I teach five private lessons each week, 90 minutes each - some to kids, some to adults. One of these is to a young couple, in their home. Last week JD joined me as they had cooked dinner for us and invited JD to play with their 4-year old son, called Paipai (pronounced "pie-pie"). JD had a sort-out of his bedroom beforehand and brought a bag of unwanted "baby toys" to pass on. The dinner was a tasty mix of Western and Chinese food and the lesson afterwards went well. One of JD's Christmas presents from me was a jar full of 300 slips of paper, each one containing a statement about him. He pulls one out each morning and reads it aloud. About 90% of the slips have something positive and encouraging ("JD, you make friends easily" or "JD, you can ride a bike pretty fast") while the others are less so ("JD, you don't know your 12 times table" or "JD, your feet are stinky"). Something to enjoy throughout the year!!
JD was awarded a special Certificate at school this week. He had been asked by his teacher to enter a National Art competition about a month ago (celebrating the COP15 Conference held in Kunming last year) and we were all pretty stunned to hear he came top in Yunnan Province and second out of all China! Admittedly there was a bit of parental help in thinking up the idea and drawing some of the creatures, but that's pretty normal in China, and JD coloured in most of it. So we were all chuffed and JD's Primary School teacher apparently gained a lot of kudos.
JD's mixed heritage seems to lead to some very odd food preferences. He likes Brussel sprouts with his chicken's feet, salt with his pineapple chunks, and ice-cream with pepper. But his latest favourite breakfast - croissants with sweet pickle - is truly disturbing!
JD finishes a three day course of IV drips today. After a fever earlier this week, we took him to hospital for a blood test. That indicated a very elevated white cell count, and the doctor strongly advised an intravenous antibiotic drip. JD has been in fairly good spirits since then, mostly at the thought of three days off school. We are hoping he will be OK to return to his class tomorrow as he has important end-of-term exams next week.
JD's Primary School is in a road full of Gingko trees. Their leaves are quite something at this time of year. JD believes the oncoming car in this photo is floating!
JD is enjoying his "Advent Calendar train" - he opens one carriage a day, each containing a small toy.
JD and I hiked up to MiaoGao Temple the other day. Good exercise, fresh air and a cheap vegetarian lunch with the monks.
JD's class came top of the ten classes in his year in a tug-of-war competition this week. Being the fattest in the class, JD anchored the back of the line and was thrilled at the victory.
One of the students at JD's after-school homework club had a birthday the other day and brought in a cake to share with the others there.
JD [bottom left in photo] and his classmates had a series of presentations about planets and space travel this week. I thought JD would love this as he's very much into tech and spaceships. But he said it was largely about how American rockets are rubbish and the Chinese ones are the best. Must everything be political in schools here?
This is JD [bottom row, towards the right] as his class are about to launch into a patriotic song they've been learning recently, Lyrics include, "The glorious People's Party is the sun that warms the ground in China!" ...helps explain global warming.
JiaJia and I challenged JD to an Art Competition last week (to get him off the iPad for an hour or two!). We decided to all draw the same thing (JD chose one of his aeroplane toys) with the best sketch winning a prize [L to R below: Jiajia's, JD's, mine]. Who won, do you think? JD's schoolteacher is fully aware that Jiajia has a Masters in Art and JD's English is fluent, so she often sends us details of Art/English Competitions for us to enter "for the glory of the school". The painting below was a JJ/JD joint effort for Teacher's Day! We took JD to a huge play centre yesterday, meeting up with a couple of his old Kindergarten classmates and their families. The kids had a blast, exploring all the rides and activities for over 3 hours [JD coming down the slide, top left].
My University lessons are back in full swing after an unusually long, but very welcome, two month Summer holiday. This was one of my classes earlier this week doing a "Running Dictation" exercise... The Chinese Government have been rolling out a series of education reforms over recent months to "reduce the burden" on young students in China. These include banning online tutoring with teachers based abroad, removal of western printed textbooks, regulating after-school and weekend training classes and reducing homework and exams in Primary Schools. However, JD's school seem to be largely ignoring the "less work" parts. Completing his daily homework is taking longer than ever. He didn't finish until after after 10pm on Monday/Tuesday, though Wednesday/Thursday were "only" 8.30pm [see below]. Crazy.
