Monday, November 16, 2009

Tuesday, November 10, 2010


Mrs. Frank and I had breakfast at the hotel at 7:00AM, and were picked up in the lobby at 8:15AM for the short ten minute ride to The Century School. The weather was extremely cold, the wind was very strong and the sky was gray. We entered the gated school campus, drove up to the main administration building, and were greeted by Principal Zhang. We were each given a large bouquet of flowers and our reception was recorded by a TV reporter, two cameraman, two school photographers, and a host of other school officials. An electronic sign in the entrance welcomed me and Mrs. Frank and we were ushered into a large, third floor, conference room. There was a LCD projecting a large image of the flags of both the United States and China. On the large conference table was tea, water, fruit, and another large bouquet of flowers. Mr. Zhang officially welcomed us and gave us an overview of the school and the cameramen and photographers constantly took pictures. Mrs. Frank and I showed everyone a PowerPoint of AMSB and briefly described the program. We presented gifts from our school and then were given a two hour tour of the campus, which included the library, the main middle school building, the pre-school building, the lower elementary school building and campus athletic fields. The walk outside was very, very cold and windy. We ate in a special dining hall for lunch with about ten other school staff members. The food consisted of about twelve different selections of seafood, vegetables, and dumplings, but the most interesting dish was that of fried crickets…which Dr. D. bravely tried. During the school’s lunch break, between 11:30AM and 2:00PM, we drove to a local department store to buy a winter jacket for Mrs. Frank, who needed better protection from the strong wind. In the afternoon we observed two middle school English classes and then met with several of the better seventh and eighth grade English students in the library…doing a question and answer in English. Finally, we had dinner in the school’s formal faculty before returning to the hotel at 7:00PM. Mrs. Frank used the evening to prepare for an art class that she volunteered to teach tomorrow. Dr. D. used the time to update his diary and review the photos which Mrs. Frank had taken during the day.

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