Christian Living
BOOK: A friend that STICKS¡ Chapters 1 & 13
1 A Heart that beats¡
Failures and foibles, single and over the hillS, unmarried, unemployed, almost on the street - - - - - all just don¡¯t look or feel TERRIFIC on a resume ¨C a resume of a life.
Have you ever felt like a loser? Well, I have. In fact, that was the sum of the titles my father gave me when I was in junior and senior high. And, in times of intense failure as a Christian single adult, I¡¯ve painfully discovered that there are many GOOD people out there who also see me as A LOSER.
Then again, have you ever asked yourself, ¡°What¡¯s it like to have a friend whose heart BEATS when I¡¯m hurting?¡± And, a friend whose eyes wont¡¯ turn and ears won¡¯t stop when I¡¯m at the bottom of my bucket?¡±
Then - - - there¡¯s Romona. Do you have a Romona friend ¨C or maybe two or three such treasures? Of course, when things just ain¡¯t goin right ¨C even just ONE Romona sure does make a BIG difference.
Romona has kept my story from ditching so many times when my candle was about to go out. Seriously, I¡¯m amazed that her heart is still processing my seemingly endless hurts! And that is why I want to share my sorry story with you - so that you can see what a true friend and encourager Romona has been to me.
Oh Oh --- First, I¡¯ll need to bore you with something¡ BUT, my email story does
begin at age 54. And yes, I¡¯ve got to give you a bit of my sorry story proceeding the not spring-chicken age of 54 - so you can catch the drift of my earlier emails.
To start with, I really must plod ALL the way back to the age of 27 when I received a B.A. in Elementary Education. At that time, teaching positions were VERY tight. However, after about a year of office work, I did teach in the Buffalo-NY schools for two years. Miserably though, due to the really rocky economic condition in Buffalo in the 1970¡¯s, during the summer I was warned by Human Resources that my teaching job would more than likely be given to one of the laid-off guidance counselors.
Sooo¡ I started a state-by-state traveling adventure financed by temporary office employment. Seeming to be going every place but no-place; in 1983, I
decided to get a graduate degree in Teaching English as Second Language.
And, on my graduate composition, I gave Jesus as one example of the point I was making (also Lincoln & Martin Luther King). When the head of my grad-dept flipped my composition onto the floor accompanied with words of disgust because he didn¡¯t like it - but with NO professional words of evaluation or suggestions for improvement - I LET him discourage me¡
Yes! In spite of his opinion, the grad-department head NEVER gave me one piece of criticism on how I could improve my composition, AND my grad-grades were GOOD ¨C but I STILL ditched. I dropped my dreams of teaching in my new field to look for a teaching position like the one I had before my grad-degree.
Thus, in 1985, I escaped to an escape-position. However, I didn¡¯t stay there long as that position required that I play football with my upper-elementary students, many of whom were junior-high age and stood over my head. And a few of these boys came from quite abusive homes. But most important of all, I ACTUALLY don¡¯t know how to play football and have no interest in learning. Sorry, football fans...
Amazingly, and I owe this to my God, I soon ended up taking several temporary and/or part-time jobs in teaching English as Second Language. At that delayed point after gaining my grad-degree; new jobs in my new field had diminished from LOTS to ONLY A FEW - and they were generally temporary and/or part-time. Reagan¡¯s economics had put muscles back into the US dollar, so many internationals who previously could have afforded to study in the USA, no longer could.
What to do now??? I decided to move to Denver where there were at least more opportunities in my field. I did get several part-time positions there and a great opportunity to teach part-time at an excellent university. However, I owed a large sum of money for my graduate studies, and it might have taken as many as five years to gain a full-time position at that university.
Therefore, since with part-time pay I hadn¡¯t even begun to make monthly payments on my college debts, off I went to a city in the southwest where, up to that pointy point, there had been plenty of employment opportunities. But, you know things DO change. I DID soon land a fulltime spring-1987 substitute position with a monthly salary of $400 at a mosque primary school. Well¡$400 just doesn¡¯t make it; so I also had to take a part-time evening position teaching English-language to refugees.
