Lego King, originally uploaded by globetrotterI.

 This is Zheng Jie.  He’s three years old and he’s the Lego King.  I visit Zheng Jie and his five year old sister every Thursday morning for play time.  I’d like to call it a class, because they call me ‘laoshi,’ but it isn’t really.  Most days we play with lego blocks or play-doh. 

I chatter away to both of them in English constantly, but they’ve only picked up a few phrases.  Zheng Jie has learned a few basics.  “Hello” “Goo Bye”  “Goo Morning” and ”Peas help me”  are his favorites.  I find it difficult to impress anything more on him because he is completely obsessed with lego.   I showed him how to make a lego robot though.  He picked up on it right away.  It’s easy to see where his interests lie.

When he’s quiet, he only wants to sit quietly and build spaceships and spacemen.  When he’s being naughty, he usually has something of mine that he’s hidden somewhere.  Last week he took my bag and hid it in his grandfather’s room so I wouldn’t leave.  He has tons of secret hiding places where he keeps his bits and bobs.  He steals crayons from my crayon box and I find them weeks later.  And he has a special marble that he simply cannot live without.  If the marble goes missing, all hell breaks lose.  I left his house once at the end of class without finding the marble and I could still hear him wailing from 50 meters down the road.

I think he’s a sweetheart though.  He makes me his special lego masterpieces.  This one is the newest addition to my collection.