Dear Ping

I had read on well pages from past students how intensive but rewarding the TEFL couse at GLV was. On the day of my arrival, the taxi I had caught from the ferry terminal could not get near the entrance of GLV due to the paving work and the building of the KFC. So I had to man-handle my 40kg suitcase and cabin bag over to the entrance, and then up the 2 flights of stairs to the reception.

By the time I got to the top, I was a hot sweating wreck, but the staff soon had me seated with a glass of water. While I was cooling down, I wondered if this was an entre to the intensive side of the course! The staff were very helpful and course! The staff were very helpful and courteous to me.

Mei-ling soon greeted me and escorted myself and others from my course to our accommodation.

I had no chance to unpack as orientation was due to start in 10 minutes tome. During orientation, a comprehensive schedule and rules were laid out, and it gave an overview for what laid ahead.

Suddenly it was Monday morning and the training began. Shireen and Mitchie are wonserful teachers and know their subjects back to front, but the pace was frantic. Parts of grammar analysis were new to me, while others were distant memories from my schooling over 30 years ago.

Despite my present job entailing teaching surgeons and nurses complex surgical procedures and how to use high tech equipment, this has paled into insignificance compared with the science of teaching English. Who could ever have thought that my native language that I have spoken for the past 47 years would be so hard to analyse; prepositions, subjects, objects-it all became a blur. Then when the classes have finished there is lots of homework and essays to do, as well as studying late into the evening. And once a week, there is a discussion group to conduct which is very enjoyable, but by the time it ends at 9pm, I am so tired.

This course is by far the most intense thing I have ever done; even more intensive than any University course that I have done, But it is also one of the best decisions of my life, and I have found it very rewarding.

For the next 2 weeks we will be teaching students and I am looking forward to getting my first lesson behind me.

I have found talking with the students at GLV a lot of fun, and of course they are all curious about life in Australia.

The facilities at GLV are very good, and I think that the environment is ideally suited to learning English by total immersion.

Finally, the food has been a wonderful eating experience, being totally different to the Chinese food I eat back in Australia..

Kind Regards