In May of that spring, a university in that city contacted me for an ESL teaching
interview. On the other hand, this interview occurred two weeks after I was hit
in the head and elsewhere by a pick-up truck that was moving at about 46mph, while I was waiting on the sidewalk for a bus. Yes, I WAS hurt, and a helicopter carried me to a nearby hospital. By the way, I DID go to the interview - but my interviewers considered me physically unable to handle the job.
Do I sound like a lucky dog? Woof-wof-wf¡. But ya know; in spite of myself - God BLESSED me! In the emergency room, I surfaced momentarily as I vomited into a hospital dish that a very kind nurse was holding under my mouth; and heard the surgeon marvel that there were NO broken bones. Yes, I had a broken rib and a broken big toe, but they don¡¯t count. The dark red-whack diagonally marked along one of my arms by the truck DID count - but no broken arm bones. And, the pickup didn¡¯t break one teeny-weeny bone in my knees; although as it swiped them - it left permanent scars on both. Moreover, the torn-up side of my face was superbly repaired by a good-Samaritan plastic surgeon ¨C even though I didn¡¯t have a cent of insurance to my name.
With all this blood, wouldn¡¯t you think I¡¯d have some surface memory of this accident? Well, I didn¡¯t and I¡¯ve NEVER had any surface memory of the accident - or its pain. But remember, the hit included my head; and when one considers that I have no surface memory of the accident, one might conclude that my head was THE or one of THE initial points of contact with the pick-up. YES! I probably had a head-on collision with a pick-up, and this did call for a brain scan - but the scan revealed no loss of capabilities. On the other hand, my accident lawyer arranged for a computerized brain scan - and this revealed that I DID have extensive brain damage; my brain was damaged from top to bottom and front to back. So on top of being already OVER a couple of hills, I had in a moment received the amount of brain damage sustained by the VERY elderly.
I wore a broken shoe to my interview at the university in that city and used most of my eye-contact efforts to keep the foot wearing-the-broken-shoe behind the other leg. As a result, since it probably would be some time before my interviewers would forget the sorry appearance that they had witnessed the day of my first interview with them; I decided to move on to a mid-southern city. There, at the neighborhood Baptist church, I met one of the three fulltime ESL instructors in that city¡¯s university having an ESL program - and soon had a part-time temp-position. After two quarter-term contracts, realizing that the three ESL teachers were probably there to stay for another twenty years, I decided to leave that university and get a fulltime position with Disney.
Therefore; I moved to Florida, got my first ever driver¡¯s license, bought the only car I¡¯ve ever had with the insurance money left after I had fully paid-off my
college loans, AND got a job with Disney. Should this surprise you? In a later
chapter, I¡¯ll tell you a little more about my brain damage. My eight-hour evening shift with Disney meant that I had to drive there in HEAVY traffic and leave in the dark when it was often raining HEAVILY. And, I found myself getting tired-er and tired-er after each work-day, each work-week - and even each day off.
To make matters worse, one Sunday after waiting until all traffic had cleared a church; I INSISTED on backing right into a basketball-hoop without looking and leaving the hoop¡¯s pole clearly bent-over - and a group of teenagers ROARING. I felt like a total JERK! Even worse, I became more worried about riding any further with ME - especially during the often dark and rainy ends of my eight-hour shifts. Added to this, one afternoon as I drove to Disney in the usual heavy traffic, I steered off the busy highway into a ditch because I thought I was going to rear-end the car in front of me. Sooo, I requested a seven-hour shift - and lost my job.
The loss of the Disney job initiated my return from Florida to my mother and sister in Saratoga Springs-NY via North Carolina and Ohio. I could have taken an office job at a good hospital in North Carolina, but didn¡¯t because I hoped my travel north would lead to a fulltime ESL position. Dream on¡ Well, as you can guess, it didn¡¯t. On the other hand, later to my dismay - I realized I could have taken that position in North Carolina and held onto it until something promising in ESL turned up. Thus, I kept my eyes open for another such office opportunity, but one like that NEVER again surfaced.
