Students, writing

Here is a class of 8th graders practicing traditional Chinese letters. Just after I took this photo the student on the right came over to me and gave me a gift of the large ricepaper poster with Chinese letters that you can see her working on when I took the picture. She was very sweet. The Chinese students in general were spirited and friendly. One liked to break dance and put on a demonstration for us. The classrooms were unheated and very plain; you can see the white uniform windbreakers the kids are wearing in class. School building construction was primitive by our standards, with single-panel wood doors, plastic door windows, and exposed electrical wiring. I did not see any fire extinguishers in either of the schools I visited. Both schools were large; the one at which this picture was taken had 12,000 middle school students.