Football + Foreign Faculty = Fun

Nimen Hao,

Yesterday's "Teacher's Day Picnic" was a HUGE success. The weather was hot (as it always is), but the sky was clear, it didn't rain, and there was a bit of a breeze at dinner time. All of the teachers in the Foreign Language Department loaded onto two buses and headed out to a really beautiful park, about thirty minutes from campus.

On the way, we were slowed down a bit by a procession of country folk who were having some sort of local ceremonial march. They were all dressed up in colorful clothes and funny hats.

It was very interesting, but a little sad too. They were carrying around these little dolls on these big sticks, which were clearly idols of some sort. They mostly looked hot and sweaty.

The park had a lot of really beautiful gardens, and a wide variety of shrubs, trees, plants, etc. There were both palm trees and pine trees right next to each other!

This is a picture of the bower that you walk under as you enter the park. It's hard to see, but those are different varieties of gourds hanging down from the trellis. I believe the park grows a lot of its own food.
There a whole lot of banyan trees here in ZJ, which I think are really really cool. And I mean that literally and figuratively, as they do produce a very nice canopy from the sun. :-) There's a really beautiful square right next to our apartments which is surrounded by these beautiful trees. I'll have to get some pictures up before too long.

They even had Ping Pong!!

Like I mentioned before, the thing I enjoyed most about yesterday was the opportunity to meet so many of the other faculty members at ZJ Normal. That's something that I really missed out on at Beihua. The dynamic between the foreign teachers and the Chinese teachers there was really different. But ZJ Normal has been a welcome change. There really are some great people who teach here.

John, Ben, and myself spent most of the afternoon teaching a group of teachers how to play American football. It was loads of fun. They were really eager to learn. There were a couple guys who had the ugliest form, but could throw the tightest spiral. It was amazing. They said that they want to form the first Chinese Olympic Football Team. We'll have to save the baseball lesson for the next picnic. ;-)

After football, we all came back to the eating area, where we had a delicious meal of chicken, sweet potatoes, corn on the cob, and a few other vegetable dishes. The chicken was cooked by wrapping the whole bird in lotus leaves, then in tinfoil, and then buried underneath a pile of dirt and ashes, and slow-roasted all day long. It was unbelievably moist. The sweet potatoes were also prepared in this way. Everything was delicious.

Here's (l-r) Mary Jane, ??, Kudo, John, Russel, and Anna enjoying their feast.

David, Ben, and Ruth

O.K.!!

Um, the reason there aren't any pictures of me is because I was always the one holding the camera. Sorry folks. I promise I don't look that different. Even with my rockin' new Chinese haircut (which probably deserves its own post, but we'll see).

I'm off like bug spray.


-高占阳


P.S. Sensai, I will explain the name shortly.