Back to Normal

Dan and Danny left this morning sometime after I did, and I was instantly plunged back into my occasionally unrelenting (oxymoron, I know) schedule. And today was one of the unrelenting ones.

I've often meant to detail my schedule on here to give you a glimpse into my actual day-to-day life, and I suppose I have done that in snippets so far, but now let me just give you the timetable I follow every other Wednesday.

6:45am -- Wake up and get ready for the day, assuming I remembered to shower the night before (otherwise, the alarm is set for 6:20am)
7:20am -- Leave for Han-Min, on the expectation that it will take a good 10 or 15 minutes longer than a normal day, as I will have to fight through the morning rush all trying to get to Siaogang by 8am
7:50am -- Arrive at Han-Min, with any luck
8:00am -- Begin Morning English! I switch off teaching this with Alison and Maggie, and we teach 5 classes of a single grade every week; by the end of the semester, we will have seen every class once and we'll start over again. Today Maggie and I taught a new dialogue for our first "middle grade" group of 4th graders; first times always have a few bumps, but overall, it went pretty well.
8:30am -- Begin the awkward hour break before my next class, usually rendered un-awkward by a coffee/tea trip with Maggie and/or Alison. Today it went by really quickly, thanks to a few great conversations with both of them and the fact that we used the time to plan for our Halloween lesson plans. Going to be great, by the way!
9:30am -- First *real* class of the day; all adorable 5th graders with Maggie on Wednesdays.
12:00pm -- Lunch. My last class of the three I teach on Wednesdays bring me my lunch in the teachers' office, where I thank them in English and they, without fail, giggle a response and run away. Love it. :) Another highlight of lunch is always sitting and talking with Maggie, Alison, and Fiona, the other English teacher at Hanmin; our desks are close together and we just sit and chat and teach each other new vocabulary. It's fantastic.
12:30pm ish -- Lesson plan time! Alison and Maggie and I plan for next week
1:00/1:30pm -- Go home to pick stuff up if I have time (I did today); if not, straight to Sanmin for our massive LET-ETA-Fonda-Alex-Education Bureau people-Dr. Sun meeting!
2:00pm -- Here begins our meeting.
4:00pm (if we're lucky) -- Here ends our meeting. Nothing much of importance happens in between.
4:25pm -- We (ETAs) finish our post-meeting meeting with Fonda and Alex, and either quickly run home for stuff if there wasn't time before (this option would make us late) or run out for food at the local market and/or 7-11. Oh, the nutritious dinners we eat on Wednesdays...
5:10pm -- Chinese class begins. "Surprisingly," we make horrible students on these days...
7:10pm ish -- Chinese class ends.
7:40pm ish -- Rachel and I reach the gym (if we coordinated and have managed to conquer our exhaustion--which didn't happen today)
8:40pm ish -- Rachel and I head home, where I drop exhausted onto whatever flat surface I see first.

I know that, in writing this, I'm inviting comparisons from people who routinely work 14 hour days etc, and I have no answer for that. I'm just sharing my day.