My Favorite TV Show

BEIJING OPERA life is grand everthing is going really well. I want to share with my friends in Seattle something that has changed my outlook on opera.

birds on the mountain

Hey

I went to the mountains last week with my host family, it amazing, the country side and mountains are gorgeous. School has been going really well and language skills are improving everyday. I won my first game of chinese chess the other day, it was pretty cool. I went to for a run the other day looking for the super market where I could find this really good snack, that family sometimes had. I got lost and ended up running around for an hour and half before I got there, and when I got there the store was closed. It was still really fun talking to the local people and getting directions. I forgot to mention this in the other blogs, but I joined my school newspaper and got invovled in the clubs where I can teach english to my clasmates and they can teach me chinese, this was like in early October it has been going good. Life is good, I know because my classmates are always telling me how lucky I am because I only have one class at the school while they have eight. Talk to later and I plan to blog more often but the internet at home has been down lately and I haven't been able to get online very often. bye

Its all good

Everything in China has been going great. I am improving my Chinese and making friends. I just recently learned how to play Chinese chess, I am not that great but I feel really cool when I play. Even though I have been here for a month everybody still looks at me like I just arrived, but they are still very friendly and want to talk with me. For all the students at OneWorld Now! I was doing a little research for college and stumbled upon the US department of State web site for people applying to work in the foreign service, The US dpeartment of State says that Mandarin Chinese and Arabic are "super critical" languages to know and they actually add points to your application to work in the foreign service. So congrats your off to a good start. I have been thinking about how China's population is so large, and the size made me think that everybody no matter what race must have someone that looks like them in China, so I have been keeping an eye out for people would remind of home. So far I found Jennifer, from the OWN office, and couple of my friends from high school, I am keeping an eye out for Kristin.

Hamlet in Chinese

Yesterday in Chinese class I quoted the "to be or not to be that is my question" line form Hamlet but I said it in Chinese and I was proud of myself. Everything else has been going I have been putting a great effort towards practing spoken and written Chinese and I can really see the improvement. Just four days ago I talked with a group of my friends here for like a solid 30 mintues I was impressed with my improvement. Every night before I go to bed I try to learn new characters and I also have tests every week on characters. Now that I am in a routine everything is running a lot more smoothly than it was in September. The food is great, the people are great, and city is amazing especially 219 park it is really interesting. I will get some pictures or videos soon. Thanks again for all the surpport. Talk to you later.

School is Great

School is going great I have been told I am going to the best school in Anshan, China. Everyone wants to help me. I was given some really good advice and that was to just talk to as many people as possible. So I decided to get more involved at school.
My school has a yearly sports meeting that I participated in. I was in the track and field area, I ran 1500 meter race, 800 meter, and a relay race. It was fun we took the 4th place in the relay. For the 1500 and 800 meter race I brought back 4th for America (which is okay, but it was out like 30 people). After the race the racers put on one of the Fuwa (the Olympic mascots) costumes and ran around in them. I was Yingying. I will try to upload the video of me. I am making friends and its been going great. Just this week I was able to make a laughable joke in Chinese so that was great. I went to a public bathhouse for the first time, being the only non-Asian person there I got a lot of stares. Chinese class is going great, we starting to break the language barrier and I can understand a lot more of what she is saying in Chinese. Trying to stay healthy while in China so I run three miles a day at school and people run with me and talk me but they never the whole time they think it is amazing that I can run for so long. I will keep running everyday to stay healthy and talk to more kids at school. I am all about the OneWorld Now! intentionality.

Host city and family

It was a three hour plane ride to Anshan from Shanghai. At the airport many people were amazed to see an African-American one woman commented on my nose and hair. Here my hair is coolest thing ever. My host family is very kind and friendly. They feed a lot, always telling to eat more and more. My city is not very urban but you can tell from all the construction that it is growing very quickly. I don't think it will look the same at the end of the adventures in China. School is amazing and I am incredibly popular everyone wants to eat lunch with me and wants to help with my Chinese. I can only understand about half of what my teachers are telling me but it is okay. I will just keep studying. I can tell from school and home that there is a strong investment in cleanliness and being helpful. I will get involved in more clubs at my school and to get to know more people. I want to explore what my school has to offer. I was told that my school is oldest and best school in Anshan so I know that there is a lot to do. My Chinese classes are great, I never had a language class where my teacher doesn’t speak English.

AFS Orientation

I have arrived in China safely and I am greatly excited. I met many people from all around at the AFS orientation in Shanghai. It was amazing to meet people literally from every continent of the world (except for Antarctica). Something the really amazed me was meeting a person my age from Bolivia, who is directly effected by the conflict. He told me that he even faced a blockade getting to airport in Bolivia and that he had to walk 3 km to get inside the airport. He gave much insight into what is like for normal Bolivian. I loved the orientation and meeting people from different cultures.

In China

I am well in China and I love Shanghai. I city is large bustling with action even at 3:00 AM. I know because I can here it from my room. Today I will meet my host family In Anshan China and very excited to start my first step towards fluency in Chinese. Everyone wish me luck, this is a big leap.

Final OneWorld Now! Goodbyes

Philmon on his last day in the office, and in America, before departing on his year-long trip to China with AFS.

Two Days till I leave

I leave to China in two days for entire year and I am really excited. I have been looking forward to this day for about four months... or maybe my whole life. Senior year abroad is going great because of all the new challenges that I am going to face. When in China I will set goals for myself and I will achieve before I return. This will probably be the most life changing experience I will ever have.

Philmon Prepares

Philmon Haile is about to embark on a brilliant journey: spending his senior year of high school studying in China. This is added to the fact that he spent his junior year as a page in Washington, D.C. All of his friends and supporters and OneWorld Now! wish him all the best and are already expectantly awaiting news of his travels and experiences.

--OWN!