Ni hao (hello)!
I hope this email reaches everyone in good spirits and enjoying the summer... China is rad!!! Travis and I have settled-in quite nicely here. We still can't believe we're in China, it's so weird. The flight pretty much sucked, although I did get some sleep. I'm not sure how. Twelve hours is a really long time. I was sitting in the middle and had no leg room, but it worked. I watched "Hitch" on the flight and was looking forward to seeing "Million Dollar Baby" but they accidentally showed the ending (I won't spoil it, but it definitely ruined it for me). When we got off the flight, there were several administrators waiting for us and helped us with our bags. We met some of the other new hires and have hit it off great. You can't help but bond through the whole transition, cheap alcohol helps too. ; ) They took us to our place that was air-conditioned. I'm convinced now that it's the best invention ever. It's SO HOT and humid here... Just like a sauna... We live in a place called, "Capital Paradise." Our apartment is HUGE. Twelve foot ceilings, three bedrooms, and 2 baths. The furniture is a little ghetto/early 80's, but whatever. It's really not that bad. The kitchen is tiny, but it's all furnished so I can't complain. The building is about four years old and there are beautiful hard wood floors everywhere except the bedrooms. It's located in a compound that includes a huge clubhouse with an indoor/outdoor pool, restaurant, bar, hair and nail salon, massage studio, bowling alley, tennis courts, squash courts, and work-out room. The work-out place I'm not too impressed with because the machines are a little old, but I think it'll be okay. I love the convenience. Anything we buy we just put on our "tab" and pay for it at the end of the month. It's great.
The school is HUGE!!!!!! I still get lost. It's only three years old and is so gorgeous... It's one big building that holds an elementary, middle, and high school. It's three stories and it has a modern/Asian feel to it. It's truly impressive. I've never seen a school so high tech. There are enormous flat-screen TV's all throughout the hallways, rooms, and the staff lounge. I guess they're going to do morning broadcasts on it and show off student work and what's going on around the school. They're even building a 2 million dollar playground for the little ones. The school is actually located a little outside of the city. It takes about a half an hour to get into downtown Beijing. The school staff have really taken care of us and have practically held our hands throughout the entire transitioning process. Every day and night there are meetings to attend and activities planned. We went on a boat ride on lake ( Umm, I forgot) and went to a night market that was super-touristy. We've gone o lots of dinners. Travis and I tried fried scorpions and squid. It wasn't hat bad. And yes, it tastes like chicken (the scorpion, that is). I've been meeting with parents and students for the past couple of days- just getting them registered and scheduling their classes. I'm learning a lot about the IB (International Baccalaureate) diploma. I won't bore you with details, but it's a very rigorous course of study and is considered "prestigious" amongst big name colleges and universities. At least that's what has been told to me... The clientele here are much different. Most of them work in the oil industry or work for IBM computers. Pretty much big wigs. I sat with a family for over two hours making a plan for what classes their child needs to take. They are so grateful, though, which makes it worthwhile. I do feel sorry for some of the students... There is a lot of pressure to perform well and get into a good college. I haven't met one student who doesn't want to attend college. This week I'll be helping out with orientation and meeting with more parents.
A made a little list of cool and interesting things so far:
1. 22 oz. of Tsing Tao (I'm not sure if I spelled it right) beer is 35 cents. Yah, I know.
2. Everything delivers! Even if you just want beer. You can walk ten minutes and there's a western style grocery store, Subway, Starbucks, Dominoes Pizza, dry cleaners, tailors, and a wine bar. The Dominoes here puts tuna on the pizza and it's really nasty.
3. It's considered rude to tip, so you can get your groceries delivered and everything else you can imagine and you're not expected to tip.
4. Food can be pretty cheap. Four of us went out to dinner and had a feast of Chinese food and beer and it only cost 10 bucks. The western style restaurants are a little more spendy, but cheaper than back home.
5. There's no drinking age here. I've been told this is an issue with some of the students. Surprise-surprise.
6. The world's worst drivers are in China. They're crazy, man. They stop in the middle of the road and drive backwards, they drive down the wrong way, and they never EVER signal. It's craziness.
7. Trav and I bought some bikes and it's been so fun riding around. There are tons of bikes here! Almost everyone has one. It takes me about 10 minutes to ride to the school. I learned quickly that you need to be a defensive cyclist if you want to get anywhere and you can't be slow. I like to ride really fast and dodge all the people, it's like playing a video game. Everything here is flat, so it's easy to ride around. A lot of our friends have bikes too and they also live here in Capital Paradise, so we ride our bikes to their apartments. It reminds me of being a little kid and asking if you want to go ride bikes or something. I'm sure we're humorous to watch.
8. The shopping is great. However, electronics aren't as cheap as I thought. Travis is good at bargaining and has gotten some great deals. My friend bought the movie "Wedding Crashers" on DVD for $1.50. It was pirated and the sound was a little weird, but the picture was okay. You could actually see people walk across the movie screen. It was pretty funny. Hilarious movie, by the way. Trav bought seasons 1-5 of "South Park" for 20 bucks and I got the 6th season of "Sex in the City" for about 15 bucks.
9. My assistant principal (Lorraine) and her husband took Trav and I out and about today. She took me to this apartment where a lady sells handbags. I got a huge Luis Vuiton briefcase type thing and a Coach bag for $150. We probably could have gotten it lower, but Lorraine said we did great. I honestly think these bags are the real deal. They are NICE. The place was hand bag heaven. Every color and style you could imagine. I was loving it! I'm going back with some of my friends here.
10. Tiananmen Square (Sorry, I think I spelled that wrong) is amazing. We drove down the street where the student stood in front of the tank in 1989. It was at night and we were in a bus, but it was an amazing sight to see.
11. You can get a one hour massage for ten bucks at Capital Paradise and a ten dollar spa pedicure (remember, no tipping). I've been told that's expensive for around here.
I think that's about it for now. We haven't done a whole lot of touring the country, but we will soon enough. This place is amazing and we feel really lucky to be here for our first overseas job... All in all, everything is going well... We do miss our friends and family and think about you often. I'd love to here what's going on with you. I may not reply right away, but I promise to always write back...
Take care and keep in touch!
CT
