It ain't over 'til it's over.

This week has been a bit of a weird one for me. At the end of last week I was making the most of the high of sucessfully making it through a term teaching, and loking forward to being able to relax and plan our next adventure of travelling. However, the celebration was short lived, as it turns out I hadn't actually finished teaching (classic China, nothing happening quite as expected).

Friday afternoon I received a call from our agency telling me that I was now working Monday to Wednesday in two schools giving demo lessons. Oh. Never mind I had made exciting plans to go to the zoo Monday,  my teaching hat was apparently remaining firmly on.
I was told to meet Wendy outside our appartment at 8am Monday morning to see the schools and then Tuesday and Wednesday I would be teaching. On the bus to the first school Wendy told me a bit about what I was going to do; first she told me the schools were very far away (excellent) but it was the next thing she told me that concerned me most, apparently I was going to teach all the classes in one grade at a time in one giant room. This meant a "most fun and most interactive" lesson to a class of 400 7-8 year olds. Lord help me. It's hard enough controlling 45 of them let alone 400! The panic was definitely there but I resolved to take it in my stride as a good work experience. As it turns out psyching myself up was unnecessary as this massive 400 student class was a complete fallacy and I would, in fact, be teaching normal sized classes. Phew.

Monday morning was spent in two schools talking to the teachers for no real reason but at least I was done by lunch and could still keep my date with the zoo.
I expected the zoo to be a depressing and grotty place but in actual fact it was pretty damn good!  Spending an afternoon in the sun with good company and a surprisingly good selection of animals was lovely, it's always nice to visit places that bring out your inner child.

Tuesday and Wednesday morning were spent giving my demo lessons and, I must admit, it was fun! It's always fun being in the classroom but I'd forgotten how fun it is to see the children's surprise and wonder when you, a foreign teacher(!), walks into the classroom. It was a different experience for me because this time my teaching method was being directly scrutinised by a group of 20 or so teachers at the back of the classroom. A slightly daunting feeling! But it was rewarding and uplifting when the teachers came up at the end to praise the lesson and say that they now saw the benefits of fun and movement in the classroom to get students learning effectively, break through! Overall, although it was a slight anticlimax to have to teach more after what I thought was my end date, it was a fun couple mornings and just convinces me more than ever that teaching is something that I enjoy, and that staying in China longer is the right decision for me.

Plus only teaching two lessons in the morning didn't impact too much upon my day and is probably a great way to get me up and out of bed! You can never know what's going to happen next in China and with opportunities behind every door the drive to get up and experience as much as possible is important. Yesterday, after my demo lessons Jenny and I ventured out to discover the famous Shantang Jie (or street). At 7 miles long it was quite a walk in the heat but it's a truely beautiful road which, although being a touristic hub, manages to give the feel of 'real China'. 

Street stalls laden with fruit and vegetable, rails and rails of brightly coloured clothes, little antique stalls...it's an amazing area to wander and wile away an afternoon. After Shantang Jie had exhausted our interest (and I'd bought myself some more obligatory 'lounge pants', I refuse to call them gap year pants) we ventured off to find the Lingering Garden down the road.
"ANOTHER garden?!" you may be thinking,  well yes. Suzhou is the garden city after all, and in all fairness it was a beautiful garden. It's true they are all similar and its true there's only so many times you can marvel over a pagoda and 'grotesque' rocks, but for £2.50 it's a lovely way to spend an afternoon.

This time next week we'll be preparing to leave Suzhou to embark on the next stage of the adventure and I can't wait. It'll be sad to say goodbye to all of our new friends, and the Suzhou bubble has been fun, but it's time to move on to the next thing and to catch up with some familiar faces from Beijing. Here in China we never have to stand still, there's always some grand adventure just around the corner...