The Study Break

           The Study Break

          We found an invitation to the Study Break one day. So in the evening after supper we all went there. As we entered , we found it looked like a restaurant with tables and chairs, a bar in the corner. All of us were asked to sign in the list. After that we went upstairs to have a look around the place. On the second floor, our attention was drawn to the great number of huge silvery cups exhibited on the shelf. What are they? Do they symbolize the prizes Yale has won ? Are they just cups for drinking ?

Cups on exhibition

Beautiful singers!

        At this time, beautiful sounds of singing came .  We made our way   downstairs. Almost all the people were standing in a semi-circle, four of them, two boys and two girls , singing in four quartets. I believe they were singing Italian songs. The harmony of the voices, the beauty of the singing girls , the youth and passion conveyed put us in a different  mood. We all clapped our hands when one song ended. Then we got to know what the cups were meant for. It turned out that it is a Yale tradition to drink with such big cups in turn and the last one will have to rotate the cups three times over his head. This is the so-called game of Rotating Cups.

As the cups went from one to another in the room, the four people went on singing. As this goes on from generation to generation in Yale, it has become a part of Yale culture .

Shopping in Westfield

                           Shopping in Westfield

On Saturday we went shopping in Westfield. It took us about an hour to arrive there by bus. Marcy’s is said to be the biggest department store. So it became our first stop. Items in it are of great variety , ranging from clothes , kitchen utensils to family lounge. Many items were on sale. To my surprise, almost no salesgirls worked in the department

Every woman loves it.

store.Customers chose items by themselves. In Changsha, the city where I came from, in big department stores there are a lot of pretty and young girls for each brand. They introduce the goods to the customer, give  advice to customers and tend to the customers all the way. So it is quite different here.

Then I noticed other things in a shoe department. Many of the shoes are marked as produced in China, some of them of good quality and craftsmanship.  However, when I did begin hunting shoes for my son , my mother and myself, I found my choice was greatly limited by the size . I also noticed the few salesperson there were men, young men, which again was rare in China. 

Everyone needs it.

For Your Bones!

 

When it was time to lunch, it was a relief to find Chinese food. The Chinese fast food here serves relatively less vegetables and a lot and a lot of meat such as chicken , turkey . It tastes different, always sweet and sour.  In spite of this, it is more to our taste than American food. What is more , the amount they serve for each is far greater than we have imagined. 

Observing Julia's Class

              Class   Observation (2)

On Thursday I went to Julia’s reading and writing class. There were 12 students in class. I was deeply impressed by the way Julia stimulated her students to reflect on and write about what they had read. 

  The class began with the passing around of the sheets of students’  annotation, which had been chosen by the teacher from what the students handed in as assignment. The students were given several minutes to think and raise questions. When the students raised the questions, Julia put some questions or add more provoking questions on the blackboard to urge students to dig deeper into the meaning of the story so that the students associated the story with philosophy about our life and society. 

Julia is teaching

      After that, Julia handed out two sheets of paper to students so that students naturally were divided into two groups of six. While one group were discussing, the other group sat around as observers to put forward their different ideas afterwards. As the parts of the story were different, students actually were discussing two different parts of the story. 

           It is amazing that students expressed their ideas from different perspectives. This, to a large extent , owes to Julia’s specific requirement for the discussion. She emphasized that students’ talk should be based on sentences and words in the story and each should illustrate his or her point with reference to a specific paragraph. So I found different students drawn by different details.

   The assignment Julia gave is to write blogs , a further reflection on what students had read and discussed. 

Students in discussion

    A good reading and writing class involves thinking and commenting, which asks for a quite good comprehension and exchange of ideas with others. Julia ‘s class succeeded in doing this.

  

Adventure in the library

                              Adventures in the library

Last Saturday , instead of going with my colleagues, I went to the library alone. After

SML Library

asking the guard for the direction , I went hunting for the restroom. After a winding stone stairs, I came to the underground floor. I hurried to the one end of the passage only to find a store room. There were a lot of things in it . The light was on, but I saw no one there. Then I turned round , what lay in front of me was a group study room. It was quite spacious, with a few sofa and chairs and a low ceiling. It was quiet, no sound , no motion. The light was on, but again no person. Somehow something in me tightened. I went on and found a passage. It was long and narrow, its floor covered with plastic materials, the walls white.  It reminded of the long passages in Gothic stories. Would a man in black or a ghost turn up ?  

I grew tense. As soon as I saw the sign restroom on my left , I turned in . I found myself standing in a closet-like place with three doors . Would doors fling open? Horror began to swept across me. I opened one of the door and got in. 

The Hallway

When I came back to the passage, I found it going on , leading somewhere . I dared not explore further, I quickly hurried back upstairs. Once I was in the big circulation room where librarians were working , I felt relieved . It was really good to be back to safety!

Several minutes later, I came cross Julia. After hearing my experience , she took me downstairs. This time I walked along the passage more confidently. The end of the passage was actually one entrance to Brass library. The long passage serves to connect SML to Brass Library. 

The Reading Room

How silly and cowardly I was. Maybe here in America, I have to get used to seeing no persons sometimes.