Oh what a marvelously confusing day!

Today when I woke up I really didn't want to go in to school to 'work' today. Man am I glad I did! Today was possibly the coolest/funniest/weirdest/confusing/strange day I've ever had.

Phew... I'm still trying to figure out what happened today. Where to start?......

Ok, so I wake up and go to school like I normally do on Tuesdays, take the mini-bus to MTR and walk up the hill to the kindergarten. What is so strange about this you ask? Well when I arrived at school, the doors were all closed up and everyone was leaving or had already left. ??? Whuha? I asked, it's only 8:45am. Luckily for me, one of the teachers was still inside, and let me in. I asked in Honglish 'what the hell is going on??!?!' haha. She told me in broken English, that "Oh, today is play day" at least I think that's what she called it. I was like "oooooo...k. So where is everyone?" I found out eventually that everyone has gotten onto like 20 buses and loaded up to go to the New Territories for some 'field day' type activity thing where the parents all came along. So there approximately 1000 people on buses going to the New Territories. This is all fine and dandy, but WHY DIDN'T ANYONE TELL ME THIS WAS HAPPENING TODAY!?!??!?! Rushing around, the headmistress found me and told 'Oh sorry, I forgot to tell you about the play day today."

It's a good thing I was actually on time for a change.

So I loaded onto a bus, with very small seats I might add, and was off to some foreign land in Hong Kong, known as middle of ____ ____ nowhere. I had been to parts of the New Territories before, but this place was really really out in the country. On the way there I saw the large bridge going to Lantau Island, and the hugantic large shipping docks on Kowloon side. They are very cool, but it is lost on me how the heck they organize it all. It was about 45 minutes by bus to where we went (I seriously have no idea where we were). The driving skills of bus drivers here continue to amaze me. I didn't think I'd ever see the day 15 large buses almost fell off a gravel road into a drainage ditch. Luckily we didn't. Oh the other funny thing I was aksed was if I wanted a puke bag on the bus. Um? Is it going to fly? Later on I could sort of see why they asked.

We arrived at this desolate looking place called somethingerater country club. Hooray! There might be a golf course, ha, no. By country club I think the HKers mean big open field with somewhat natural grass. What ended up happening was all the kids and parents got into groups by age in the field and played games and scavenger type stuff all day. There was also a huge covered area so we could hide from the nuclear fallout from North Korea (haha, that's what I'm blaming the smog on)

I really wasn't asked to do anything all day, other than wander around, and take the occassional photo with some students. A couple parents who spoke very good English talked to me for awhile, but mostly I did nothing. Which is exactly what I wanted to do all day anyway so I was happy. The consession dude ripped me off I think, because the ice cream I bought cost waaaaay too much. He claimed to not speak English. Ah well. The rest of the day I wandered around some more in this 'field' till about noon, when the teachers attempted to gather everyone back into one group to head back to the buses. We left around 12:45 I think. The journey home was the same rollercoater ride, but in reverse.

Alrighty, we were almost back at the school, and I still really didn't know what was going on the rest of the day. No one even told me what the place was called we had just spent 4 hours at. I may never know. The head-mistress said something about Lunch earlier, but really didn't make it clear what she meant and where or how I was getting where I think I was supposed to be. Turns out me and 5 other teachers were going out for Lunch with the principal in Hong Kong Island! haha, I didn't really expect this. And we got our own bus to go there. Super duper!

We arrived in Wan Chai around 2pm, and met our Principal at some decent looking Seafood place. I have no idea why, but they all talked for about 5 minutes, and then it was decided the 6 of us were going to go somewhere else. Ok, do I have to pay? Is all I cared about. We walked down to the main level, and someone lead the way to a Chinese restaurant directly above the place we had just come from. I was aksed if I like dimsum, which I said yes to, and off we were. The restaurant was very large inside.

I can't remember most of what we ate (because I dont know what it's called) but it was very yummy. I had jellyfish, squid, pork, veggie things, and Chinese chips and pineapple sauce! mmmmm. Also I got to entertain all the teachers as they laughed at my English. Umm, hello? My English is ENGLISH! They find the language funny I guess. I also talked with the computer tech, the only other male teacher at my school. His English isn't too great, but we understood each other for the most part. One memorable moment was when he thought I wake-boarded instead of rugby. I don't quite know how he mixed up that one.

So the verdict is.... I didnt have to pay! Woohoo!

What a weird day. I hop on a bus to an unknown destination early in the morning with about 1000 people. I go to some field in the middle of nowhere. I get ripped off by the ice cream guy. I go for Chinese dimsum with the teachers and it's all paid for. My job is so hard huh?