The Last Five Years: Photo Challenge Day 2

Step one: Cut a hole in the box.

We opted to do History Day to get out of doing debates in English. Best. Decision. Ever.

Prom 2006: Who needs a date when you've got a Kat?

Yes, this is way old. August 2008. But don't we look awesome?

This is our Kat. We met her in sixth grade at the end of her driveway. Her new puppy peed at our feet and from then on we clung to her like moss. It's amazing to think that it's been over ten years since we met. We've stayed friends despite moving several times and are aunts to her adorable daughter Iris.

Five Years Later

Well, they say if you’ve been friends with someone for more than seven years you’re likely to be friends for life. In 2011, when we first wrote about Kat we’d known her for 12 years. This year our friendship hits 17. I think it’s safe to say we’re going to be friends for a very, very long time. Now, if only we could get her to return to California!

August 22nd, 2009. Should have shown this the last time. Here's that one time we were in Kat's wedding.

May 2010. Here's that one time we were at her sister Jennifer's wedding.

April 9th, 2011. Here's that one time we were all at Bry's wedding.

December 2011. Celebrating Iris' birthday and the fact that Kat is about to have Calvin who
I apparently have no photos with.

July 2014. That one time we were at Alicia's wedding.

August 2015. That one time Bry was too pregnant and had to fly back to
China and missed Mary and Aaron's wedding.

So. Many. Weddings. And mine is next!

July 2nd, 2016. Don't complain that it's a holiday weekend. It's Bry's fault.
And nobody stopped me before I put a deposit on our venue. 

The Last Five Years: 30 Day Photo Challenge: Day one!

It has been a little more than five years since Bry and I started writing this blog in the hopes of becoming wildly famous! Just kidding, we just really enjoy writing.  But five years ago we did a photo challenge and having recently reread those posts I decided that we should revisit them to see what has changed in five years.

Still displeased. (Right picture is in China.)

1. I feel special when animals or babies sleep on me or in my arms.

Five years later: Yeah, that's still true. These days it's just Alice that's in my arms, but how many babies and animals can you hold at one time anyway?

Update from several minutes later: Bry was asleep and I got to try to move sleepy Alice to my bed but she was waking up. She stretched in my arms and let out a giant fart. Mmm. Babies.

2. I love bad movies. I collect them.

Five years later: Who even really collects movies anymore. Netflix is cheaper. I try to buy movies- old movies I want to share with my nonexistent kids, though. Most recently I bought Beetlejuice and Hocus Pocus. 

3. I can't sleep with socks on. I just can't do it no matter how cold I am.

Five years later: Yes. Still the same. Who in the hell can sleep with socks on?

4. My usual nightmares involve losing someone I love or all my teeth.

Five years later: Yup! I've added two or three wedding nightmares to the mix, but my most common ones are about losing teeth. They fall out and I try to shove them back in and make them stay. Never works.

5. I usually make funny faces in pictures on purpose for fear of trying to take a good picture and it turning out horrible.

Five years later: See picture above.

6. I enjoy doing grandmotherly things like baking, crocheting and wearing silly sweaters.

Five years later: I recently crocheted an octopus. And I am currently wearing an ugly sweater that Steven gave me five years ago. 

7. I still have a crush on Shang from Mulan. 

Five years later: He's still dreamy. Last summer, I tried to convince David to buy Alice either a stuffed Shang and Mulan doll or Shang and Mulan Barbie dolls from the Disney store in the mall. He surprised us all by buying one of each Mulan. WHAT GOOD IS THAT???

8. I wish I were talented enough to be in musicals.

Five years later: Since writing this, I got to sing Carmina Burana. Not a musical, but it did at least fulfill a life dream. I also got to sing WAY more karaoke so I'll have to settle. I just can't dance.

9. I love writing poetry but can only manage to produce something I don't hate every few months or years.

Five years later: I am not confident that I've written ANY poetry since writing this...

10. Out of all the characters I learned in China, the only four I write almost every day are "I really miss you".

Five years later: I have taken and passed the HSK 1 (97%) and HSK 2 (89%). My Chinese is much better but I think even if I was fluent I'd still shy away from speaking to native speakers. I have much more confidence when shouting orders at babies or cats.

Always the life of the party. (Note: right photo is just after I'd come home from the hospital after birth.)

