And then there was that time where my knowledge of hospitals came in handy

Seriously youku.com! Wtf. I was able to watch Doctor Who the other day, why won't you let it work nooooooooooow? >:-( I wasn't even finished with the episode....that's just cruel.

So yesterday this little girl comes into my office and starts to ask me in English if I will teach her class tomorrow. I look at her and ask if she's from class one, because, why yes I do teach class one tomorrow. Then she says, no, she's from junior three. Aha. She's from class one. The ominous class that I haven't met yet because of events on Fridays that just happened to coincide with my meeting them (such as police station and sports day) I got attacked by said class on sports day with a lot of "why have you not come to our class teacher?" "We really want to meet you!" Man, if this doesn't make me feel loved, I don't know what does. I have them third period and I'm actually a little bit nervous. These kids have the best grasp of English in the school. I feel like I should prepare something special for them. However not having enough time, after last night's adventures, I will have to do introductions and questions for the teacher again. (Intros they love because we get to throw that ball around) I just don't want to let them down. I feel that my classes as of late have not exactly been up to their allotted potential and I know that they are expecting greatness. Living up to the expectations of children is one of the tallest orders anyone can ask for - I think.

So Wednesday I walked out to the gate to wait for my ride to Chinese class (i.e. the bus that will be the death of me someday) and I come onto a scene involving police officers, parked cars, and what used to be a perfectly decent bicycle. It seemed that one of the students had been hit by a taxi crossing the street on their bike. Granted I had just left a small group of students when I left the cafeteria only about 10 minutes before. I found the nearest english speaking teacher and drilled her as to what happened, what grade level, was it a boy or girl. It was a boy - luckily that ruled out my stalker girl - from grade two. Now grade two is not my grade, but I still love all these kids so my heart was pulling. I also didn't see the kid. He was taken to the hospital before I had come on the scene and no one seemed to be able to explain it correctly. Here was was opinion I got.......omg chinese people..... "He is feeling a bit dizzy, I hope he will live." WHAT DOES THAT EVEN MEAN?? Gosh Tina! The kids really didn't know how he was, or if it was serious, I kept getting different answers from people. So me and stalker friend decided to go and visit him yesterday after school because he is a classmate of hers. We brought him some candy.

When we got to the hospital, she found that it was much bigger and more confusing than she remembered. Luckily...there was English and chinese. And not only english.....hospital english. "Radiology area, Out Patient Ward, Internal Medicine, Radiation Oncology ward (def not there) Surgery" I was back home. You would have thought I had worked there, I walked with purpose to the area that I figured he would be (Internal Patients) up to the 5th floor (peds). She asked me why we were going to the baby area and I told her it was because pedeatrics was for any kid under 18 - which she refused to believe me. When we got to peds we found that, no in fact he was in the out patient are, in the other building. So back down the stairs we went. When we came to the elevator there were more signs in English. She said that she was adamant that he was on the fifth floor. Fifth floor said "Surgery ward/Orthopedics" I asked "Are you sure?" The students really had no idea what kind of shape this kid was in.

We took the lift up to the fifth floor and asked the reception nurse where the boy was and we took a left down a hallway filled with people in casts and have ligaments set back in place. The room he was supposed to be in was filled with men all sitting around eating boxed lunches. We went in and she asked them if the boy was there and they pointed to the adjoining room. The mother and father came out and said that he was sleeping, but we could go inside. This poor thing had deep cuts on his shoulder, his side, near his lungs, his knee and his hip. Apparently he had had surgery on his hip and collar bone and on his foot that was in traction (I can relate to that) My heart broke, this was alot worse than they made it out to be, and I think that Katherine was shocked as well. Her face dropped, she was expecting him sitting in bed, eating soup and to be back in a week's time, but here was her friend, laying in pain and seriously wounded. We were going to let him sleep and just leave the candy, but when we were turning to go the father came and told us that he had woken. When he saw Katherine he smiled a little, weakly though, but when he saw me his eyes went a little wide and he tried to cover his naked chest - to which his mother yelled at him for touching the cloth to his injuries. I knew he was embaressed so I asked him if he felt any pain and he said no (he was more than likely on Chinese morphine) and I told him he was very strong and that we were very worried. I told him that we would look forward to his coming back and then I told Katherine that maybe we should go and let him sleep.

His mother walked us to the elevator. I could tell that the poor woman was holding herself together for her son but she was shaky. I put my hand on her arm and had Katherine translate a little for me. I told her that her son was very strong and it was a very good sign that he was up and awake. I told her that he would be fine. She nodded a little and I think even if she didn't understand that us being kind and paying her son a visit was enough. Me and a very dejected Katherine got into the elevator and headed back downstairs. The poor girl was shocked. She said that she didn't expect him to look like that, like he was in so much pain. She felt like crying, she didn't understand why these things happen to good boys and girls and not to bad people. She didn't want to go home feeling upset. I wasn't sure what to do. So we walked in the nearby park. It was none other than the first park in Xin An that Benny took me to back in September. It was pretty and clean and we wandered around talking for a while. She told me about the boy in the hospital and how he sat near her in class and how they would make jokes and help each other with homework. Then I realized he was her version of my Curt -san when we were in Japanese class. I explained to her about me and my friend who was like that. (The subject of "romantic love" as she calls it always seems to brighten her up a little)

As we were walking and talking we came upon an area in the park where people were learning to dance. We decided that this would be the perfect thing to take our minds off of her friend being in the hospital. We decided that we would learn the dance moves. The funny thing about Chinese music is that it each has it's own complicated dance moves (sort of like line dancing or THE HUSTLE) each one is slightly different and I've decided impossible for a foreigner to figure out (especially one with two left feet) but we tried anyways - and we made fools of ourselves. But we had fun. We did this for about an hour, and after sweating our butts off and learning some sweet dance moves (that I will never remember) we headed back to the bus to go home. I treated her to an ice cream at McDonalds and I think she was a lot better by the time she left to go home.

I'm glad I saw the boy. If I hadn't I would have been worrying nonstop, but now I know that he will be okay. Waking up and talking is always a good sign. I do think that it will be more than a month before he is back, but I can't wait to welcome him back with the rest of the staff and the kids. Until then I will continue to pray for him as I ask you guys to do please.

Side Note: I just finished teaching my Junior Three (one) class and it went awesomely. They were attentive and they did what I asked of them. We did the introductions and English name thing and then I had them ask me questions. One sneaky little one named Sara asked me a question and then right after asked if I knew any songs. Haha. I've been teaching "Take Me Home Country Roads" to a few of my Junior one classes so it's been stuck in my head all week. So I cleared my throat and sang a shaky if not decent version of the chorus - to which I was met with a round of applause. Now these adorable kids applauded me when I walked in and when I left too. They're really good students, I just hope that I can live up to their expectations of an English teacher. P.s. This is for mom - They knew NBA and they were the first class to know our basketball team PISTONS. One had a newspaper and pointed out Chancey Billups and Sheed Wallace. Lol. Awesome. I was psyched. I think I'm going to go curl into a ball and study chinese and cry because I feel so loved today :-D.