From cold New York State, I again made several attempted moves down South, but my post-accident mental stamina could never handle the hardships entailed in such moves. It was in Memphis-TN that I met Romona on one of these excursions. As a Team Supervisor in a large paper company, she became my temp-assignment supervisor. From Memphis, I journeyed to Virginia to what sounded like a strong teaching-possibility, but due to restructuring - materialized into NOTHING. Since I spent most of my time in Virginia unemployed; some kind Christians let me stay in an old house in their yard, so that I could save something from my sporadic temp jobs. Then I took a short teaching-trip to Taiwan in the winter of 1998.
From Taiwan, I backtracked to Chicago and stayed there until July-1998 before I returned to Saratoga-NY. From Saratoga, I again flew to Taiwan and taught ESL for a year in a Christian college (9/98-6/98). Please believe me! I DID ask God if I should stay there longer; and I¡¯m sure His answer was via my Christian dentist. The dentist¡¯s purpose in having me wait until he had finished for the day and then having me sit back in one of his easy-chairs was to persuade me to stay; he considered me to be his English teacher. From his perch over my
eyes, the Christian dentist asked me a series of questions; but suddenly
stopped asking - and assured me that I HAD to leave that position.
At about this point in time, I was beginning to think of myself as the Flip from Flop. Would my flips EVER stop flopping? Would I ever stop flipping? Would I ever stop being a FLOP?
Soooo in late June-1999 there I was, not only unemployed; but worse - a SORRY missionary returning to her mostly non-Christian family - for help. THANKFULLY, I was able to maintain periodic-contact by snail mail with Romona, and she was always gracious enough to give me another reference - and to encourage me.
Feeling a deep need for a strong Christian environment, I moved about a hundred miles to Syracuse-NY where I stayed at the YWCA until I was enough-employed to rent an apartment and join a mostly-black, God-hearted Church. In March of 2000 while still at the YWCA, I began emailing Romona.
Oh¡ And ¨C PLEASE don¡¯t go on a hunt to uncover the identity of any un-named or re-named persons appearing in my stories, since you might suddenly realize that some SO-AND-SO is actually YOU ¨C at heart...
Subject: Hi!
Date: 28 Mar 2000 (from Syracuse, NY)
Romona,
I finally discovered email at the library and now have an email address. You gave me your email address before I went to Taiwan, but I never used it there because my college didn¡¯t provide email for the teachers. I¡¯m now living at the YWCA in Syracuse and it looks like Syracuse MIGHT be a great place for me to do some more ESL teaching. However, I¡¯m in waiting-mode right now.
Karen Sunderland :-)
Date: 28 Mar 2000
Karen!
How wonderful to hear from you. I just looked at your address the other day and said to myself, "Self, you need to write to Karen."
I'm glad to know that Syracuse seems to be a good place to be. I saw some disturbing things in the news recently about Thailand and I thought about you. The "Y" seems like it would be an interesting place to live. When I first graduated from college and moved out on my own, I lived in a place that was
kinda like the "Y'. It was quite an experience. One that I will never forget,
especially the radiators that clanked and the huge cockroaches!
Things here are great. I'm being challenged and blessed in ways that I never dreamed of. God is so good to me. Bobbie is doing well, too. She's traveling right now in Maine. I'll tell her that I heard from you, because I know she'll be delighted.
Thanks for always continuing to think of me. Take care of yourself and I'll be in touch! Ciao, Romona
SUBJECT: Ah CHEW!!! (forwarded to Romona)
Date: 4 Jan 2001 (I am still in Syracuse)
Shirley and George (-members of my church in Syracuse),
My recent sneezing and shivering turned out to be a cold, a flu-like cold with sinus problems. With God's help, I¡¯ve been managing to keep-up on my hour-long daily studies of Chinese. However, today I got up with a headache and stuffed sinuses - AND the feeling that I was going to end up having to drop back into bed. I immediately took some sinus medicine that a new assistant at the freebie cupboard wrongly gave me; and it cleared my head - and my body was available for action. Then Christian radio comforted me with these words, "Do you have a problem?! God is going to take care of you.¡±
As I listened to a bible study while eating breakfast, I heard more encouragement. The teacher was unhappy about the many Christians who give up on what they know God wants them to do because of their lack of resources of some kind. The study ended with a song about being lifted on Eagle's wings. Ain't God wonderful!
