Elelator Go Down the Hole

There are a dozen things that I've thought "oh, I've got to post about this..." but I've been so busy with work that I haven't had a chance to. Plus, we just moved the past couple days, into our new place! Pictures are coming soon.

Right now I'm at an internet cafe near one of the schools I teach at; I'm surrounded by World of Warcraft players...haha. I've been teaching at English summer camps like crazy. Most days last week I left the house at 7:15 and didn't get back until after 10.

Saturday, I taught my usual classes in the morning, and then summer camp in the afternoon. After my first class, I had a 40 minute break so I went out to the lobby to buy a bottle of water. (I had been by the school earlier in the week and while waiting for a meeting, I watched 10 Chinese guys try and move this vending machine into the corner. Needless to say, there was a lot of yelling involved.) But the water at the vending machine was 2 yuan (about .30 cents). I figured I could save myself 1 yuan by going downstairs, so I headed out to the elevator.

On the ride down, I was the only person in the elevator, which is unusual. We went down about 4 floors when suddenly the elevator lurched--that is to say, dropped, about 3-5 feet. The lights went off, and I was left standing in the dark. After about 30 seconds, the lights flickered back on, and the LEDs indicating the floor changed from 5 to JU. I'm still not really sure what JU means, but at the time, it didn't sound good. After a couple minutes, the doors opened onto the 5th floor. At this point, the water upstairs sounded mighty tempting, so I headed back up.

Looking back on it, I feel as if I went through some kind of strange urban Chinese rite of passage. And I passed, since the whole experience was really quite run of the mill for me. I guess I just wasn't that surprised that the elevator would randomly malfunction and just perfunctorily drop me off at the next floor. It all happened so fast; I just shrugged and went back upstairs. Ahhhh...China, how we love you.

By way of news, we're doing well. Last night was our first night at the new place, which was exciting. Since Marilyn's done with her class, I'm counting on her to post up a nice 360 degree virtual tour of the place. English camp has been interesting; some of the students are angry when they find out I don't speak Chinese...but I've had some really neat chances to naturally share with the students some of my own story. I'm working up a rhythm on how to get the students interested; I've never played so much hangman or 20 questions in my life...