Saturday 19th May

Today was the school family fair, which meant that everyone had to work today, and no, we weren’t getting paid for it! We had to be at school for 9am to set up and then sort out our own stands.There were all sorts, food stands from local companies, stationary stands, info stands, game stands (which the teachers were running). There was a water wars area inside the enclosed basketball court which was very popular, there were water balloons, water pistols and all things like that and seen as it was 30 degrees this was very popular! There was a penalty shoot out, archery, darts, bean bag toss, lucky dip, all sorts of fete games like that. There was also a stall run by Chinese teachers (i’m not sure what the game was) but they had a bin bag full of water and goldfish and if you won, you won a goldfish which was put in a very small sandwich bag where the fish only just fit in it. A lot of teachers thought this was cruel and they actually ran out of bags for goldfish (typical in China really) we were finding dead goldfish all day, which kids were picking up and carrying to their parents. I was on the face painting stand with 3 other teachers so we did our own face painting first, I painted myself as a leopard and another teacher did a glittery rainbow on her face. The fair opened to parents and children at 10am and I was painting kids faces from 10am until 1pm, one kid straight after the other. One of the Chinese teachers was also face painting, but wasn’t very good at it so I also had a lot of parents bringing their kids over to me asking if I could “fix this”. One of the kids I didn’t even know what it was supposed to be and had to ask! I love face painting though and had a really good day.

At 1pm the game stands closed and we all went to the stage area to hear the school pop band and then there was the talent contest. One of my grade 4 girls was singing in the talent contest and did an Adelle song. This kid is 10 years old and I had goosebumps, she was amazing! I had a very proud teacher moment. After this there was the parents Vs kids football match while the teachers started to clear away, then the highlight of the day, Kwai wars! 5 teachers had volunteered to be put in the stocks and all week students (and teachers) could vote for who they wanted to be put in the stocks by putting money (kwai is also the name for Chinese RMB) in a box with that teachers name on it. The money then goes to charity and the teacher with the most money in their box is put in the stocks and students can throw cream on a paper plate in their face. This years winner is the admin vice principle (who everyone hates). After that we finished clearing up and then we could all go home at 4pm.

I went home to shower and wash my face paint off and we all met at the Irish bar at 5.30pm for dinner. Everyone was pretty tired though and didn’t stay out long, my arm had been aching from all of the face painting and I was ready for bed by 8pm!

Follow the link to see the photos from the day! http://www.internationalschool.info/family-fair-talent-show-at-beijing-international-bilingual-academy/

Wednesday 16th May

6.30am my alarm went off today. I have had 3.5 hours sleep. I’m exhausted, seriously considering calling in sick but after the school just paid for my visa feel that would be an unwise move. I got to school just before 8am and lay down at my desk until school started. My mood was not great at this point, lack of sleep makes me incredibly grumpy and the last place I wanted to be was at work. I manage to get through the day with only one grumpy moment with the kids, in the afternoon one of the grade 2 girls said she was too tired. My response was “you have no idea how tired I am so don’t even go there”. The rest of the day went by quite quickly. After school a group of people were going back to the Malaysian restaurant that we tried last week so I tagged along. The food was delicious but I didn’t stay out long as I desperately just wanted to crawl into bed.

Tuesday 15th May

This was quite possibly the worst 24 hours I have had in China! I had showered (the towels still hadn’t been replaced) and at 9.30am someone was knocking rather loudly and insistently at my door. I opened it to find a woman who told me that I needed to leave now. I told the woman that check out wasn’t until 12pm and I wasn’t going anywhere, to which I was told that she was very busy and needed to clean my room now. I said again that check out wasn’t until 12pm and I wasn’t leaving until then. I then realised that I needed to leave for the visa office and there was a big chance that when I came back my things would be in a pile outside my room. I came out of my room and i was walking to the lift and the woman came out of another room and ran after me, “you leave now?” she asked, I told her no, I would be back in an hour and I left.

