more exploring of cultural differences

Today was a rather chill Wednesday. Surprisingly I didn't feel stressed or overwhelmed. The only weird part was theory this morning. Our class is prone to go off on tangents, especially if K or P ask a random question. And we really were awful in terms of paying attention this morning. What followed hopefully shook some people up. But perhaps not...as I will show later.

So while trying to answer a really easy question, someone mentioned that K wasn't there and wasn't asking questions. So Prof G. mentions offhandedly that he wouldn't be with us any longer and that he had dropped out of the conserv. Which immediately caused a ruckus, everyone was like, "wait what, we thought he loved theory!" Prof G. tries to quiet us down and return to the question. Meanwhile some members of the class are still exclaiming over K, so it's definitely sort of chaotic still. Finally Prof G. loses it and leaves the room. Comes back and starts over. Asks some guy the same question. Guy hasn't been paying attention and so fails to answer the question. Prof G. gets really quietly angry and stops teaching. He puts up a class exercise and tells us we have the last 15 minutes of class to do it. By this time the tension is so thick you could feel it smothering everyone. so. awkward. Everyone is absolutely silent. He leaves the room as we start and comes back and just sits there. I felt soooo bad. Honestly, even though I hadn't done anything personally. After we finish he gives us a talking to. I agreed with most of what he said. Basically we had taken the joking too far, we were disrespectful by falling asleep and stuff.

But. apparently some people didn't quite agree as much as I did. I talked with one kid later about it and he didn't feel bad at all. He thought it was Prof G.'s fault that the class always went off on tangents because Prof G. himself always makes funny/sarcastic comments. I was so surprised when he said that. I had never even considered the idea that it was the professor's fault. I think I'm so deeply imbedded with the idea of respect for authority/teachers that Chinese culture dictates that I've never considered that possibility. I just assume that they're right, that they're smarter than me. Well, no. Not always. I think I always respect them no matter whether they know a lot or not. Yeah. Even if I disagree with them, I still respect them. Americans can be so disrespectful. American teenagers especially. Texting during class, during chapel, falling asleep all over the place, cutting classes indiscriminately. And they wouldn't agree that they were being disrespectful. They have no concept of that.

Sigh.

oh, finally met one of the ROTC guys. Through church. engage guy radar, mmhmm. LOL did I just say that out loud? yep. It's true though. And he's a really sweet guy. Just keepin' my eye out for potentials. I promise I won't be silly about guys until forever.