Hitting the ground running in Lianyungang

Hey guys! I’m still alive.

I’ve been in China for 9 days now and finally feeling a little less homesick. Although everything at the moment just seems to be BEET BEET BEET in my brain. Anything that happens at work I just think, ‘oh well at BEET…’ ok, ok Claire. Just shut up now.

I’m slowly adding more to my apartment and I really like it there, except for the really ignorant neighbours who drive me crazy – keeping me awake until 2am and waking me up again at 6:30. So far, even ear plugs haven’t helped. Not sure what my next step is!

Thankfully the weather is getting warmer and I no longer need 10 layers on every morning. When the skies are blue it’s just amazing here. It’s a fairly flat city and although there are lots of buildings, there’s also huge empty spaces!

On Friday I had to go to the local hospital for a medical check, which I was dreading and also expected. Thankfully Jane (my boss’ wife) came with me and helped me fill out all of the forms etc. We weren’t there more than an hour but it was a weird process. So for those of you thinking of coming to China, this is how the medical goes…

CHINA HEALTH CHECK IN CHINA

1. Firstly, you need a copy of your passport, your real passport and 2 passport style photos
2. You need to fill out a form with all of your details, they scan it, re-print it and then ask you to sign it.
3. Then you pay for your medical. Mine was around ¥380 but was covered by the school.
4. Now you start the process.

• Giving blood
• Blood pressure, height and weight check
• Eye sight test (point the way the arrow is facing lol)
• ECG
• Ultrasound
• Chest X-ray

Then you’re free to go home!

Thankfully the hospital was only 30 minutes away by Taxi and then Jane took me to Starbucks for breakfast and we met our colleague there too. #foreignershangout

I managed to get a single seat in the Buddhist restaurant but unfortunately they were quite low on food! But what I had for ¥20 was still a bargain, and so delicious!

I had a little lesson in the afternoon (on Friday) which wasn’t terrible, but I wasn’t happy with it. Thankfully my lesson yesterday was 10x better and my boss said I had ‘hit the ground running’ !

Which meant beers for me! I went out with some new friends to watch football, play pool and hang out at this local bar. It’s strange, quirky but the weird thing is you can smoke inside! Aaaaah. My hair smelt so gross when I got home!! But it was a great evening out despite the horrific West Ham defeat.

Then I had one more teaching demo on Sunday, which unfortunately was a bit of a flop.

I expected the children to be more engaged and lively and everything I said just went down like a lead balloon… it was awful. I had no idea how to redeem myself!

I’ve borrowed some books from my boss’ mini library and plan on reading more over the next few days. I couldn’t bring any books with me!

Then my colleague invited me to dinner, and my boss and his wife joined us too! So it was a really great evening in the end. I’m sure they think I’m a total weirdo though…

On the plus side… I’ve figured out how to use the washing machine and my clothes are all fine! Hooray!! #smallvictories

xo