halloween in china

so so soooo very sorry for the time in between blogs. the internet at my apartment randomly stopped working (due to a broken modem) on wednesday night and just got fixed today. i have been in between cafes and restaurants using their WiFi and spending too much money on coffee, food and smoothies. can't complain too much :) but now it's back and i am catching up on my grey's, office, it's always sunny, etc!

onto halloween.

very unexpectedly, halloween was a HUGE celebration at Wunan. since it is an international school, they make a really big deal out of the holidays of different cultures, primarily american. the hall way was decked out in jack o lanterns, ghosts, spider webs and witch hats. i could not have been happier! i love halloween!

all week i taught about halloween! it was so easy. we sang songs about ghosts, and dressing up. i even carved a pumpkin for both my classes. they were amazed (sadly, no pictures. i was too busy sawing into a miniature size pumpkin, using an over sized knife :)

on wednesday, one of the parent's business put on a halloween extravaganza for my 3 year old class. this was the BIGGEST halloween party i have ever seen for children, even in america! it was so bizarre. i get a text from my chinese teacher the night before stating "tomorrow. dress up in costume. you will be emcee for halloween party. it is your culture and funny. give reward. let dance. let trick or treat."

hmmmmm....

alright.

so i am dressed up like this walking down the streets of china. you think americans have been stared at before? try wearing some ears.

and the party snapshots look like this.

party scene - all decked out. no joke - there were professional video cameramen, a DJ, treats and prizes galore. along with about 20 photo snapping parents.

boys of the 3 YR class.

my 2 little pumpkins. aaron and jiajia

rich and terry

then on friday - it was party #2 with the entire school. i got to spend the entirety of it with my 5/6 class. by the way, the foreign teachers (jacquelyn, gene and i) had to yet again put on another "show" for the school. 

this time it was full of dancing, singing, and ... a FASHION SHOW! haha it's my dream come true. i had my kids strutting their stuff to Michael Jackson's "Thriller" and posing like models. peace signs and karate moves were being thrown left and right.

after the "show" we took the kids trick or treating down Hengshan Lu, the road by the school. there were PTA parents lined up along the sidewalks giving out candy and just having fun.

 it was such a fun day to immerse the kids in a different culture's holiday. i wish america was more like this... maybe i will change that when i come back :)

& now for the cutest girl ever.

and my two cutie boys.

weekend and some sillies

played around on photo booth with the kiddies!

leo - mr. quiet

nicholas and xixi

mark, hong, me, leo

mark and bobo

overall - the weekend was a success! friday night, went out on the town with the gang to celebrate the 2 month mark in our adventure of a lifetime. saturday, relaxed and got some work done in the day time. that night, i went to alice and amanda's apartment with the gang again and played some games, had some wine,  and enjoyed a jam session by the ever so talented jake and shaun. love having sing-a-longs with the group. today, mac and i went to a starbucks and busted out the lesson planning for the week and then...

dun dun dun (scary sounds...)

came home to a kitchen FULL of GNATS. AAHHH! they have infested our drain. we have bleached them, we have used Raid... they are mutant! so gross... we are clean, i swear! after dealing with the gnat situation we visited our local Marks and Spencer for some inexpensive wine. OH and our WINDOW falling out in our kitchen and our STOVE stopping working... we needed some wine. it was necessary.

wine is REALLY pricey here! but this place has great choices at a great price. i also bought some amazing soup! or maybe it was mediocre, but anything remotely close to western food in china is amazing.

came home to an evening of wine, lesson planning and music.

this week is going to be crazy! Halloween festivities all week - lessons, programs, teaching... whew.

cheers to it being great :)

my morning and afternoon walk

I recently have discovered that instead of walking to the metro, getting on the recently ever-so-crowded metro, and then walking some more to work, i can walk the whole way and it takes about the same amount of time! I am trying to avoid the metro at all costs. As soon as the weather hits about 75 degrees here, the Chinese believe it's time to turn on the heat in the metro station. So, by the time I get there, I am already a little warm (and sweaty due to the humidity) and the heat is full blast. I can't breathe! I end up shedding any layer possible and looking like a wreck when I walk in to Wunan. Since the fall season has finally decided to show up here in Shanghai, I want to walk as many places as possible and enjoy the beautiful weather before winter comes.