Once again the heat was unbearable as soon as I left the hostel but it was still torrential rain and high humidity. I took the ferry to Hong Kong Island and took a taxi to the visa office to collect my passport and visa. I was told that I was only getting a 14 day visa (but after speaking to admin at the school was told not to worry about this) so I left and returned to my hostel. Sure enough, the bed had been stripped and my things were in a pile on the floor. There still were no towels so I had to use my combats again after my shower and then I finished packing. I was quite annoyed with the hostel by this point and went to checkout, only to find that the door to reception was closed and locked. This was 5 minutes before checkout! I was really annoyed by this point so I just left the keys by the reception door and left. I took a taxi to the mall where I was to get the coach to the mainland only to find that i didn’t have enough money for the taxi. The taxi was 27 Hong Kong dollars and I only had 21. The valet had opened the door to the taxi and was taking my bag out and heard me say to the taxi driver that i either had 21 Hong Kong dollars or Chinese money or I needed to find an ATM. The valet asked me how much the taxi was and I told him and he spoke to the taxi driver in Chinese. This seemed to calm the taxi driver down and the valet paid for my taxi for me which was so sweet of him. I offered the valet my 21 hong kong dollars and he said “no, you will need that money” I actually wanted to hug him! Now at this point I have no make up on and my hair is scraped back and the valet said to me “where are your parents?” I have to say, I was a little bit mortified and wanted to shout “I’m 26!” but considering he had just been so nice and paid my taxi for me I told him that I was on my own. The valet then asked me where I was going and walked me through the mall and delivered me to the reception for the coaches. It was all very embarrassing but I was very grateful to him. I waited an hour for the coach and then got the coach to Shenzhen. The coach was again the no air conditioning city bus (it’s 33 degrees!), with us all crammed in like sardines with people stood in the aisle and it is a mix of the smell of wee, cigarettes and BO. It was two hours of  hell!

By this point I am having a pretty bad day where I feel that I hate being in China and cannot wait to get back to Beijing to my apartment and friends. I get to the airport and my 8pm flight to Beijing is delayed by 2 hours. Of course it is. How else would this day go other than badly? I hang around the airport until 10pm when I board the plane and get settled into my seat. Now I hate travelling and it is well known by my family that I am stressed at the airport, short tempered and generally very irritable and no fun to be around until I get to my destination. During this flight the Chinese man fell asleep and at one point his head is on my shoulder, but as I am reading my book I don’t really notice straight away. At some point I notice that the man next to me has drooled on my shoulder and I just saw red. I shoved the man with all of my might off me and shout at him “you drooled on me!!” with so much anger and attitude that the air stewardess comes over. Now this man does not speak English and has just woken up to the English woman next to him shoving him and shouting at him and he looks so bewildered and starts stuttering in Chinese to me. The stewardess asked me what was wrong, and still really angry I tell her “he drooled on me” looking at the man in utter disgust. The stewardess is now looking at me in a strange sort of well-what-can-we-do sort of way and speaks to the man in Chinese. I sort of humph and cross my arms, silently fuming and hating China even more and the man kept his distance for the rest of the flight.

We landed in Beijing and its now 2am, I queue for a taxi and finally get one and the taxi driver won’t take me to Houshayu. Now this is a common problem as a lot of taxi drivers don’t know where Houshayu is and don’t want to get lost. After arguing with him (in Chinese!) and telling the taxi driver that I know the way, I realise that I have two choices. I either get out of the taxi and risk the same argument with the next taxi driver or I can phone someone who speaks Chinese to give them directions. It’s 2am on a Tuesday night. I finally decide to ring Mr Wang, my favourite black taxi driver (who unfortunately will only drop me off at the airport, hanging around to pick me up is too risky as he would face a £2000 fine if he got caught, which is roughly a year’s wages). Mr Wang answered the phone and after much apologising from me for phoning at that time he gave the taxi driver directions and off we went. I arrive at my apartment at 2.30am and I realise that I cannot find my keys. I am rummaging about in my bag, using my phone as a torch and I am really annoyed by now, pretty much everything that could have gone wrong, has and I am close to tears. I considered phoning someone but it’s 2.30am, everyone I would consider phoning would be asleep and all have to be at work at 8am. I keep looking for my keys and have pretty much tipped my bag upside down all over the path when I finally find them, by this point its 3am! I am extremely annoyed by this point but also relieved to be in my apartment and climb into bed. Definitely the worst day in China so far.

