After a while, I heard a loud thump in an office nearby. I went out to see if everything was fine and I saw Mr. Zhang standing in front of his door, perplexed. ‘Are you alright?’, I asked him. He stood there, as if he hadn’t heard any of what I said. ‘Are you alright?’, I repeated, approaching him. I took a look at his office, and he had dropped a big amount of folders and books to the floor. ‘I don’t know how it happened, I just entered the room and my headphones got in the way and I dropped it all and I lost my class plans and now I have no idea what to do, and you don’t even understand what I’m saying I’m sure’, he said in a very quick Chinese. 

- Ok calm down – I told him in Korean – You should take off your headphones when you enter your office if you have that big amount of papers on your desk 

Yixing was even more perplexed. Apparently, he had no idea I could understand Chinese. Which makes no sense because he asked for an assistant who could understand Chinese anyway. ‘You understand my language?’, he asked. I chuckled, ‘I studied for four years in Shanghai’. He opened his mouth in surprise. 

- Now I feel embarrassed to speak Korean to you, your Chinese must be so good – He said, squatting to pick up his things. 

- Don’t be. My Mandarin skills are better on its listening form. I can’t speak properly – I explained, helping him to pick up his books and folders.

- Oh I see – He smiled. He had such a soothing smile – You studied there? Shanghai University?

- Yeah! I went to art school. 

- Very interesting – He said – I studied music, but no job for me so I came here to teach Chinese because it’s easy and I can improve my Korean. 

- Sounds interesting – I said, collecting the last folder, under his chair – Here you go

- Thank you – He said 

- Hold on –I smiled. 

I stood up and went to my office. Grabbed the lesson plans he had given me before and handed them in to him. ‘There you go. Now you don’t have to go through that mountain of paper to find your lesson plans because I had them too, remember?’, I said. His face lighted up, and he shook a little, as if he wanted to do something else than just standing there smiling. ‘Thank you again, you’re like a savior’. I smiled, and went back to my office. 

Ten minutes before his class started, I went back to his seat and knocked on the door frame. ‘Ready Mr. Zhang’, I said. He lifted his head and signaled me to come closer. ‘This is for you’, he said, handing me