Let's just say, I LOVE my new walking route to work. I pass so many little shops, restaurants and old, beautiful architecture. I walk down Yongjia Lu to Wulumuqi Lu (pronounced Woo-loo-moo-chee) Is that not the funniest  (and most fun) word to say? I always repeat it over and over to my cab drivers. They think it's hilarious! They have helped me perfect my pronunciation :) Anyways, I love walking down the street and seeing the Chinese culture in such a raw, free, and natural way. I see old ladies enjoying a morning walk, families opening up their businesses, people buying fruit and old men exercising. I am going to try and take pictures soon of these men :) It's too funny.
My half hour walk is accompanied by my iPod and my thoughts. I look ahead to my day and think about my future. Me. My thoughts. China. Wow. I just LOVE it. I know I say it a lot.

Tonight  - I am going to dye my hair, again. When in China, right?

glass floors & neon wigs

last week, although emotionally it was destined to be a failure, went great! i kept my head up and my heart open. i was NOT going to have a bad week, so i didnt. yes, i had some things go wrong in pretty big ways, i ended up in tears more than once, but you stop crying and you move on.

my school went on a field trip to the oriental pearl tower! field trips, no matter where you are in the world, are hard to execute! i knew taking kids on a field trip in china, where i don't know the language was going to be hard! i had my chinese teachers with me of course, but still. a little frightening. all went GREAT though! the bus ride was fun into pudong and i had a great time talking with veronica.

veronica!

xixi and april - the other 2 girls out of 3 in my 5/6 yr class!

 she made a great partner :) . once off the bus, it was into a crowd of thousands and thousands! i still have NO IDEA how no one got lost. not even once. we waited in line for ever to get into the elevator up to the top. we get up there and the observation floor is made of glass! i saw it and kinda freaked out! Yaoyao, the chinese teacher, looked at me and said "are you scared?" and said "yes..." the kids LOVED it! all of them ran up to me and grabbed my hands and arms and started laughing. one of my boys, JJ, says "Miss Jami, don't be scared. take my hand. i will help you." i loved it. he was so sweet! we played on the glass floor and laughed and laughed. 

so scaryy!!!

playing on the floor! 

a few kept jumping around me to make me more scared. oh it worked! i got off the glass and onto "solid ground".
also - fell asleep on the bus ride back to wunan, only to be awaken by screaming kids "Miss Jami fell asleep!!!!" my bus buddy Veronica was asleep too :)

group picture! loove these kids!!!

then on saturday i went to the shanghai jazz music festival in century park! its very possible it has been my favorite thing i have done in shanghai yet!!!
we began with a few drinks, lunch and quite an interesting time on the metro. we decided that since we were heading to a music festival, we might as well make music in the metro! :) we did our own renditions of: Hey Jude, Don't Stop Believing, Lean on Me, and Love Story ... to name some of our top hits :) (by the way american friends, i am now engaged to my friend jake, it was quite romantic and i was the one who proposed, to Love Story nonetheless :) hahaha anyways, as soon as we got to the festival our attention was grabbed right away to a row of short, neon wigs. they called our names, and we answered.

so... we put on the wigs and rocked out all afternoon and into the night. there were 3 different stages and we were able to get front row for them all. dancing, running around, singing, screaming, laughing.... using port o potty squatties... i hope i NEVER have to do that again. i love live music and being in shanghai made it even MORE amazing. that's all i could think about "i'm in shanghai. i'm in shanghai."
i love this place!! i am already ready for this weekend. we are heading back to the world expo for the last time. we are gonna make this one real magical :)

pink is the new black :)

becoming jami

"The only thing more unthinkable than 

leaving was staying; the only thing 

more impossible than staying was leaving." 

