I live on the fifth floor and I walk the stairs when I do not have a 20-pound backpack and five-pounds of groceries to carry. I left the school last night and had dinner with some of the other teachers. By the time I went home it was dark already. It is really hard to push myself to walk the stairs when the lights in the stairwell do not work. The lights on the first to fourth floor are all burnt out or the motion/noise detector is defective. I do get light when I pass by the third floor though because the detector in the third-floor hallway works like a charm.

I suppose I would not think twice about it if I were walking in a well-constructed stairwell but it is not. Let me start with the hand rail.The underside and sometimes the side of the handrail has this rough texture to it. It feels as though the wood was not sanded properly or something went wrong with the paint and it now has a texture similar to stucco applied in that prickly fashion. Then there are the actual steps. It starts out okay, Continue reading

Here’s the talk around the office. The government instructs that any classes with more than 30 percent of their students exhibiting flu-like symptoms should have their classes suspended for a week. The kindergarten has already suspended classes for one of their classrooms. Today, 16 percent of the elementary school is absent because of flu-like symptoms. What will happen? The teachers are having a meeting while the English teachers are in class in a few minutes, so we’ll find out what was decided after we get out of class.

I’m Canadian. I am taught that you should always put on your seat belt when you enter a vehicle. No one does that here but me. I get into the front seat of a taxi, I put on my seat belt. I’ve assimilated somewhat. I get into the back seat of a taxi, I don’t put on my seat belt. I don’t think I do that in a Canadian taxi either. It is very rare to find me in a taxi in Canada so I don’t recall if I do put on my seat belt.

Today, I went to extend my resident permit. I was going with someone from HR and two other people that needed to renew their permits, too. I felt like I was doing something wrong by putting on my seat belt when I sat down in the van but I can’t help from doing it. I’ve been in a few accidents, one of them in China, so I understand how precious the seat belt really is. I feel like I should stop wearing it so I don’t offend the drivers but Wuhan driving is kind of crazy sometimes.

We have school buses that drive students home after school. The buses are supervised by two teachers. I had to take over someone on Friday. I love the driver, he’s an awesome guy, but I get scared when I’m in the bus sometimes. I don’t know exactly how fast he was going but it felt like 80 kph because it sounded like the bus was working pretty hard but maybe it was only 60 kph. We’d hit bumps on the road and I’d fly half a feet into the air. I would flinch whenever he braked hard to avoid the vehicle in front of him or the person that was jaywalking across the street.

As I am tired, I am going to stop right here and go to bed. Good night. :p