My roommate has moved in. His name is Liao Chongyang. I have this written down on a karaoke flier, because this is a lot harder to remember than my Chinese name (it's An Ning, in case you were interested, which according to MDBG.net means "peaceful, calm, tranquil, composed, free from worry." I was told it was a warrior name, so that's a little confusing). He's from Henan province, I believe, and I met his parents over the computer yesterday. They were very hard to understand, which I'm going to say is because they spoke in the Henan dialect, or "Henanhua", which they actually weren't I just couldn't understand them because they talked too fast. But they were speaking Henanhua to Chongyang after I left. There are dozens of these different dialects, at least one or two in every province, each one basically as different as French is to German. Fortunately, almost everyone is taught the "putonghua", or common language, in grade school. This is Mandarin. Also, there is no difference in the written language, which probably helps bridge the language barrier a lot as well.
Anyway, Chongyang is a very nice guy with very nice parents (they repeatedly called me "shuai", or handsome) who is extremely enthusiastic about helping me with my Chinese. I don't think I've had a single conversation with him yet that hasn't ended in, "if you encounter problem, or something, you can come to me," jutting both thumbs out and vigorously pointing to himself and cracking a big smile, and then, "understand?" I then shake my head vigorously like a five-year-old being asked for the upteenth time if I've washed my hands after coming out of the bathroom. But he's a great roommate, he doesn't go out or do much but study, also he doesn't know very much English, so not much of a drinking buddy, but that's fine because he's clean and extremely nice. He's starting to grow on me. I'll probably have more to say about him as the year goes on.
Anyway, that's it for now. My mom sent me a care package so now I have a lifetime supply of M&Ms and a sudoku book to do while I poop, so that made me very happy. I like packages. Hint hint.
Monday, February 28, 2011
Thursday, February 24, 2011
Food and Fears
People are still shooting off fireworks. Not a lot, once, maybe twice a day I’ll hear a boom or a crack and reminisce about that night 6 days ago. I apologize for taking so long to send another wire, it’s just that they’re doing such a great job of keeping me busy all the time that I haven’t had much time to relax, let alone write. Classes have kicked in and there’s no slowing down, and I’ve actually got my first Chinese test tomorrow at 9 am. So this might be a short post. But let’s see, what’s happened…
I think I ate some cow penis today. It might have been intestine, but that doesn’t quite have the same ring to it, and to be quite honest I will probably never know. You might be surprised to hear this, but it was pretty disgusting. It was cut into pieces, and I picked one up and looked at it. It was the pink of overcooked hotdogs on one side, and some kind of incomparable pinkish-white on the other. I tried to take a bite of it but it was too rubbery to rip apart. This should have been my first, if not second red flag. But rather than put it down and say, “oh well”, I put the whole thing in my mouth and chewed on it, for a while. It didn’t taste good. It was kind of sweet, mostly flavorless, and definitely overpowered by the texture. I tried eating the peppers it came with, but they were fairly flavorless too, and plus, everything was touching. So for the first time in I believe my entire life, I left a full plate of food on the table.
But I certainly got the thought out of my mouth with dinner. Darren texted us before our Silk Road class, asking if we wanted to go to a place with really cheap and good noodles. Considering that Xi’an is allegedly the noodle capitol of China, I was overeager to sample a local specialty. I was also pretty hungry. So after class he took us to a little hole in the wall across the street from university, and ordered us something I can’t remember the name of now. But it was indeed a Xi’an specialty, and it was indeed delicious. Egg and tomato and peppers and square noodles that made music in my mouth. I’m digesting it right now, and let me just say that I have been very happy with my stomach’s reception to the local cuisine. With the exception of that spicy soup, I haven’t had any problems whatsoever.
