Lots of laughs and bruises = paintballing

Hi,

Invited to play paintball, something I never done at home but happily do in China for a social event. I must be mad? The common day off for the EF teachers in Shenzhen kids saw a large majority of us turn into badly dressed modern day "soldiers" (or refugees from Tenko?) on our morning off.

Safety equipment (shirt and trousers, helmet), a belt to mark the above the belt line fatal shot..., a bevy of paintball bullets, two teams set off to do battle.

NanHai Hotel in Shekou, has a game range where corporates do battle with red paint, laugh a lot at each other, develop strategies to win the flag, and at the same time avoid getting shot in the tender parts or the bigger targets (the butt). Cheating abounds amidst the laughter and the cries of I'm out, don't shoot (it hurts!).

Bruises , most of us have a few small welts like bad mosquito bites or decent small bruises (about the size of an Aussie five cent or Chinese 5 jio coin) as souvenirs.

Adjourn to Mc Cawleys for lunch : a pint and a roast pork and gravy sandwich... a debrief, a chat and a follow up visit to the butcher and two supermarkets FULL of western, familiar yummy delicious food. I am so glad I don't live in Shekou ( about 10km bike ride), the pay would go just on familiar food. Captain Morgan Rum was my big find, I needed it when I was down with that bad cold and no voice so it's medicinal of course.

Pate!

Earth Hour SZ

Hi, Just to say that I did observe Earth Hour tonight. More lesson preparation by candle light but this time by choice not blackout. My trip to Ikea a few weeks ago at least netted some candles, decorative and functional. From my balcony I couldn't see any sign of difference in the immediate area but apparently some of the major hotels were going to do their bit. HK was quite well placed to show their support with all the glitz and glamour in lights.

It's possible the Shenzhen Bay bridge dimmed its lights but I couldn't see from here - maybe the visibility is low. I think it will catch on as some schools registered so that's a great start to raising awareness at grass roots.

Halfway through the weekend, our busy time certainly makes the day fly by. I am teaching a bit of everything tomorrow starting with the 5-6 year olds, then 3-4s, then 7-10s, then the over 10s. An early start and finish on Monday allows me to get to Gaelic Football for a run, Tuesday we are Paintballing (yikkes) and Thursday morning climbing the stairs at Mt Nanshan before work with a young enthusiastic local girl called Angela ( she makes coffee at the Mountain Breeze Coffee Shop). A return to the active outdoors (while the weather permits). Yes, slow news week!

Cheers

A story of the Rugby ball and the round ball

Monday began with a lazy start then into work to prepare for 3 VIP sessions (1-1 students). After this a journey towards physical activity began. Waiting at the bus stop for an age it seemed to catch the 72 bus to the terminus. Down the concourse and into the MTR (subway) to the junction of lines 1&4 (2 and 3 are not built yet!) change to line 4 to its terminus. Wander out into twilight and follow the text instructions to the sporting field. Why am I heading in this direction? To try my hands and feet at Gaelic Football (now. stop laughing immediately). A bunch of Xpats*
gather to practice / teach the skills of the game for two hours 8.30-10.30pm. For me one of half a dozen girls, a great opportunity to exercise off the pints of beer. Except that after the training/scratch matches we adjourn to a bar called Xpat for a beer! Just build the pint cost into the training costs...
* Irish, NZ,Canadian, US,Chinese, UK, Sth Africa, Aussie just to name a few nationalities




Tuesday, a day off started with slightly rebelling muscles but not as bad as I expected. It had been fun but learning how to play will be a bit tricky, maybe I'll stick to goalkeeper. I sort of did OK in the 7 aside scratch match.


Despite the dreary wet weather on Wednesday I decided to go to Hong Kong to see the Hong Kong 10's Rugby, a tournament in lead up to the sold out 7's (I'm working anyway as I console myself for not being able to go to such a world renowned event). The 10's saw some good running rugby and a wide variety of shapes and sizes playing. The stronger sides have Ex-All blacks or Springboks in their sides. No Aussie side but a few Aussies playing by the sound of the voices.






The 10's is held at the Hong Kong Football Club, the scene of my first Australian Vets hockey tour in 1996 and the hockey pitch just reminded me how much I miss the game and the tournaments.



Mind you, a pint of beer and a Villis pie was good consolation while watching others run around. Someone had to give the Heineken girls something to do in the cold drizzly weather.


