Hurry Everyone! Smell Teacher Jenny!

Normally when I get to the Jin Yuan school, I head straight upstairs to get the flashcards for whatever class I happen to be teaching first. Imagine my surprise when in the main upstairs hallway is packed with kids and teachers... From other schools.

It's common to see a teacher with her class out in that hallway, since that part is more like a large room than a hallway, but when I bumped into Eric, my brain must have misfired, because all I could do was stare for a bit at all the people. I figured out fairly quickly what was going on.

A couple weeks ago (I forget if I mentioned it) I had to sit through the Chinese teachers at the different schools giving special classes for a teaching contest. Today they were having the finals, and the winners from each school were at Jin Yuan to give their best lessons. (I was wondering why Lucky had called me the night before to ask about some pronunciations.) Some of it was boring, but once I fought off the sleep (It was still morning, and I was sitting down. Normally I'm running around with the kids by this point.) I was able to enjoy the theatrics.

Nobody can make a lesson as dramatic as a Chinese English teacher. I swear they treat it like a broadway production. though I wasn't expecting it, I wasn't that surprised when Jenny came out coved in brown paint to help with the phrases "wash your hands," "wash your face," "brush your hair." She even took off her shoes to do "wash your feet." Then she would run to the kids so they could smell how clean she was. Before this, they even went so far as to show a video of the other teachers not wanting to play with Jenny because she was a "dirty baby." Their exact words. Dirty baby.

I love my job.