Now that we've been here for over a year I feel like I'm qualified to say that October is officially our favorite month in Beijing. The humidity is over, the cold cold cold hasn't set in yet, and the slight breeze blows the pollution away for repeatedly blessed blue sky days! For us October held classes, work, the Chinese National Holiday, food poisoning, apartment hunting, and a growing baby boy!
A's work and my classes have been going well. A is so happy at his job and really enjoys what he's doing. This month they had an out-of-office day together with the finance department and traveled up to a farm/park/petting zoo/restaurant outside of the city and spent the day just hanging out together. Their end of year party is coming up and although A won't be playing "Chinese Name That Tune" again this year for the company's entertainment, he will be participating in a way that we'll be sure to post a video of later. :) My classes are good and I'm really enjoying my students. I didn't really post about it last year, but if you ever asked me about my classes 6 months ago I would have told you that my students were cheating rascals that infuriated me. Luckily, and surprisingly, I haven't had any problems with cheating so far this year which makes me really happy. I still have to tell at least 1 student every day to stop taking pictures of me on their camera phone...but besides that, it's going well. I only have 7 weeks left of teaching so we're on the downhill slope.
Chinese National Holiday is a lovely week in November that we get a whole week off - Hooray! Last year we were like, "what is this silly holiday?" but this year our attitude was much more, "Awesome! Chinese National Day again! Yes!" It's funny getting used to a new set of holidays, but it's also fabulous to get a break when you're not expecting it.
