Summer Camp Drabbles
- Getting visits from my old students to my classroom.
- Getting small gifts from my old students. The volunteers of Duke Engage 2015 will never forget the flower war.
- Taking short mental health holidays to visit my old students at their respective summer camps. Getting to see them play chess, paint, draw dance, etc. was one of the my favorite parts of this summer.
- See number 1-3. Especially number 3.
- See number 4.
- Seeing my PE class representative, Diana, in action for the first time. I think I would've died without her. At the age of 14, she would make a better army officer than 99% of cadets at West Point.
- Getting Youyou's old students to help me with my class. Also hearing the new students calling them "学姐" (approximately translates to: upperclassman ) and seeing how good they were at directing younger students.
- Seriously, see number 3.
- My students deciding to split their bread in half and sharing their food when the school messed up the bread order and only gave us half the amount we needed, even though they were all very hungry.
- One of my new students insisting on coming to class even though he had a bad fever and stomachache.
- One of my volunteers standing at the front of the class and passionately announcing if anyone bullied Jenny again they'd have to deal with him.
- Running around with my students at the Forbidden City scramble to answer all their history questions before anyone else. Also, seeing them ask random strangers if they knew the answers to the questions.
- Michael wrapping his arms around the other two boys' shoulders in my Forbidden City group when I mentioned I was worried about them getting lost.
- My old student Vicky toying with a water balloon while jealously asking which of my new students was my favorite.
- Watching my old students play with puppies during the afternoon lunch break. Also, VIcky fiercely defending the smaller puppy from the larger one.
- Getting a card from Elsa with a note written all in English. For perspective about why this was so awesome: I once spent 2 hours teaching her 10 vocabulary words.
- Pulling an all-nighter with my volunteers the night before the last day to make all the students little cards and gifts.
- Getting woken up by students at 5:30AM after we all fell asleep for half an hour in the classroom while making the cards.
- Seeing the look on Diana's face when she saw the Garfield picture I drew on her goodbye card.
- See number 3.