Poking the corpse with a stick

Passing through.

Well, here I am again. Two months have passed since the last entry. August in Chengdu continued to be grey and wet with rare sightings of sunshine. Unfortunately, sunshine often coincides with a hint of blue sky rather than actual blue sky because there's often a thin layer of cloud or pollution which admits sunlight, but not much else. When I saw some pictures of bright sunshine and clear blue skies in Beijing just recently, I realised how much I'd been missing such things.

We went to Pudong (near Shanghai) for the usual start-of-term conference only to find that returning teachers didn't have to attend the first day, which meant that I was able to go into Shanghai for the first time ever and look round. But because I thought I was going to be stuck in a hotel for three days, I didn't bother to take my camera with me. Of course, the weather was absolutely ideal for taking photographs.

And then it was back to school. This term held no surprises. The classes fall into the usual pattern, one being as thick as two short planks and the other being thicker. I've also been saddled with four conversation classes, but because I can't hold a conversation with sixty kids at once, I give them an activity and leave them to it. I wander round the room, but I can't hear what most of them are saying because of the cacophony of voices. This part of the term has also been peppered with interruptions: Mid Autumn Festival; National Day Holiday; monthly exams.

I see nothing of the teachers in the A-level programme, but they work in a different part of the school and are probably in class a lot of the day. I've already heard that one of the teachers has been sacked, and the current hope is that Quincy will come back. If he does, he can then tell me all about the A-level programme.

My current intention is, if the posts are available next year, to work for it for at least a year, but I also have my doubts about the hours and students. I would no longer be a gentleman whose leisure time is occasionally interrupted by teaching; instead, I'd be a gentleman whose teaching time is occasionally interrupted by leisure, and many of the things I enjoy doing and the freedoms I have would be severely curtailed. From what I've heard, the students in the A-level programme are of the same low quality as the kids in our programme. I had my doubts about a seventh year of teaching cretins, although at the moment, a plenitude of interruptions is preventing my suspicions – that I've really had enough of dealing with mental defectives – from being confirmed. The only difference is that the students in the A-level programme are doing that and nothing else. In other words, the classes count for something.

And if not the A-level programme, there is a chance that the programme might have a school in Kunming next year. Hong Kong is also never far from my considerations.

I may be back in a couple of months; or I may be back next week. 再见.