Ball retrieval team


Tossing up about staying overnight and returning to SZ next morning and coming home while the border crossing and trains still operated, finances won, and the fear that I might enjoy it (HK) so much that the journey back to the mainland would become a drag. I decided to save the HK Dollars for next time when hopefully I'll get to Ned Kelly Bar for some jazz. Probably when Jen and Deb come over if not before then, at least the immigration officials all use the stamps in the passport economically using up small spaces, not a whole page.
.HK night life in Causeway Bay
late night BBQ snack on my street corner

HK would be much less of a challenge in day to day life. Taxi drivers speak English, signage is generally multilingual and main landmarks have English names. You can buy a reasonable coffee and a roastbeef and horseradish sandwich, a broadsheet newspaper and recognisable necessities in the chemist as well as a full range of unknown goodies. I forgot to mention my visit to the chemist to get first aid stuff for the anticipated scabby knees at Gaelic (my knees that is) and some more reading matter at Dymocks.

Back to reality of the modern SZ. Simple tasks are daily challenges till mastered but i am working on ticking off the tasks.

Anyway, it's now way past midnight and time for bed. Cheers till next time.

A day off with a difference, on St Paddy's Day

Monday night, teachers finalising the week's administrative input under the watchful eye of Lindeman , a result of the Director of Studies getting creative with my camera and Lindsay's wine. The end of a busy week usually has an excitement of two days off and a few sleep ins but this one was complicated by a school outing on Tuesday. We were all off to Evergreen Resort as thanks for our work on the WinterCamp. Scan through and see what this afternoon encompassed.

Teacher's carrot?

Pensive on our day out or avoiding looking at the camera?

SZ Kids 3 and 4 staff at Evergreen Resort. Who is the only one without black/dark hair!

A recycled fanta can water buffalo

Centre Manager Sonia and Ada (yellow) sliding down the deck of the pirate ship

The rainforest is so wet they provide umbrellas!

The sun was shining hence a rainbow in the mist


Rainforest on the edge of development

look what you can do with a 10mm lens!

The adventure park has ropes, swings, rockclimbing, rope challenges to treat most nervous types.

What you don't get to see is the full impact of the rainforest gully, the butterfly farm, the fishing club, the aquarium and enormous fish, flowers, the melon garden, the pottery house and the resort.

We played impromptu basketball, tug of war, played on stilts, hopscotch, and other activities to amuse. I'll be curious to see if there are any sore muscles on Thursday as it was all quite strenuous at times (a competitive bunch).

After all this fun, we met our bus and went to dinner which was Sichuan (swimming in chilli).

A day off with a difference but we did manage to avoid the KTV Karaoke session as it was St Paddy's day and EF teachers were gathering at Sherkou McCauleys so we wandered down there until bed called. The League of Nations of EF kids teachers are a friendly bunch, having commandeered the pool table and most of the top floor it was a celebration again.

I took it easy as I have yet another cough, some form of URTI without a sore throat but with a loss of voice for a while making teaching a challenge where creativity takes over from normal lesson plan. I actually feel OK just sound dreadful when the cough reflex kicks in! A whole week (until St Paddy's day )without alcohol certainly saves money but I am sure you can drown from the inside on drinking so much water.

Hopefully a day in the outdoors and a few beers and doing naught today must be giving the medications a chance to work. Easy day tomorrow too.

Yippee - I have CNN and BBC World TV Channels, giving a great respite from those really annoying commercials on the two HK channels.

Cheers and belated Paddy's greetings to you!

Two weeks at a time

view on a clearer day!

As I sit here on a wet Thursday night listening to the rain, I try to recall what's happened since I last wrote. Thunder and lightening outside so I will sign off in case we lose power again, safety first... see you in the morning!

Friday, dark overcast morning:

Its still raining but not as ferociously, the pool at the gardens now has some water in it, as does the pond across the road.

Well, it seems like ages since I last sat down to chronicle the exciting events of daily life in Shenzhen.

On my days off last week, i went for longish bike ride in 27 degrees warm sunshine and ended up in Shekou for lunch at a great bakery I'd discovered last year, great roast beef and mustard sandwiches! No that's not my bike in the photo, it belongs to the recycling man who was collecting cardboard from the bakery, its amazing that most things can be reused out of necessity by these very enterprising locals.
I bought some nursery rhyme books and craft books at a small going out of business bookshop.