Roommates come in tomorrow. We’re going to meet them at a karaoke, which is a little strange to me but I’m rolling with it. It’s especially strange because it’s at 2 in the afternoon. But that’s okay, I’m pretty anxious to meet this guy so I suppose the sooner the better. Though I am going to miss having a room to myself…
Oh okay here’s something that happened this week. We went to the Big Wild Goose Pagoda (sounds better in Chinese). If you’re familiar with Journey to the West, or Monkey as it’s known in the actual West, then it might intrigue you that this is where the main character came back to and put all of the scripts that he got from India. It also has some remains of a Buddha underneath it. It’s 6 or 7 stories tall, and something that struck me was that on the 4th and 5th floors, there were TVs hanging on the wall with a made-for-Chinese-TV movie about Buddhism playing. I just thought it was weird to have a TV in an ancient pagoda, but I suppose I’m going to have to get fairly accustomed to this kind of tension between the past and the present. Between tradition and modernity. It’s kind of a big deal in China. Bigger than I thought. I don’t mean to imply that it’s on the minds of every Chinese, because that is perhaps far from the truth, but it is certainly something that has struck me. I suppose I was expecting a modern city, but when I see the giant buildings and shops that stretch from street corner to street corner, selling glasses and haircuts and lingerie and headphones, I kind of forget I’m in China. I feel like I’m still in America, but everyone looks and speaks Chinese. There’s barely anything left that gives credence of a living culture. I’ll say it now and I’ll say it again—commercialism is not a culture. It’s culture’s cancer. It’s hard to notice it in America, because we’re in the thick of it, and as a Chinese proverb roughly goes, you can’t see the face of a mountain when you’re on it. So it was strange when, on the way to a restaurant the other day, I walked through an alleyway that looked like China. There were street vendors everywhere, different smells and sounds bombarding me from both sides, mopeds dragging five times their mass while weaving through the throbbing mass of people. There was even a fat little dog with a duck leg in its mouth. And I thought, “this is the China I imagined”. Then I was out of the alleyway, and on the corner of a six-lane street. Billboards, gyms, malls, everything that makes an American feel at home. Except for all the Chinese people. I wonder if what’s happening is right. What’s going to happen when that alley gets bought out by investors looking to corner the alleyway market? What’s going to happen if the whole world turns into America? The scariest part is that a lot of people would like that very much. But Lord knows I don’t want a white bread world.
Maybe I’m projecting my fears a little. True, there is rampant commercialism here, but there are also fireworks! In the street! A boy’s gotta stay optimistic about things like this, so I’m just going to get the food while it’s still steaming and hope it isn’t donkey dong.
Friday, February 18, 2011
Happy New Years, Happy Rabbit Ears.
Last night was the last night of the new year's celebration, and presumably the first night of the lunar new year, given that the moon was swollen and breaking through the soup of of exploded fireworks' ghosts. I had just eaten dinner with the whole group at a nice western cafe where I treated myself to some pan-fried spaghetti with steak and peppers, some garlic bread, and a nice glass of Bordeaux red, all for the cost of a combo meal at Wendy's. It actually did push me over my budget of eating for 6 dollars a day, but hey, it was new years an I was celebrating it my own way. Oh! And this goes out to Darby. There's a Chinese tradition of eating this certain food on the last night of celebrations, these glossy, white glutenous rice balls with yummy stuff inside of them. We ate these ones with sesame paste in them, which kind of has the texture of caviar, but it's sweet. And do you know what those pearly orbs bursting with black specks made me think of, Darby? You guessed it, spider eggs! Little translucent baby spiders just crawling down my esophagus.
Mmm.
Anyway, back at the cafe, I finished my glass of wine and we walked out into the new dusk, and were greeted by some cacophonous orchestra of booms and cracks. Right across the street, a couple of men were lighting off one of the boxes of black cats that had been the bane of our morning's existence that day. For those not familiar, black cats are tiny cylinders of gunpowder lined up two by two on a string that you light one end of, and they go "POP POP POPOPOPPOPADAPOPADAPOPOPOPOPOP POP" and you go "wow! That was marginally fun and extremely loud!" Right, so these guys were lighting up a box at a time. During the climax it sounds less like firecrackers and more like the ocean crashing into your eardrums.
So that was happening, and instead of taking a right and heading back to the hotel, we "hung a Louie" and walked to the main street, Changan Nan lou. Best decision ever.
