CBA Basketball Game!

In August David and I were talking and he mentioned again how he would love to coach if ever had the chance and if the right door opened.  I know its something he has always wanted to do.  A few days later eating lunch with friends we found out there is a basketball coaching position open at the international school in Xiamen.  Our friends suggested David interview for the job.  We just looked at eachother and started laughing, it was only a few days before that we were talking about him coaching one day. 

After being interviewed, he is now officially the head basketball coach at the high school!  I'm pretty excited for him.  We were invited to the last game in the tournment of the CBA (Chinese Basketball Association) by the atheletic director at the high school and we brought some friends along. 

CBA website: http://www.asia-basket.com/China/basketball.asp

 Xiamen (厦门）vs Shanxi (山西）

 

Chinese cheerleaders dancing to American music

The mascot kinda reminded me of Chick Fil A

Slam dunk competition!

Half time break

Score was 82-77 山西 but we were so confused when we saw the 厦门 team jumping up and down and excited.  It was wasn't making any sense.

After talking to some other people nearby we realized it depended on who had received the most points in the overall tournament, not who actually won the games.   At the end the girls came out to pass out the trophies and rewards.

Overall it was a really fun night cheering for Xiamen's basketball team and hanging out. 

Spending time with friends

Some of my coworkers and I got together on a Saturday to hang out.  We spent the whole morning making jiaozi 饺子 and had a great time eating them and having girl time together in the afternoon.

A duck in a bag!  This duck had traveled a long way!  It was brought from Nanjing on a train!

The 馅儿 (stuffing)

The art of 包'ing 饺子 （three years in China and I'm still working on my technique)

I love the people I get to work with!  Such great friends!

Eating 东北 (Northwest) style thanks to 王老师 （Mrs. Wang) for making sure we ate it with cucumbers 

Was walking to the BRT (the subway) to head home and was pretty excited to find this little restaurant!  Its a little Xi'an restaurant!  Apparently there are a few of them here, since I moved here I've been trying to hunt them down!  Made my day!

I love my job!

This is the university where I work at.  I love my job! I love teaching, hanging out with my coworkers, and getting to know my students!  I couldn't ask for a better boss or staff to work alongside with!  I am so thankful!

20,000 students!

All the girls carrying umbrellas to class to avoid the sun

The library where I like to hang out when I'm not teaching

This is the building I work in

My classroom!  Mike giving his presentation!

Notice anything unusual about all the students in this class?? 

They are all boys! A class of 27 boys! The school decided to split the classes up so we would have smaller classes!  I am thankful for that.  However, they thought the easiest way to split them up was by sex.  We're hoping that will change next semester.  Some classes I teach are either all girls, all boys, or mixed. 

I teach on the third floor

I was a bit nervous at first with having a class with all boys, but its actually worked out really well.  They are great students, outgoing, respectful, and listen really well. 

All of my students are sophomores except one class of freshmen.  All freshmen throughout the country are required by the government to do military training the first six weeks of school, instead of taking regular classes.  After a month and half into the semester I'll be meeting my freshmen class for the first time next week.

The girls' class!

During the second week we were studying about families, discipline, routine, and rules. 

Here they were writing down all the rules they had as a child.  

Last week we studied about money and the importance of being weathly, desire to be rich, what is poverty, and how to help the poor.  Next week will be an interesting week, the chapter is about the body: being healthy, plastic surgery, diet, self image, and smoking.