Mike: Puppies, People, and a Party

Boy, today has been a really long day. Today was our last day of teaching. Today’s moral value was kindness and our morning activity (led by the Colorado team – us!) was to have every class come up with some ideas for how we could serve or show appreciation to someone on our school campus, like the folks that cooked our lunches every day, those who cleaned the building occasionally, or others.

Our class broke into groups and came up with several ideas and then went our in smaller teams to work them out. I believe one team wrote a letter of appreciation to someone at the school (either a school leader or someone taking care of the dorm during camp); one group I think made a card of some kind. Our little group went and sang a Chinese translation of the Thank You song (“Thank you, thank you… my friend”) to the security guard at the front gate of the campus. Coincidentally, right as we left, a group from another class also came over to say thank you as well.

Then, this evening, we had our class parties, which was a time for the students, the teaching assistants and our foreign teachers to party! We had impromptu speeches from most of the teachers and the teaching assistants and one student. There was shirt and notebook signing, a little crying, a big cake (it was one girl’s birthday today) and an exchange of gifts between us teachers, the teaching assistants and the students. We even sang some silly songs for the kids too.

Looking back, I think the class party was definitely the best part – the highlight – of the entire trip. It was great to engage with the students some more and express thanks and affection for them and continue encouraging them to keep on working on their English and in who they are as people. It was great to tell students how we had seen them improve over the couple weeks and praise them for who they are.

Looking back, at the beginning of the camp, the students to me were just “Chinese kids”, and like so many other Westerners, I had a hard time telling them apart from one another. Just as we have a hard time telling apart Asian faces, I wonder if they have a hard time telling apart us Westerners as well. So I had a hard time at the beginning in putting names to faces except for a few students that had a distinctive look. But as I have been here, I’ve been able to distinguish them more and more. What’s funny is that now I no longer look at them as “Chinese kids”, but as regular students, as though they were the same American students I’ve worked with back in my church’s youth group. Somehow, the fact that they speak Chinese to one another doesn’t matter any more. These really are some amazing kids!
One final story: Vicky and Leah (two students) bought a puppy from a disabled old woman they ran into yesterday on the street for 40 yuan (about 6 dollars), in order to help her out. Wow. He's so cute.

Vicky (her birthday)



the puppy Vicky and Leah bought