1. My most embarrassing moment is from 5th grade, and it involves watermelon seeds.

Five years later: Since the birth of my daughter, I can honestly state that I have had a new "most embarrassing moment."  It turns out that after you give birth, your body is a little empty but somehow still full of air.  When the nurse came to massage my belly to help my uterus shrink back down... she didn't massage so much as manipulate me like a tube of toothpaste... and squeezed out a long string of farts.  I had, thus far, only allowed my husband to hear a handful of those butt whispers in our 7 years together but this nurse didn't seem to mind helping us reach a new level in our marriage.

2. I developed earlier than most of my friends, in that I got acne when I was 9.

Five years later: You know, the beauty of being pregnant is that you get to experience the thrills of puberty all over again!  Only, this time, you aren't allowed to use any sort of medicines because those could hurt the baby.  My lovely Chinese coworkers were thoughtful enough to let me know any time my face erupted- which was constantly.

3. I fell in love with Mozart- as in the character from the movie Amadeus- and learned flute so I could be a child prodigy... because no one explained how that was supposed to work.

Five years later: It has now been 17 years since I started learning flute!  And also officially it has been the longest I have gone without playing.  I don't believe I've touched my flute since I left for China in August of 2013!  That is heartbreaking... I gotta break that sucker out and give her a whirl.  

4. My inability to master Mandarin Chinese is something that frustrates me everyday, and occasionally in my dreams as well.

Five years later: I've been living in China since August of 2013!  My Mandarin has expanded nicely, as well as my listening skills for bumbling through life abroad.  Still nowhere close to fluent, but happy.  

5. The fact that I never got to mourn the death of our childhood dog, Buddy, (who was put to sleep when we were studying abroad) will always haunt me.

Five years later: Gosh, and now my parents replacement dog for Buddy has died.  They rescued Shirley (an older dog) a mere two or three months after Buddy passed, back in 2008, and had her put to sleep a few months ago.  One more family dog I never said fare well to.

6. I feel extremely accomplished every time my cats come to their names- which is hardly ever, but still...

Five years later: I'm trying this out on my 6 month old... with slim results as of yet. She takes up all of my time these days.

7. One of the happiest moments of middle school was the realization that I could now check out three books per week, and I would, even though I could never finish all three before they were due back.

Five years later: The last book I read was by Frederick Douglass- nearly 6 months ago.  See answer number 6 for the reason I no longer read.

8. My first interaction with "race" was when I was 6 and a black family moved in a few houses away in my gated community- I was fascinated.

Five years later: I have become the very type of person I hate!  I point out all the foreigners to my husband- because there are so very few of us in our neighborhood in Shenzhen.

9. The first time I saw David, I knew he was going to be trouble.  Despite agreeing to marry him, he manages to cause a little trouble in my life at every given opportunity.

Five years later: Our daughter is also trouble.

10. I joined track to stalk a boy.  Stupidest. Mistake. Ever.

Five years later: Can't say I've done anything this stupid since then, except, perhaps, having a baby in China.

Being 26

The worst thing about being 26 wasn't the overpriced one bedroom apartment, the two part time jobs, the feeling that she'd wasted her college years or the fear that the online master's degree that she was getting would be useless: it was the sense of relief that washed over her with each paycheck. If there was one thing she'd gotten good at, it was being poor. That, more than anything else most days, disgusted her. To the best of her knowledge, she was working harder than her managers. If not harder, at least longer hours. By the time she would clock out that week, she would have logged 61 hours across her two jobs. 35 hours at one and 26 at the other. Neither enough at one job to get benefits. Some nights she only got 5 hours of sleep before getting to go back to work. And one manager had had the balls to call her a slow worker. The same manager that had hired her.

Except that instead of a dog, it's two cats. And instead of this ending as a teenager,
it's the song that never ends.

The hard thing about  being 26 was trying to make new friends after moving to a new area. She looked much younger than 26 and yet couldn't relate to the recent high school grads. She was happily living with her fiance and couldn't understand her coworkers relationship problems. She bought her hair clip at Icing but was spending her hours daydreaming about her upcoming wedding.

This is how I feel when I try to dress up.

The okay thing about being 26 was that she'd finally amassed so much time on the planet that she was alright at accomplishing many daily and work-related tasks. She was adept at paying her bills on time (as her high credit score would show) but her apartment complex's four setting washer and dryers alluded her (as her many shrunken shirts would show).

Story of my life.

The good thing about being 26 was the confidence that allowed her to solve problems for customers at work easily and got her two comment cards within two months of being hired (a thing that never occurred in her previous two and a half years) The confidence in herself that helped her tune out the criticisms that she knew to be false.

