another post

Today I went to the Beijing World Bank office, and it looks like I'll be helping out a fe days a week there. Unfortunately, I was an hour late to the meeting, which, thanks to my mother, made me feel absolutely terrible. It was, however, pretty unavoidable. The lecture i attended before i left ran over, and it turned out that I was on the metro for almost an hour, which was much longer than I had thought it would take. But everything worked out fine in the end.
Okay, that was boring. A few random things. Everyday we sing the Chinese national anthem in class. It's pretty violent. And a few days ago I had fermented duck eggs. And last night I saw an acrobatics show at Acrobatics Macrocosm, if that means anything to my family. and i'm bored, so i'm getting off.

hi!

First of all, everyone please send positive thoughts towards my grandfather, Hal, who just had a heart attack. I've been told he's recovering and I spoke to him myself, but let's all pray for his recovery.

As for me, nothing nearly as serious as a heart attack, but I'm back on track--pretty much recovered from my cold, my knee is feeling better after I fell down the stairs, and my hip has mended from my tumble off my bed. I am now an offical Beijinger, with my used bike and my cell phone. My cell phone is pretty terrible--some of the buttons don't work--but it was only $25, so I shouldn't complain. Everything is really cheap here, like water bottles for 25 cents, and an average lunch about 50 cents, but it has been adding up, and I'm finding that I'm going quite a bit over my budget. It might be time to call the parents about it, especially since we have a long break coming up in July, and we're all traveling. Everyone wants to go to Shanghai or a beach town, but I'm eyeing a trip (it's actually a tour, so not by myself) to Inner Mongolia. It's only about $125 for everything for four days, so it's quite a good deal. Anything more expensive than that and I'll have to start cleaning out my savings account! I have had a lot of move in expenses though, and I have to realize that although going out is a lot cheaper here, it does add up.

I'll talk about some miscellaneous stuff before i get into details about outings. First of all, class is going really well. It's pretty easy, just difficult sometimes to understand what the teacher is saying. And I'm still struggling with making words come out of my mouth. Actually, the other day, I made the whole class laugh with a language mishap. I wasn't feeling good and had my juice to drink, but I was told Chinese teachers don't like it when you drink in class. So I told the teacher in Chinese that I was sick, and did she mind if I drank my juice? The funny part was that instead of saying juice, i said alcohol instead. She looked at me really funny, and wondered if I was serious until everyone started laughing! Anyways, it lightened up the class a bit! I also was really negative about the people when I first got here, but I'm not so much now. You just have to be prepared to be laughed at a little, and laugh along with them. I had a pretty good time buying my bike yesterday, and when I went with a friend today to buy hers, I was joking with all the vendors whose bikes I didn't buy, as they were telling me that my bike was terrible, and they would have sold it to me for half the price!

Here's a list of random things about Beijing:
1. everyone rides their bikes while talking on their cellphone/holding their umbrella and someone is always riding on the back fender
2. "Screw the foreigners" is the city's favorite game
3. There is constant, ongoing construction, and while everyone says they like it, there's a lot of discontent, especially from the people who are being forcibly relocated
4. there is no toilet paper in the bathrooms, and no toilet, either (I actually prefer squatting)
5. I'll think of more, I'm just drawing a blank

As for outings, the highlight of recent times was Saturday night, when I declined a visit to Silk Alley (major tourist shopping, going there Sunday) with a group of 15 or so and decided to go with just three other girls to a place called Houhai, otherwise known as the Back Lakes areas. We ended up renting a little motor boat and put-putted around the little lake, which has a cute little bridge across it and is surrounded by bars and restaurants of varying price and chiceness. After about an hour of enjoying the cool breeze, we returned the boat and headed for a restaurant. We ended up eating right on the lake and had a pretty decent meal. We then headed towards the bars and ended up shopping for a bit. ( I bought a cute wallet) We stopped by one bar to listen to the music and then got to a bar with couches outside, right next to the lake. We sat around, talked, and enjoyed the evening until it started pouring, at which point we ran 20 minutes to find a cab. Previously, I had been going out with a huge group of people, and this was a lot nicer, as I was able to actually talk to a few great girls, and actually have a meaningful conversation. I also talked to the owner of the bar for a few minutes, in Chinese, so that was nice.