I¡¯m going to have a telephone interview with the missionary agency on January 11th from 8:00pm to 9:00pm.
In the PRECIOUS LOVE OF JESUS, Karen
READER: You might be thinking, ¡°You applied to be a missionary? You¡¯re kidding!¡± Well, you¡¯ll soon see that you¡¯re not alone in this opinion.
Of course, the kind ex-missionary man that interviewed me on the phone explained that, due to my primarily short-term work-experience; I¡¯d need to get experience as a short-term (2-year) missionary before I applied as a fulltime missionary.
Therefore, in early 2001, I attended a short-term missionary conference. At this
conference, there were representatives from mission-fields around the world and several of these representatives expressed an interest in my joining them. On the opposite hand, the Director of the short-term missionary office and my group leader felt I was not a good choice. She communicated this by her disinterest in social conversation with me as we left a group meeting one morning and by only recording my 1974-76 teaching position in Buffalo-NY on my prospective missionary data sheet, since she didn¡¯t consider my years of temp-experience as employment. The data sheet and her opinion were what the evaluators used to judge my qualifications. So, I was rejected.
13 Licked by laundry¡ Am I an illegal alien?
Subject: WHAT???
Date: 22 Oct 2004
Romona,
This email has three references to attachments, but there are NO attachments. I¡¯ve included these references in case I need to submit the info in the email to the local authorities or to the Provincial office that takes care of visas. (8/30/04)
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MARCH-APRIL 2004:
I responded to an internet employment listing to teach English in a Medical College in China; the position required a teacher of: Conversational English, Oral English, and (English) Reading. SEE ATTACHMENT #1 APRIL 2004.
When the Supervisor of this position interviewed me on the telephone, I read the above course-titles to her and asked if I might be assigned any other courses. She answered that the only other course I might teach would be a basic US History course.
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APRIL 2004:
SEE ATTACHMENT #2. The Supervisor emailed me that she wanted to employ me as a teacher, and she instructed me to apply for a China Z-Work-visa. The teaching position at the Medical College was to start at the beginning of September-04 and my tentative arrival date was mid-August-04.
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JUNE 2004:
The Supervisor emailed that her sister at a nearby high school needed an English teacher for the summer. As a result, I agreed to come to the Medical College early; so that I could teach at that high school for six weeks, starting the last week of June. (Note: I verified with Chinese visa experts that I could work at the high school whenever I arrived in China, even though my Z-Work-Visa didn¡¯t begin until SEP04.)
So, I arrived to the Medical College late the evening of Sunday-June 13. The Z-Work-Visa the Chinese Embassy had printed on my passport had an important note attached to it. This note instructed me to go to the local public security bureau of the city I would teach in within 30 days of my entry into China to avoid an illegal stay and deletion of my Z-Work-Visa. The local security bureau would give me a Residence Permit for Aliens which is required to maintain the Z-Work-Visa.
During my initial week at the Medical College as I waited to temporarily move to the high school; I showed the note attached to my visa to my Med College Supervisor and requested her help in getting to wherever I was supposed to go. However, the Supervisor assured me that I did NOT have to go any place because her office would take care of the matter for me.
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WHAT ABOUT THE IMPORTANT NOTE ATTACHED TO MY VISA?
Because I trusted my Medical College Supervisor to take care of the above matter, I forgot about the visa note and began preparing to teach at the high school. So, it wasn¡¯t until MID-TO-LATE AUGUST that I looked at that note again and realized that the Medical College Supervisor had not taken care of my visit to the security bureau, since she had never gotten me a Residence Permit for Aliens.
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AUGUST 1 (SUNDAY):
I returned to the Medical College and moved into my assigned apartment for the school year (I thought). The computer in my room was very old and broken; and after it had cluttered the desk for a few weeks, I carried it into the hall - so I could use the desk.
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AUGUST 3 (TUESDAY)
I met another new teacher, Becky, who arrived on about August 2. Our Supervisor, who didn¡¯t come to her office in our building during most of the August vacation, came in on August 3 to meet with us. I asked her what subjects I¡¯d teach; and she, for the first time, apprised me that I¡¯d teach American/British Literature.