As we walked, we began seeing the source of some of the major booms in the night. Right across the main street, there was a legitimate Fourth of July setup on, I shit you not, the sidewalk. I'm talking about the big guns. Greens, reds, the kind that have a sparkle aftereffect, the ones that just shoot white sparks from the ground, the shimmering golden ones. Ones shaped like hearts. Blue ones that exploded in triplets. A wayward green wasn't ready to bloom at the apex and exploded about 15 feet from my head. My reaction was to grab my hat and scream "Woooooooooo!!!" at the top of my lungs, garnering the attention of locals and in hindsight making me question my instinctive reaction to danger. Nonetheless, I continued watching until that particular show was finished, which was about five minutes later.
I then went into this supermarket with some other students, which was our initial reason for going out there. This sounds strange, I know, but I had a dream about this the night before I left America. I dreamt I was in China (obviously) at night and they were celebrating the new year with lots of fireworks, and then I was in a market. But nothing spectacular happened in the store, I just bought some shampoo and notebooks and ping pong paddles.
Back outside, more fireworks. From every direction you could hear the blasts bouncing off of buildings, because it should be of not that few fireworks broke the canopy of the office and apartment buildings that crowd the skyline. My mission now was to get to higher ground. The obvious answer: our hotel's roof. Second best decision ever. Not second best, equally the best, but chronologically second. I had to crawl over a corner where there was a ten-story drop, so there was a faint element of danger in this pursuit that only added to the awesomeness of the night, and climb up a bunch of ladders until I got to a tiny (I'd say 10 feet by 20 feet) platform in the middle of the building. Once up there, I just kept spinning around, slowly, saying "wow", and occasionally, "woo!" when someone really near was shooting them off. Now they were at eye level but they were supposed to be, and in those moments, when someone ten stories below and twenty feet down the street set off a nice blue and white array, my heart sailed and my mouth went "WOOOOOO! WOOHOOHOO!!!!" I can't really describe the scene, of dozens if not hundreds of different places spitting incendiaries into the smoke-choked sky, where there wasn't a moment when you didn't hear a canon or a handgun thundering through the city. This is a really shitty analogy probably only two people will get, but it reminded me of Boom Boom Rocket.
But I'm not gonna try to poeticize fireworks. Really, you don't need to make fireworks romantic. They are inherently awesome. By their very nature. I'm just going to leave it at one of the best nights of my life. China, you have my respect and admiration. I salute you. Actually, that's deceiving. The reason why this was so awesome was that it wasn't set up by a government or a country club. It was people, going out and getting a fuckton of explosives and lighting them off wherever they please. And everyone else is totally okay with that, it seems. Which is unutterably amazing. So, Chinese people, I salute you and your penchant for reckless abandon. And I like your food too.
Mmm.
Anyway, back at the cafe, I finished my glass of wine and we walked out into the new dusk, and were greeted by some cacophonous orchestra of booms and cracks. Right across the street, a couple of men were lighting off one of the boxes of black cats that had been the bane of our morning's existence that day. For those not familiar, black cats are tiny cylinders of gunpowder lined up two by two on a string that you light one end of, and they go "POP POP POPOPOPPOPADAPOPADAPOPOPOPOPOP POP" and you go "wow! That was marginally fun and extremely loud!" Right, so these guys were lighting up a box at a time. During the climax it sounds less like firecrackers and more like the ocean crashing into your eardrums.
So that was happening, and instead of taking a right and heading back to the hotel, we "hung a Louie" and walked to the main street, Changan Nan lou. Best decision ever.
As we walked, we began seeing the source of some of the major booms in the night. Right across the main street, there was a legitimate Fourth of July setup on, I shit you not, the sidewalk. I'm talking about the big guns. Greens, reds, the kind that have a sparkle aftereffect, the ones that just shoot white sparks from the ground, the shimmering golden ones. Ones shaped like hearts. Blue ones that exploded in triplets. A wayward green wasn't ready to bloom at the apex and exploded about 15 feet from my head. My reaction was to grab my hat and scream "Woooooooooo!!!" at the top of my lungs, garnering the attention of locals and in hindsight making me question my instinctive reaction to danger. Nonetheless, I continued watching until that particular show was finished, which was about five minutes later.
