Luke's Volunteer Venture to China!

Hong Kong Chillin’

Yesterday I arrived in Hong Kong for the China’s National Holiday Break and will be here for the remainder of the week! First impressions of HK were: 1.) For Real, the boarder crossing looked identical to Jurassic Park, Wild! 2.) I’m in one of the most gnarly and world renowned cities ever, you only see this in movies! & 3.) I’m gonna make this trip one I’ll remember for the rest of my life, hopefully even grandchildren story worthy!! FaceBook, Twitter, and every other website you can ever think of is available here because its not technically China, so I’m proxy free for the week; which is an awesome relief. I will on the other hand be super busy with expeditions and explorations during the duration of this adventure, therefore I won’t blog much at all… but when I arrive back to Wenling really next week, expect another cheesy video blog and some stellar photos!

Stranger Danger!!!

Twas another day in Wenling, China when I was off on an evening escapade playing some routine 3 on 3 basketball at the court right up the street. I usually start playing at about 5:30 p.m. after I eat supper here at the Kindergarten, and the sun sets earlier and earlier every night, so it’s usually dark by about 6:30. By now I know who’s good, bad, and everything in-between when it comes to playing on teams, and of course I try to get on a pretty decent squad… but this time, I wasn’t so fortunate. One of the guys on my team was rather chubby with glasses and had normal street clothes on, he most definitely wasn’t the “bounciest ball on the court.” On the contrary, my other team mate was the guy that takes his job way to seriously, kind of like your local rent-a-cop hired by a tacky security service. What I mean by this is he tried way to hard while we were playing, but his skills weren’t as sharp as you might hope for. After quickly coming to the conclusion that I wasn’t placed on the all-star team of the evening, I knew I was gonna have to play my little heart out in order to win and stay on the court, so I did exactly that. We won our first three games with me scoring at least four of the five points, if not all five. I was actually kind of shocked because the other teams were all fairly good and we were actually beating them. After about four consecutive games we finally lost and by this time it was getting pretty dark. After getting on the court one last time and winning our last game, everyone was beginning to call it quits and was heading out. 

Just as I said “zàijiàn” (goodbye) in chinese, one of the guys I play with quite frequently came up to me with his cell phone and had on it translated into English, “do you want to come with me to play basketball at another place tonight?” Now I know what you’re all thinking, just what the title says, “STRANGER DANGER!!” that’s like someone asking you to help them look for their puppy, except for this wasn’t exactly the same situation… at least I hoped. First of all he barely knew any english what so ever, therefore I had no way of communicating with him about where we were going, or how long we’d be there, etc; and second, I had to get into his car in order to drive to the next destination, which indeed had SKETCHY written all over it. I’ve been told this is definitely something you never want to do in a foreign country, but that’s exactly why I did it… thought I’d live on the edge a little bit; sorry mom! Kidding, but I did see him as a rather friendly and trustworthy fellow, so I hoped right in his mini van. Oh, and I didn’t have my China cell phone on me either, so if I were to get into a sticky situation, I would have no way to call for help. Now you can go ahead and say I wasn’t the “bounciest ball on the court.”

Continuing onward and back to the matter at hand… Once we started driving a little bit he went ahead and got on his phone in order to call one of his friends that could speak some english. Which I was unaware of at first until he handed me the phone and she asked me, “Have you eaten dinner yet? My friend wants to take you to get something if you haven’t already.” I wasn’t all to hungry so I just told her to tell him, “No, but thank you for the offer.” In which I handed him back the cell phone and she told him. After about a seven minute drive we arrived to another outdoor basketball court, except for this one had lights so of course you could play at night, take that Mother Nature! Do keep in mind though that during those extremely moderate seven minutes, I couldn’t help myself but wonder if I was going to end up in a random basement within the next half hour or so, doing any and everything you’ve ever imagined to be in a horror flick… you can say I was a tad bit nervous. We finally pulled up to the court and I noticed there wasn’t really anyone playing, so I became a little Curious George and began to then wonder who in the heck we were gonna play against. 

In the mean time I initiated in shooting around, and shortly there after another young lad showed up to join us. After about 10 minutes one more guy arrived and we started up a quick game of 2 on 2. After winning back to back games I started thinking to myself, “I sure hope I didn’t come all this way with this stranger for nothing, when I could be back at the Kindergarten attempting to do something productive.” Next thing I knew I saw a little tiny pick-up truck pull up with three guys in the cab and one in the bed holding a basketball, I knew they had came play… Plus they had their game faces on, so it was pretty darn obvious. I looked over as they got out of the truck and all of the sudden I saw the driver step out and I literally blinked three snappy times and rubbed my eyes, I couldn’t believe what I was seeing; it was finally a Chinese man that was taller then me, I just couldn’t fathom!!! This guy stood about 6’6” and had to weigh at least a good 225. I felt like a little kid inside because I was just so astonished at the fact that I would be playing against someone taller than myself for once! There was one other guy out of the four that was about six feet tall while the other two were just your average Joe’s. Now it was gonna go down, this kooky stranger wasn’t some bimbo that wanted to sell my body parts on the black market, instead he just genuinely wanted to have a jolly ole time playing some basketball with his new American friend. Ya see, there still are some good people in this world, even when CNN tells us differently!

