Another School Year

A year ago, I wrote a post about September signifying the beginning of a new school year every year of my life since I was five. This year is no different as I am currently settling in at my new school. I’ve gotten to the point where I’m sure it will feel quite strange if I’m not starting a new school year come September.

When I first accepted this job, I really only knew that I’d be a teaching assistant at a British run primary (elementary) school in Tai Wai, Hong Kong. After a week of preparation and a week of classes, I now have a much better idea of exactly what it is I’ll be doing.

First of all, my job is to help out in the P2 class, which consists of twenty-one children born in 2006, currently ages 5 and 6. Instead of a September 1st cutoff date for age, in Hong Kong, it's January 1st. My duties include keeping the children on task, giving individual help to those who need it, and making the lead teacher's job easier in whatever way I can. And starting this week, I will teach an after school club on a subject very dear to my heart, baseball. Besides myself and the lead teacher Ms. Katie, our class also has another full-time teacher named Ms. Ada who is mostly focused on one boy with special needs. 

During my first week of classes, I felt utterly exhausted, but I hope this was simply because I still need to fully transition from my slow vacation pace to fast work pace. The class is funny and charming but we certainly have to work hard to keep them focused and under control, even with three adults in the classroom. Despite their occasional wildness, it’s pretty amazing to see twenty-one kids, all of Asian ethnicity—mostly Chinese and a few Japanese—speaking and understanding English so naturally. For almost every single kid, English is not the native tongue. If I ask in English how to say something in Cantonese OR Mandarin, they are usually able to answer me with no hesitation. Trilingual is the norm.

The school itself is quite professional, something I am very pleased with. The teachers are all talented, easy-going people and many, like me, have just started out at the school. This is not due to high turnover but because the student enrollment has gone from thirty to ninety students in a year’s time. Last year was the primary’s first year of existence so there were only two classes: P1 and P2. This year, there are five classes going up to P3, so the faculty has naturally grown as well. By the time the school reaches full capacity in a few years, it should hold some three to four hundred pupils, at least by my calculation. Perhaps at that point I won’t be the only North American to have worked there. My coworkers come mostly from Britain, but also Hong Kong, mainland China and South Africa.

My general philosophy is not to look much more than a year into the future, but it’s certainly nice to have a solid option to work at this school for longer, should that be something I want to pursue. I have certainly considered and been offered the possibility of working towards my teaching credentials while employed at this school in the future. It’s right next to my house and so far, seems to be a good fit with my educational thinking. But as I mentioned, one year at a time.

Working with primary students is a brand new experience for me. After only a week, I have an infinitely better understanding of the way they interact, what makes them tick and what makes them laugh. I’ve spent a lot of time thinking back to my own wonderful elementary experience on Bainbridge Island at the Island School. Surprisingly, I still remember a lot about that time, especially my friends and teachers. It was a pivotal six years in my life and I hope that I can positively influence these kids the way my teachers and teaching assistants influenced me back in the 1990s. 

Guilin

My second trip of the holiday was to Guilin, China. Guilin is about 300 miles north (the distance between Seattle and Eugene) but the best way to get there is by overnight train. The trip was planned by my old friend Henry, whom I’ve mentioned here before. Henry’s been teaching English in Guangzhou for the past six months and had been to Guilin only a month ago on a solo journey. This time Henry took his coworker friend Angel and myself along for a few memorable days in the region.

I had been to mainland China twice before: once with my university jazz band in 2009 and once to visit Henry in April of this year. But this was the closest I felt to experiencing China as the Chinese do, mostly because of the train. At around 5:30 pm, we departed on a train from Shenzhen—the Chinese city bordering Hong Kong to the north—and spent its 15-hour journey in seats since we hadn’t booked our tickets in time to get beds in the sleeper cars. In the passenger cabin, the lights never turn off and lots of people only have standing room only tickets. It’s hard to believe, but many aboard the train actually stood up for the entire trip. As far as facilities, there is a toilet between cars for dozens to share and hot water to prepare cup of noodles. That's it. Not a pleasant night, but certainly a unique one.

