So I was using the hosepipe to soak the dog today... don't worry I do not harbour a extreme dislike of animals, its an act of kindness to keep him cool, honest, as it is a 'stay indoors' day on my personal weather scale. Such being the case I have decided to continue my study of Chinese script. Its a relatively new endeavour (a few days old) but the subject has been a curiosity of mine for a while (probably introduced through Chinese Chess) and this is probably a good time to get into it seriously, as I will be spending some time in China in the latter part of the year and knowing the sign for 'toilet' could be of great importance.
I got the book (for Chinese study) from a library, which is connected to a local history museum. One being brought up in such a historic country (with a tendency to pilfer other countries' artifacts), my experiences of a museum dictates that there should be elements that date back to 1000's of years ago. I was brought sharply back to the modern era by a placard declaring one item to be 'over 200 years old.' The history of Australia in the British eye (or mine at least) was that Australia gained its importance when we shipped all our convicts out there. But as I read, there were the (standard) initial settlers (non-convicted) that 'discovered' the land before the Brit's thought it'd be a good dumping ground. Thus the museum's initial display showcased items that were given by the aborigines to the first settlers as welcome gifts, then the rest of the place (which is all contained in one large room) showed the quick progression to what Western Australia is today e.g. a model beach hut and 'try it yourself' surfboard on springs... needless to say I gave a lot of my attention in there to the surfboard.
I have also been informed that it is rare to come across people in Perth that can actually call themselves locals as most people have emigrated here and are thus 1st generation residents. This really brought home just how young this place is, very bizarre compared to the grasslands of home where some friends could trace their family tree back for 100's of years and still be on the same island.
So referring to my previous blog about entering the old as time profession of teaching...though the somewhat younger branch of guitar teaching... I gave a friend a lesson on Monday armed just with my 6 years of knowledge (a.k.a I didn't plan anything as such, not the safest teaching approach) but low and behold the student beareth the goods and had already assembled a folder containing guitar chord shapes (and had been practising) and spare paper... Keen to the max! Any teacher's dream. And the guitar playing did not let her down either, in fact she was leaps and bounds better than myself when I started out. Think I hit easy street with this one.
Buoyed by this success I gave Christian a lesson on the ukulele the following day. I am not as practised by any means on this instrument but going on the whim that the skills of one stringed instrument are transferable to another (I found it more challenging than I anticipated). After passing a few initial problems (tuning and chord shapes) I got him practising the simple (and a favourite) Green Day - Time of your life chord sequence. Since then he has been playing it around the house frequently and (to my delight) with quick accomplishment.
It's been 2 weeks now since I arrived and as Liz (mother of the house) pointed out, it feels like I've been here for ages (in the good sense that I have fitted straight into life here), so on that note 再见，直到下一次
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