Christmas Kareoke

It was a beautiful thing to see...

Joyce, our English department leader, asked Becca and a I to host a Christmas party at school. We agreed with a smile. I tossed together a quick PowerPoint and Beccs alerted the masses the day before, but we thought attendance would be around 20 or 30 kids. It was the week before exams, before the talent show, during lunch break. Who wants to go to a lame gringo Christmas party when you can be texting on your iPhone 4s while eating delightfully spicy street food? How wrong we were.

Beccs and I open the door to the auditorium and there are at least 300 kids waiting for the party to get rocking! There are 299 seats in the auditorium and it was pretty much standing room only. It was amazing and humbling and loud and nerve-wracking all rolled into a ball and dunked into a stew of teenage body odor.

Beccs and I went into entertainer mode. We sang, "Angels We Have Heard on High," "Joy to the World," "Silent Night," "Santa Claus is Coming to Town" by Jackson 5 (China loves MJ more than life itself) and finally "All I Want for Christmas is You" by Mariah Carey. We belted out these Christmas classics with a huge smile, thinking what an awesome opportunity to sing "Silent Night" in the public school with 300 precious kids who had never sung it before. I've sung "Silent Night" since I was a fetus, but this time it is seared into my brain as the most memorable.

Then we had a scavenger hunt where they had to go and find ten things - from a picture with a teacher to a 串 stick to a right size 40 shoe (don't worry, Chinese sizes aren't the same, that's like a size 10). The groups came back sweaty and breathing heavily and excited to have completed the mission that didn't involve studying or getting a grade. One group just drew all the objects on a piece of paper. Clever.

I'll never forget walking into that auditorium and seeing all those eyes light up. Wow! This kind of stuff doesn't happen in the States.
米佳