I automatically knew that the two tallest guys wouldn’t be on the same team, therefore common sense lead me to believe it would be the four of us that were already there, against the four that had just showed up; and bam, I was right… that’s just something they can’t teach you out of a text book. After getting into the first game I began to realize that these guys were kind of the real deal, and were actually weren’t to shabby on the basketball court. After this I knew I’d have to kick into high gear and play smart in order to win the first game and set the standard for the rest of the games to come. It came down to a close one, but with a classic pick and roll maneuver, we were able to beat em’ by a cool two points. We obviously had no one else to play with in order to rotate teams so it was just the same two squads, and we played a best 3 out of 5 game series, in which we won at the extent of all five games. 

After this series had come to a closure, all I wanted was some high quality H2O, and I asked my new found friend where I could get some. He immediately started waiving his hands no and pointed over to the Chinese giant as he was walking away off the court towards some buildings. Once again it was my gut that told me he was off getting some water to bring back for the crew, and I was right; two for two on the common sense chart for the night! He returned with about 16 or so bottles of water and once I got mine open it was consumed in about 5 seconds flat. After a brief water break we split up into three teams of three, and started playing some 3 on 3 games, of course.  

We played about five of those and by that time I was utterly exhausted and was ready to fold my deck of cards for the night, metaphorically speaking. I asked him what time we were leaving and to my surprise he understood me and said, “10 o’clock.” By this time is was about 8:30 and there was no way I was sticking around for another hour and a half playing basketball when I had just played for literally three in a half hours straight. I tried to tell him that I needed to leave a little closer to nine because I still had to prepare my lesson plans for my class the following day. He had no idea what I was saying this time and then called his friend who spoke english and I gave her the rundown. She then told QuanJing, which is his name by the way, and he understood and insisted on taking me back at that very moment. I didn’t refuse his offer and I said “zàijiàn” to my second group of basketball buddies for the night and headed back to his vehicle. 

Once we got into his mini-mini van, and he burned some rubber, he started playing the song “Yeah” by Usher. Now you all know this jam, it was a hit back in 2004 featuring Lil Jon and Ludacris and you hear it at just about any place that involves dancing these days; Proms, Homecomings, Wedding Receptions, House Parties, Bat Mitzvahs, Night Clubs, Banquets; you name it and they definitely play it. I couldn’t help myself but to start singing along only because it’s such a classic and after hearing it an insane number of times over the last seven years I naturally knew every single lyric to the song, even down to the high pitches in Ushers voice… I knew it all. QuanJing was weirdly impressed with my ability to sing along to this hit and couldn’t help himself but to smile and keep saying, “good” in his thick chinese accent. What can I say, I just couldn’t deny the musical vibes when I felt them. He knew I was a teacher and just took my right back to my Kindergarten and dropped me off at the front gate. I said “Xiè xiè” (Thank You in Chinese) multiple times as I got out and walked to the gate. After the security guard let me in and I started walking to my room I thought to myself, “Did that really just happen?! I went and played basketball at some unknown location with a complete stranger in a foreign country where no one can understand me! Gnarly!” 

I got back up to my room and informed Blake that I had returned safe and sound but he was just so frazzled and worried about where the heck I had been the past two hours, considering I usually am back to the Kindergarten no later then seven due how dark it gets so early; but It was now nine o’clock or so and I was just getting back. After I stood in his doorway dribbled in sweat and explained my night, he was in awe of my stupidity regarding the fact that I went with a complete stranger in China… but he also wasn’t surprised. I went to sleep that night thankful of the fact that I didn’t get kidnapped and held for ransom by some Chinese Mob member, instead I had a new found friend and experienced something that quite frankly no one should ever experience in China, but leave it up to me to do so!

