Photo opportunities

Today has been another long, but enjoyable day. I got a good eight hours of sleep last night and was ready to teach. At 8 a.m. I taught on "small talk," which turned out to be a good, practical lesson. About 5 minutes until the end of class the FAO's assistant came in and told me to continue teaching so someone could take pictures of me. A policewoman came in and took pictures of me as I reviewed the lesson. I hoped I looked glamorous. I guess they needed proof in pictures that we were actually teachers.

Then after class, Joelle and I were taken from the new campus to the police station for more pictures. It was really random and sort of funny, but it was rather nice to get off campus for a while. We drove to the station and walked in as officers stood around in nice blue uniforms. A man took us to a counter with a sign over it in Chinese and English. In English it read, "Crime Emergencies." So we stood there at the counter as the officer sort of looked at our passport, but didn't really do anything. Another officer took pictures of this event as other officers looked on. They just told us the pictures were for "a file." I wouldn't really be surprised if we see our pictures on some billboard, proclaiming "We welcome you to our fair city!" So that was a nice outing.

In the afternoon I had another class, which was also good. It is nice that the weather is still very pleasant. It was about 80. After class we went to English corner on the new campus. We were each surrounded by a million people again. This time is wasn't as suffocating though. The students are all very eager to learn English. At 5 p.m. the FAO assistant whisked us away and we stepped into the van we usually take, which has tinted windows. I think this is what it must feel like to be a celebrity...

Today is our teammate Jonathan's birthday so we're going out for dinner. I hope you all have a great day!