Lao Shi

Cool breezes bring construction grit and the stink of burning things.
I can now hawk up dirty phlegm balls like a true Shanghai-ese.
The temperature plummets, humidity edges towards dampness,
The bathroom becomes funkified.
The leaves brown with age and fall to the ground,
Autumn in New England gone toxic.
Bus exhaust billows in black eddies from twisted tail pipes.
I […]

Friday I had the strangest meeting with a principal I’ve ever had in my short career as a teacher.
On Thursday, instead of a faculty meeting, we were forced to attend the Chinese track principal’s retirement party. It was supposed to be a surprise, but you can tell from the guy’s face he knew all about […]

At a school in the States, dealing with a substantiated case of child abuse means getting social services involved and contacting the police. A support system exists that works with families both in and out of school to solve the abusive situation. Not so in China, where child protection laws are all but nonexistent, and […]

I added a photo album just for Company Sports Day. See more dorm girls dressed as cheerleaders, security personnel masquerading as bootleg Disney characters and watch what happened during the tug-of-war contests. Classic.
Click here and check out the right column.

Company Sports Day was to School Sports Day what Jefferson Starship was to Jefferson Airplane: bigger, easier to like and a hell of a lot scarier. (Give me “White Rabbit” over “We Built this City” any day.) At least I wasn’t hung over.
The little girl cheerleaders from school sports day grew up into the young […]

The School and Company Sports Days passed by in a cloudy, humid blur of bodies dressed in their finest cheerleading duds, marching to the tune of the Chinese national anthem on continuous loop. Truly these were days that will be remembered by all who attended for the rest of their lives as some of the […]

Look: I made a movie. Well, it’s not really a movie, but I narrated a bunch of still pictures at least. It’s about how Buddhists make offerings in a temple I visited downtown. I have a small collection of movies that are building… more is surely to come.
Note: Because I’m a cheap bastard I’m […]

A few weeks ago I posted about how the fire alarms at the school were tested.
Here’s an update: Not surprisingly, the tests weren’t accurate. The scheduled fire drill didn’t go off as planned, and an unscheduled one just up and happened on its own one day. Because the drill was unexpected, most of the […]

Autumn has blown into Shanghai, and the city almost – almost – smells livable. Not clean, but livable, though colleagues are getting sick left and right. In the daytime it’s downright hot, but there is a lovely cool breeze and nights are perfect. Unable to stand soulless Pudong, I visited Old City (Nan Shi) Shanghai […]

I left my keys in the apartment when I headed out to school the other morning. Close up of eyes widening in realization, mouthing out “ohhh shit”, turning around in slow motion to catch the door which had yet to settle in the frame, but damnit – too late. Doh!
After school I headed to Living […]