Monday 14th May

I didn’t sleep very well last night because of all of the noise from people outside and an ongoing battle with the air conditioning!  I would wake up too cold and turn it off then a few hours later be too hot and turn it back on and this went on all night.

I woke up as my alarm went off at 6.30am, showered and got ready to go to the visa office, which according to the map I found on google was only a 20 minute walk away from the star ferry. I walked to the ferry and took it over to Hong Kong Island at 7.30am and the heat hit you as soon as you walked outside. The humidity was also really bad. I got to the visa office after a 30 minute walk and was dripping from the humidity. There was already quite a big line at 8am, even though the doors don’t open until 9am. Luckily I had brought a book and read that until the first ten people were let in. We were given an application form to fill in and then I was part of the next ten people that were allowed into the building. I finished my form and went to the desk and I was done by 9.30am, with a slip saying to come back after 10am tomorrow. This then left the rest of the day to explore the waterfall park that I hadn’t had time to go to last time.

I got outside and I was met by the heat and humidity, along with a torrential rain thunderstorm which scuppered my plans for the day. I got a taxi to the star ferry and then a taxi to my hostel from Kowloon harbour. Once at my hostel I had another shower and sat reading my book for a while. I was interrupted by room service coming to take away my used towels and then I went out to find somewhere for lunch. It was still torrential rain and the heat hit me as soon as I left the hostel. I found a little cafe and had lunch there, then explored an indoor market. There really wasn’t much to do with the weather being so bad so I returned to my hostel and had to have another shower because of the humidity. This is when I realised that my used towels hadn’t been replaced so i had to use my combats to dry myself. I spent the rest of the afternoon in my room, with the sound of crashing and drilling from the room next door. I was also interrupted a few times by a builder wanting to measure something in my room which was very annoying.

I went out to find somewhere for dinner and it was still raining so I didn’t go far, then returned to my room for an early night. A very disappointing day really.

Sunday 13th May

My alarm went off at 4.30am this morning and I had to force myself to actually get out of bed! I had a quick shower and did some last minute packing and I was ready just in time for my driver to pick me up at 5.30am.

Now, in the words of one of my grade 1 kids “I tell you, ok” about my driver, Mr Wang. Mr Wang is a black taxi driver in our area and is the happiest man you will ever meet. He speaks a little bit of English but he is always so friendly. I have booked him for full days every weekend for about a month now, and when Matt was over we used him for three days in a row picking us up at about 8am, driving us around all day and taking us home for about 6pm and he was charging us really cheap prices. If I need a taxi anywhere I will always call Mr Wang first and if he is free he will always pick me up and take me where I want to go and he always looks really pleased to see me. Raena also uses him a lot and I think we are his most loyal customers.

Anyway, Mr Wang picked me up at 5.30am and asked if I wanted to go anywhere for breakfast on the way to the airport (how many taxi drivers do you know that would offer to do that without you having to ask them?) I said no and he took me to the airport and I got breakfast there while I waited for my flight to Shenzen. Now the school had booked my flights and instead of booking a direct flight to Hong Kong which would take 3 hours, they booked the cheaper version of a flight to Shenzen in the very south of China and I had to get a bus the rest of the way. I have never done it this way before and didn’t have a clue where to go or anything, I had just been told to ask someone when I got there where to go and to buy a ticket.

Now I hate flying, or travelling for any long periods of time. I get travel sick, I get bored and I hate being sat still in cramped spaces for long. The flight was boarding on time and I got on the plane, got settled and then we sat there on the runway for another 55 minutes with no explanation. Someone had bad gas on the flight so that wasn’t very pleasant and the flight was 3 hours long. I landed in Shenzen and asked where to go and was pointed to a desk where I bought my bus ticket to Hong Kong. The bus really surprised me as it was actually a coach, there was lots of leg room and it had air conditioning! Considering how much I had been dreading this journey it was turning out to be a lot better than I had been expecting. We drove for about 20 minutes and we got to immigration. We had to get off the coach and take everything with us and go through immigration. On the other side the luxury coach was nowhere to be seen. I didn’t have a clue where I was supposed to be going and no one spoke English so I just went along the long line of coaches showing my ticket until one of them ushered me on. This is where my day started to go downhill. This was exactly what i had been expecting when I had been told I would be travelling by bus for 2 hours to Hong Kong. It was a city bus, not a coach, which was crammed with people. There was barely any leg room and I am quite short, there was no air conditioning and it stank. It was 33 degrees and I was melting, to make it worse, the smelly man next to me was hocking and spitting the whole way there which was disgusting. For 2 whole hours!

