TravelBio

  On our way to the holiday apartment we stopped for snacks and drinks at a local convenient store. As soon as I stepped out of the shuttle van and got smacked by a cloud of hot, humid air I was reminded just how far south we’d come; it was after midnight and the temperature was still close to 30 (over 80 Fahrenheit). After getting past the momentary heat shock, I looked around and noticed streetside food stalls, bright buildings, shirtless guys playing cards, and tanned skin—it seemed more like Vietnam than China to me. Streets of Sanya After the three day weekend for Labor Day in early May we had one more holiday before summer vacation: the Dragon Boat Festival. I’m still not sure what the holiday is for, but I ain’t complaining about an extra day off. Originally the vacation was scheduled from Thursday, June 9 th to Saturday the 11 th (then we’d be back for work on Sunday; those weird schedules again!). But as it turned out the main campus was hosting the Ch...

Damn Hangzhou traffic. Well really I should say damn Didi drivers! Didi is the Chinese version of Uber. Katherine, one of the Chinese counselors, ordered a ride with Didi to take Joanna and me to the train station Friday afternoon at 1:30. Our train wasn’t scheduled to depart until 3:30, so I assumed we had plenty of time. The key word in that last sentence is assumed. By the time the driver made it to the school and we were on our way it was after 1:45. Then he took the one road we should have avoided, the road that’s plagued by construction and always a parking lot. I kept thinking he’d realize the mistake and take an alternate route ASAP. There I go with my assumptions again. He was following the GPS directions, and my guess is he was a part-time or new driver who didn’t know the local area. Many Didi divers don't actually know the city well and just use their smartphones to get around Progress was painfully slow, and as 3:00 came and went we were still miles...

The first weekend of April was a holiday called Qingming, or Tomb Sweeping Festival, so we got an extra day off school. Traditionally Chinese travel to their ancestors’ graves twice a year to clean the site and honor dead relatives. On our school calendar it’s listed as a three day holiday, but two of the days are Saturday and Sunday, so one more precise. That happens often – holidays fall over a weekend, or we get an extra day off only to come in to work on a Saturday. Relatives honor the dead by cleaning tombs, saying condolences, burning incense sticks, and leaving food and drinks on the grave. Regardless of one or three days, I was happy with a break. I hadn’t left Hangzhou since I came back from the Philippines and wanted to get away for the long weekend. Ralph was off to Shanghai to visit a lady friend, Justin was being Justin (a home body), and Trevor had sunk into a prolonged melancholy characterized by a penchant for receding into his apartment on Friday eveni...

June is nearly here, and the semester is nearly over. My last day of work is the 29 th , and I’m scheduled to fly out that same evening. But before I move on to my summer vacation plans I need to recap what’s been happening this spring. My main counseling duties consist of helping students with university selection and applications. Those apps were finished by January, so I wasn’t sure what to expect once spring semester commenced. To be honest, not much else has replaced my admissions work. Springtime is recruiting season for high schools in China. Most schools screen 9 th graders (Chinese high school starts in 10 th grade) simply based on test scores; so basically the top high school in Hangzhou has first pick of students, the second best picks from the remaining candidates, and so on. Since our department is an international division, the process is different. Any student who wishes to go to an international department – or more accurately, any student whose parents ...