5 minutes later and yell at us for money until we gave him the cards back. I’m going to post some pictures of the temple on Facebook soon, but I’ll also include some below. The pictures don’t do the temple justice though; it’s absolutely beautiful and so peaceful there. The architecture was so detailed and everywhere you look there is something to attract your eyes. It has been around for about 1400 years (though rebuilt a few times), and it was amazing to think of the history that has surrounded it throughout the centuries. As soon as you walk in, you are met with a statue of the Laughing Buddha and in the centre is the largest pagoda in Guangzhou, called the Flower Pagoda. Many people believe if you build a pagoda, it will keep away the bad spirits around and bring safety and good fortune to the people close by. All-in-all, it was a pretty successful day and we hope to go back to check out some of the other temples around Guangzhou as well.

Some of Alethea’s students took us out to see a movie the other night; it wasn’t Guangzhou, but it was still an adventure and an experience. It was a 3D Kung Fu movie with Jackie Chan, called CZ12. Don’t ask me how to say this in Chinese though, because I couldn’t tell you! It felt very much like the movies at home, but there were subtitles throughout the whole movie in Chinese and English. A lot of English was spoken though, so it wasn’t that bad. One of the students had points on her card (like Scene at home) and so she treated Alethea and I to the movie and we just had to buy ourselves popcorn. Boy, was I ever excited to get popcorn—I ate it all within the first half of the movie! The 3D glasses were pretty high-tech and they told us we weren’t allowed to touch the lenses. One of my students, Alex, wants to take me to see the Hobbit with her and her friend when it eventually comes out here and I am so excited for that! My boyfriend bought me the book for Christmas over iTunes in Canada so I’ve been reading it again to remember the story.

It’s been nice to be able to keep in touch with everyone from home so easily with Skype, Facebook, and emails. I like to think of it as being able to take my heart with me wherever I go because I have the love and support from so many people at home. Even though I am so far away, this experience has shown me a lot about what and who is important in my life. From China I kept up my Christmas traditions (watched “It’s a Wonderful Life” on Christmas Eve just like every year and ate lots of chocolate) and it felt like I was right there with my family. I got to Skype all of my family on my Christmas day and I heard my parents both got iPads so they can keep in touch better with FaceTime. As well, I got the wonderful news right away that two of my good friends got engaged on Christmas and I was ecstatic to be able to connect and hear that! Today, it snowed and it was magical to see how beautiful it all was and how happy the kids were to see it. I had been wishing for snow (although my heater in my bedroom is broken so that is rotten timing), and to see so many kids out laughing and having a giant snowball fight reminded me of home. Between the warmth from my students, the love from at home, and the peace at the temple, I have definitely been feeling the holiday spirit. I know that the memories, love and appreciation for my friends and family stay in my heart—whenever and wherever in the world I may go.

At the entrance to the Liurong Temple

The friendship house. This shows some of the beautiful oriental architecture.

In front of the main temple - Daxiong Baodian Hall.

Inside the hall are the 3 gods: Amitabha, Sakyamuni, and the Apothecary Buddha. They symbolize the past, present, and future and are some of the oldest and largest statues in Guangdong province.