The best part about being 26 was accepting that she'd accomplished a lot in her short time and that it was okay that she wasn't "where she thought she'd be". The best thing about being 26 was to finally fall asleep next to the love of her life every night. Granted, some nights he'd beat her to bed by three hours, but at least he'd warmed it up. The best thing about being 26 was looking to the future and knowing she wasn't facing it alone.

We're in this thing together.

Blood, Sweat, and Beers

While sitting in on Bry's class today, I ended up writing a poem. We spent all of last week using Shel Silverstein poems to have our students look for the long 'E' sound, and I think you may find that my poem channels him just a little.

Blood, Sweat, & Beers

I exercise and exercise
And yet I never get thin
I swear to you, I exercise
This isn't just a whim

I do it in the morning
And at noon and every night
I wouldn't dare skip exercise
It's how you get thin, right?

I know you shouldn't skip it
So I squeeze in extra sessions
I'll do it nine, ten times a day
I never make concessions

I'll do it til I'm bloated
And there's no food in the house
I'll do it til I'm sad and broke
And can't do up my blouse

Oh, did I say exercise?
I meant to say "I eat!"
The fact that I'm not fat at all
Is really quite a feat

What Were They Thinking???

One of the best parts for me in each of my foreign language classes was getting to choose a new name.  The act of deciding upon a new identity was a ritual that began every beginning foreign language course, and as a student I enjoyed taking on my foreign language persona for an hour or two during the school day.  In Spanish class I chose the name "Rosana" which looked like a combination of my first and middle name: Bryana Rose.  And in French I chose the name Aïcha because I thought the two dots over the "i" looked cute.  On both occasions I chose my name from a list of names in my textbook and it was approved by my teacher.  

Last semester, which was my first semester as an ESL teacher, I struggled to take role every day and never had a solid system in place for calling on students when I wanted class participation.  "But, Bry-" you question, "why didn't you just call their names?" "Ah ha!" I say to you.  I cannot read their names, whether written or typed, as Chinese characters.  They must tell me, or write down, the pinyin (or Romanized) version of their name.  For instance, 王飞飞 will be written out as Wáng Fēifēi.  This name makes me giggle, and if you are anything like me then you think it also sounds like a name for a well-endowed Chinese poodle.

Don't have too much excitement there, Fei Fei.

This is the actual name of one of my students, as is 杨 义青 or Yáng YìQīng.  Now this name seems boring and typical to me.  It was the name of the first student in my morning class on Monday, so I used it as the example name for every other class when instructing the students to please write the pinyin of their names.  As soon as the students saw or heard this name the whole room would erupt into laughter.  I don't know if it is a silly name or if the students recognized this person by his name and thought it was funny that he was my example, but either way I knew there had to be a better way!  

Enter: the naming ceremony.  After a Power Point where I introduced myself, I had each student write out some sentences about themselves and then choose an English name.  (For some background information on the Chinese and their English name habits, go HERE.)Then they would read their paper to the class and afterward I would wave my hands and shout out their new English name like a game show host.  Fun for me.  Embarrassing for them.  (I'm getting my practice for being an awkward parent out of the way now.)  Now, herein lies the problem.  Some students chose names off my Top 100 Baby Names list, and some did their research and chose... uh... unique "names".

These are pulled from both of our classes, as we have 13 classes between us.

The following are people who chose Chinese sounding names.  Basically new Chinese names:

*Lanbo

*Kai Wen

*Maike

*Misaya

The following are girls who chose boys names:

*Allen

*Steven
*Clion (pronounced "Colin")

The following are boys who chose girls names:

*Jasmine

*Eren

*Aria

*Zoe (Chosen several times... pretty popular!)

*Mackenzie

*Lucy

*Ruby

*Amber
*Rose
*Sunny

The following are mostly boys but there are some girls mixed in, too. We've arranged these from what we consider most normal to WTF: 

*Bryant (as in Kobe)

*Akon (yes, the singer) (except that he can't pronounce it correctly)

Much like Ted Mosby and the word "chameleon", many Chinese students only ever
see words but never hear them pronounced.

*Eason
*Carte
*Jiessie

*Arno
*Talon (we actually know someone by this name, but it's still fairly uncommon)

*Eden
*Villa
*Sweety

*Minis
*Felix
*Jovita (Pronounced "Zovita")
*Brio 

Brio, what are you doing in America? We have class tomorrow.