We arrived in the main city of Guilin and took a bus to the smaller, more touristy city of Yangshuo. Once we got to Yangshuo, we rented bikes and spent some time looking for our reserved hotel. By the time we arrived, it had been nearly 24 hours since departing my flat in Hong Kong. We were a bit tired but it was only the afternoon by then, so we went on a bike ride through the nearby farm area.

I can’t overstate enough how beautiful the pastoral scenery is in the Guilin region. What dominates the landscape are numerous pointy mountains created by karstification. I’d never heard that word before I went to Guilin so for an idea of what it means, consult our friend Wikipedia! Anyway, biking through the farm lands and seeing acres of rice paddies beneath hundreds of mysterious green spikes felt otherworldly. The only downer of the first day was the mother of all side aches hitting me at the end of our ride. I’m not sure if it was eating too much before or lack of sleep or what, but it was not pleasant. Fortunately, the pain was all gone after a few minutes lying on the hotel bed.  

The following day was the best day. With Henry at the lead, the three of us biked the twenty-two mile stretch to the town of Xingping. Twenty-two miles may not sound like all that much but the journey was quite hilly and ended up taking us around seven hours. I’m a competent biker but not a great one and this now holds the record as my longest bike ride. The sights we saw along the way were even better than the day before. Near the end of the trek, we were given a spectacular viewpoint looking down upon the Li River. Just as the sun was setting, we caught a raft and floated down to Xingping, bikes, tired riders and all. As Henry said to me, the great thing about biking on trips is that it’s both a rewarding, healthy activity and a way to feast the eyes on magnificent scenery.

That night I stayed in my first hostel. In a nutshell, it was amazing and I want to stay in more like it. We went to bed after eating delicious pizzas cooked in the hostel, just what I most desired after a long day of exertion. The next day, we hiked up to the top of one of the mountains known as Lao Zhai Shan. As expected, the view was stunning and first time we’d been able to see a city from above.  We headed back to Yangshuo by bus this time, and ate at a Buddhist influenced vegetarian restaurant. The nice thing about China is you can eat what may be on the pricier side by Chinese standards, but still ends up costing a reasonable amount in Hong Kong or US terms. With work in less than two days, I had to depart from the group at this point. I headed back to Guilin by bus and then to Shenzhen by sleeper train. Fortunately, I was able to book a sleeper bunk on the way back and shared my room with an astoundingly nice family from Guangzhou. I slept well and received Chinese lessons and free fruit from them in both the evening and the morning.

I’ve read a couple books about China recently—one by Peter Hessler called River Town and one called Factory Girls by his wife, Leslie Chang. Both are great books about the extremely complex nature of China. In Hong Kong, it’s easy to look at China as the bad guy, more of an “oppressor” than Britain was back in colonial times with China’s current educational mandates and role in the housing monopolies. This trip didn’t do much to change my own complicated feelings about China but I certainly was moved by the majestic countryside and the kind people I met along the way. Everyone should come to China at least once. It may not always be the best, but I think it’s the most interesting country on earth. 

My wonderful travelling companions: Henry (tour guide) and Angel (translator) 

Sure doesn't look like it, but it's rice

Li River

Guangxi Province countryside

Looking down on Xingping

Corn with antennae

Sabah

For those of you don’t know too much about Malaysia, it’s split into two parts, like New Zealand or Michigan. But instead of having two islands, or two peninsulas, Malaysia has one of each. Sabah is the name of the part of Malaysia that lies in the northern half of the island of Borneo, bordering Indonesia. This was my third trip down to Southeast Asia this year, and while the journey to Puerto Princesa in January remains the best, Sabah was still an enjoyable exploration. The furthest south I’ve travelled yet.

