Halloween at Yi Zhong

Halloween at any school is a big deal. At Yi Zhong, it was monstrous. The kids were pumped about it. Halloween isn't normally celebrated in China, but the kids definitely knew about it. We started out by teaching some simple vocabulary, had a few powerpoints on Halloween traditions and then they just took it from there. No room was spared. The kids literally stared painting the walls. I guess they have a lot of pent up creative juices just waiting to spill all over desks, lockers and floors. They ordered all sorts of stuff off Taibao (China's variation on ebay) including most of their costumes and whole lot of tacky decorations. And the the costumes! Those were incredible. The It's not every day that you can dress up as whatever you want. 

Obviously, I took the opportunity to wear all the jewellery I brought to China (okay, let's be honest- more like half), a whole bunch of bindis and a lot of scarves. Sam had a miraculous find of an old light fixture that was to become my 'crystal ball,' and I spent the whole night rolling up fortunes so that I could tell my trick-or-treaters the future. 

The kids and most of the Chinese staff thought I was Johnny Depp. I chose to accept this as a compliment. Here we are... and I can see your future.... 

It's written on this paper:

This is my homeroom class. They are a bunch of sweethearts. Also, please note the tombstone posters with epitaphs written on them in the background. This was a writing assignment I thought up to make sure I sucked the fun out of Halloween. Teachers are good at that sort of stuff. You know, taking a completely good holiday theme and turning it into school work. 

Zombie teachers: blurry Sam, Sinead and Joey. Just getting ready to scare the kids.

Vincent went as RenRen. It's China's version of facebook. 

And we have a gangster with a unicorn:

Zombies. These girls went all out with the make- up. Apparently they got up at 4 am to get it just right.

Mr. Groves took the opportunity to wear full body spandex.

This is the Chinese principal, Frank, with the Chinese head teacher, Emily. The fortunes were a big hit.