Blog #7

Looking back at this year, I can tell that this year was far better then my English classes in previous years. One thing that made this year so much better was the movie project. Over the last few weeks, we were able to watch our favorite movies for marks. This was just one reason why the project was so great. It was really fun to watch movies and explain what made them so great. Watching the dark knight was a great way to finish the year, especially after doing essays. while we tried to find a room to work in, we spent our classes in the hallway. we would watch a scene for a couple of minutes at the start of class, then we would discuss who or what would be the best choice for each category. There is no other class where we get to argue about who is the better actor in a movie. this was one thing that made English class fun. the other project that make this class great was the Poetry anthology. while some of the poems weren't as good as others, they were still fun to do. the best part of the project was building the bar table to present my poems. I have wanted to build something with my growing pile of hockey sticks and bike parts, but I didn't know what to build. I did not have enough parts to build a bench or a chair. So i built a bar table. after I get the stand back, I plan to attach the table I bought. One thing about this year that bugged me was the essays. while it was nice to have months to write an essay, it lowered my level of focus on them because i felt i had so much time. one thing that would make the essays way better would be if there were check-ups every week to make sure we worked on the essays before the last weeks before the deadline. other than this, everything seemed good for English.            

Spring Break

The best part of spring break for me was my trip to China. We left on March 21, and came back on April 3. The trip started with everyone meeting at the airport at 7:00 AM. After we managed to get away from our families, we moved through security to board our first flight to Vancouver. The flight going there wasn't very long, around an hour. Our next flight however was not as short. The flight to china was about twelve hours, with a fourteen hour time different. We boarded the plane in Vancouver at 1:00, and we arrived in China at 4:00 in the afternoon the next day. We met our tour guide, checked into the hotel, and then walked to a few sites before we crashed into bed. The next four days were spent working at the orphanage. We would work from 8:00 until 3:30. Later in the evening we would go on an walk around the city. We went to a Chinese snack street, to a local mall, and to the forbidden city. After working at the orphanage, we took a train to Xi'an, the cultural center of China. There we got to see the Terracotta warriors. The day was spend walking through the museum, learning about the history and culture in the city. After the tour was done, we returned to the hotel, and got ready to go see the local market. At the market, we saw a lot of the same things we saw in Beijing, but we also saw lots of new things. some of the similar foods we saw was scorpion, spider, centipede, and lots of other weird food. after a few days, we got packed and rode the bus to the airport. our flight was scheduled to leave around 5:00, but we were delayed until 10:00. once we finally took off, we flew to Guilin. We arrived in Guilin around 2:00 in the morning. our tour guide thought we would be hungry, so she bought KFC for all of us. The next day we got up, and toured many of the historical sites throughout the city. That evening, we had a cooking class scheduled, where our dinner was what we cooked. We cooked stir fry, lotus root, steamed pork, and bok choy. That evening in the market, I had the chance to try a Chinese McFlurry. they was almost no difference between the Canadian and the Chinese McFlurry. After this, we took a flight to Shanghai. It was clear to us that this was the economic center of China. this city was a far more urban city than Xi'an and Guilin. Here we had the chance to walk through a museum. We saw ancient clothing, jade, coins, and tools. The next day was our last in China. this day was spend packing all our things, and getting ready for the long flight. We left China at 3:00, and arrived in Calgary at 5:00. Of all the spring breaks I've had, this was by far the best break.