My Chinese Nana

As I was writing my last post, I thought it would be nice to share some photos of my Chinese Nana who has in part inspired my love of China and Mandarin.

This is my Nana, Gladys McGargill, a few years ago on her 80th birthday. She was born in Australia, spent a few years in China, and then the family moved back to Australia for good. Nana spoke English and Mandarin when she was little but when they moved back to Australia, her father did not allow them to speak Mandarin anymore because they needed to do their best to fit into Australian society. This meant that Nana didn't remember any Mandarin...I actually know more than she did as an adult.

Here are a few cute photos of her when she was very young.

This is Nana's family. She is the girl on the far left. Apparently my great grandfather was a Chinese herbalist both in China and Australia. He had a shop (not sure if it would be called a shop, maybe practice, clinic??) in Little Bourke St. in Melbourne.

This is Nana with her two sisters. She is on the far right.

Here are Nana and her sisters on her wedding day when she married my grandfather, Alan Muir.

Nana travelled to China with her sisters about 20 years ago. Here are a couple of photos from her trip. I was about 8 when she went and always treasured the gifts she bought back for me. I even kept the wrapping paper for years. haha She bought me a beautiful pink, silk Chinese brocade jacket and an embroidered handbag. I still have them. :-)

This is my mum, Nana and I on my wedding day. 

This is Nana with her four daughters on her 80th birthday. My mum is second from the right.

Well, that's my Nana. She passed away a couple of years ago and I always wished I could have known more about her earlier life. In the last year before she died, I remember her telling some stories about when she lived in Ballarat in Victoria as a teenager and the things she and her sisters did. It was fascinating to hear how my great grandfather travelled into Melbourne from Ballarat each week and other funny stories about going to the theatre. I also had the opportunity of living in Melbourne for a few years and got to spend a little more time with Nana's sisters and my other Chinese relatives. I really enjoyed my time down there and got to attend a few big Chinese banquets which was a lot of fun. (I was particularly thrilled one time when we went to a restaurant that had Jay Chou music videos playing! You don't get that in Queensland! haha) It was great being able to try more authentic Chinese foods and be a part of my extended Chinese family. 

So Maybe I'm A Little Crazy...

I have this crazy dream that I would one day LOVE to be a Mandarin teacher in a primary school in Australia. Now this is crazy for a few reasons.

1. My proficiency is nowhere near good enough. (In my opinion...and I'm working on this!)
2. Although I try my best, who knows really how good my pronunciation is??? (Also working on this!)
3. I've never even been to China. (I'm working on this too!)
4. I'm not a native Chinese speaker. (Well, my Nana is Chinese so technically I'm part Chinese...not that you'd ever be able to tell!)

Now 3 of those problems I can work on. And I do have a teaching degree so I'm qualified to be a primary school teacher. But it still feels like a crazy dream. I'm sure any Chinese person would be cringing reading this...that some random Australian wants to teach Mandarin, their language! But no matter how much time goes by or how long I spend trying to figure out what I want to do with myself, I always come back to wanting to teach young children Mandarin. It's the ONLY thing I get excited about when I try to figure out what I want to do.

I have absolutely LOVED teaching my boys to speak Mandarin and use it as part of our daily lives in our own home. I also thoroughly enjoyed helping out other students in my chinese class. They often didn't understand what we were learning or doing until I explained it to them.

So, I have a bit of a long term plan. The plan is to keep learning Mandarin on my own and as soon as I can, with a tutor or in a class. Then after my husband does his first year or two of primary school teaching and gets fully registered, we hope to go and live in China for a couple of years (this will hopefully be about 2015) which will give us all a wonderful opportunity to learn the language and experience the culture. Then, unless we just love China so much we don't want to leave, (which could be a possibility lol), we'll move back to Australia and I can apply to be a Mandarin teacher in the Australian public schools system.

My dream does seem somewhat more possible with the very recent push for all Australian primary schools to offer an Asian language (one being Mandarin) to every grade by 2025. This means there will be a much greater demand for LOTE teachers and more jobs available.

Anyway, we will see what happens. In the meantime, I'm really getting back into using ProVoc to help me remember characters. It's amazing how quickly they can come back after doing a few drills and I LOVE how customisable it is.

Lets hope I look back on this post one day and am able to say, "I finally achieved my dream!"