Since I spend most of my time on campus I thought I should put up some photos of the college. Pingxiang college has about 10000 students, so it’s pretty sizeable! Here’s the front of the college.
It looks quite impressive. Interestingly this is not where we teach. Or live. Or ever really go. The middle building is the library and the one on the right is administrative. We think the left one is some sort of science or engineering block. And this is the view from the same spot in the other direction.
Not sure what the point of such a long drive is but I like to run up the steps and pretend I’m Rocky. While all the students take photos on their phones which go up on QQ, a sort of Chinese facebook.
There are 3 big teaching buildings where all the subjects are taught. This is building 1, with fancy lecture rooms and multimedia equipment that actually works.
I only teach here once a week but it was too hard to get a photo of building 3 without being trampled on.
There are quite a few sports grounds including an athletics track, basketball courts, tennis courts and badminton courts. Here are the freshers out doing their military training on the track last week.
There are also a few shops and stalls which include a post office and a ‘place where post goes’. I am hoping that’s where I can pick up things sent from England but so far the only thing that has happened there was an impromptu photoshoot for all us foreign teachers. Noone knows what has become of the photos that were taken. Yet another confusing happening to avoid dwelling on.
There are 2 canteens but we only use one of them. Here’s one of the students’ areas.
Fortunately there’s a separate eating area for teachers and we get free lunch. I think the food is alright though it’s always a bit of a gamble and I generally avoid the meat. And it doesn’t please everyone. Here is Terry, actually texting home in dismay at being served carrots, cabbage and some kind of ear-shaped mushrooms all in one go.
The college is built up into the hills so backs onto countryside. I’ve had a couple of exploratory runs and as soon as you leave the back of the college it’s just rural village and paddy fields. There was even a chicken strike. The close proximity of the countryside reveals just how quickly the city has sprung up; it was good to glimpse a bit of rural China.
Later on we ran past a man wearing only his pants, and I decided I had glimpsed enough.
Overnight a massive poster sprung up on one of the buildings. Only one line of English on the whole thing, but it was quality translation.
I think they try too hard.
