Intrigue and Hidden Agendas in China!!

More than just Temples in China

  OK, before you start thinking that we have been thrust into a spy novel here in China, we haven't.  We just work at a school, like many of our teacher friends.  I swear to you that they should make a reality TV show about teaching.  It doesn't matter where you work, whether it is in the United States or in China.  The same types of things happen, because people are involved.  Man, I think that sometimes we would have been better off, if God had chosen Elephants to be the smart ones.  Anyway, here is a little bit of the intrigue that has gone on this week.

SCHOOL:  This week found us going along our merry way, teaching and going to school as normal.  Unfortunately, Taylor has lost her favorite and best English teacher this semester.  We have been waiting around for her replacement for the last couple of weeks.  Apparently he isn't coming because he cannot get out of his current contract until September.  Obviously this doesn't do Taylor any good.  After a couple of things that happened I had to finally step in and get involved.
  I am jumping ahead, so I will digress a little bit, because I need to give you a little bit of background.  If I haven't mentioned it before, part of the contracts that Cecelia and I signed included a provision that our children's education would be truly international and that we would be paying 20%.  I initially negotiated to not take more money and to have the school not charge us anything, but the school didn't want to do that.  So when we arrived in the fall our kids were to be placed in international classes where they are taught in English and then have a Chinese class as well.  Sounds reasonable right?  Well, it didn't work out that way.  Claire has pretty much an international education with a few shaky teachers, but with her we have had that in the past as well.  Poor Taylor on the other hand has been placed in a situation in which most of her core subject classes are taught in Chinese.  So, Cecelia and I have been home schooling her a bit.  We work together to do her Math and English.  She then had this wonderful English teacher that would do special projects with her and about 14 other students that speak, write and read English well.  She was happy and doing well, but then came the end of the semester and we find that we lost the great teacher.  Now I probably wouldn't have had a problem with the situation if they had a teacher ready to go when the semester began, but they didn't.  Especially in PYP, the teachers are told who the VIP students are and they get special treatment. We found out that Tay lost her English teacher because the school is servicing some of those VIP students and trying to implement leveled reading in first grade.  Taylor's old teacher is teaching one student for eight periods a week and then spending four periods doing reading groups for the higher level readers in year one. What set me off was that some grand kids of someones nephew's, sister's, cousin's, brother or something like that were admitted into the advanced reading group because they were VIPs instead of purely by their reading levels.  That was the straw that broke the camels back for me.
  You all know me, I am not one to just sit back and take things as they are if it isn't right.  So, I simply went into the foreign affairs office and calmly stated that I feel like my daughter is a VIP and that the school has violated our contracts.  All I requested is that we not be charged for Taylor's tuition, or to work out the problem in a timely manner.  I also mentioned that the cost of my services for all of the changes that they are making has just gone up drastically.  So much so, that I equated it to the amount of money that the parents of the VIPs have in the bank.  Now, I know that sounds like I am making myself more important than I really am, but I have spent a bit of time writing papers, sitting in meetings and discussing the changes that they don't really want to make, without any compensation.  I have done it because I enjoy working with a few of the people that are in charge of the project and I believe this school could really be better with some dynamic changes.  This school lives off of its reputation, but has lost sight of the fact that they are starting to get pressured by other international schools in the area.  Besides, Taylor's education and happiness are most important to us.
  The ironic thing, is that during my interview last April, the staff member that interviewed me was worried about me coming and wanting to make changes.  I told them then, that all I wanted to do was come to China and have an experience with my family and teach.  I mentioned that I would sweep floors for them if they wanted me to do that as well.  I was really looking forward to not having any extra curricular garbage.  I really don't know how I get sucked into this stuff.  I know that they say that your problems follow you wherever you go.  Trust me I have looked in the mirror, I really don't think I brought this one on myself.  I am just defending my daughter, isn't that what I am supposed to do?
  Well enough of that.  So now we can get on to the reason we came to China in the first place.  The culture and experience.  I didn't want you to get the impression that everything is beautiful through rose colored glasses.

Come on you have to let me share some golf!!!

ADVENTURE:  This week we had a pretty ordinary week, except I played in another Chinese golf tournament.  So, you may think of this as just another story about golf, but it has its pitfalls.
  I took the day off on Friday and went with my Chinese friend David.  We went out to a golf course near Xipiquio Mountain Park.  It was located in a city called Gao Ling.  The drive took us about an hour to get there, but was nice.  This was the first time I had truly seen mountains here in China.  Living in a giant delta, it is difficult to see anything taller than a hill around our home.  It was amazing  how quickly the mountains thrust themselves out of the ground.  One minute we were in a flat delta area and then the next I was next to a 2500 to 3000 ft. peak.  It was a very overcast and misty day so I didn't get an opportunity to see the place in detail.  Cecelia and I have wanted to go visit the Mountain Park they have there, but everyone says to wait for the rain to come first.  Apparently there are amazing water falls and streams there after the rainy season.  They also have the largest Guanyin Statue on mainland China.  It is even bigger than the one we saw in Hong Kong.

Confucius in the clubhouse, or is it Confusion?

