Happy belated 2011 to all! Apologies for the late blogging but with the New Year came freedom in the form of 7 whole weeks of Spring Festival holiday and I’ve only just got back from my first bit of travelling. More on these travels later…
Since normal New Year pales in comparison to Chinese New Year out here, there wasn’t much in the way of celebration. So the final year students held their graduation dinner on New Year's Eve. Jav and I were their Writing teachers, so we were invited and brought Chrissy and Terry along as our plus 1s. We were a little late after a lunchtime banquet with Bob and friends, and an afternoon of throwing the giant inflatable red donkey around. But we made it.
The students put on various performances during the dinner. Here’s one of my classes singing a song, in which nearly all of them ended up crying:
The monitor, Jen, couldn’t stop crying. Literally, couldn’t stop. I gave her extra help last term as she was worried about her English, and we’ve often gone out for dinner together, so I was sad to say goodbye to her too. But attempting to take a photo was probably a mistake.
Poor Jen.
Naturally everyone wanted us foreigners to sing, so we performed Auld Lang Syne. I imagine it was fairly disappointing.
Many, many photos were taken. Here I am with some of my students. Their enthusiasm makes me forget how bad their writing can be…
There is not much else to be recorded about the night, apart from the fact that it snowed a little at midnight. ‘A very little’, as my students would say. Of course, that didn’t stop them from getting very excited, or from building snowmen...
They certainly try to make the best out of what they have!