Thankfully Kowloon was the first stop so I jumped off the bus and went in search of a taxi. I took a taxi to my hostel on Nathan road (a very low budget hostel as a lot had been booked up at such short notice) If I had thought the entrance to my last hostel  in Hong Kong was a dive, this was far worse! I got to reception and the lady shows me to my room which was supposed to be a double room but was actually a single room and the air conditioning didn't work. I complained and after huffing and puffing about it the lady agreed to move me to a different room. The new room was supposed to be for three people as there was a double and a single bed in there, but it was such a small room the lady couldn’t fit in it with me and my bag so I would hate to be actually staying with two other people there. Luckily the only bit I cared about was the air conditioning and that worked so that was good, after 10 hours travelling I just wanted to rest. I had a shower and I was sorting out my things when I heard a lot of banging and crashing going on in the room next door, I went to investigate and the rooms next door are like a building site with all the tiles being pulled off the walls and lots of shouting and drilling! I’m hating this hostel already, I knew I should have paid the difference to be put up in a hotel!

I went out for dinner and found an Italian restaurant around the corner which was quite nice, then came back to the hostel at 7pm to Google the visa office and work out how I was going to get there in the morning.

Saturday 12th May

It’s Saturday. I have been looking forward to this lie in all week. I was wide awake at 6.30am! Why is it that on your day off your body clock doesn’t let you sleep in? I also realised at 6.30am that I have run out of electricity. I was supposed to be getting up at 8am to wash and dry my hair as I was getting picked up at 9.30am but without electricity I had to wait until 8.30am when the maintenance office opens to put money on my electricity card.

At 9.30am I had arranged for a driver to pick me up and we went to pick up Amanda, Raena and Doreenda as we were going to the old summer palace. It was forecast rain so we all had umbrellas but when we got there it had turned into a beautiful day. The park was gorgeous and we wandered around and also got a boat across one of the lakes before stumbling across the actual ruins. We had a great day climbing rocks and parts of the ruins but after three hours were a bit tired so we called our driver and he came to pick us up.

We went to Sanlitun to one of our favourite restaurants, Carmens (the Spanish place I go with Matt) and we met Shanna there. We had a lovely late lunch and then got our driver to take us back to Houshayu. By this time it was 7pm so I packed for Hong Kong and had an early night.

Friday 11th May

This week I have been really tired and every day after school I have gone somewhere for dinner with friends and come straight back home and been in bed by 9pm. Now I am not a morning person anyway, but getting up at 6.30am every morning has been really hard this week. School has been good, but I have felt really tired by the end of each day and I feel like this week has really dragged.

I have been sorting out what I need for getting my Visa in Hong Kong, the school have booked my flights for 8am Sunday. Naturally, they were the cheapest ones that they could find and I fly to Shenzen and then take a 2 hour bus to Hong Kong. It’s been an average of 32 degrees, most buses don’t have air conditioning and I get travel sickness really easily. Great. The school have also given me an allowance to book my own hotel, which I finally got round to doing today.

After school yesterday Doreenda, Amanda, Anna and I went to try a new restaurant that I have been wanting to go to ever since I got here. Not far from the school there is a lake and there are tons of restaurants around it and I had heard about a Malaysian restaurant that I wanted to try, so we went there. Now I have never eaten Malaysian food before (so this is my new thing for the week) but the food was really good, we each ordered a dish and an appetiser each and tried a bit of everything, it was delicious! I’m quite proud of myself actually as I am a really fussy eater, a few years ago I never would have tried the things that I am trying now. We had a really lovely evening next to the lake and then got a taxi home and I was in bed by 9pm again.