  When we finally arrived at the golf course I was not impressed.  The entrance was not very nice and when we got to the clubhouse they were doing construction.  The golf course had been built in 1997 and  is currently being renovated.  The driving range is a platform with green mats on it built over the edge of a lake. We didn't get to warm up, but I wasn't sure that I cared to after seeing that you hit off the mats into the water and the balls float.  I guess taking a few swings wouldn't have hurt.
  After having a quick lunch of you guessed it, Chinese food we headed out to the course.  Out on the course my attitude changed completely.  The course was outstanding and very difficult.  The reason it was so difficult was that it was a mountain course with narrow fairways and lots of elevation changes.  On top of that I have never seen a golf course in which there are so many out of bound stakes.  I am not sure the course superintendent understands the concepts of using the appropriate stakes to define certain areas of the golf course.  Maybe they just ran out of red paint from Chinese New Year.  They had out of bounds on the edge of cliffs, separating fairways and encircling par threes.  There was one par three that had so many white stakes that I thought it was stadium seating for the crowd that was supposed to be there watching.  I only experienced the white demons a couple of times.  Surprisingly I played very well and had a wonderful time playing with my partners.  Apparently it was a team/individual tournament.  Our team played pretty well and in the end I think I shot like 76 or 77.

They tell me it costs about $150 to play here.  Thank goodness I got to play for free!!!

  Upon returning to the clubhouse I changed, took a shower and finally looked at my phone.  To my chagrin I had a number of texts from Cecelia letting me know that I needed to get to Guangzhou as soon as possible.  I had her ATM card and she had no money for the birthday party that she was going to in the city.  I was going to meet her after the golf tournament, but she needed money to buy the birthday present and to order dinner.  She was worried that I would not get there before the dinner ended.  I called her immediately to let her know that we were done and then we were leaving immediately.  To make matters worse my phone ran out of minutes while I was talking to her, so I could only receive calls and texts but not respond.

   I let my playing partners know my predicament and we rushed off immediately to the after party dinner.  Of course I wasn't going to be staying for dinner and I let them know that I would be catching a cab as soon as we arrived at our destination.  We were making good time and I was feeling like I was going to be alright, until we received a call in the car while driving.  My friend David then informed me that I needed to attend the dinner, because I had won a prize.  I still wasn't going to attend, because I figured that I would just have David pick it up for me.  One thing that you need to understand is that over the last few months I have been working with a couple of the Chinese businessmen in the area and have been very concerned about insulting someone because of not knowing the culture.  So, at a lunch meeting I asked my friend David to coach me in this area.  With that said, David looked me straight in the eye and said, "This is one of those times in which you need to attend, I will get you out as soon as I can."  I said alright and we made our way to the dinner.  It was being hosted in a grand ballroom of one the large hotels near our home.  Fortunately when we sat down I got a text from Cecelia saying that the bus was really slow and that it took her an hour and a half to get to Guangzhou.  The party had not started yet, so I figured I had about a half an hour to spare.  Dinner started with flair.

Now that is the way I like to start off dinner.  It doesn't help to absorb Brandy very well though!!

  There was a large ice sculpture for each table with sashimi covering the ice below.  We were served dinner quickly and then the presentations started.  The great thing about Chinese golf tournaments is that once things get going it goes pretty quick, unlike compared to the United States in which the dinner, raffles and speeches drag on for hours.  As the ceremony continued on they called up the closest to the hole, longest drive and the guys who had the best score for 9 holes.  I figured I was in the running for one of the back nine scores, since one of my playing partners was one of the front 9 recipients.  Finally all of the back nine awards were given out and I just figured I had won a raffle prize or something.  The last of the prizes were given out and they called two guys up onto the stage and gave them large crystal trophies.  I was starting to think there was a mistake when the music got louder and the announcer shouted out my name.  Apparently, I am the Champion for the year.  I was shocked and David was lifting me out of my chair and pushing me to the podium at the front of the banquet hall.  I made my way to the stage and there was lots of hand shaking, slaps on the back, picture taking and toasts with Brandy.  To tell you the truth I don't honestly know how I won, because I don't know who was keeping score.  Anyway, after leaving the stage there was much toasting at the various tables and many Chinese calling out my name and raising their glasses to me.  They also shouted something out in Chinese, but it happened so fast I can't rightly tell what anyone said.  In the end, I finally had a moment to sit down and David let me know that it was OK for me to leave then.  Before leaving I had David go with me so that I could thank his uncle and the directors of the tournament for allowing me to participate.  In a Brandy induced fog I made my way down to the street and jumped into a cab.  I managed to tell the driver on my own in Chinese where I wanted to go and off we went.  It took about 45 minutes to get to Guangzhou and I was thankful for the break.  It gave my head a little bit of time to clear before finding Cecelia and the gang at the restaurant.  The rest of the evening was spent sharing stories of the week and of my supposed victory.  I even drank beer out of the crystal trophy.  The trophy has some Chinese writing on it that is supposed to say Champion of the year, I just hope it doesn't say something like "Number one village idiot".
  The rest of the weekend was pretty quiet.  We just hung out on Saturday and then went to church on Sunday.  We had a very pleasant walk to church on Sunday and made a couple of discoveries along the way.  I have added them and the remainder of the pictures from Macau in a slide show at the end.  By the way, Taylor picked the music out for the show this week.

  Look forward to next week's blog, because I will be sharing stories and images from a magic kingdom that we will be visiting this upcoming weekend.  Until then, we miss all of you.  Weeks like this we wish for our friends and family at home to be around.  Thanks for all the prayers.