I then went into this supermarket with some other students, which was our initial reason for going out there. This sounds strange, I know, but I had a dream about this the night before I left America. I dreamt I was in China (obviously) at night and they were celebrating the new year with lots of fireworks, and then I was in a market. But nothing spectacular happened in the store, I just bought some shampoo and notebooks and ping pong paddles.
Back outside, more fireworks. From every direction you could hear the blasts bouncing off of buildings, because it should be of not that few fireworks broke the canopy of the office and apartment buildings that crowd the skyline. My mission now was to get to higher ground. The obvious answer: our hotel's roof. Second best decision ever. Not second best, equally the best, but chronologically second. I had to crawl over a corner where there was a ten-story drop, so there was a faint element of danger in this pursuit that only added to the awesomeness of the night, and climb up a bunch of ladders until I got to a tiny (I'd say 10 feet by 20 feet) platform in the middle of the building. Once up there, I just kept spinning around, slowly, saying "wow", and occasionally, "woo!" when someone really near was shooting them off. Now they were at eye level but they were supposed to be, and in those moments, when someone ten stories below and twenty feet down the street set off a nice blue and white array, my heart sailed and my mouth went "WOOOOOO! WOOHOOHOO!!!!" I can't really describe the scene, of dozens if not hundreds of different places spitting incendiaries into the smoke-choked sky, where there wasn't a moment when you didn't hear a canon or a handgun thundering through the city. This is a really shitty analogy probably only two people will get, but it reminded me of Boom Boom Rocket.
But I'm not gonna try to poeticize fireworks. Really, you don't need to make fireworks romantic. They are inherently awesome. By their very nature. I'm just going to leave it at one of the best nights of my life. China, you have my respect and admiration. I salute you. Actually, that's deceiving. The reason why this was so awesome was that it wasn't set up by a government or a country club. It was people, going out and getting a fuckton of explosives and lighting them off wherever they please. And everyone else is totally okay with that, it seems. Which is unutterably amazing. So, Chinese people, I salute you and your penchant for reckless abandon. And I like your food too.
Wednesday, February 16, 2011
School, Food, and Fireworks
Yesterday marked the first day of classes. Every day except Wednesday and of course weekends I have Chinese language study from 9am to noon. On Wednesday afternoons I have Chinese literature from 2:30 to 5:30 pm, and Thursdays Silk Road at the same time. I'm very excited for these classes, and they are all going to be very enlightening.
I just got back from dinner, where I got food for the first time without the assistance of Darren. I felt very proud of myself. I got kung pao chicken. It was delicious. And roughly 2 bucks, so no arguing with that.
Standing out on my balcony I could see or hear fireworks being shot off from three different locations. I don't know if I already said this, but New Years goes on until the 18th, and it seems like everybody is getting rid of their surplus incendiaries before it goes out of style. It's a little magical, seeing a whole city celebrate something for ten days, with people simply setting up giant fireworks in the middle of the street, or lighting black cats on the sidewalk. I like a holiday with a healthy measure of explosions.
I got to talk to my family today, and at the risk of sounding like an advertisement, Google video chat is the best thing ever. I just can't believe something so awesome is totally free. I'm sure skype is the same, but nobody had skype. Sorry skype. But it was really nice to see everyone's face and show them where I was.
Anyway, that's it for tonight. Just a little post to keep the fire going. I've got a lot of studying and reading to do, which I haven't done in quite some time. I'm still kind of in vacation mode, and I've really gotta shake that out of my head. It's looking like this semester is going to be no cakewalk academically.
I just got back from dinner, where I got food for the first time without the assistance of Darren. I felt very proud of myself. I got kung pao chicken. It was delicious. And roughly 2 bucks, so no arguing with that.
