The Chinese Man Who Played American Songs on his Harmonica

Today is Saturday, one of the long work days. I had to wake up at 8:20 so I could get all my hours in. Whenever I'm not teaching but working I'm supposed to be available to test new students, but mostly I sit around a lot reading. Caitlin and I started watching Wild China, a sort of Planet Earth like documentary on the nature of China- lots of Guizhou landscapes! Then I had a new class. I originally had 5 students on the roster, which moved up to 8, which is now 11. They are beginners, but they are older- around 9 years old. So they learn quite fast and understand things better- but there are some wild ones in the class. They seem to love games and things with teams so it should be fun.

 

After that I had nothing but TTO on my schedule so I decided to go to English Corner. English Corner is just a time when anyone can come to practice their English- so there are ages ranging from university students up to very old. It was fantastically fun! They asked us a lot of questions about ourselves. And we had everything from doctors to an engineer to young university students. There was a very old man there, who is over 80 years old- still coming to practice his English! He is amazingly interesting. He first learned English when the Americans were in China during World War II fighting the Japanese together. He remembers going to a church and learning American songs there. And guess what- he brought his harmonica along and some music. He played the Marine Corps March and Swanee River and Oh Susanna, it was great! He also told us about swimming in the lakes when he was growing up in Qingdao. I can barely imagine how different China was 50 years ago when he was at university. Another guy asked me for my opinion on the Chinese government, and we discussed our opinions on the direction the government will take. Everyone was very interested and offered to help or talk with us if we wanted to know anything about Guizhou.