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AUGUST 21 (SATURDAY) ENTER THE LAUNDRY:
I began washing my clothes in the 4th-floor kitchen washing-machine at about 8:00am-ish. The water in my building and the neighboring buildings was turned off at 9:00am-ish. At that time, my wash was approaching the rinse cycle. Therefore, the machine emptied the soapy water, but couldn¡¯t draw water in for the rinse; and so, the machine and my clothes just sat there.
On previous days when the water was shut-off, it wasn¡¯t turned on until noon; so I went to a computer cafe to do some work, since a working campus computer had not yet been assigned to me. Next, I had lunch before returning to my wash at 1:00pm; but I climbed the stairs to the 4th floor and found the 4th floor door locked. I then tried to unlock the door with my 4th-floor-key (which had worked when I first arrived), but the lock wouldn¡¯t budge. Finally, I asked Becky to try her key, and it didn't work either. (I think they changed 4th floor keys and didn¡¯t tell us.)
We sadly realized that the secretary/housemother/housekeeper had gone out and locked certain doors - which are not usually locked. Although the electric WAS turned on at about noon and my laundry probably finished its wash cycle at about 1:00pm ¨C I couldn¡¯t get to it to hang it on the clothes lines outside the 4th floor kitchen. Then again, at 4:30pm a Chinese student-friend suggested that, by then, my clothes were probably stinky.
Sometime during my wait for the secretary, I tried to call my Supervisor. However, I wasn¡¯t able to get her until 6:30pm. By that time, I was exhausted and it was too late to hang out my laundry and expect it to dry in that humid climate; therefore, I asked the Supervisor to ask the secretary to open the 4th floor door early the next morning, so that I could re-wash my laundry then. The Supervisor agreed to my request, and we said goodbye¡
Shortly after the Supervisor hung-up, the secretary returned and knocked loudly at my door. I opened the door and the secretary motioned for me to go up to the 4th floor. I attempted to tell her in simple English and basic Mandarin Chinese (which she, a speaker of her province¡¯s dialect, seems to be annoyed by) that I was VERY tired and just wanted her to open the 4th-floor door early the next morning. As I tried to refuse to go upstairs, the secretary¡¯s babbling became angry - and she pulled me out of my second-floor room, up to the 4th floor, and into the kitchen. I found that my laundry didn¡¯t stink, so my plan was to dry it in the secretary¡¯s housekeeping dryer. However, before I did this, I¡¯m sure I again called the Supervisor for permission to use the dryer.
I took my laundry down to the secretary¡¯s second-floor laundry room (which is next to my room) and put it into the dryer. As I put my clothes into the dryer, the secretary yelled at me and waved her arms in the air over her head. I had previously seen her do this mysterious waving, so I just ignored it. Instead, I turned the dryer on - but it made so much noise that I checked the machine to make certain that it was a dryer - and not a washer. Then I set the running time for about 15 minutes.
Soon my room-phone rang and it was the Supervisor. She relayed to me that the secretary had called her and told her that the dryer was broken. Hence, I took my wet clothes out of the dryer and hung them in my room (next to the secretary¡¯s laundry room). When I left the laundry room, the dryer was off.
As I finished hanging the wet clothes in my room and its bathroom, I heard the dryer start again. I thought Becky or the secretary must have started the dryer that time - because I DIDN¡¯T. Becky swore to me that she hadn¡¯t TOUCHED the dryer that evening, so I was mystified as to why the machine was running. As a result, I again called my Supervisor and she asked me to get the secretary on the phone. I ran down to the first floor to direct the secretary up to my phone, but she wasn¡¯t in her room - and the woman who was there couldn't understand a word I said.
When I returned to tell this to the Supervisor; she had hung up - so I called her again to explain that the secretary must have stepped out. Not long after that, I heard the secretary return and the dryer stop. Then my phone again rang; the Supervisor relayed to me that the secretary told her that I had turned the dryer back on. Moreover, during this call or the previous; for safety reasons, the Supervisor emphasized that she didn¡¯t want anyone to use the broken dryer - AND I took her warning seriously.