Today was an exciting day for grade 2 as we had our green star awards. For grade 2, after each lesson I mark their work with a traffic light star system. If they have done well, they get a green star. If they have done OK or haven’t exactly understood what I wanted them to do but its obvious that they have still tried then they get a yellow star. If they have barely done anything then they get a red star. If the children get a red star they lose their playtime the next day to finish the work, and if they get 3 red stars in a row a note goes home to the parents. If the children get 3 green stars in a row they get a certificate at the beginning of Mondays lesson and we have a little award ceremony. Then at the end of the semester, the 3 children with the most green stars get a prize and seen as today was meant to be my last day, I had already told them that today was going to be prize day. Now over the past 2 weeks it has been really close, to the point that I was trying to think of a tie breaker as 6 students all had the same number of stars. By today I had 3 clear winners and 5 students came in joint 4^th place with only 1 star less than the student who came 3^rd. I gave out the prizes and everyone got a certificate saying how many green stars they got out of a possible 27 to take home and show their parents. This process will start again on Monday for the last 6 weeks of school and everyone kept saying to me that they were going to try their best and get a green star everyday! I am so pleased that it has motivated them as I was a bit worried that the students who didn’t do well would be discouraged and not even try, but they were the ones who said they were going to win the prize next time because they were going to try their best. It was great to see them all so excited, I was actually really proud of them all today!

After school I went for dinner with Anna, Amanda and Raena in the city. We went to the Kros nest (another place I have wanted to go to but never been) and we all shared a pizza which is their speciality. We ordered the medium pizza and it came on its own tray and nearly filled up our table it was that huge! The pizza was really good though and we were there for ages just chatting. That is my favourite kind of night out, just going for a meal and chatting with friends, not going to a smoky bar and not being able to talk over the music. I must be getting old! We got a taxi back home and it was 9pm when I got to my apartment. 

Monday 7th May

The alarm went off at 3.30am this morning to get up and take Matt to the airport. I had booked a driver to pick us up at 4am and we got to the airport at around 4.30am and seen as there wasn’t a queue, Matt was able to check in straight away. We said our goodbyes and I got back in the car all teary eyed and the driver took me back to Houshayu. He could tell that I was upset as he asked me if I wanted breakfast and took me to Mcdonalds which I thought was sweet. It was 5.30am by the time I got back to my apartment and as I needed to be up at 6am to wash and dry my hair there wasn’t much point going back to bed. I was so tired all day and spent most of the afternoon fighting to stay awake in my lessons. One of the things that did suprise me was the kids were all excited and asking if I felt the earthquake on Saturday (luckily I was in Hohhot). After school I had an early dinner with Doreenda and then came home and I was in bed by 8pm!

Sunday 6th May

I managed to have a lie in this morning for the first time in ages. We had to go to the school in the morning for Matt to check in online and to print his boarding pass. This made me wonder what do people do who are on holiday and have no access to a printer? It seems like a stupid system to me. We then got a taxi at 11am to pick up Amanda and went to the Hilton hotel near the airport for the Sunday champagne brunch. The food was delicious, in particular the pear and walnut home made ice cream! We got a taxi home at 2.30pm and I had a sleep as I felt so full.

At 7pm we got a taxi to the Green cap so that Matt could watch the football and had a snack there.

Saturday 5th May

This morning I had arranged for a driver to pick us up at 8am to take us to the great wall at Huanghua. It took us 90 minutes to get there and already it was 34 degrees, it was going to be a hot day! We took the boat across the lake rather than walking round it like I had done last time and we both agreed that we would try and reach the 3^rd watch tower. We stopped for an ice cream and to stock up on water and then started the walk to the bottom of the great wall and scrambled down to it. By this point I was already feeling tired, the heat just drains all of your energy! We started climbing up the great wall and made it as far as the first watch tower and we both agreed that that was far enough! It was so hot and we were both really tired by this point. The views were amazing though and we both agreed that it really is a beautiful spot, you just don’t get scenery like it back home. We were at the great wall for a total of 3 hours and it was still breathtaking the second time round. We got back to the car and our driver took us to Sanlitun, the centre of Beijing where we went for a late lunch and to the Yashow market to look for some more souvenirs.

