So I get paid tomorrow and I'm really excited. I didn't save as much as I meant too, but I did manage to hold onto a little over 20% of what I earned. I already have a sheet of paper with some projected expenses for food, an air filter for winter, and a remote for powerpoint presentations. As of right now, I have a pretty sizeable sum left that has not been allotted to any expense or saving (unless I go to Changsha for Thanksgiving which I've heard is pretty expensive) so I'm feeling pretty good about possibly saving even more this next month.

The hard times have continued too. On Thursday, I didn't have any classes due to an exam that the 9th graders had to take this past week. So I was sleeping in pretty late (around 11:00AM) when I heard a clicking sound coming from my door. Thinking that the door should not be clicking unless I was unlocking it, I walked over in my pajamas and arrived in time to see my door open and a pair of big eyes (whether they were actually big or seeing someone not really dressed and standing in the dark and reaching for the door handle was a complete shock that made his eyes big, I'm not sure) looking in. I responded pretty quickly: I shut the door in his face, pulled the handle up to lock the door again, found that I hadn't used the second lock and turned that too since he had clearly gotten past the first lock, and went to get changed so that I could walk outside and inspect the lock for any scratches or something that could tell me if I had been careless the night before and simply forgot to lock it (and if someone happened to think my room was someone else's and accidentally let themselves in). However, when I came back I found that I couldn't get the door open. No matter how many different ways I played with the lock, I wasn't able to move it. So I messaged my liaison and sent an email to the field director so that they knew about the situation. My liaison got help right away. I wasn't locked into my apartment anymore than an hour when the locksmith got through and spoke to me with the help of another teacher from my school. Then I had to stick around so that I could give the police a report a little while later. I was given a demonstration of how to lock my door, which was well-intentioned but still kind of stung after going through that incident.

I've played through that day a few times in my head since. I keep asking myself if the door was actually locked, but since the I got up as a result of hearing something at the door my guess is that it was locked and the guy was working away at the lock. My guess is also that when I shut the door, whatever he used to work through the lock got stuck in there and made it hard to for the mechanisms to work properly. I can also say that making sure I had used the second lock falls on me, though even if the door didn't open I'd probably have to report an attempted entry. From what I understand, this kind of thing is relatively rare but since we had a previous incident that was very similar to mine about a month ago, there are a lot of questions about whether the foreign teachers should be moved, if the school can get double doors and security cameras installed in addition to the newly installed gate we got after the last incident. I hate the idea of moving, but I might not have a choice if it's for our safety.

Adding to all this, I tried to find one of the English teachers to ask for Chinese lessons but either he changed his schedule for the day or he's caught up in something I don't know about. I'm sure he's busy and has a load of things to take care of, so I didn't push too hard. But then he passed by my classroom during a particularly noisy moment and looked at me. So I feel really embarrassed about what a colleague I respect a lot must think of how well I do my job, and how that might affect my asking for Chinese lessons from someone who already has a teaching job and a lot of work to do. One of the head teachers offered an assistant in one of my other classes too, which was actually ironic given that the class she was talking about is really well behaved.

Anyway, I've been stressed but I have to be ready for my classes tomorrow especially since it's Saturday. Students are usually a little wilder when they've only had one day for their weekend. Which is pretty understandable for a bunch of 13-year olds.

So it's been a while since I posted. I had my first long break of the year with National week. I went traveling with friends, but I'm afraid that because I was tired and stressed and at times frustrated I got passive-aggressive and snappy with them. I know better than that and that they deserve better from me. I'm sure they had their own stresses and frustrations too. And I snapped about the smallest things too...I need to send a pretty big apology to them for that. I'm not the best travel buddy...That's not to say it was all stress and frustration though. I had a really good time out in Sichuan despite feeling really tired and missing my kids a lot. I got to see Wenshu Yuan which I wanted to see when I was accepted by the Colorado China Council and I got to see the pandas in Chengdu as well. Our hostel was pretty nice and not too badly priced, we were close to Wenshu Yuan and walked out to the Tibetan quarter as well. Seeing Chongqing after hearing Dad talk about it so much was pretty wonderful too. I wasn't sure what he meant when talked about a massive city in a forest, but going around Sichuan I did notice a lot of trees and vines. I haven't seen that quite as much in the places I've been to in Hunan. Chongqing really surprised me with all its greenery and the vines waving around on the highways.

Chongqing was a tough place to maneuver around both as foreigners and as tourists during National Week. Our appearances obviously set us apart and meant that a number of times people offered high prices for services. We also struggled to understand where our hostel was relative to where we were since we had no map with us and couldn't really say how long it would take to get to Ciqi Kou, an older style part of the city. I wish we had spent more than a day out in Chongqing. I'd like to go back and explore at a different pace and see about this laid back lifestyle that Sichuanese people are known for. In particular, they are known for spending lots of time in teahouses playing mahjong and chatting, though I've also seen ear cleaners make their rounds in teahouses too. Sadly, I did not buy any tea since I felt I couldn't carry it if I did but I have no doubt I can pick up tea just about anywhere I go in China.