Busy weekend of grading...and a walk to Meilan Lake

Yesterday we walked to the campus for some take-away Cold Pot.  Walking home we saw a cart piled high with stuff.  We are frequently amazed at the things that people haul on their little carts or scooters.  So here is one example for you to see.

Before the sun set, we felt we needed to pull away from work and take another neighborhood walk.  This time we walked leisurely along the Ma Lu (river) and then extended a bit further to walk to Meilan Lake (near our nearest Metro station.  Our health app says we walked just over 4 miles.  It was nice, as I hope the photos can show, and the temperatures and gentle breezes were wonderful.

Whiteboard reminders and after school rewards.

Today was the 2nd Embedded Systems Technology (EST) exam.  We came into the classroom thinking we were ready, and Rod had planned a short review before splitting the class in half and having them take the exam in 2 classrooms.  But, I suddenly noticed that one student's data sheet (that Rod had handed out the day before and that they needed to use during the exam), had some extra hand-written notes on it.  A few other students had notes on theirs also!  Some students forgot to bring their data sheet to the exam.  That meant we needed to quickly print fresh, clean copies to make it fair for all students.  But alas, the office with the printer, was locked!  Fortunately there is a student class monitor.  He and his classmate offered to take one clean copy and find another printer nearby to quickly make photocopies.  While they did that, Rod proceeded to briefly review.  Copies soon arrived, and the class was split so half went with Rod to the room next door.  All the desks were cleared of notes and exams were handed out.  Whew!  Quick thinking and flexibility are essential.  :)

Before ending the class period, Rod wrote reminders on the whiteboard so the students would be prepared for classes next week, especially for a special lab on Monday and the EST final exam on Wednesday.

Well, after a "4-day" week of classes, we feel tired and in need of a walk and maybe a treat.  We enjoyed our walk very much and we also enjoyed sharing a hot fudge sundae at KFC.  Rod is getting better and better at ordering in Chinese!

Art, Flora, and Sports on the campus

When we leave the main building with classrooms, we cross a courtyard to go to the school cafeteria for lunch or to buy food or fruit or drinks or supplies in the small shops along the side of the cafeteria.  Immediately as you leave the main building, you can sometimes see displays or artwork.  On this day we saw some interesting drawings, some possibly like advertisement fliers.

There is also natural artwork, painted by God--
flowers!  Here are some blooming that I have also seen in my home state of Washington.  The pink one is an azalea.
We have also seen magnolia trees outside our hotel, which are also planted near CBU in Riverside.




And while Rod was working on an exam at his computer, I went outside for a break and walked around the school track.  Low and behold, I saw some of our students "shooting hoops".

Sharing Lilian's office

It is great to have colleagues and friends here and also to experience the culture together.  Here you see Rod and Dr. D. having a discussion.  You also see Darla and Jean.  Lilian has been so helpful to all of us, and while sharing her office with the professors, she also has students pop in for help or counseling.  Her compassion and wisdom in working with these students is so admirable!

Monday classes...sometimes more tired students...

Students sleeping in class have been a big and an ongoing problem.  Jean has tried walking around the classroom, gently tapping students on the shoulder to awaken them, but some are so very tired they just put their heads down on their desks and are pretty much "out for the count".  So, in one of the photos posted here, you can see Rod actively lecturing and writing on the whiteboard, and yet two students in the front row are asleep.

Another challenge is the varying levels of English among the students.  It is not always easy to tell just how little they are comprehending in a lecture.  Reading English is better for them but listening to native speakers or audio recordings and answering questions is very challenging.  And standing up to speak is very difficult.  One photo shows one of our students with his laptop on his desk--it has Rod's technical notes in English on one side and translated into Chinese on the other side of his screen. That helps him understand the notes but doesn't help him expand his English skills as much.

Dr. D. & Darla are now in our hotel!

Rod's dean came to teach the final 2 weeks of the Oral English class.  Dr. D. will change the focus and will be teaching how to give a technical presentation.  This is a wonderful time for him to get better acquainted with the students and observe ways to improve this "exchange" program for the future.  It also reduces Rod's focus to his embedded systems technical course for the final 2 weeks.  As we approach the end of our teaching time here, some grading has accumulated and final exams and final grades need to be completed very soon!

The day before was a very rainy day, so the blue skies in these photos are even more special plus the air is much cleaner after the rains.

Friday Adventures.

Today we tried yet another food option and also revisited our new Ma River walk.  The closest KFC is just about 15 minutes walk up the street our hotel faces on.  There is also a 2 or 3 story grocery-department store above the KFC.  Well, around the corner from KFC are 2 local food eating places.  We looked into one of them and a waitress immediately urged us to enter and be seated.  We had not yet decided to eat there and were a bit hesitant.  She handed us a menu in Chinese which we could not read. Rod told her that and she handed us a menu in English.  Even that was not self-explanatory.  But we decided to jump into a new experience and were seated.  We took casual note of what others were eating but failed to notice that all had "soup" on their table.  Fortunately, another customer seated near us, Yvonne, overheard us struggling to communicate and order with our waitress.  Yvonne, is Chinese but later told us she spent a year in Chicago.  Her English was very good, and an extra plus was that she had worked as a waitress.  So Yvonne, took pencil and menu in hand and mediated between our wishes and what was offered and we got our order placed.  The restaurant is a hotpot restaurant, which means all meals center around a hotplate (or 2) in the center of each table which has hot water boiling away with a soup base of your choice.  Then you select the meats and veggies you want to put into your boiling pot.  They also have little garnishes to choose from to sprinkle over your rice and cooked items.  We chose minced garlic, cilantro, thin rounds of red chili peppers, a peanut-flavored sauce, and green onions.  We opted for veggies in our hotpot which included potato slices, cabbage leaves, more cilantro, chunks of tofu, tomato pieces, and some onion.  As the pot boils and the veggies are soft, you select them and place them over your bowl of rice.  It was very nice and the broth in the pot only improves as it boils down.  So it was a fun food adventure...like unto what we enjoyed with Rod's colleagues years ago at SP in Singapore.