So the semester is winding down. I just finished a week of review, which means the next two weeks are midterms. The plus side is that I don't have to plan lessons. The downside is that I have to give about 450 kids 3-minute oral tests. This isn't like giving your opinion on socioeconomic issues - it's more like "Where is the cat?" But after that, it looks like I get one week to myself while Ella still teaches. Then it's nearly 2 months off. What are we going to do? Going to Vietnam, probably. But who knows?


Actually someone asked me a lot of questions recently about my job, as if they were thinking of taking the jump. I've said it before, but if anyone wants to make the move to teaching English abroad I definitely recommend it, and would be glad to find you a gig. Most days I don't have to roll out of bed until 9 or so, I get a 2.5 hour break in the middle of the day, and am often home before 4. Physically it's pretty easy, although mentally it can be a little tough at times. Did you know that some children are insane?

Still, I wouldn't trade it for anything.

We did some more tourism around town, first checking out some ruins of the Nanyue Palace. I saw the Nanyue King (or what was left of him) a few months ago after first coming to Guangzhou. But basically, the Nanyue Kingdom is what Guangzhou (and Vietnam) was around 200 - 100 B.C.. Crazy to think that I was walking in ruins more than 10x older than my home country, but that's China. It was pretty well preserved, although a lot of it is just pottery. I've gone on record that I hate pottery in museums. Every civilization has it, it all looks the same. Still, they have this really cool open pit you walk above on glass floors, where you can see sort of how the city used to be laid out. It sort of reminded me of the Rape of Nanjing Exhibit, except you know, much different in mood.

We actually saw a lot more that day. An old library used by Dr. Sun Yat Sen (now a children's library), the oldest mosque in Gaungzhou (closed to visitors), the Revolutionary Museum (lot of old pictures about WWII and the change to Communism), and a pretty temple downtown. We also dressed up as Santa and drank a lot. Turns out Guangzhou also has a Santa Pub Crawl, with unlimited beer, cocktails, champagne, and food. So, that was a great night, from what I remember of it. We went to 4 different bars, and the drunk bus kept the party going. Since Christmas is not really a thing here, you can imagine the stares we got, a parade of 50 some drunk foreigners all holding beer and dressed like Santa. We stood out, is what I'm saying.

Determined to not develop a beer gut, next weekend would be different. A few months ago, our boss told us about this thing called The Hash. What is The Hash, you and I ask? As I was told, it was started by some American military folks who wanted to drink, but not get fat. So, before drinking, they have a really long hike in the forest. How that works is that before hand, someone runs along the trail and marks it with flour. They will occasionally put in false trails that you have to double back and try to find the correct path. Along the way, there are beer caches that tend to disappear if you are too slow. And then at the end, you stand around and roast each other on how much they suck at hiking. Followed by copious amounts of eating and drinking. It's something I have certainly never done before, but it was a lot of fun. Although, towards the end I was starting to get quite worried. We were still in the middle of the forest and it was getting dark, so next time we need to pick up the pace. We were not the last ones to finish though, and the organizer said that next time they will make it shorter. Still, we got some great photos on the way, and definitely earned those 10 or so beers.