Standing out on my balcony I could see or hear fireworks being shot off from three different locations. I don't know if I already said this, but New Years goes on until the 18th, and it seems like everybody is getting rid of their surplus incendiaries before it goes out of style. It's a little magical, seeing a whole city celebrate something for ten days, with people simply setting up giant fireworks in the middle of the street, or lighting black cats on the sidewalk. I like a holiday with a healthy measure of explosions.
I got to talk to my family today, and at the risk of sounding like an advertisement, Google video chat is the best thing ever. I just can't believe something so awesome is totally free. I'm sure skype is the same, but nobody had skype. Sorry skype. But it was really nice to see everyone's face and show them where I was.
Anyway, that's it for tonight. Just a little post to keep the fire going. I've got a lot of studying and reading to do, which I haven't done in quite some time. I'm still kind of in vacation mode, and I've really gotta shake that out of my head. It's looking like this semester is going to be no cakewalk academically.
Tuesday, February 15, 2011
Recap #2
Okay, so, where were we? Right. Xi'an is big. But I'm getting ahead of myself. We got out of the train station and smack dab into urbanity and we made a beeline for the first familiar face: a McDonald's. Apparently my resident director, Darren, who is basically our mother hen, had never had pancakes in China before, and upon discovering that McDonald's now served them, we really had no choice but to humor him. One interesting thing that I learned there was that at every restaurant, or really any service industry-type place, you get a receipt that does two things: it proves that the establishment is paying their taxes (and not you yay for no sales tax), and also gives you a chance to win up to fifty yuan(!!!). That's right, it's also a lottery ticket. And the funniest part is that if you win, the government doesn't pay you, the restaurant has to pull it out of their own register. To avoid the chance of this, or perhaps to evade taxes, some places offer you a coke in lieu of the receipt. Darren says in this situation take the coke. It's a free coke I mean who wouldn't.
So we get our food and pile into a van and drive to the hotel. Told you about the hotel, it's pretty snazzy. Smells a little funny, due to some mysterious and enduring plumbing problem, but I'm getting used to it. I tried to use the Dhoop sticks Darby got from Italy, but the stick broke in the little holder and I can't get it out. Sorry for wasting your Dhoop, Darb, but I promise I'll bring it back. After that we went to dinner at a hotpot restaurant famous for its mushrooms which, let me tell you, was great. Remember that bit about being jealous about my foodgasms? Well let's just say that time has come. A hotpot is a hot pot (heh) of soup in the middle of a round table, made this time from a mushroom base, into which a lady puts mushrooms, meatballs, spinach, basically anything you could desire. You then mix up your own dipping sauce from different pastes of sesame, chilies, tofu, leeks, and garlic, and dip everything into that. So sososo good. And you will never have it, unless you come to China. Ever.
So that was Sunday I guess, days are a little wonky for me right now, but the next day we met with our Chinese teachers at a Yunan-style restaurant for lunch. They asked who liked spicy food, and I raised my hand, and they pointed to one dish and said "zuo la", which means most spicy. Of course, I had to pick it, because I didn't want to look like a wuss and I also didn't know what the heck anything else was. I cried over that bowl of soup. I have never cried from spiciness before. I cried that day. It was kind of epic and made me feel very cold afterwards.
I should tell you right now that I am experiencing diarrhea now, most likely because of that dish. Now you know, and you can't unlearn it. Let me say for the record: it was worth it. And don't worry Mom, I'm drinking lots of water and taking my Acidopholous every day.
Today's Tuesday, and i just got out of my first classes. But that will have to wait for another time, because it's dinner time and I'm am very hungry and yes, you will likely be jealous again.