DAFEN ARTIST VILLAGE http://www.dafen.com/

Dafen artist village is truly an amazing place amidst the tall building and traffic chaos of SZ city. It's a lengthy but incredibly inexpensive local bus ride to the other side of SZ for us Nanshaners. We actually had to bus and subway to the Luohu Commercial Centre and then find the bus (103) from there. Armed with our blue books "Shopping in Shenzhen" we felt confident we could find our way to somewhere! (Oh, we are Hannah and Von as our days off overlap on Wed).

We went past a lake/reservoir , saw the Wutong Mountain turnoff and the big hill itself. And then we saw signs of artistic businesses so we jumped off at the next stop and spent some time wandering around the amazing streets of the artists enclave. Original works, copies, framers galore giving the eyes a feast of colour. We found the place to deck out the ancestral home with hunting scenes and Victorian portraits. I was very taken by the ability to paint from a photo and I might find one of my favourite photos to take to get a painting for my apartment wall.

After this, and a visit to the art gallery ( airconditioned respite for those who dislike the heat) we headed back to more familiar territory of Dongmen Shopping Area where Hannah paid a visit to UniQlo (Japanese based but western style and sizes of casual clothes). A final stop near Window of the World to pop into H&M (UK outfitters) and Ole a top end supermarket with just about everything...no Maggie Beer Pate or Branston Pickle though. I spent next to nothing all day...wow what an achievement.

The day ended with dinner at a small Muslim restaurant where you point at the pictures on an out of reach notice board to order...it was tasty and really cheap. Then drinks with Ray and Loretta ( Aussie Teacher at adult school and his wife), as we practiced weightlifting with 500ml glasses of Tiger beer. We called it stumps at 2am! Luckily, Thursdays are an afternoon start at school for me.

During the weekend, we had a power cut to the whole area and then the apartments were off until 3.30am. My belated lesson preparation of colouring in and cutting out props for small stars was done by headlamp! Paddington came to class to model hat. scarf, coat , wellies/boots as we were doing a lesson about the weather and cold/snowy clothes.

Having survived the weekend, the next days off were reasonably uneventful.

recycling /load carrying waiting for work

local exploration - wind powered street lights

In Nanshan Book City - The Logic (?) of English Grammar!

tall buildings but with large public spaces

I stayed local except for a trip to get some summer weight duvets (guests) and a coffee plunger (200rmb less than local shops). Its a 20minute bus ride and a 20RMB taxi (Thanks to the Blue book again as the address is also in Chinese who knows where the free shuttle picks up from!). You could be anywhere in the world once inside...great place to just wander. Apparently the food hall is consistent with Adelaide, good cheap food of European style..oh well next time. How ironic, most items in a Swedish store made in China, but not all. I caught the shuttle back so now I know where it picks up from near Window of the World.

Later that evening back on the buses with Lei, Luke and a fellow teacher from Guangzhou, to trek to Coco park, a shopping and bar precinct in Futian to catch up with other teachers from SZ kids schools. More weight lifting exercises with 500ml of Carlsberg this time.

Von and Nicole (SZ1 school).

Achievements this week:

• secured tickets to Splendid Acrobatics at Nanshan Poly Theatre (April )with Hannah
• purchased a ticket to the Duke Ellington Orchestra performance 20th May @ SZ Concert Hall- thanks to local school staff who wrote the instruction in Chinese in case I needed them but the girl at the ticket office speaks enough English to help me!
• arranged a 15L bottle of water delivery (Thanks to Ada at school for the phone call to arrange). I bought the water cooler thingy, just needed the water. A soggy delivery man arrived with the water this morning, now I need an extension cord to plug it in.
• purchased some more books to read, several classics
• made my way to Ikea
• hoping to have made progress towards cable TV links to BBC World and CNN and whatever else comes with it, tired of the adverts on the two HK channels...can nearly quote them verbatim!
• presumably I have survived my probation period at school...
• ordered my dumpling lunch yesterday in Chinese! ee jyao-zir (1 dumplings steamed)
• raced home in time yesterday to prevent serious flooding as the rain was coming in the back bedroom window (thanks Luke for mentioning both rain and windows! - he flew home too)

Things I still have to understand:

• why locals frantically press the door close button on the lift, who do they think is going to jump in at the last minute?
• why the frenetic dash to get a seat in the Subway ( not a fast walk but a sprint with elbows out!)?
• Why does everyone Else's business at the bank take so long when I am waiting!
• Where are all the post boxes to send mail?
• What happened to the warm weather? it's only 16 today! It was 27 last week.

Ok, enough for now