My girlfriend and I flew directly from Hong Kong to Kota Kinabalu on Thursday morning. It was only a three-hour flight so we were able to spend some time exploring the largest city in Sabah that afternoon. Formerly a British trading hub called Jesselton, Kota Kinabalu itself isn’t anything too special. It’s filled with markets, hotels and restaurants like most other touristy Asian cities. My favorite moment of that first day was walking around the State Mosque during the call to evening prayer. The place was fairly desolate but for a mesmerizing male voice, singing praise to Allah, or so I assume. Malaysia’s official religion is Islam though Sabah is actually more Catholic. Overall, one of the country’s biggest assets is its peaceful coexistence of dozens of different cultural groups.

The next day, we had a beginners’ scuba course. This was the activity I was most excited for and it didn’t fall short of my hopes. Our instructors and fellow divers were lots of fun and we managed to go on three decently long dives just off of Gaya Island close to the city. Unfortunately, I have no underwater camera to document the dives but we saw lots of colorful coral as well as Nemo and friends playing in the sea anemones. Scuba gear is such an amazing invention. I like to compare it to the airplane, which game humans the ability to fly like birds. Scuba diving allows us to swim like fishes.

Day three was a bit of a disappointment. After checking out a couple local museums, we went on a river cruise to that advertised itself as a great way to see both proboscis monkeys and fireflies up close. This ‘nature’ tour ended up being a two-hour drive to board a massive vessel with hundreds of loud people consuming a buffet dinner and socializing with one another. We saw a couple of monkeys that were dozens of feet away and one bush of fireflies. We expected peace and tranquility and got the epitome of lazy, "sightsee in your comfort zone" tourism. So it goes I guess.

The last couple days consisted of some thrilling whitewater rafting and a so-so tour of Mount Kinabalu National Park. My expectations were high (so to speak) for the tallest mountain in SE Asia but it ended up being mostly obscured by clouds and the flora and fauna weren’t anything as special as I read about. Or at least what we got to see. There was a special flower in the area but the tour guide asked us for about $10 US per person to see it so we declined. The rafting however, was totally exhilarating. Worth every penny to rock up and down the rapids of the Padras River. 

Unrelated to being in Malaysia, it was wonderful to come back to our hotel every night at watch the Olympics. We really lucked out that our holiday timed itself perfectly with the games. It’s always so inspiring to me to watch people chase their goals with such passion and guts. And to see an American beat the Chinese frontrunners in men’s platform diving in David Boudia :)

I traveled up to Guilin, China after a day back in HK. You can read about that above soon. Here are some photos of Sabah. 

Sabah State Mosque

Floating dock on Gaya Island

Photo with a photogenic monkey photo

Everybody's got something to hide except for me and my monkey

40 meters above ground on the jungle canopy walk

Mount Kinabalu

Dozens of Goodbyes

July began with my one-year anniversary in Hong Kong and is ending with the conclusion of my first full-time job. It’s been an emotional time and I think I summed it up decently in my final weekly newsletter, sent to my students’ parents: 

Hello everyone, 

For my last newsletter, I'd just like to write a huge thank you to the many students, parents, grandparents and helpers I've gotten to know during my time at this school. I'm not usually one to get overly sentimental, but I have really been blessed to get to know all of you. During these last two weeks, I've been quite humbled by having received so many well-wishes for my future.  

From my first day here until now, I have learned just as much if not more from my students as they have learned from me. Watching so many kids transform from babies into inquisitive, clever children is something very few people get to see and I will never forget this experience. It's also confirmed my belief, from the Beatles, ALL YOU NEED IS LOVE!  

I wish each and every one of my students all the very best as they grow up.  

Cheers!  

Mr. Ben 

I really haven't had an experience like this before—saying my goodbyes and thank yous to so many people at the end of a life chapter. And by so many, I mean 150 students and their families plus nearly twenty colleagues. The closest was probably graduating university but that grand finale had been known by everyone involved from the get go and the majority of my friends were leaving with me. Announcing to the students and parents that I was leaving was probably the hardest step in the process but bidding adieu to the tight-knit colleague group was nearly as tough. After spending so many hours with certain people, you develop quite an attachment. 