So we get our food and pile into a van and drive to the hotel. Told you about the hotel, it's pretty snazzy. Smells a little funny, due to some mysterious and enduring plumbing problem, but I'm getting used to it. I tried to use the Dhoop sticks Darby got from Italy, but the stick broke in the little holder and I can't get it out. Sorry for wasting your Dhoop, Darb, but I promise I'll bring it back. After that we went to dinner at a hotpot restaurant famous for its mushrooms which, let me tell you, was great. Remember that bit about being jealous about my foodgasms? Well let's just say that time has come. A hotpot is a hot pot (heh) of soup in the middle of a round table, made this time from a mushroom base, into which a lady puts mushrooms, meatballs, spinach, basically anything you could desire. You then mix up your own dipping sauce from different pastes of sesame, chilies, tofu, leeks, and garlic, and dip everything into that. So sososo good. And you will never have it, unless you come to China. Ever.
So that was Sunday I guess, days are a little wonky for me right now, but the next day we met with our Chinese teachers at a Yunan-style restaurant for lunch. They asked who liked spicy food, and I raised my hand, and they pointed to one dish and said "zuo la", which means most spicy. Of course, I had to pick it, because I didn't want to look like a wuss and I also didn't know what the heck anything else was. I cried over that bowl of soup. I have never cried from spiciness before. I cried that day. It was kind of epic and made me feel very cold afterwards.
I should tell you right now that I am experiencing diarrhea now, most likely because of that dish. Now you know, and you can't unlearn it. Let me say for the record: it was worth it. And don't worry Mom, I'm drinking lots of water and taking my Acidopholous every day.
Today's Tuesday, and i just got out of my first classes. But that will have to wait for another time, because it's dinner time and I'm am very hungry and yes, you will likely be jealous again.
Monday, February 14, 2011
First Week Recap
So I'm aware I've been out of commission for about a week now, give or take and international date line, and a lot has happened in that time. So, let's just get down to it.
The plane ride was uneventful. Long. You can imagine. One exciting thing is that I am now about fourteen hours into the future from Austin, TX, so when you read this, it's like I've gone back in time to talk to you! Or something. Time travel is a very complicated sport. Anyway, I got to the Beijing airport and found my group without a hitch. My first beverage was a "special" iced coffee from a stand outside the terminal, which was basically just water and flavoring. Coffee is very hit or miss here, but I did invest in some instant coffee this morning, so I should be okay.
I stayed in Bejing for about three days, and stayed in a dorm room in the BCLU (Beijing Culture & Language University) campus, where most of the Alliance kids are going. In fact, only 7 out of I believe 30 of us are in the Xi'an program, which is fine by me. The less the merrier. The Larryer. Anyway, Beijing was way too big, I was overwhelmed by its mass and acutely underwhelmed by my utter inability to say even the simplest of sentences. It seems that all of my Chinese skills have gone into hibernation for the winter, so I'm relearning a lot of the language. It's frustrating, but I think with time I'll be back in shape.
We took the overnight train to Xi'an on Saturday, after visiting a secluded, extremely awesome part of the Great Wall, which was completely unexpected and amazing. I'll post some pictures soon, but let's just say for now that we ate a homecooked meal made by farmers in a mountain town and it had just snowed. Beautiful.
So we got into Xi'an Sunday morning, and got to our hotel, where we're staying on the tenth (top) floor, which is the only floor with a balcony in each room. So I get to wake up and drink my NesCafe with a whole portion of the city in front of me. It's pretty great. And very cold. But worth it. I can watch some Chinese melodramas if I want to, which are great because almost all of them are set in the Tang dynasty or something ridiculous and I have no idea what's going on. But it's fun.
Xi'an is much bigger than I expected. I mean, I expected pretty big, but I don't think I've ever been to a city this big, and it's considered small! "Xi'an?" The Chinese say, "Pah! It only has 8 million people! What a small city!" It really makes Austin look like baby stuff.
Oh, look at the time (me, not you). I've got to get to class. Recap #2 when I get back!
The plane ride was uneventful. Long. You can imagine. One exciting thing is that I am now about fourteen hours into the future from Austin, TX, so when you read this, it's like I've gone back in time to talk to you! Or something. Time travel is a very complicated sport. Anyway, I got to the Beijing airport and found my group without a hitch. My first beverage was a "special" iced coffee from a stand outside the terminal, which was basically just water and flavoring. Coffee is very hit or miss here, but I did invest in some instant coffee this morning, so I should be okay.