4th week in China, 3rd week of teaching…

I started off my Monday morning with freezing cold shower, because they shut off the Kindergartens water heater system over the weekend while no one was here, expect for Blake and myself; it would just be wasted energy if kept on. After getting rid of the goose bumps and throwing on some warm clothes, a knock at my door from the Head Master insisted that we come down to the playground area for routine morning exercises that all the children participate in. It was here where I was embarrassed in front of the whole Kindergarten, not by choice, but by lack of dance skills and choreography that were suppose to apparently be known by this time. The Friday before hand our Liaison/ Interpreter, Vicki, had showed Blake and myself this cheesy little dance that she informed us we were going to perform for our students in the future, but by no means told us it was going to be coming so soon. She literally had us watch the video a total of three times, and off I went, not knowing when I’d see it next, or when she expected us to learn it by. Here’s the link for the video for all of your curious readers: http://www.tudou.com/programs/view/bOQFNrpxj1E/   Now if that’s not one of the corniest things you’ve ever seen, I don’t know what is! And yes, she expected us to know this dance for the morning exercises that took place the following Monday! Now back to the situation at hand. 

Once we got outside, they were lowering the Chinese flag in order to let six of the oldest students in the Kindergarten walk around the rest of the children while the National Anthem of China chimed in the background, and they then handed back the flag to whom they got it from, so he could raise it to the top of the pole. I really didn’t understand the whole concept of what was going on, but I just respected the situation by quietly observing everything that took place.  After what I would call “The Ceremony of the Flag,” the rest of the teachers in the Kindergarten starting looking at Blake and I, waving their hands in order for us to come forward, to the front of everyone and all the students. We had no idea what was going on until all of the sudden, BAM, the dreadful “Let’s Play” song came on. It was as this point, my heart jumped into my throat, my cheeks looked like that of an atomic fireball, and I felt a drop of sweat approach my right eyebrow. 

Blake and I just looked at each other, and started acting out the song in the form of dancing as best as we could. Now I’m not by any means the kind of person that gets nervous in front of anybody, especially a large group of people, but when you’re expected to know a dance routine and perform it in front of your Head Master, Dean, Co-teachers, staff, and all the children, in a foreign country, that right there will take your nerves for an apprehensive roller coaster ride. It was totally obvious we had no clue what the heck we were doing, but once the song finally came to an end, the overwhelming emotion of relief led me to take a deep breath as I promptly smiled and started walking towards the back of all the students.  I think that we were suppose to be the ones that made them “exercise” per say with that pathetic dance, because at the conclusion of our embarrassment, the teachers and students started filling inside the Kindergarten and headed to their classes. Even though I had just made a complete and utter fool out of myself, I stood by the door leading into the Kindergarten and proceeded to give all the children high fives as they marched in by single file lines. Most of them get extremely excited and blurted “good morning” with their slight Chinese accents and a great big smile from cheek to cheek.

About two hours following the events that had just taken place, it was time to go teach what they call my “Top Class” which is the eldest students in the Kindergarten at the age of 5. These little rascals are the best behaved of all the students, and of course understand a tad more than those students that are younger then them.  This week’s lesson topic was teaching them the words glass, cup, tea, juice, water, and beer. Yeah, you read it right, I was teaching 5 year olds the word beer! In the United States this would so not be acceptable, but in China, it’s fairly normal to learn at a very young age apparently. Along with just teaching them the words, I also had to teach them how to use the words in a proper sentence. A simple phrase such as, “give me a cup of tea, please.” Or, “give me a glass of juice, please,” along with the proper response, “here you are.” Most of the children catch on very quickly, but no matter who you’re working with, you always have those that don’t learn at the same pace as others. 

Now I’m not one of those typical teachers that are tedious and no fun, instead I like to have a good time with my students while still making everything educational and learning experience. The best way I find to do this is through simple ruled active games.  Since the students don’t speak English, let alone understand it, you must make the games very simple, so the children can catch on quickly and understand the concept by very few examples. One game I played with my students is what I like to call “Race, Snatch, and Return” Here’s how it goes: I line three students up next to each other, take a basketball, count to three, then roll the ball out in front of the students as they race to see who can snatch and retrieve the ball first. After they tussle with each other for a few seconds I call them back and randomly choose a flash card with one of the vocabulary words on it and make each student say a different one, then follow that with the simple phrase it is used with. Not only is this giving the kids a chance to be themselves: young, wild, and free as they dash and race to see who can seize the basketball first, but it also brings them back to right where they started and allows them to show the rest of the class what they had just learned, regardless if they needed a little hint or not. I find this game very successful in the teaching of my students, one because it gives them the chance to have a competitive edge amongst their peers, and two because it instills what they need to learn into their memory. At the conclusion of class I say, “goodbye” and “see you later” to all my students, followed by a fiasco of high fives and even the barbaric ones that latch onto me wanting me to stay. 