In these last two weeks, with the end in sight, I felt what an impact these kids had on me and vice versa (I hope/think?) and that was something that really brought into focus the fact that teaching could be a career path for me. Of course, I'll need a lot more training to develop teaching skills beyond what I have now. But more than ever before, working in education seems like a pretty solid way to pass the weekday hours and try to make a difference. 

As I posted earlier, I start at the primary school on August 20th. I’m looking forward to (and also a bit nervous about) broadening my teaching experience and comparing this to my year teaching toddlers. During the next three weeks, I’ll spend half the time lounging around in Hong Kong and half the time travelling to both Kota Kinabalu, Malaysia and Guilin, China. Expect many photos and blog posts to come from these two trips.

One Year Later

This Wednesday marks my first Asia-versary. Since I’ve been here, I’ve learned a metric butt-load* about many things. For example, teaching, small children, teaching small children, Hong Kong, Asia in general, Chinese culture, travelling, Cantonese, having a fulltime job, being in a relationship, self-reliance, etc. But for this post, I’d like to make a brief timeline of the last fifty-two weeks. I’ve always been a big fan of timelines, way before Facebook I might add (for hipster credit). Here it goes, with older posts linked. 

July 3-4, 2011: Travelled from Seattle to Hong Kong via planes, trains, boats and automobiles. Definitely the longest and most anxious days of my life. The journey went: Bainbridge Island house->BI Ferry Terminal->Seattle Ferry Terminal->SeaTac Airport->San Francisco Airport->Hong Kong Airport->Kowloon MTR Station->Roommate Ben’s Chan Uk Village flat. A 30-hour journey from totally familiar to completely foreign. 

July 16: First day teaching. Not just in HK but first day teaching any class period. It wasn’t supposed to be until the 18th, but my predecessor decided to ditch a bit early so I showed up and got a whirlwind introduction to the kids, parents and fellow teachers. Another nerve-wracking day for sure. Thankfully, I’d been trained about the job during the previous week so I at least had an idea of what to do. 

August 26: Flew alone to Taipei, Taiwan for my first trip outside HK as well as my first vacation alone. Good times and good memories, particularly seeing a Taiwanese professional baseball game. 

October 16: Began dating my gorgeous girlfriend, changing my life infinitely for the better ☺. Our first date was on the serene Lamma Island. 

December 18: Journeyed back across the Pacific to Seattle. For two weeks, I spent time with good friends and family in both the Seattle area and the Napa Valley. Being home made Hong Kong feel like a strange but wonderful dream. 

January 23, 2012: Went to Puerto Princesa, Philippines with four good friends, all connected to my school in HK. Possibly the best vacation of my life, this consisted of four near perfect days on an idyllic tropical island. I can still taste the delicious fruit smoothies and milkshakes. 

March 4: Moved into a new flat in Tai Wai. Took some cash and a bit of work to get it all set up, but once the place came together, I settled comfortably into my first solo apartment. 

April 3: Took a trip to Bangkok, Thailand with my girlfriend. It was far too short of a stay but I enjoyed seeing another world class city nearby. Some sweet golden temples they have there. 

(upcoming) July 28: Final day of work at my school. It’s hard to describe a day that hasn’t happened yet, but I expect an ocean of bittersweetness. More details in a post yet to come. 

So there’s a year. No gooey reflection necessary. I’ve had a great time and I’m optimistic about what the future might hold!

*'Metric butt-load' is a specific unit of measurement established by my great chum, Taylor Hagbo. It's quantity should be self-evident. 

Language

I’ve been meaning to write something on this for some time. So far on this blog, the only time I’ve spent much time addressing this endlessly fascinating topic was back in August when I discussed my own pursuit of learning Cantonese. I still use and try to improve my Canto every day, but that isn’t what this post is about. Of all the differences between the world of Hong Kong and the world of Seattle, I’d say that the role of language is the most interesting to me. Growing up in the United States, I knew that most of the world’s population didn’t speak English. And I knew that there were a whole lot of people who spoke multiple languages fluently. But I never realized how much of an anomaly American citizens are in being mostly monolingual. 