I stayed in Bejing for about three days, and stayed in a dorm room in the BCLU (Beijing Culture & Language University) campus, where most of the Alliance kids are going. In fact, only 7 out of I believe 30 of us are in the Xi'an program, which is fine by me. The less the merrier. The Larryer. Anyway, Beijing was way too big, I was overwhelmed by its mass and acutely underwhelmed by my utter inability to say even the simplest of sentences. It seems that all of my Chinese skills have gone into hibernation for the winter, so I'm relearning a lot of the language. It's frustrating, but I think with time I'll be back in shape.
We took the overnight train to Xi'an on Saturday, after visiting a secluded, extremely awesome part of the Great Wall, which was completely unexpected and amazing. I'll post some pictures soon, but let's just say for now that we ate a homecooked meal made by farmers in a mountain town and it had just snowed. Beautiful.
So we got into Xi'an Sunday morning, and got to our hotel, where we're staying on the tenth (top) floor, which is the only floor with a balcony in each room. So I get to wake up and drink my NesCafe with a whole portion of the city in front of me. It's pretty great. And very cold. But worth it. I can watch some Chinese melodramas if I want to, which are great because almost all of them are set in the Tang dynasty or something ridiculous and I have no idea what's going on. But it's fun.
Xi'an is much bigger than I expected. I mean, I expected pretty big, but I don't think I've ever been to a city this big, and it's considered small! "Xi'an?" The Chinese say, "Pah! It only has 8 million people! What a small city!" It really makes Austin look like baby stuff.
Oh, look at the time (me, not you). I've got to get to class. Recap #2 when I get back!
Monday, February 7, 2011
Leaving tomorrow
My plane takes off in less than 20 hours. That's two sets of ten. I'm getting all of my final loose ends tied up, including this blog, and hopefully I will be prepared and ready to go to the airport at 4 am tomorrow.
Right now I'm waiting for a meeting, so I can't see a better time to get started on this journal. It will be my first time keeping a weblog (or "blog" for short so I hear), so I hope my readers will bear with me in the exciting months to come.
I'll be getting into Beijing tomorrow evening, during what appears to be the nicest, warmest day out of the ten-day forecast. Oh, and it's also still in the throes of Chinese New Years, I believe, which means anything from massive crowds, abandoned cities, skies full of fireworks or I don't know what else. I'll be really interested to see if celebrations are still going on or if I'm building something out of nothing. I'm trying to keep expectations low but that's very hard when it comes to China.
Alright so I'm not going to lie, I have nothing to talk about at this point. It's pitiful. I'm mainly just waiting, packing, and waiting. Not a lot of sleeping. Quite a lot of eating, but that's pretty par for the course. Trust me, there will be a lot of food posts, and you will be so jealous. I might even post pictures. Who knows. I don't really know how to do that yet. But check up on me every once in a while, see what I've got to say, or just see if I'm still alive. I think this blog is going places.
Right now I'm waiting for a meeting, so I can't see a better time to get started on this journal. It will be my first time keeping a weblog (or "blog" for short so I hear), so I hope my readers will bear with me in the exciting months to come.
I'll be getting into Beijing tomorrow evening, during what appears to be the nicest, warmest day out of the ten-day forecast. Oh, and it's also still in the throes of Chinese New Years, I believe, which means anything from massive crowds, abandoned cities, skies full of fireworks or I don't know what else. I'll be really interested to see if celebrations are still going on or if I'm building something out of nothing. I'm trying to keep expectations low but that's very hard when it comes to China.
Alright so I'm not going to lie, I have nothing to talk about at this point. It's pitiful. I'm mainly just waiting, packing, and waiting. Not a lot of sleeping. Quite a lot of eating, but that's pretty par for the course. Trust me, there will be a lot of food posts, and you will be so jealous. I might even post pictures. Who knows. I don't really know how to do that yet. But check up on me every once in a while, see what I've got to say, or just see if I'm still alive. I think this blog is going places.
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