Temperature report in DaXing, Beijing, China:
Thurs and Fri: 38 degrees Celsius = 100.4 degrees Fahrenheit.
Last Thurs: 39 degrees Celsius = 102.2 degrees Fahrenheit.
With no AC at the Dandelion school, we find little reprieve from the intense, dry heat of July in China that is only beginning. I have found some ways of coping, however.
1) I hide in Dandelion’s library, one of the coolest rooms in the school.
2) I buy and eat one of China’s wonders: a popsicle.
Even though it sounds pretty commonplace, you have to understand what a popsicle in China means. They are exotic as they are numerous in variety. There are icy ones and creamy ones, and some that are both. They vary in flavor from peach, to grape, honeydew and cantaloupe, hawfruit, taro and chocolate, coffee, yogurt, green (mung) bean, sweet red bean, chocolate, strawberry, to blueberry. And, they’re 1 RMB each, which equates about 15 US cents.
The students at Dandelion have to cope with the heat as well. There are fans in the classrooms, which help a little. However, when the sweltering afternoon strikes at its peak, they seem to drop off one by one into a stupor. Our whole DukeEngage group tends to take little naps in the afternoon along with the rest of the school because the heat just seems to sap out all our energy.
Despite the temperatures, however, we manage to maintain pretty busy schedules. I’ll outline a typical day here:
8:00 a.m. – 9:40 a.m. My class that I’m assigned to usually has Chinese language and Math classes. Inbetween, they have 5 minute breaks, eye massage exercises, and morning school meeting.
*note: everyone in our group has been assigned to a class in the 7th grade, so we have gotten to know the 7th graders very well!
10:05 a.m. – 10:50 a.m. English class. I help out with the English class by usually pronouncing English words for the class, reading out English passages and having them read after me, or asking questions in English – all to help improve their oral proficiency.
11:00 – 11:50 a.m. Usually I go back to the school’s volunteer office and do some work until lunch. This includes data-entry, such as the grades of the quizzes our healthteam gave during our health and hygiene classes that we taught to the 7th grade classes. Sometimes I spend time working with Kim and Alice on designing the next week’s healthy living course. Other times we talk to administrators and teachers to get their opinions on our lesson plans, our projects, or to get permission to give out awards for an art contest on health topics. These include oral hygiene, general hygiene (handwashing, showering), smoking, drinking, hydration, and exercise.
11:50 a.m. – 1:30 p.m. Lunch and break time. I usually eat with the students in my class in their classroom. 2 or 3 students are assigned to go to the school kitchen/cafeteria and bring back large pots with food for the rest of the class, and everyone ladles food into their personal lunchboxes and eats at their desks, or outside. Usually all the food is vegetarian, from tofu, eggplant, zucchini, cabbage, tomatoes and egg, although sometimes they have some meat, and once a week they have a chicken leg for lunch.
After eating, all the kids have different tasks to clean up the classroom, from sweeping the floor to cleaning the tables and taking out the trash. Then the students either nap, study, or go to the library and read.
This is when I usually hide in the library.
The English section in the Dandelion school library actually has some interesting selections, such as the full set of Anne Rice vampire novels I’ve begun, old classic Nancy Drew and Hardy boys books, the Baby-sitters clubs, other novels such as Memoirs of a Geisha, Angels and Demons, and even some Chinese classics translated into English!
Then I get a popsicle, because this is when it really gets bad.
1:30 – 1:40 p.m. Afternoon News. The school broadcasts the radio news station, which all the students are supposed to listen to.
1:40 – 2:25 p.m. Self-study class, which is a period during which the class does homework. Usually I help with their English homework or with their oral english project that Alice, Anna, and I set up; They write a play and act it out, all in English.
Often during these periods, which vary each day and for each class, we teach the hygiene courses.
I have also used these times to interview and film each student in my class in English, to gauge their current proficiency level.
During the week the kids take other classes too, such as history, biology, geography, art, music, library time, and phys.ed. There are EIGHT total periods in their day!
5:15 p.m. Classes end. I hang out with the kids!
6:00 p.m. Dinner. I eat with the class, just like during lunch.
7:00 – 9:00 p.m. 2 nightly self-study sessions, with a break in-between. Sometimes they are structured so a teacher comes to help with their homework (usually math). Occasionally I stay for a while to help tutor English, or to help out with the English play project. But I have to make sure I leave around 9 because the last bus home leaves at 9:20p.m!
9:00 p.m. onwards.
I retire at our hotel and work some more on data-entry, lesson-planning, and research on toilet solutions for the school. I usually send emails because the internet works slowly and unreliably at the school.
Finally, I hang out with the others and watch a Korean drama on TV, or have bookclub time in which we talk about the plot of a Chinese romance novel.
SLEEP! (and dream of popsicles…)
.jpg)
