Teacher Getting Hit By Culture: A Hard Day's Night

Hey All,

Yes it has indeed been quite some time since my last post and you'd be correct in guessing that I have been keep pretty busy here since the Fall Break which now almost seems like a distant memory. Though the school day might officially end by 3:05, my school day stretches on quite a bit longer than that. Usually if I can get out of school before 6pm that is a pretty big accomplishment.

You'd think that now having been in Macau for a while now, reality would have started to sink in already. It certainly has but there are still moments I catch myself thinking it's all still a dream. Each day is filled with so many remarkable things, whether at school or outside of it, that it doesn't seem real at times. I try not think about how long I've been here but simply to take things as they come. That seems almost to be the key to surviving first year teaching. With all that goes on each day I am always trying to learn from the experiences I have.

It has been a solid 4 weeks of school after the Fall break and things have been busy during the 4 weeks. This past week was report card week, where the general stress and anxiety level amongst the teachers was at an unprecedented high at the school. I have first hand experience now in telling you why I always noticed as a student, that teachers seeming to be a bit worn when report card marks and comments are due. This week was one of long evenings and tons of marking. I've actually been pretty good about keeping my mark up to date but having to squeeze in 2 unit tests this week was not an enjoyable experience for my students or myself. For the first time this year it seemed I wasn't the only person consistently leaving school after 5pm. There was definitely a feeling of "we're in this together" being conveyed whether that was through conversations, or putting in a group order for coffee from the casino/hotel across the street. I am happy to say that it is all over now and I have finished the brunt of report card business... for this term. Only 3 more terms to go!

Outside of report card stuff, things have been pretty lively at the school. I've had the secondary principal and head of school sit in on a few classes and that definitely made me feel like a was a student teacher again. Thankfully those particular lessons went quite well. The school has also thrown together a few family events, one being family community day and the other being Halloween night. I don't really know how it got started but it seems as though I am the backup event photographer when the other teacher who knows photography is busy doing other things. I got a chance to handle a Canon 7D, which is an incredible camera but also a bit intimidating having never used as high quality a camera as that before.

Halloween also signaled another dress down day for the students and staff. Showed up at school as a vampire that day (no not the Twilight type... ugh... more like Dracula) and I think the kids really appreciated it. It was also a perfect time to do some Halloween science demos. I first showed them the decomposition of hydrogen peroxide by a catalyst reaction (otherwise known as the Elephant Toothpaste demonstration) and the students were thoroughly entertained by it. What I didn't expect was how much they loved the second simpler demonstration where I "ate a candle". By the end of the day, apparently every student in middle school now knew me as "that teacher who ate the candle". I literally had some of my students running down the middle school hallway yelling "Mr. Liu ate a real candle"... hehehe.

As busy as school life has been, I've still managed to explore around a bit in my spare time. I finally got a chance to go down to a popular black sand beach down in Coloane called Hac Sa. Apparently the "must-do" while down at Hac Sa is to try out the Hac Sa barbeque. I had another go with the pork chop burger and it was AMAZING! I was actually do there twice within the span of one week. Once we took our youth group kids for an evening on the beach. I think they really enjoyed their time at the beach but I was exhausted by the time I got home. A group of teacher also went to a nearby place called Norman's Pub to celebrate Canadian Thanksgivings. Couldn't complain about the food (both quality and quantity) or the company and together we roused up a stirring rendition of O Canada. I also had the chance to swing by Old Taipa a few times, once to catch a bit of the Festival of Lusofonia which was a celebration of the Portuguese culture here in Macau (remember Macau was a former colony of Portugal). Unfortunately I didn't get to linger for long but it was still nice to get a small taste of an interesting bit of Macau culture.

Well that's about all I can tell you about now. Hopefully it won't be as long a gap between this and the next post but I can't make any promises. As before, let me leave you with some photos and a random story.

Getting Hit by Culture moment: When I first got to Macau, the change in currency was something to get adjusted to. 1 Canadian dollar is equal is approximately 7.5 patacas or MOP. So during the first few days, when I would eat out at restaurants, even the most simplistic meal (approximately 35 MOP) felt like a lot (which of course it wasn't). Over my time here I've definitely gotten use to doing such things as paying for groceries with $500 MOP but I worry that once I get back to Canada, I'll look at a price tag and say to myself "$100 only? Of course I'll buy that".