Wednesday, March 7, 2007

Chasing Shadows

Last week, my students decided to throw a Chinese New Year Party. We ate lots of good food--chicken, duck, fried rice, noodles, dumplings, Xue Hua's famous rice cake and some funny green things that looked like tennis balls. While we were eating, we put some music on and Fatima became our impromptu dance instructor. Jeff and Flaco and Claudia were all very good dancers and they had no problem "cutting a rug." Others who had never danced much before got up and did their best...Sheng Lin and Clive had a nice slow dance with Fatima. After dancing we played the game, "Do you love your neighbor?" We listened carefully, laughed and tried to sit down in the empty chair before our classmates.

As we walked up Delancey Street after class, Xue Hua's daughter, Meng Ting, kept giggling. As she is usually a little shy, I couldn't understand what was making her smile. Then I looked down on the sidewalk and realized that she was stamping on my shadow. Once I realized what she was up doing, I ran a few steps ahead...she squealed and ran ahead too trying to step on my shadow again. We played this game all the way to the F Train.

It was a fun morning.