7 Days Off ZOMG!

Woohooo!! Passed through the storm, and now to reap the silence of its aftermath. The last three days have been crazy busy, an average of 9-10 hours spent at the school with hectic planning and lessons, numerous of which were cover classes so more difficult by virtue of zero rappart with students. We had a weird weekend. Usually, they're our busiest but because it's National Day [week] we had Saturday off (I had a 1h20m VIP) which was dedicated to planning. Then we had Sunday as per usual, Monday took on our Saturday schedule, and Tuesday took on a Sunday repeat. This meant we had 7 days straight of classes and prep in a row. Now it's over. Bless'edly over.

Tomorrow is rest and recooperation day for me, and then I'm off to Datong for 3 days on Thursday. The lads are hitting Dalian (Hong Kong of the north), Michelle is back in England until next Weds, and Camilla had to scrap some plans because of not being able to get in touch with her friend. She has also been on extra weird because there is a mouse in their apartment area. Apparently she has a severe phobia of mice. It bordered on fucking irritating because she won't go into their shared kitchen, and is afraid to sleep there. Whatevah.

I'm just happy this week (or 10 days) is done with. I feel mentally bludgeoned. Neither Alistair nor I could put together coherent sentences to combat Nick's oh-not-so-witty barbs. The cure and salt-in-the-wound was, of course, beer. But we got Nick pretty good by sharing an anecdote of him stripping and table dancing in a hip-hop place here in Tang Shan... for a bunch of cheering men. Katy, his lady-friend, thought that was quite funny/horrifying and pressed me for specifics (which I gave as a second-hand account) so the conversation persisted beyond Nick's control. Pwnt.

Datong in two days. Not sure how I feel about it. I just feel so battered right now that I'm not really looking forward to it. I know I'll have a blast, and again fill my camera. However, at the moment, I just want to vegetate for a few days and feel some sense of normalcy.

Apparently, Katy was telling me that a lot of the girls at the school are impressed that I'm doing these trips by myself, and that Alistair and Nick are somewhat envious. The thing is that I'm not doing these to be anti-social, but to lay claim to my own experiences. I love going out and just 'being' without accompaniment. Granted there's one person I'd love share every moment with, but given that that's a physical/geographical impossibility, I do my best to really enjoy myself and spread my stunted wings. I bungle most things, and botch almost all conversations in Chinese, but it's fantastic all the same.

So I'll be back on here with a dissertation on Datong and environs on Saturday. Hope you all are well, and adjusting to what I hear is a fairly chilly autumn back in Canada.