Silver Lake Resort & Hotel (Shenzhen)

We arrived at the Shenzhen train station around 8pm on August 24^th. We boarded buses and headed to our hotel, the Silver Lake Resort & Hotel. We had to choose new roommates (basically in the lobby they said grab a roommate) which I did, a guy I hung out with a few times in Beijing. He’s cool. Our main luggage was sent to this hotel a few days before so all we had on the train were our carry-ons. The luggage was supposed to be in the lobby. But just like the Beijing airport, mine was nowhere to be found. Here we go again. I looked three separate times. I even had a few friends look. Couldn’t find it. I had two coordinators look for it. Nowhere to be found. The lead coordinator said maybe someone grabbed the wrong suitcase when they went up to their room and will return it as the entire luggage was supposed to be there. I checked into my room and then walked with a few friends to a little convenience store outside the hotel to buy some bottled water. We walked back to the hotel and decided we would go to the hotel bar and order beers. But before I went to the bar, I told the group that I would look into the lobby again for like the 5^th time for my luggage and low-and-behold, it was now there. Who knows…?

Now that my mind was at ease (as my suitcase contained everything), I could relish my Kingway large bottle of beer. Kingway is the local brewery in Shenzhen. I liked it. Not bad. Actually liked it more than Beijing’s Yanjing and China’s main national beer of Tsingtao (like Bud in the U.S.). We toasted our first night and first beers in Shenzhen. We talked to a returning teacher before heading to our rooms for the night. You see, there are about 40 returning teachers that met us in Shenzhen. They did not have to do the orientation, teaching, and studying in Beijing. All of them taught during the previous school year and some for a few years. So there would be about 40 new faces we would have to meet.

The Silver Lake Hotel was so much nicer than our Hotel in Beijing. It was more secluded and less city-like than our hotel in Beijing but the downside was you had to take a taxi to go anywhere. The landscaping of the resort was very nice and the hotel had a nice laid back feel. We would be staying 3 nights concluding with our contract signing ceremony (with our individual schools) Saturday morning the 27^th. We would be provided free breakfast, lunch, & dinner buffets at the hotel and they were actually very good. As I said in a previous post, the food here in China is very good. The main itineraries for us before our contract signing were mandatory police interviews as well as mandatory tests at the local hospital.

Regarding the police interviews, they asked us each individually why we were there? We were told before-hand by our coordinators to be as vague as possible. Don’t give detail. Just say you’re a teacher teaching English at a public school. So why did I come to China asked the officer? To spread capitalism and go to Tibet, I said. Have I been to China before? Yes, on June 4, 1989 in fact. Of course I didn’t say this or I wouldn’t be writing this today.

Regarding the tests at the hospital, that was something really different. All foreigners living in China have to have certain tests done. Had to have a chest x-ray, blood taken, eye test, EKG or something, blood pressure, urine sample etc. All these tests were done on the same floor in different small rooms of a hospital wing. Basically we had a sheet of paper and had to go to these different rooms in any order to have the tests done. Have the papers stamped and signed and then hand it in. It was like a maze and we just bounced from one room to the next talking to each other. As I mentioned in a previous post, no towels/hand dryers or soap in the hospital bathrooms. We are in a hospital! Am I the only one who is amazed by that? And I also let them take blood from me? I think a lot of us were concerned about that.

There was not a whole lot to do at the hotel. A few of us rented paddle boats on the resort’s lake one sunny day for like an hour and I came back drenched with sweat as it was so hot. Another day I walked around with Laila and took the nice pics of the resort you see. Went to a beer garden one night which was fun. At the garden, I had some awesome fried eggplant in garlic (where you peel the eggplant from its skin with your chopsticks) and some garlic bean curd skin on skewers which I love. Also had beers of course.

On Saturday morning I was nervous. This is when everything would be getting serious. I would meet my people from my school where I would teaching. We would have a banquet. Sign the contracts. They then would drive me home to my apartment afterwards. We all would be heading our separate ways after we all signed our contracts with the individual schools. I found my table and met the vice-principal of my school as well as the Chinese contact teacher. The Chinese contact teacher is basically the bridge between the school and myself. When I need help or when I have problems, I go to her. Her name is Lily. Or when I need help with translation, I also go to her. I also have a back-up Chinese contact teacher as well in case Lily is busy or something. They gave me a nice bouquet of flowers. They were very nice. They wanted to know about me and my background but what they were most fascinated with and what they asked me the most about was my lack of meat-eating (i.e., being a vegetarian). This amused them as a lot of food (good food I must add – not counting the meat dishes) came to our table and placed on the Lazy Susan and they watched which foods I would eat and which ones I would not. Also, the Chinese also tend to spoon the food onto your plate for you so I would have to tell them no to this dish, no to that one, etc.

After the banquet, I grabbed my suitcase from my room, met my vice-principal & contact teacher in the lobby, went into the van, and was anxious to see where I would be living for the next year. Also was glad to finally unpack and stop living out of a suitcase for about a month. Was anxious to see my apartment. My neighborhood. My school...