My Favourite Class

Saturday saw me join perhaps my favourite class, Senior 2 class 122, on a picnic in the nearby countryside. We set off at 8am and walked out along the road to Wan Nian Qiao and Guangdong before turning off into a little valley, setting ourselves up beside a small river. As some of the kids set to work creating a way across the river (and inadvertently damming the thing - the water level dropped by about a foot lower down the valley!) others went to collect firewood and started building fires, while the rest began to prepare the food.

I just wandered round, chatting to the students, eating whatever they'd cooked, cheering with some of them and taking plenty of photos. These students are on the whole very enthusiastic in class, and I go in every Friday knowing that I'll have no problems with getting them to do whatever I'd planned. It's a nice feeling, and pretty refreshing at the end of the week after some of the struggles I have to endure. There are almost 70 kids, but as a class they are one. There's no animosity, no conflict, no great difference in ability just a happy unity that makes them a pleasure to teach.
The above pic shows two of my stand-out students on the left. In the middle is Rowling, named after the great J.K. She's a fan... This girl's English is fantastic and she has a great voice on her too. There was an open-air dancing and singing competition at the town square that evening that we went to watch, and she wowed the crowd. The girl on the left belongs to a threesome of girls who sit at the back but who are amongst the most active in class. When they introduced themselves to me as Sunny, Sugar (written Sugger) and Betty I could barely keep a straight face. This is Betty. How could a girl so beautiful choose a name like Betty. It's just unfortunate.Not as unfortunate, I thought, as the English name that Yang Han Wu provided me with one day. His pronunciation is not the greatest and I sincerely thought that he'd said his name was Pissbag. Several weeks went by before I found out that what he's actually called is 'Peace of Bird'. Even then I thought he'd said 'Piece of Bread', which I seriously thought was unusual only because bread doesn't really exist here! I am becoming numbed to the absurdity... He has since renamed himself David, after me. I am really quite touched by that. This guy is a truly remarkable young man. He is the most optimistic and ambitious kid in class and tries his hardest at everything. I said before that Betty and co. are pretty active in class, but only when they can get a word in edgeways as this guy is always first to speak out. He comes round my apartment a few times each week to do extra listening practice, which would get a little tedious with other students, but for him and some of the others in this class I have all the time in the world. Sometimes the Chinese can be pretty cruel, and while he does get some stick for being so short, as he's confided in me a few times now, he is well-liked and respected throughout the school thanks to his infectious happiness. I admire him.
Another kid who's just incredibly friendly is Li Ke Zhe, here on the left. He makes up yet another threesome with Yang Han Wu and another kid called Zhao Rong Fu, who are the number one contributers in class. Great guys.
There are other kids in the class who are just as friendly and who are equally good at English, which is why they are such fun to teach, but I finish off here with burping girl. Personal habits are a much more relaxed affair here. I am forever seeing kids with their fingers right up their noses trying to scratch their brains, and I no longer get embarrassed for respectable ladies farting in my apartment, so it's with no great ill-feeling that we christened this one 'burping-girl'. With so many students, nicknames have to rule, so she joined the ranks of funky fringe, funky fringe's friend, bigface, smoothface (as opposed to acne kid), lion, bitch's daughter, ping pong boy, cute girl, short guy, Yao Ming and so on. Well, one night she came to visit with dancing girl and just burped the whole time, so 'burping girl' was born. Class 122 is the second best Senior 2 class, but still has it's share of non-English speakers. She is one of them. That's ok, I'm sure she has other talents, so please don't call me cruel for posting this email she sent me the other night:

"Help Me Well?

David: You are good oh , I am two tall Class 122 Xie Xiao Hua , am that your beginning is so-called litter flowei. Haw-haw! We went to cook a meal in the open yesterday I take advantage of friend's hand machine having shot many photos , whether may in asking the email using memory calorie to transfer to table top or our on your computer please or not use. Not getting up because of I do it in other place , think that tries in you. Can?"

I can translate some of it - 'two tall' must be Senior 2, 'hand machine' will be mobile phone and I guess file size is measured in calories now - but really I only have the vaguest idea what she's on about. Her follow up email didn't really help either...

"大卫，How do you do: I am 122 bunch of Xie Xiao Hua , am your so-called litter flower. Our shift cooked a meal in the open last Saturday I there is I using my friend's mobile telephone to have had a picture taken , do it come out , be just with that memory calorie but on other computer. Do I think that tries well playing you? Thank you。"

Bless. I love it.