Qu China

Monday was the day! My first day of school - again! It started off strong - a 5 page paper and a 20 page reading assignment. Thus far, it's been quite good. The reading was interesting and had well thought out and embedded YouTube videos. However, the paper topic was so dry that if you were to touch it, it would probably crumble to dust. Vacation is coming in 16 more days! But unfortunately that means that I have to do 7 days of school work in addition to my normal school work. This wouldn't be so hard if the weather wasn't perfect, I didn't have such great friends, and if the banana bread in the oven would bake slower. :) Also, the secret is spreading. I told two other old coworkers today that China might be a possibility. This just starts to feel so real when I think about how close I am to going!

I've been watching a lot of RuPaul's Drag Race recently so please know exactly what's running through my head when it's just the phrase 'really, queen?'. Well, this is exactly how I felt today when I checked my email and saw a job offer sitting in there. I haven't even started my TEFL class yet and y'all are stressing me out about accepting job offers? Anyway, it seems rather legitimate. I'll be making more money than I am now (which isn't much, but is better than nothing), I'll get a housing allowance, and bonuses based on performance.  But it's nerve-wracking to think about accepting a position when you've never seen the building, never met the staff, and don't know exactly what you're signing up for. So queue my gut wrenched stomach not doing too well after my well-rounded dinner of Honey Nut Cheerios. So this job offer is for a teaching position (teaching English - let's just clear that up now. Apparen...

Today was another great day on the Qu China side! (on the life side, not so much. But that's not for this blog. ;) ) I had a phone interview with Shay from the TEFL Academy and I officially got signed up for my TEFL class! It will be online and 14 weeks long. I start on April 23rd. I've branched out on the number of people who know about my dirty little secret. We're up to three in my home life and four in my Winona world. So I guess at this point, I kind of have to put my full weight into it. I guess the only thing holding me back is my puppy. I keep thinking about how I would survive an entire year without her - but deep down I know she would be in good hands on my trip. Anyway. Back to relevant matters. I'm taking the longer version of the class which includes an extra three weeks for training teaching English to special needs children and business-oriented adults. I'm beyond thrilled to get back into school but I'm nervous because I've been out of ...

Welcome to Qu China! (For some help here, qu ( 去 ) means 'going to' - now go back and read it again.) They say the first step is the hardest - whomever 'they' happens to be. Yet, this first step wasn't that difficult at all. Quite frankly, I think it was probably the easiest part of the whole process. I received an email from Career China asking if I had any interest in a teaching position abroad and I didn't really know that I had replied (in all honesty, I was at Ben and Nikki's house and it was very late at night). Turns out that I did reply - and two days later, I had an interview date set up, had a fingerprint card in the mail, my teaching license submitted, and my old Alma Mater filling out paperwork. Tonight I had my first Skype interview. Tomorrow I have another with a different company. It feels to be flying, but I know that after the initial excitement, everything will die down for a while. In a few weeks I'll be starting my TEFL (pronoun...