hot day in central Illinois

A hot day like today makes me long for retirement even more than I already do.  To top things off our air conditioning quit working on Sunday.  The one problem I have about returning to Peoria and returning to work is that I miss being the English teacher in China so much.  But the English teacher could not have fixed the air conditioning and done it for 16 dollars.  I guess there is some advantage to being a "gong ren", or working person instead of the English teacher.
I have been in contact with one of the students that I met at the Wednesday English Corner in Xian.  The difficult thing about communication with the Chinese students is that I met so many people and was not able to learn enough names or you learn an English name and then do not know who they really are.  I have been emailing Ellen since I left.  She wrote me today that she was afraid to speak out even though she liked me.  I have told many of my students to practice a few sentences and get good at saying them and then you just have to force yourself to talk to foreign visitors.  I have always told my students that every day I walked in the classroom I was nervous.  I enjoyed teaching but I was always nervous that it would not go well and I could not help them learn.  But you just have to suck it up and try and try and try.  If I can get students to practice saying things like can I help you find something, or is this the first time you have been to China, etc.  If they would practice 10 sentences that would be "ice breakers" I think they would develop the confidence to then continue to talk with the foreign person.  They just have to force themselves to not be so shy.  I know how they feel because I have missed several opportunities to talk or do something for just that reason.  Something does not go well, you lose some confidence, and then you put your hands in your pockets and shuffle off.  It happens.
One good thing about being back here is the Guatemala coffee bean dryer project.  It is starting to develop and we are starting to get some more people involved.  I think we will have a good team of students and faculty to work on this and I hope we can develop something that will work or set the ground work for something that will work in the very near future.  Sometimes you have to get something built to see how to do it better.  Right now I need to get something built.  But that is going to make my days before retirement a little bit more interesting.
I am just glad the house is starting to cool off.  In Xian, in the classrooms you did not have air conditioning.  The last day I taught it was 98 and we had two over head fans and two windows opened.  Students were trying to give a speech and we had construction noise and the hallways are loud.   I felt bad because I was leaving and this one girl said to me, "smell", and I taught, "Of course I smell, it is hot, I am nervous and sad, I know I smell.  And then see told me one more time, "smell" and she did smell from ear to ear.  :-) , with a great big grin.  I will always remember my Life in Xian, and I will do it with a smell on my face and a tear in my eye.