A the conclusion of class, it’s only about a half hour time period before lunch. There is no traditional cafeteria at my Kindergarten where all the students eat, instead they all eat at tables in their classrooms and have the food brought to them, while the staff have our own dining hall in which the majority of us eat together in. The food here in China is as expected, COMPLETELY different then from the U.S. You eat white rice with just about every meal except for breakfast, and there is no MSG in the food, so you find yourself full for about an hour, and than hungry again right after that. Due to Wenling, the city I live in, being so close to the coast and the China Sea, our town has an abundance of seafood. Which is awesome for me because I love seafood, but it’s still not the same as the seafood I’m use to back home. It’s not different in terms of the type of seafood we eat; it’s different in the terms of how we eat it.  For example, we eat shrimp with almost every meal here at the school, which is just grand for me considering I love shrimp, but one they are called “prawns” here in China, and two they still have their head, tail, and shell on them. I’m use to having the convenience of shrimp that are head and shell less, and most of the time tailless, so you can just pop them right on into your mouth with no problem; it’s a whole different ball game with these guys. The first couple times I ate the shrimp here I observed how everyone else ate them, and they can take the head, shell, and tail off in a matter of seconds just by using their mouths. I was in awe of this what seemed like a quick and easy method, but I just couldn’t figure it out so I gave up and resorted to using my hands to peel each shrimp one by one, which I think is WAY to much work for one darn flimsy shrimp! After a week or so of getting awkward stares and messy hands, I was back at trying to do this whole process with my mouth. Except this time I was determined to learn, and wouldn’t give up until the job was done. Needless to say, I’m now a self proclaimed professional shrimp peeler with my mouth, and I challenge anyone who thinks that they can out “peel” me to contact me following my arrival back to the states… but seriously, I’m awesome at it. Some other interesting grub that we chow down on consists of clams, octopus, cabbage, tofu, extremely fatty meat, potatoes, egg noodles, pumpkin soup, sea weed soup, and other random soups. These are just the basic foods that we eat on a more consistent basis, but trust me, there are some oddly weird things that randomly come up as well. 

After lunch is all done it’s mostly just chill time where I occupy my afternoon by either skyping those that are still up considering the 13 hour time difference, surfing the internet in order to find new interesting things to learn about, taking a mid-day nap, or hanging out in the main office area with some of the really cool staff members. One of the kid’s that works here is about 22 years old and is the computer tech guy. His name is Kah-Kah, and it super funny. He know’s a tiny bit of English and constantly calls me “Skyboy” which I’m sure all of you guys can guess why. We try to communicate through the randomest things and use a lot of hand gestures and noises to make each other laugh. I’ll put up a picture of us two soon so you can see what he looks like. Another one of the staff members that is always in the office and teaches me Chinese is the dance teacher. She is also about 22 years old and can understand and speak very little English as well. It always goes back and forth of Kah-Kah and myself making fun of her in some way, or her and myself making fun of Kah-Kah in some way. I refer to her as “her” at the moment because I’m not quit sure what her name is, but I’ll find out here soon. Vicki is also sometimes in the office and when she is she can often times translate things for us if we’re not already using google translate. It’s pretty darn exciting that I’m making friends with those that I’m around on a daily basis, and  from the vibes I get, they think it’s pretty cool too. Usually by this time it takes up a huge chunk of my afternoon until dinner time (5 o’clock), which we have similar if not the same type of food that I talked about earlier. Once dinner is all over I take part in my daily routine of playing basketball for a couple hours with the locals until it’s dark and well into the night time. Often times after this I’ll shower and go out to the main street to grab a snack with Blake and just walk around, or just hangout in my room and try to find something productive to do such as prepare for my class the next day and do lesson plans, watch a movie, read the Bible or a different book, work on my blog, etc. But no matter what I choose to do before I go to bed at night, I always make sure to reflect on my day and remind myself of why I even came here in the first place, all while being so thankful of everything I have.

As far as my experience goes, it’s been incredible. I mean how many people get to say they lived in China for four months teaching and serving the people in a less fortunate country? And even if they can, who can say that they did it right out of high school at the age of 18… not very many. Committing to this experience has also been the biggest sacrifice I’ve ever had to make, literally. Not seeing the ones that I love for four whole months, going from a par-time income to a full-time volunteer position, and leaving behind our country and everything I’ve been accustomed to my entire life; if that’s not a bizarre transition, I don’t know what it is. I wouldn’t trade this experience for anything, but I’d trade anything to come home. That might sound like a contradiction, but to me it’s just emotions. Not being able to go out and speak to whomever you so please and know that they can understand you, or being able to be comfortable and comprehend everything around you, it toys with you but at the same time changes your perspective on life in a positive way. I always knew growing up living in the situation of being the youngest of 11 siblings, 7 of which are adopted, and having over 50 different foster children come in and out of my family would propel me to have a passion to help others, but I never knew it would affect or influence me so young in my life; but I’m super thankful it did. Because everything I’ve ever experienced has led me to this one, and I’ll never forget it.