*Khunnie (Pronounced "Queenie")
*Queena (Conveniently in the same class as "Queenie")
*Apple
*Summer (One boy and at least two girls)
*Honey

*Star
*Blue (At least one boy and girl)
*Green

*Rex
*Angel (That she insists is spelled Angle)

*Culle (Apparently pronounced "cool")
*Tony Williams (First person to choose a first and last name.)
*Sunshine
*Leaves
*Bamboo

*Night

*Monkey
*Wolf
*Pitbull
*Raiden

I wasn't sure how to pronounce this until I verified that this is in fact who he named himself after.

*Tony Stark

*Superman
*Little Eight
*Jelly

*OK

*Faker
*Fuck

This doesn't even take into account all of the multiples we have. In one class alone I had two Amy's and an Aimee. Luckily, two of them later opted to change their names (to Summer and Honey...). Like Western food, China just doesn't get Western names. But that's fine. Who doesn't love getting to try to call on "OK?" to answer a question. Or "Fuck?" for that matter. No, the real problem is that they choose names that are just too similar sounding for them to distinguish.    

In one class I have an April and an Avril. No matter how much I try to over-pronounce their names so that it's easier for them to hear, they never get it right. I also have an Ada and an Anna in that class and they can't tell their names apart. In another class I have the same problem with an Emma and an Anna. Sometimes, it's a bit of a nightmare. You'd think we could get away with skipping this whole "English name" formality, but the truth is that we can't pronounce their real names. It goes a little like this:

This might be an exaggeration. 

Ode to XAPI

Our school makes some odd choices. A month ago we gave and graded our finals. We input our grades and were done with it. Today, in the middle of Bry giving a class, our assistant rushed over to tell us we had to go fix something. I went with him. Turns out that something we should have/easily could have done a month ago we were never told to do. Then they waited a whole month to tell us. Then they decided it was really important to do by tomorrow... Part of it involved writing down our students' Chinese names... Yeah... that was never going to happen. But it prompted me to write a poem in my head as XAPI fueled my hate-fire (Can you name that movie?).

My patience is waning.

Ode to XAPI

This school is so frustrating
I could pull out my hair
Apparently there's rules
But I'm still unaware

They make them up randomly
Or so it would seem
Just to frustrate a foreigner
Trying to live out a dream

Pretty good, right? Now, how about some more frustrations. Yesterday, I had my first class of the semester. At the end, a student came up and started talking to me. His English was pretty good so when he followed Bry and I to lunch we weren't too annoyed. He proceeded to insist he buy us lunch. I didn't turn him down. I told him what I wanted and told him that Bry and I would share. Then he bought Bry her own food. Now, Bry and I have been sharing food on campus after we learned that there are no optional serving sizes and that somehow the Chinese can eat FAR more than we can in one sitting. When he sat that food down in front of me, I knew I would never be able to finish it. Sure enough, when I was done about half the food on the plate left.

Being in China can feel like this...

When I got up to go throw it away he said, "You are full?" I said, "Yes." He then proceeded to point to a poster on the wall and asked me if I knew what it said. I said no even though I am aware of what it stands for. He began to LECTURE me on how hard the peasants work to make the food we eat and that it shouldn't be wasted. I reminded him that I said Bry and I share and that HE had ordered twice as much as we normally eat. He said he understood and we dropped it but... What the hell??? Students and teachers either have a much different relationship here than in America OR nobody gives Bry and me any respect here. Bry and I used to go out with one of our professors for beer and I would never have thought of calling him out on any behavior (not that I found anything he did odd in the first place). Where's the respect?

So much of this.

Dirty Teachers

No, not like that!

Bry and I recently got our new schedules for class this semester and... well, I already miss our old ones. Now we're getting up for class at 8:10am four days a week. When are we supposed to shower???

Now I miss my cats.

Now, I know what you're going to say. Just wake up earlier and shower. Well, little do YOU know that between about 11pm and 6:00am our water shuts off every day. We're still not sure why. We have to plan our lives around this finicky water source we have (which is still better than when we ran out of propane for two days while Steven was visiting) which can mean that if we stay up too late we lose our chance to brush our teeth or flush. If we forget to fill our electric tea kettle, we end up spending the next day sans coffee.

I don't want to complain, but...

At least our next semester has finally begun. We get to begin counting down the days until we get to come home! About 20 week left. Once we've bought plane tickets we'll begin an official countdown.

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You're welcome.