With his 188 cm above the ground Tom rules the basketball court in the University. Well, at least he would've if height was all that mattered. Everywhere he walks he also get a pretty good view of the crowds, which helps when you lose your friend and just have to look for the only blond guy among ten thousand people.
But being taller than the average Zhou is no laughing matter. Not when you are travelling by public transport, and the expected public is way smaller than you.
For when do you know that you're too tall for China? When your kneepad is flat after sitting in a bus or an airplane? When your elbow hurts after the shopping cart constantly bumping into you while passing down the aisle? When your head aches after crashing into doorways, signs, lamps, roofs, all of them hanging too close to the ground? When your feet are hanging out of every bed there is? When you want to buy clothes, but no stores have your size in shoes, and no sweater arms are long enough? When your best hope of buying clothes is to get them tailor made? If you cover at least three of these, you can surely, with Tom's guarantee, apply for the title; "Too Tall for China".
That said, the young generation in China seems to be much taller than their ancestors. Seeing grandparents, parents and kids walking side by side, it seems like each generation are growing over ten cm. If that's the case, we're looking at the Chinese National Team in Basketball with an average height of 250 cm twenty years from now. Good luck to the rest of the world! So, next time Tom comes to China, he'll probably feel a lot more normal. And maybe public transport is more suited for people like Tom. One can always hope.
Tuesday, 24 March 2009
Saturday, 7 March 2009
Our last semester in China starts...
Teaching has started. Students have found their pencils and sharpened them thoroughly. And we are ready to continue what we started last semester. Or, at least we thought so.
Much remains the same, Red Cross teaching started again two weeks ago and Christian's school has started. Well, Tom's school has started as well. But the difference is that Christian has started teaching. And Tom is still waiting. Tom went home from Beijing two weeks ago and thought that his teaching would start the following Tuesday. But no, on the contrary. When he finally got to Yinchuan, his superiors tells him that teaching is not in another two weeks. Kind of a bummer when you have your family visiting and you could have stayed longer in Beijing.
Anyway, after having been in China for over half a year, you get used to "expect the unexpected". So instead of asking why, Tom decided to tell you about the changes made to his subject.
It seems now that Tom has the same amount of teaching. But what used to be two classes have now doubled. So Tom is going to teach two lessons a week in four different classes. And where he had students who were randomly chosen last semester, he now has all new students who had to apply for a seat. Big changes. But foreign teachers in China are really popular. So I guess they had to be made to make more people happy.
So now he is just preparing for next weeks lessons, and waiting eagerly to hold the white chalk again.
Enough about the teaching, today is Women's Day, worldwide. And we would like to congratulate all women, young and old. We would not have been here if it were not for you! Thank you all for giving this world more than we men could ever give.
Last thing, thanks to family members for coming to visit during our holidays. We really appreciated it, and promise to repay you with dish-washing when we return to Norway. =)
Much remains the same, Red Cross teaching started again two weeks ago and Christian's school has started. Well, Tom's school has started as well. But the difference is that Christian has started teaching. And Tom is still waiting. Tom went home from Beijing two weeks ago and thought that his teaching would start the following Tuesday. But no, on the contrary. When he finally got to Yinchuan, his superiors tells him that teaching is not in another two weeks. Kind of a bummer when you have your family visiting and you could have stayed longer in Beijing.
Anyway, after having been in China for over half a year, you get used to "expect the unexpected". So instead of asking why, Tom decided to tell you about the changes made to his subject.
It seems now that Tom has the same amount of teaching. But what used to be two classes have now doubled. So Tom is going to teach two lessons a week in four different classes. And where he had students who were randomly chosen last semester, he now has all new students who had to apply for a seat. Big changes. But foreign teachers in China are really popular. So I guess they had to be made to make more people happy.
So now he is just preparing for next weeks lessons, and waiting eagerly to hold the white chalk again.
Enough about the teaching, today is Women's Day, worldwide. And we would like to congratulate all women, young and old. We would not have been here if it were not for you! Thank you all for giving this world more than we men could ever give.
Last thing, thanks to family members for coming to visit during our holidays. We really appreciated it, and promise to repay you with dish-washing when we return to Norway. =)
Monday, 2 March 2009
Sunday, 1 March 2009
Pictures from our backpacker journey
We decided to put up a lot of pictures in one post instead of adding to the numerous texts we've been writing. So here they are, directly from Tom's camera, some of the things we saw during our one and a half month through China. Enjoy!
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