Consequently, when I heard the dryer start up again shortly after we had hung up, I was VERY NERVOUS. Thinking that something or someone (perhaps the secretary) was a bit strange - and FEARING an electrical fire with no one to go to for help - - - yes, I AGAIN called the Supervisor. After the supervisor expressed her annoyance with my many calls; as she hung up, I remembered that I had set the dryer¡¯s timer on about 15 minutes, tiptoed to the laundry room, and quickly turned the dial back to 0. The dryer never came on again, and I slept peacefully. The Supervisor never did have time to listen to my story ¨C not even to the ending.
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THE VACATION-REASON:
Several days before August 21, a student noticed the bad shape the lock on my room¡¯s door was in. He reported this to the secretary; but she insisted that because the workmen were on vacation, the lock couldn¡¯t be fixed until school started. And; the last week of August, my lock completely stopped locking.
The vacation-reason was also the Supervisor¡¯s reason for the workmen not being able to begin the refurbishment of the two rooms on the third floor above Becky's and my 2nd floor rooms - until one week before school started. Then again, a couple, who are on the staff of this Medical College (and whose building is across from my building), claim that the workers¡¯ vacation-reason is an excuse. Truthfully, the refurbishment should have begun well before one week preceding the start of the fall semester.
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WATER SHUT-OFF:
From 8/1 until about 8/15, the water in the foreign teachers¡¯ building was shut off for only the entire morning and sometimes also the afternoon; and shutoffs involved all the buildings in the area of our building. Further, on water shut-off days, as a courtesy to the residents; there was always water in the early morning, during the midday break, and at night - so the inconvenience was not totally unbearable.
On the week preceding Saturday-August 21, a new type of shut-off began occurring in my apartment. I noticed that on several nights and early mornings during that week that the water was very slow and limited in amount. During these partial shut-offs, I¡¯d flush the toilet and find that there was no or almost no water in the sink for about 15 minutes. Still - - - it was do-able.
On Saturday-August 21, the night-time, partial water shut-off continued all day; but primarily below the 4th floor and in Becky¡¯s and my apartments. I couldn¡¯t take a shower that morning, since there was only enough water to spot-wash in the bathtub.
That afternoon, a graduate student visited me; as we chatted, he became a little annoyed with the ongoing flow of water through the pipe(s) in a hall-side corner of my room¡¯s ceiling. I explained that the workers (who had very recently begun refurbishing the two apartments on the 3rd floor) must have partially shut off my water and rerouted it so they could chop-up the above bathroom floor with pick axes. As Saturday-August 21 slipped from day into evening; my water supply appeared to be becoming progressively more limited, and the ongoing flow of water in the ceiling corner continued. Before he left, the grad student kindly let me know that before anyone shut off my water, my supervisor SHOULD have informed me that it was going to happen - and when.
That evening, I filled two large jugs from the first floor closet with water. On Sunday morning, I had planned to supplement my bathroom's weak water flow with this water, so that I could do a better job of spot-washing than I was able to do on Saturday morning. However, before I went to bed, the water flow was SO decreased that I suspected that the two large jugs of water might be my only bath-water.
That night, because I had no idea of how long I might not be able to properly wash myself, I couldn¡¯t sleep. Hence, I got up at 3:30am and noticed that it took 15 minutes for the toilet to flush. Further, there was NO water in the sink and only a little water trickled from the tub¡¯s spout - and there was no one to tell. The Supervisor had already become annoyed with my phone calls for help, and the secretary and I couldn¡¯t communicate.
Worn out and frustrated, I looked up at my ceiling and noticed a LARGE and unfamiliar-type spider on the wall near the ceiling, and I screamed. I screamed again when the spider scurried a bit down the wall. Wanting to get someone's attention - as I kept an eye on the spider - I rushed my two still mostly-packed large suitcases and my small blue suitcase out of the room, down the stairs, and piled them against the wall across from the secretary¡¯s office/bedroom door.
At 6:00am, the worried secretary came to my door. While she can be nasty (and sometimes for who knows what), the secretary does care about doing her job well and pleasing people. After she efficiently killed the spider, I flushed my toilet for her - and the secretary witnessed that it was flushing VERY slowly. Then I turned on my sink faucet so that she could see that it was releasing NO water. Seeing this - she scurried over to my tub, turned on the water, and was visibly displeased and surprised to note that only a trickle of water dripped from its faucet. About an hour later, my water was turned on completely - and this sort of thing has never happened again.