I’d say the average American (with the notable exception of recent immigrants) speaks English natively and knows a handful of words in other languages, most likely Spanish. I personally studied Spanish for three years and though I was good at it, I saw it more as a high school requirement than a valuable life skill. And I believe most Americans feel the same. Why shouldn’t they? Most Americans will spend their entire lives interacting only with native English speakers, speaking only English to each other. It’s the way our society is and has been since the country was founded. The term “language” is pretty much synonymous with “English” to most Americans (and probably most Australians/Canadians/New Zealanders). Simple as that. But it couldn’t be more different in Hong Kong and the rest of the world.

In Hong Kong, the native language of the people is Cantonese. But the national language of China is Mandarin. And the language of commerce, travel, most things international, and HK’s former colonial owner is English. So when announcements are made on trains or busses, they are stated in each of these three languages. That being said, Hong Kong people have a wide variety of skill levels at each of these languages. I’ve come across Hong Kongers who can only speak Cantonese, and others who can speak all three of the aforementioned flawlessly. 

Most Americans may find this unique or unusual, but I think that this is closer to the global norm than what American society is. In mainland China, most citizens speak Mandarin in addition to one or more local dialects, whether it’s an ancient village dialect or Shanghainese. In continental Europe, most citizens speak their native tongue, English and often a third or fourth language to boot. In Africa, most people speak a tribal language passed down by their parents in addition to their country’s ‘Lingua Franca’, whatever that may be. I challenge you to start Googling random countries in the world and check out the languages spoken by its people. More often than not, you’ll find a lot more lingual diversity than in the USA. 

(sidenote: The increase of Latinos in the US is changing the language landscape of America, but this is a different sort of issue that I’m not even going to try to tackle) 

I continue to be impressed by the polyglots I interact with all the time. And working at a school that teaches Mandarin and English to native Cantonese speakers, I encounter dozens of them every day, from teachers to students to parents to domestic helpers. Sometimes I feel a bit guilty about my own heavy reliance on a single language, but that’s not my fault; it’s the way my native society works. For now, I can only continue working on my Cantonese, and potentially other languages in the future. It’s great for the brain and it’s a surefire way to feel more like a global citizen.

The Next Job

I’ve been sitting on this news for a while but wanted to wait a while before posting anything about it. This August, I’ll begin work at an international primary school (ages 6-12) as a teaching assistant. At this point, I don’t have an extremely clear picture of what my job will consist of, but basically, I’ll be doing my bit to make the teachers and students lives better. Part of my duties include organizing an after school club, which will almost certainly be music related. Additionally, I expect to do some one-on-one help with kids that need it and assist teachers, as you may imagine a teaching assistant would do. For the second time in as many jobs, I’m thrilled to be receiving an offer that’s a challenge and something totally different than any experience I’ve had. 

Until recently, I was planning to stay at my current school another year, but when I got this interview thanks to a former colleague and eventually a job offer, I couldn’t say no. The school is within walking distance of my current flat, there’s no work on Saturdays, and much longer vacations throughout the year. I enjoy teaching the toddlers and will miss being the lead teacher that I am now, but I do suspect that two years of my current job might have burned me out, had I taken that path. It’s just a tiring job that’s hard to sustain. 

As it stands, I’ll be completing my current tenure at the end of July, and starting at the primary on the 20th of August. This gives me three glorious weeks of vacation. It’s the first time I’ve had that much holiday since June 2011, when I was completing my endless checklist of things to do before Hong Kong. Now, I expect to travel (though not home unfortunately), relax, write, make music and do other things I simply haven’t had time to do.

So the next chapter of my journey begins. For now, I look forward to the next six weeks of watching my little tykes as they dance to “Twist and Shout” and “Singin’ in the Rain” in preparation of our school concert. It’ll be hard to say goodbye to the kids and my coworkers but so it goes. Onward!