Two hours later we were ready to leave and picked up my friend Raena on our way back who was also in the city. We got back to Houshayu and dropped our things off and then went to pinnacle for a cold drink sat in the sunshine. We only stayed for one before it hit me just how tired I actually was.

Friday 4th May

Today I used my personal day so that I could spend the day with Matt. At 9am I had arranged for a driver to pick us up and take us to Fragrant hills which was about an hour away. It was another really hot day, 33 degrees! We were discussing whether to hike to the top of Fragrant hills or to get the chair lift up, but that discussion soon ended when we saw the hill! The chair lift took 20 minutes to get to the top so it would have taken us all day to walk it! The views were really good, you could see for miles and there was a cool breeze at the top which was much needed. We looked around the spectacle lake and a cave with a waterfall, then took the chair lift to the top of the hill. After looking round we got the chair lift back down and went to look at the Azure Clouds temple which was up another slope but was well worth the visit. We were looking around Fragrant hills for three hours and then called our driver who took us to the Pearl market for some souvenirs.

After the market we went to Sanlitun and back to Carmens, the tapas restaurant we both love and had a really nice meal there. We then came back to Houshayu and had been out for 9 hours but had both had a really nice day. 

Thursday 3rd May

Today was another scorcher at 31 degrees! It has also been a very weird day. It all started when I was trying to get a taxi to work when one of the other teachers pulled over in his taxi and I jumped in with him. The first thing he said to me was “how’s it feel to be back?” and that he had got the email from Dave saying that I was in Hong Kong trying to get my visa. I thought this was a bit weird and said that I had been to Hong Kong on the last break but didn’t get my visa. I got to work and told my friend about the conversation, thinking it was weird that another colleague would email saying that I was in Hong Kong when I wasn’t.

At this point I should probably say about what has happened over the last two weeks. I hadn’t mentioned this before (to anyone) because things can change so quickly that I wasn’t sure how things would work out. Before the Easter break I was asked if I could get a new visa when I was in Hong Kong. In my contract it says that the school will pay for all costs so they would reimburse me, but as I had booked and paid for my holiday to Hong Kong myself, I didn’t have the money to pay for a visa myself, so I had said that if the school gave me the money upfront then I would get my visa. This is a conversation that I had with the admin girls who sorted out visas and they said that they needed to check with the principal first. To try and cover myself, as one of the admin girls has a reputation of not doing her job, I also asked the vice principal to speak to the principal for me as well. A few days after I got back from Hong Kong I was told that Vanessa (the admin woman that has been making life difficult for everyone) had told the principal that she had told me that she had the money for me for a visa and I never went to collect it. Now this is a complete lie and I was furious that she would say that to the principal, who believed her. The principal then said that because of that, the school weren’t going to pay for me to go to Hong Kong to get a new visa and I would have to leave when my visa expired on the 16^th May. Now I have had a few problems with Vanessa in the past over various issues and she doesn’t like me and I do not like her and I was so angry that my boss, the vice principal, said that he would speak to the principal and a few other people did on my behalf, but the principal still believed Vanessa and wasn’t changing her mind. Although she did say that the biggest reason that the school were now not getting me a new visa was because it cost too much money to fly me to Hong Kong, put me up in accommodation and pay for a new visa for me when there is only 6 weeks left of school. This I could completely understand and although I was really upset at the time, I had only just sort of accepted that I was going to be leaving early.

Anyway, back to today. I had forgotton about my conversation that morning and was going about my day when I bumped into another collegue who threw out his arms and shouted “your back! I thought you were stranded in Hong Kong?” Now this I thought was a bit weird, this was the second person to say something about me being in Hong Kong. After further questioning it turns out that another teacher had gone to Hong Kong to get his visa and they weren’t letting him back into the country and somehow I had been mixed into this story because everyone knew that I needed a new visa soon so assumed that I had been in Hong Kong. All a bit weird.