As an end-of-holiday treat, Jiajia and I took JD to an indoor skiing centre about 30 minutes drive away. It's JD's third time skiing. He loves it and has been asking us to go again for ages. After JD made four descents of the beginner's slope without falling over, I took him up to the Intermediate slope. It's a fair bit faster. He got down without falling over but ended up crashing into the cushioned fence at the bottom! He decided to return to the baby slope after that! The centre isn't cheap (£20 each) and Jiajia had to pay full price even though she only wanted to watch. So we persuaded her to at least have a try. Let's just say it wasn't her strongest showing!! Jiajia, JD and I spent today at the Yunnan Safari Park. Forecasts of heavy rain kept the crowds away and, as it turned out, we only needed our umbrellas as we were returning to the car park to leave. The park itself is huge - 10km to the most distant enclosures. Some of the animals are caged, but most are in large open-air enclosures and seem well looked after. You can pay extra for a bus to take you to the different areas, but we opted to burn off some calories and it was fun to explore the walkways and suddenly bump into unexpected creatures, some just arms length away (think giant tortoises, peacocks, zebras, llamas, ostriches etc). We saved a lot of cash by bringing a picnic but blew it all on various kids' rides and entertainment for JD at the end of our visit! Still, it was a nice end to the day, as the heavens opened.
JD's been desperate to return to the reservoir I took him to a few months ago, to try and catch more clams. To that end, he spent some of his pocket money on a snorkel mask last week which he has been keen to try out. Unfortunately, my eye doctors said swimming was forbidden for a month after my operation, let alone in a dirty reservoir, and Jiajia doesn't enjoy swimming. So instead, we tried out a swimming pool not far from our house which I found on the map recently, and invited JD's friend "Johnny" to come along with his mum, who was happy to look after both of them in the water. JD had a great time, though the mask wasn't quite as water-tight as he'd hoped.
A really mixed day today. Jiajia, JD and I visited the Bamboo Temple with a friend of ours - Du Laoshi - a 40 minute drive up a mountain on the outskirts of Kunming. We had a good look around, including the famous 500 detailed statues of monks in various poses there. Then we joined the monks and worshippers for a vegetarian lunch. Thankfully, JD only suffered scratches and bruises and was keen to keep on. The rest of us, including the driver, were a lot more shocked, and we decided to head back to the temple and the car. JD said the gods kept him safe because he'd donated a few yuan to them in the temple. I'm wondering whether they arranged the crash because of the meagre cash amount But, after a rest and a thorough check-up, we did drive on to the park and JD enjoyed a few hours of fishing (including catching a 20cm long shrimp and nearly catching a yellow garter snake). After returning to Kunming, we found a car wash for which Jiajia had a free ticket, and enjoyed a large dumping meal while the car was cleaned inside and out. A day of ups, downs, acrosses, insides and outs.
JD entered another competition yesterday. This one was a little more low-key than the Lego extravaganza earlier this week, but still fun. The task was to make a collage featuring the cat logo of the sponsors plus something on the theme of the "UN International Biodiversity Conference" being held in Kunming later this year. This contest was a nationwide one, so we won't know the result for a week or two, but it was a fun event regardless.
JD took part on a huge Lego Competition this morning along with 43 other kids of a similar age. He got first place in the initial round ("Make your name out of Lego"), then made the tallest tower (though not the most stable, so 4th place there) and then came first again in the final solo round ("Make an amazing building"). Overall, a sensational first place! His prize was a Harry Potter Lego set worth 700RMB (£70), a certificate and a handshake with the head of the bank who sponsored the event. JD was gob-smacked, and we were pretty chuffed too!
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AuthorPaul Hider lives and works in Kunming (SW China) and regularly updates this blog about his life there. Past blog entries
April 2024
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