It's A Party

Today was an extraordinary day for our small exchange group! We held a party for our Chinese friends that turned out to be a great success! The kids have been planning for some time, and most brought small gifts and prizes from home. I would guess that we had at least 50+ kids here at some point or another during the two hours that we were allowed for the party. We organized tables with carnival-type games such as pin the leaf on the flower , toss the penny in the cup, solve the riddle or the sock toss. Our guests could earn tickets entitling them to fun prizes such as stickers, pens, “lucky money envelopes”, Saugus gear, cool socks and tee shirts plus some beautiful home-made book marks etc. We also had “American style” food with rice-krispies-like treats, chocolate chip and oatmeal cookies, taffy, M and M dark chocolate candy, fruit, Coke, Sprite and orange drink. The Chinese kids also brought some Chinese snacks, walnuts and cookies.

After we had given out all the prizes we had the entertainment portion of the party. A couple of Chinese boys did break-dancing, Aida played her flute and a number of people sang – Max, William and Allen (from the Chinese group of 2008) sang the Back Street Boys, Katie sang Hey there Delilah, one of the girls for the group coming in the fall sang for us, as did our former Chinese teacher, Shi Laoshi. Finally our 3 students sang a shortened version of American Pie. All but one of the students from the last 2 exchange groups came, as did the kids who will arrive in August and their teacher Mrs. Li. All in all it was a fun two hours, but I think we are tired now. The kids will have to wait until 5:30 to go home but tomorrow is a day off – Sunday. In fact the Chinese students have school today, tomorrow and Monday, and then the out-going “10th graders” will have vacation. The students heading into their senior year will have only one day per week off until August, followed by a two-week “vacation” which most will spend studying.