Wangxiang Mountain

Wangxiang Mountain is the mountain I mentioned I was going to, in the posts "A Beautiful Day, part 1 & part 2". Lishui, the city I live in, is situated in the mountainous region of the southwestern part of Zhejiang province. The landscape is beautiful here. I have views of the mountains, in the not so far distance, from my apartment and my office at school. I read somewhere that 88.5% of Lishui is mountainous and that the highest mountain in Zhejiang province is Huangmaojian Peak with an elevation of 6,329 feet, which is located near Lishui. The Oi River runs through the city, it's just across the street from where I live and work, and there is a very nice river promenade and park along a vast stretch of it.

Nature is abundant, everywhere you look, even in the middle of downtown, there are trees and birds. Now that it is spring, magnolia, cherry, orchid, and other types of trees are in bloom, making the city pink and beautiful. Birds are singing louder than ever and hopping around all over the place... have you ever seen cartoon birds that are small, round, and hop? Those are the types of birds that I see everywhere here, they are so cute!

Wangxiang Mountain is a relatively small mountain and is a lovely place to take a stroll and relax. The loud hustle and bustle of the 2.5 million people and their honking cars disappear, and a peaceful tranquility ensues.

An ancient gate at the entrance to the mountain.

The sun was quite bright!

The back side of the gate.

A vendor selling snacks for the journey up the mountain. We bought two types of pickled carrots, sweet and spicy. I really like pickled vegetables, they are a good snack.

Starting our way up the mountain path.

I'm not sure what this structure is for...but it's pretty!

Cutouts in the wall depicting animals and plants.

Carvings depicting Herons.

The path up the mountain.

There were homes at the base of the mountain.

Looking back towards where we started the climb from. I have a lot of practice walking up hills since I lived in San Francisco for many years...all that training paid off!

Up, up, up...

A pagoda, towards the top.

Detail of the pagoda roof.

A nice place to sit and relax.

This was the largest pagoda I saw on the mountain.

The area surrounding the pagoda.

A stone path.

I was told these are memorials to the workers by one person, another person said they are memorials to the soldiers. So, I'm not sure, however, it's a beautiful area and tribute, to whomever.

Another pagoda, in the middle of a pond.

It just so happened that the two children playing near the pagoda are students of mine. As I walked closer, I heard shouts of, "It's Jenny!" I'm so famous, everywhere I go people know me! Ha, ha!

Shadows on the walkway.

The bridge to the pagoda.

The pond had Koi leisurely swimming about.

A child atop a tiger statue.

The sunlight was beautiful!

Playing cards.

Looking down through the bushes towards the Oi River.

A twisted tree and another pagoda.

Someone had their comforter for their bed airing out on the bushes.

The path down the other side of the mountain.

This wall reminds me of a dragon's back. Perhaps it was meant to?

Wall cutouts on the descending side.

I like the juxtaposition of the rough stone and smooth concrete.

Me and Jina.

An interesting wall and gate around some homes.

Little pink flowers.

The gate we exited was undergoing some renovation. It's good to see that China and its people care about preserving their history.

A brick path.

A view of apartment buildings.

A church just outside the park, at the base of the mountain.

Kites for sale.

It was a perfect day! I plan on going back to Wangxiang Mountain to take some "proper" photographs with my camera. I only had my cell phone, so all the photos were taken with it. I think they look pretty good actually, however, they won't look good larger, or in print. Plus, I can spend hours taking pictures and for that I should go alone. Who wants to stand around and wait for me to photograph every inch of someplace!?! Well, perhaps only another crazy photographer!

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PS. Trees were being trimmed since it was the beginning of spring, and the weather was nice. I don't know if there was any advanced notice given, in the form of signs being posted or something, but I do know it isn't a good idea to park your car under the trees being trimmed! Here's a photo to prove that...

I bet the owner of that car is going to be a bit upset! Several other cars were completely covered. I didn't realize there were cars under the mounds until I saw this one!

Teaching Children.