 - eat. pray. love. elizabeth gilbert

as my blog is titled, i have really learned what it is like to "become jami" this week. this week has been super trying on me mentally and emotionally. between my students, teachers, and boss stressing me out at school, to some things going on in my personal life, i have really been tested.
what. am. i. doing. here?

i know exactly why i am here: to become who i am supposed to be. to realize that i have more courage and faith in myself than i ever though i had. in order to do this, i had to do some letting go. i honestly don't think i have ever let go of one thing in my entire life. ok, backtrack, i have never let go of someone before. yes, this is getting personal, and no this isnt about my wonderful, oh so exciting china adventure, but this blog is also about growing up. learning.  i had to do one of the hardest things by letting him go. how was i supposed to be "me"? how was i supposed to live my life in waiting? it wasn't fair.
i am happy living here. i am BEYOND happy living here. am i happy about what (who) i have lost? no, not at all. i am scared. i am broken.

but this is only one section of my life that i feel this way. at least i am somewhere that helps ease the pain. that i can wake up in the morning and only be reminded of this pain until i reach the doors of Wunan Kindergarten and be hugged by April and Mark, or blabbered to in Chinese by Terry, snuggled by JiaJia, laughing with Rich, smiling with Xixi, playing trucks with Brandon and heck... even yelling at Eleven and Bobo. they are who keep me sane. once i walk back into my apartment, i realize my loss. i occupy my time by exploring my neighborhood with Mac: us gagging in front of the market, almost being hit by taxis, screaming with excitement at a Kraft Mac & Cheese box (which we bought) and struggling to buy fruit at the market (which is CRAZY cheap by the way, be jealous).
i will make it through this, because look where i am. what i am doing. i am following my dreams. i will be the happiest girl in the world...


one day :) and right now, i am pretty damn close.

exiting the honeymoon phase

my week off in china went great! jennifer was here and we were able to do everything touristy in shanghai that i could even imagine! i also got to sleep in everyday which was amazing, but i also had a horrible cold in which i infected jennifer while she was here, and now my roommate. living in such close quarters... they were destined to get it. i am still coughing, blowing my nose and exhausted... but life goes on. it's back to teaching 8 hours a day, 5 days a week, with no break until February... i can't think about it. it will drive me crazy! i get weekends off of course, but no big break. no thanksgiving, no christmas break. thank goodness christmas is on a saturday this year or i'd be working it.

i feel like i finally LIVE here. the honeymoon/vacation phase is coming to an end and reality has settled in. i work and live here. i work and live here. i am here a year. this is where i live now. some days i love it! i could not be happier! but some days i am also like, ok, i am ready to go home. those days are few and far between, but recently i have had those thoughts. i think it is because jennifer was here and that feel of home just felt so good. and now it's gone... i dont know when i will see someone from home again. my mom and sister are coming sometime, but it's not set up.

do not get me wrong, i love china! but i am a little homesick. i won't lie. i've heard the first 2 to 3 months are the hardest. i agree.

check out my flickr pictures. i was going to upload some on here but blogger is being lame.

temple time

yesterday Jen and I decided to jump on the metro and try to find a few Buddhist temples we had found online. this was a TRUE adventure, because other than knowing the metro stop, we had no clue where to go next.
our first visit was to the Jade Buddha Temple. As we step out of the metro tunnel, we have absolutely NO idea where to go. So, I called my friend Amanda and she got out a map of where we were. Thank goodness, or I would have had to try my less than beginning skills of asking "Where is the Jade Buddha Temple?" which i don't even know how to say at all, except "Zai na li" which means "Where?" Jade Buddha? That would have been in English... yeah, we would have been screwed. We finally found the street and proceeded to follow some other westerners closely, assuming they were heading in the same direction :) We walked through a pretty rural part of China. There were people pulling their children in old shopping baskets on the ground... really sad.
But, we made it!

reclining buddha- not THE jade buddha, but one of them

the temple

feeding koi for good luck

Then, we made it to Jing'An Temple, easily! Literally, it was right off the metro and we found it with ease. It was made out of BEAUTIFUL wood. I was so amazed!

Jennifer at the temple

HUGE silver buddha - my favorite of all!

In other news, my cold came back with a vengeance :( this whole time Jennifer has been here I have been blowing my nose and coughing hard core. i am not happy about it. i hope i am better before teaching because frankly, it really sucks.

it's chinese national day!

i promise you that i have not forgotten about you, faithful blog readers! this week has just been crazy busy with the end of month and filling out feedback forms for all my kids! (like report cards). i also worked 6 days in a row... whew. crazy! now i have 7 days off and i couldn't be happier. HAPPY CHINESE NATIONAL WEEK! i will blog some this week when jen is here about our adventures!

this girl comes in about 17 hours!!
eeeee! say whaaaa!