By this point, I needed to go and speak to the principal as if I changed my flights I knew that I would get charged and seen as that was the schools fault I wanted them to pay the charges. I also wanted to get my side of the story across as well. I went to see the principal and she agreed to pay the charges and told me that the only reason that the school were not paying for the visa was that it was just too much money for the school to pay for just 6 weeks. I told her that I had heard that Vanessa had said that she had the money for me and that that was a lie and then I got a bit emotional as I was telling her that I loved my job and that I wasn’t ready to leave and that I was concerned as to what would happen to my classes once I had left.  I’m glad that I put my side across and that the school were going to pay for my charges and I left it at that and went back to the office.

At lunchtime we had ordered food in which was supposed to arrive at 12pm. By 12.45pm (when classes start again) it still hadn’t arrived so I had to go to my lessons and eat it at snack time at 2.15pm. During lunch I was speaking to my friend Raena about the weird conversations that I had had today and asked if she had received an email about me being in Hong Kong and she said that she hadn’t and that they were weird conversations.

At 2.15pm I came back to the office to eat my lunch and Doreenda was there aswell, we had 15 minutes to eat our lunch and get back to our classrooms, which was less than ideal. Just as I was finishing mine Raena came into the office and told me that the principal wanted to see me. Now the first thing that I thought was that I was in trouble and I was really nervous walking over to her office. On my way there James came out and asked me where I was headed, I told him that I had a been summoned to the principals office and he said that was where he was heading aswell. We got to the office and the principal, both vice principals and the curriculum co-ordinator were sat waiting for me, I instantly thought oh this is bad, I’m going to be sent home or something! I sat down and everyone was looking at me and the principal said to me “I don’t want you to change your flights” I wasn’t sure what she meant at first but then she said “we are sending you to Hong Kong for your visa on Sunday 13^th May, the school needs you”. She carried on talking but I didn’t really take anything else in, I was still trying to absorb what she just said. James walked me out of the office and said to me that I should probably go to speak to the grade 1 office. I wasn’t really sure what had just happened and I knew that grade 1 were all teaching so I went to Raenas office as she had just come from seeing the principal when she came to find me.

Now this is the part that I am still in complete shock about and get all choked up every time I think about it. Yesterday, Dave (who I was attached to with grade 1) Tracy and Ashley had sent an email out to all of the teachers saying about my situation, that the new visa came down to money and that everyone wanted me to stay because of the hard work that I do and that they were going to all pitch in and see if the school would meet them halfway. By lunchtime they had the 3000 RMB (£300) and Dave and Tracy (another grade 1 teacher who’s sons are in both my grade 2 and 4 classes) had gone to see the principal. The principal had been blown away that all of the teachers wanted me to stay that much that they had rallied round for me and she had said that if it comes down to money and everyone thinks that I am that valuable that the school would pay for my visa and she gave everyone their money back! As Raena was telling me all of this I felt so overwhelmed that everyone would do something so nice for me, and that teachers that I don’t even help out in their classes had all pitched in to help me stay that I was in complete shock and so emotional I just started crying. I think I sat there not being able to string a sentence together for a good 30 minutes, I just couldn’t believe everyone had rallied round for me like that. I may have my moments where I hate my job, but the people I work with are true friends with hearts of gold and I am just so thankful to everyone.

At 4pm James came into the office laughing and saying he was glad that I was staying and that it had all worked out. Now I had had a conversation about the two teachers saying I had been stranded in Hong Kong and James had walked over to the principals office with me, the whole time not letting on that he knew what was going to happen, I’m never playing poker with James!  I packed up my things and went down to the grade 1 office and thanked them all, they had heard about my weird conversations with the two other teachers and then they had heard that I had been to see the principal and had been worried that that would have ruined their plan, but it had all turned out well. I was still a bit shocked and just didn’t know what to say, I think it’s one of the nicest things that anyone has ever done for me. We decided to go out for a celebration drink and then for some food at the swan and had a really nice evening. I’m feeling very lucky right now to have such great friends. 

Wednesday 2nd May

Today was the first day back at work and it was a really slow day. The weather was gorgeous, 31 degrees! Matt met me after school and a bunch of us went out for a cool drink in the sunshine. We went for sushi and teppanyaki with two of the teachers from school to a restaurant that we hadn’t been to before. The food was really good and everything was cooked at our table in front of us which was fun to watch. We were quite tired though after our sightseeing weekend and had an earlyish night.