The land of China.

I'm less than 3 weeks away for going away for 3 months.. It's getting hard to wrap my head around it. I got accepted for an internship in China to teach English to elementary school children, what more could I dream of?! I'll be living an hour or two outside of Shanghai (pronounced, shonghai) in a city called Wuxi (pronounced wooshi). I'm staying in an apartment in one of the experimental bilingual schools and teaching in the classroom as well as workshops afterschool and on some weekends. There will be a lot of opportunity for travel and learning from my experiences. I do have to admit, I was hoping for a more rural place for my internship. When they said Wuxi was a small city, I figured that's what I would be getting. I guess I need to start realigning myself with Chinese thoughts on what constitutes a small city, 4.6 million people! The only thought that came to my head when I heard that is how much I'm going to get lost. I am getting nervous, about the language barrier. The internship didn't require interns to know Chinese, they just wanted native English speakers to be able to teach. I got a little book to carry around with me to help, but I have a strange feeling I'm going to order my food wrong, a lot.
I had a dream last night that I was leaving for the airport, getting ready to board the plane, and forgot my camera. Some people may not think that's a big deal, but I LOVE taking pictures and would be so sad if I wasn't able to document this wonderful internship I'm about to experience. That will be the first thing I pack now!

On another note, I got asked to shoot my first wedding! It happens to be going on the day before I leave for my internship, but hey, what's a little stress to add to the excitement? I just got a new camera and I'm really happy with it. I've been shooting a lot and I love that I can actually see what I'm shooting because the review screen is so much bigger and clearer than my last one. I'm hoping that for the wedding it will be good conditions, but I'll just take it as it comes. I did the engagement shoots for the couple who is getting married and they were absolutely wonderful in front of the camera. They were cute and cuddly as though I wasn't even there. Hopefully the wedding day goes just as well!



photos.

     I have been experimenting more with lighting in my photos and I think I'm finally starting to get to a beginning point.. I think this picture of one of my roommates with lighting is one of my best so far. I'm hoping to get better and quicker at it, I'm not always going to have patient people waiting for me to move around my equipment and wait for me! It's also hard trying to be able to wait for just the right moment. Yes, I could get a fancy camera that takes 8 pictures a second, (too bad they're super expensive) but I've got to work with what I have. I think it's better practice for me and makes me really think about what I'm doing.

     I've been thinking that photography is really somewhat of a parallel to how I'm doing in life. I tend to take more pictures when my life is going well, and vice versa when it isn't. I'm not positive about this part yet, but I also think the types of pictures I take somewhat reflect how I am feeling and the phases I am going through, whether my pictures are of people or nature or something else completely. Hopefully the pictures keep on flowing!

"Life isn't about waiting for the storm to pass, it's about learning how to dance in the rain."

      I'm not sure what it is but as I was riding my bike to work the other day, something clicked, "I'm incredibly happy!" I thought. What? What was this random thought popping into my brain? Could it be from me riding my favorite green polka dot bike? Or the fact that I was wearing my bug-eye sunglasses? Maybe it was that school was finally over - It could have been all of them combined! Whatever it was, I'm glad it happened.
     I have been somewhat negative the last while trying to take pity on myself for this little mishappening or that, but really, why? I love where I am in my life and what I am doing with it. Yes little things may not go exactly as planned during the week but I wouldn't be the same I am today if those wouldn't have happened. Plus, I'm in a lot better mood once I can accept what's going on and know that my life is in God's hands. What's going to happen will happen, and I am extremely happy with the happenings.

Schooling.

I had a hugely wonderful opportunity to volunteer up at a school in Salem. I have gone up every Friday for the past 5 weeks and stayed throughout the whole day interacting with the children and observing the teacher and her teaching methods. I didn't realize how attached I would get to these kids in such a short amount of time... I think I'm going to be a "crier" when I eventually start teaching, every time my class moves on I'll start bawling.

It was very different being in a classroom for a full day rather than just part of it. I also liked being in a different district where I saw some things that they don't do here in Eugene. The school in Salem was low-income, and so they are trying out a new type of curriculum. The kids get there every morning at 8am and go to "team time". Team time is when the kids get exercise in, helps reduce tardies, and gets the children awake for school. The kids then come into the classroom and eat free breakfast while the teacher starts up the day. The kids are in school until 4pm every day except for Fridays, when they get out at 2:30. It was interesting for me to see how the kids showed up tired, then got energy, then their energy drooped towards the end of the day. This is something that you don't get to experience when you are only in a classroom for a few hours out of the day.

The kid's personalities were absolutely ridiculous and I loved 'em to death. Each one had his or her own way of doing things, thinking, acting out, being kind, and learning; it's making me a little nervous for how I'll adapt my curriculum to fit each and every one of the kids in my classroom. It's somewhat of a good nervous though. I was waffling when I chose teaching as my major, I didn't know if it was right for me or not. After going up to Salem, however, I know that teaching is for me :)