OneWorld Now! -- Philmon in China

I'm Back

2009-06-29T16:35:00.001-07:00

I am back in America and I already want to go back to China. I things I would say I miss the most would be my friends.
In this year in China I learned many things. Two very important things that I learned were how to keep a room tidy. Another very important thing I learned was that in life everyday depends on you, while in China I learned that I make my own environment. If you go to a foreign county it doesn’t mean you can learn the language. I learned if you don’t have a good sense of self –control you cannot accomplish anything. All in All this year taught me that everything my teachers and parents say about studying are true: everything depends on self control and hard work. Also something that I got better at in China is communicating with people, being dropped into a new environment with few friends forced to active in making friends and talking with people.
I want to thank Oneworld Now! for providing with the opportunity to go to China, I am forever grateful.
For the people who read my blog ,thank you

hey

2009-04-22T08:34:00.000-07:00

Life has been great. Volunteering at the elementary school has been really fun. I have been learning a lot about elementary schoolers in China. All the kids at the school all want my signature they think it is the coolest thing ever ( but not as cool as my hair).
Something very interesting happened today which kind of gave me a better insight into want my classmates are think and feel.
At my school we kind of have psychology class. In this class we do activities that have to do with emotions and thoughts. Today we did an activity. The teacher asked us to write our five most things in our lives and then rank those five things by importance. Then the teacher called on some people to share. The first person got up and said ranked love and her own personal goals first ( respectively) and then put family at the bottom of the five. The next person the teacher called on said he didn't know. The third and final person also ranked family last and other things first. I feel when they say family they mean the stress put on them by family i.e. Parents . A huge problem is that parents and society put a huge amount of pressure on the children to study, so there is not a lot of time for individual hobbies. I know three students do not represent all of China nor my class but I think it is interesting how they ranked their own aspirations before studies and parents, which breaks from the wide-spread stereotype that all Chinese students care about are studies and they feel studies are most important thing. Today was incredibly interesting. This year has been the best year of my life.

life

2009-03-08T10:42:00.000-07:00

Life is a going really well. Next Tuesday I will start volunteering at the Gangdu Elementary School to help teach English. In China I am having wonderful I am incredibly to everybody like Kristin, Jennifer, Vincent, Kristian, Merriam, Mellisa, Nick, and supporters who could make this possible. I walk just about every where talking with people and thinking.one of biggest ways I have changed in China is view about having a structure and plan for everything.I feel really lost in my in thoughts about the future and the change that I want to bring to the world, after sailing in circles in my sea of thoughts, I realize am only 18 I can still become whatever I want. Its okay to be lost for now.

Hey

2009-02-22T18:23:00.000-08:00

Life is good in china and I am getting violin lessons a teacher's wife at my school I am doing every Monday for 3 hours it really fun and I learning because I am learning how to play an instrument in Chinese. The way my Chinese teacher says I should learn how to play an instrument and the way my American book says is really different. In China students usually of my age usually start at a more advanced level than the my book suggests. It is really fun. Here is some pictures of China.

More pictures

2009-02-14T16:02:00.000-08:00

This of my classmates and our new years party.

My first Chinese New year

2009-02-14T15:39:00.000-08:00

pictures of me making dumpling on Chinese New Year. I couldn't roll my mine to well so everybody didn't really want to eat them but I thought mine were really good. Check my sliver chinese traditional clothes from Tang dynasty(唐装 ).

CHINESE NEW YEAR

2009-02-09T17:48:00.000-08:00

I just celebrated Chinese New year for the first time and it was really fun. I loved getting together with all my family members and eating dumplings. I think I ate like 50 dumplings in one day. They taste so good, the ones I made tasted okay, but they looked really wierd, everybody besides me was afriad to eat them. Chinese New Year is a 15 day celebration, full of fun, good spirit, and fireworks. I think in the past 15 days I heard and saw more fireworks than I had seen my whole life. The works usually start art like 7:00AM and go until 2:00AM it is amazing, for 2 weeks fireworks were my alarm clock and my lullaby. This was the best Chinese New Year ever. School has started and fireworks are over. The silence is a little weird.

Myths and truths about China

2009-01-02T16:14:00.000-08:00

Just couple things I wanted to say about China. Every body before I was coming to China was telling that I should buy everything in China, becuase everything is really cheap there, and I'm not going to lie I also had that impression also. We were all wrong everything is expensiive shoes, clothes, and electronics, though all made in China are all more expensive in China. The only thingsthat Ihave found to be cheaper here are electric and motor scooters. Also the price of fruits and vegtables are cheaper here. This realization came to me when I was talking with my host mother (in chinese), and she said in a chinese mind one RMB is equal to what one dollar is in my mind. When I saw a pair of shoes for 600 yuan I was blown away. China is going great I just a lesson on christmas for 4 different classes and performed chinese kung fu, gave a little speech, and read poetry in the new years performances. I will try to get up videos and pics soon. I hope every body had in the snow in seattle, no snow herebut it is freezing. A couple days of agoit was about -5 degrees F.Bye.

My Favorite TV Show

2008-12-06T00:24:00.000-08:00

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

2008-12-05T22:09:00.000-08:00

Hey

2008-11-20T04:24:00.000-08:00

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

2008-10-28T19:26:00.001-07:00

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

2008-10-13T19:34:00.000-07:00

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

2008-10-02T13:32:00.000-07:00

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

2008-09-20T10:33:00.000-07:00

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

2008-09-20T10:24:00.000-07:00

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

2008-09-13T15:41:00.001-07:00

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

2008-09-09T13:26:00.000-07:00

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

2008-09-08T14:43:00.000-07:00

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

2008-09-08T11:38:00.001-07:00

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!