The workers started the 3rd floor renovation late and were questionable from the outset due to their taking it into their own hands to shut off my water without telling ANYONE¡
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VISITOR LIMITATIONS:
Many of the Chinese that I¡¯ve met in this city think that foreign teachers should be treated much better than my co-teachers and I have been treated here. These kind people feel this way because foreigners travel long distances to get to China and because our English language assistance is much needed and wanted at this time.
When I arrived in June, I marveled at the fact that none of the foreign teachers that taught here during the past school year were continuing for another year. Since then, I¡¯ve learned that their stay here was not pleasant.
Furthermore, for the so-called protection of the foreign teachers, our Supervisor doesn¡¯t allow students or anyone to visit us unless they present a student ID or other social security type ID to the secretary. Then again, the secretary often becomes visibly annoyed with prospective visitors, ID or not. My first attempted female visitor was a young mother I met on the flight to China; this woman actually got into an argument with the secretary over not being allowed to visit me because she didn¡¯t have her ID with her.
Brave students who have been blocked from visiting teachers sneak past the secretary and quietly up the stairs to the teachers' rooms. These courageous souls certainly have made life much less lonely here for more than one foreign teacher. One student shared with me that she considered the visiting rules for foreign teachers in this college and the neighboring schools to put foreign teachers in prison.
As much as possible, I¡¯ve complained about this to my Supervisor - but with limited results. Nevertheless, I¡¯ve made friends of all ages here and have invited anyone who wants to visit me to do so. I really think this is why I¡¯ve had and can continue to have quite a few visitors - as long as they bring IDs.
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MONDAY, AUGUST 23
On 8/23 as the refurbishing slowly continued, I decided to take the option of moving to a guest room on the other end of the foreign teachers¡¯ building - and I carried my things there with Becky's help at 3:00pm. I HAD to get away from the all-day pick-axing over my head because I NEEDED a quieter place where I could contemplate and face the shocking news that I had received that morning - that week would most likely be my last week at the Medical College.
On Monday (8/23), her first day back in the office; at about 10:00am-ish the Supervisor of the Foreign Teachers called me down to her office. Her opening comment to me was, "The English ability of the college students here is very high." (It may be high, especially in reading, but NOT in speaking. In fact, large numbers of the students here wish they could have more contact with foreign teachers than the little bit they actually receive.) Then she went on to say, "A teacher is now applying to teach English Literature."
To back her introductory hints, the Supervisor informed me that there were high school sayings about me. However, that was as specific as she would get regarding my teaching performance at her sister's high school. Moreover, the Supervisor made the following statement that she repeated more that once in her speech to me, "I have employed a lot of teachers in the past." (This is SO true as her teaching staff seems to be having a yearly 100% turnover.)
The Supervisor hires the foreign English teachers, but she is NOT a member of the English Department, and doesn¡¯t do well with the English Department Director. As such, she confidently informed me, "The English Department wants a Literature teacher, not an English as Foreign Language teacher.¡±
I¡¯ve noted previously that the Supervisor did not mention my teaching literature until after I arrived here, and then not until August. SEE ATTACHMENT #1 FOR THE DESCRIPTION OF THE TEACHING OPENING AS IT APPEARED AT THE TIME I APPLIED ON THE INTERNET.
The Supervisor went on to tell me that the high school I taught at during the summer didn¡¯t have any openings and then asked, "What other high school do you want to teach in?" She suggested the foreign language high school in the downtown. However, she emphasized that I shouldn¡¯t check with that school myself; she¡¯d check job possibilities there and pass the information on to me. (I think she gets a kickback for such references.)
Furthermore, the Supervisor commented that I needed to learn "the Chinese way
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God is Not Against You - He Came on an All Out Rescue Mission to Save You
...in Christ God was reconciling the world to himself, not counting their trespasses against them... 2 Cor 5:19
Therefore, my friends, I want you to know that through Jesus the forgiveness of sins is proclaimed to you. Acts 13:38
LEARN & TRUST JESUS HERE
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