My job is teaching English as a foreign language to children here in Lishui, China. I work, and live, at a really nice boarding school. Before coming to China I had read a bunch of horror stories about working for horrible schools who take advantage of foreign teachers, and living conditions that were deplorable. Neither happened to me... thank God! I have a great one bedroom apartment that is fairly new with modern fixtures and furnishings. It is extremely quiet here, in the apartment building, because I'm the only one living in it, all the other units are vacant. My coworkers are really nice, especially my "helper" Janice, she is the one in charge of making sure I am doing okay.

When I accepted the job, and arrived in China, I was under the impression that I was going to be teaching high school kids. Boy, was I wrong. When Janice took me to my classroom that first day, and I saw the little children, my first reaction was, "What the...!?!, Oh s**t!" I had absolutely no experience with children, let alone teaching children. That was then...

The children are ages six to eleven and they are super cute! I'm having a lot of fun, and some frustration, with them. They seem to like me; they scream my name whenever they see me, hug me, hang on me, make me little drawings, give me stickers and candy (and their colds!), show me their new pencil cases and headbands, and like to talk to me (whether or not we understand each other doesn't seem to matter to them). All in all, they are great. However, there are those few who ruin it for the rest of us!

Me and Laura. She was so sleepy and just kept hugging me!

Me and Wanda.

Me and Coco.

This is Eason. He is so funny! I asked, "How old are you?", his response was, "I am nine years old. No, I am nine years young!" As he smiles and puts his hands on his hips.

This is Chloe.

Here is Wanda again. She is super sweet! She sings the loudest in class, and is so off key I think my ears will bleed! I love her enthusiasm!!

Each class has it's trouble maker, some classes have a few, the frustration I have is trying to discipline those that don't pay attention, cause distractions, hit, bite, and kick their classmates, and in general are "BAD". I have tried so many different ways to get everyone to pay attention and behave properly in class; star charts for good behavior, writing good and bad names on the board, bribing with candy and small toys, etc. Right now, I am rewarding the three best behaved students with play money, they receive a dollar and when they have three dollars they can "buy" a piece of candy from me. It only works with the kids that are usually good, the bad ones are still bad! I make a point to praise the trouble makers when they are being good or have done something correctly, but it doesn't seem to help much. If anyone has even the smallest suggestion to help me out, please comment and I will try it!!

It is the beginning of the hiring season, in the ESL/EFL world, for the next school term which starts in September. I was just asked what my plans were and if I wanted to stay here for another school year in Lishui. My answer was, "Yes!", I really like it here so far and I really like the kids I teach. I will have the same students that I have now, so perhaps the stability of having the same foreign teacher will help those that have been a bit of trouble (many foreign teachers only do a year and then move on to other countries in order to travel the world). I'm excited about staying here longer, it will give me a chance to really get to know China and perhaps I can learn some Chinese (my job is teaching English, and when people see me they want to practice their English, so I haven't learned but a few words of Chinese so far).

Did you see that me and the kids are bundled up? Not only am I wearing my down coat, I have a scarf and a sweater on underneath! This was just this past Thursday, which was two days ago, and today the weather is beautiful. Check out the posts, A Beautiful Day.

Here are some pictures of the school...

The view from my office window of the front gate and courtyard.

It may have been sunny, but it was freezing!

These are classrooms. My classroom is at the end of the hall on the third floor.

These are also classrooms.

The hallway on the seventh floor where my office is.

It's raining, it's pouring!

Looking outside, from the second floor hallway.

The view from my classroom window, on the third floor. That is the pool in the middle, and on the right is the cafeteria and gymnasium building. The buildings on the left in the distance are the dormitories.

The sun is coming out! Can you see the rainbow above the mountains on the right?

The sports field and dormitories. The building in the back, on the far right, that you only see a bit of, is where I live.

Here is a video of my class and another combined, the other foreign teacher was out getting her residence permit renewed, so I had a large class. The class is working on some letters and phonics. I supplement their lessons with videos and songs from www.dreamenglish.com. Towards the end of the video you will notice some students holding up their books, they are mimicking the aliens in the video who hold up signs with the letters on them. See what I mean about the kids being cute!

This is a video of my class only, singing "It's a dog!", by www.dreamenglish.com. That is Janice walking around, you can hear her tell the class in the beginning that I am going to video them so they all need to sit up and sing.