In China, time flies so quickly. In an instant, another week is gone, and I’m left realizing that we are already a fourth of the way through our time here (which is absolutely insane).
In the week I’ve been living with my host family, I already feel like I’m at home. My twin host siblings, Zhao Siting and Zhao Sihan (also called Emma), are cheerful and energetic, funny and hard-working. Almost every night, we play a game of Chinese chess, which I have only just learned how to play thanks to the twins. They also enjoy playing badminton, and just by watching them, I feel the urge to play myself. (A new goal for my time in China: learn to play badminton well enough to survive against Alexander for at least thirty seconds.) Simply by walking home with them every day, watching movies together, and eating at the same table every night, I feel like I understand a little about what it is like to have younger siblings, and I could not be happier. My host dad is an excellent cook, and even when he is busy with work, he still finds the time to sit down with me and talk about Chinese culture over some tea. My host mom, who works in Guangzhou during the week, is incredibly sweet and an engaging conversationalist, and I constantly look forward to the weekends when I can meet and talk with her.
Finally, my host family has two dogs (!!!) who are both quite smart and very entertaining to play with. One of them, named Hei Dan or Hei Dou (depending on who you ask), is scared of strangers, but adores food. For the first few days, she refused to let me touch her, but still trailed behind me wherever I went. Of course, when it was time for dinner, she suddenly completely overcame her fear and came right up to my leg, staring at me with huge puppy dog eyes until I gave in to her. The other dog, simply named Gou Gou (which literally means Dog), looks a little bit like a Shiba Inu, but is black and white. She’s very friendly, quickly becoming used to me, but is extremely scared of thunder and lightning, an obvious problem considering we are living in Zhuhai. One night, when a huge clap of thunder shook the entire house, she raced into my room and hid underneath the bed, staying there all night.
I couldn’t imagine living with another family while in China. In Zhuhai, I truly have found a home away from home—not only in my host family, but also in my fellow DukeEngage members. This week, we celebrated Evan’s birthday with a Hawaiian-themed surprise party (big shout-out to Bryant and Yanan who really carried the whole operation), and being able to see the honest shock and happiness on his face is one of the memories I know I will treasure most when I return to America. As time goes on, I feel like I am drawing closer and closer to the other Duke students here, and though tensions are occasionally undeniably unavoidable, I am extremely grateful for the opportunity to become friends with these amazing, talented, funny people.
In other news, we officially began teaching our extracurricular classes this week! As a whole, my Chinese Dance class has been quite successful. I have sixteen wonderful, hard-working students, and I think I (maybe) even have all their names down now! That being said, it has only just sunk in that I literally only have three weeks—twelve days—to teach this entire four-minute long, fairly complicated dance, and this thought is unbelievably stress- and anxiety-inducing. If there’s ever a time to hustle, it’s now! I want my students to have a dance they can be proud of, so I have to keep working hard to teach well and get all the logistical details figured out. In fact, I’m currently writing formations right now, and let me tell you, although I love all sixteen of my students dearly, making formations with seventeen people (because I have to be in it) is incredibly difficult. There is literally no divisible number, and when I think of how beautiful the formations would be with sixteen dancers instead, I feel complete regret. Nonetheless, I’ll make it work, and I have full confidence that the final performance will be wonderful.
Although I have truly loved my time in China so far, it is not without hardships. Keeping the students engaged is becoming harder now that we are past the fun initial introductions and games, especially because their English skill levels have such vast disparities. I want to strike a balance between teaching my students and having fun with them, between helping them practice English to gain confidence and making sure they don’t become overly intimidated if pushed too far out of their comfort zone. Sometimes, I wonder if I’m truly making an impact on my English students at all—more than anything, I simply want them to be interested and willing to participate in my lessons, which I am not sure if I am facilitating with my current lesson plans. That being said, Zhuhai has taught me to adapt to different situations; my lessons change not only day by day, but even hour by hour, as I figure out what does and doesn’t work. (To be honest, I feel a little bad for my Monday classes, because they’re always confronted with my raw materials that have yet to undergo trial and error.) While I have tutored before, I have never had to create such detailed plans and Powerpoints for each class. This is an entirely new experience, but not one that I dislike at all. Although it can be difficult keeping the students interested, when I finally grab their attention and see the light of comprehension dawn in their eyes, the satisfaction I feel is unlike none other.
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