Okay, that' s probably enough for today. Tonight we're going to an acrobatics show, tomorrow the group is hearing a talk on the different legal systems of China and the US, I have my meeting at the World Bank regarding working there, and Friday we have a tour of the hutongs, or alleyways, of the city. Saturday we're going to the Great Wall all day and Sunday I have a shopping date planned with a friend. So it's busy busy! Hope everyone is doing well!

another hello

Hi, everyone! I'm actually down with a cold right now, which is unfortunate, but I'm making it. Some random stuff before I have to get back to my homework and a nap..yesterday I bought a bike. I know my mom isn't crazy about me getting one, but it's very sturdy and I've only been riding it on campus and on roads with huge bike lanes. I'm going to start out really slow and work my way up. A lot of kids in my program have a bike, so it will be fun to go out with them. Okay, really not feeling good all of the sudden, so I'll stop here, and I promise I'll write more later. Bye!

have a phone number

For all of you that like calling long distance, I now have a cell phone. The number is 13522092717, and you may need the city code, which is 10, and you'll definitely need the country code, which I don't know.

okay, an update

I'm going to sit down and write this for at least ten minutes! I just got back from a group trip to the Forbidden City, which as you know, I was at just last Monday. I decided to go anyways, particularly because everyone was going, and we had a guide this time. The Forbidden City is where the emperors of the Qing and Ming Dynasty lived, and is a particularly terrible place to visit in the summer, as it is basically composed of a series of gates and larger buildings containing thrones/beds/etc which are divided by huge concrete squares. When visiting on Monday, my sister and I were wondering why there are no trees in the complex, since the concrete creates a hot wasteland, and I got my answer today. First of all, the emperor wanted to live in the tallest structure in the palace, and was concerned about the possibility of a tree growing higher than his living building. Second, assassins could hide among the trees. Finally, the character for tree, shu, placed in a square box, is the character for trouble, so it was bad luck to have trees. That's your interesting random fact for the day.
In other more specific news, it turned out that I tested into the highest level class, which is good and bad. It's good because I have to pass my fluency test in the fall to graduate, so I darn well should be in the highest class. However, it's bad because I have a lot of trouble understanding what the teacher says. It's especially trouble when other students make a joke, everyone laughs, and I have to laugh along just so I dont' seem like the class idiot. I have two teachers, one for oral and one for written, and I'm in class for four 50-minute sessions a day, 8 am-12. After class today, I went with friends to one of the one campus cafeterias, which specializes in dumplings, or jiaozi. Unfortunately, I was misunderstood at teh counter and got vegetarian dumplings, but a second trip landed me what a friend described as "pork gushers", gushers being the candy with juice in the middle, for those who don't know. I'm planning on a strict diet of jasmine tea and dumplings, alternating between pork and beef. Actually, I've also been to another cafeteria on campus that has lots of little dishes that you just pick up and put on your tray, and my favorite dishes there so far have been the fried rice and some really great green beans. Also regarding food, I went to a Korean barbecue with friends last night, which was a lot of fun. The food was super spicy but good, and we sat on chairs that rose only about 3 inches from the floor. Unfortunatley, when we divided up the bill between the fifteen of us, we had to each pay the huge amount of 40 RMB. Yeah, that's $5 US. Today at lunch, I paid a total of $2 for about 12 dumplings and a bottle of pepsi.
So, Jen, that's the food rundown for you! Actually, I've been meaning to talk about it anyways. I have gotten only mildly sick once, and that was from a salami sandwich at a hotel, so I've been really lucky. The key is to ease into the food slowly, get some Chinese bacteria in the stomach, and then go for the meat on the stick street vendors!
I'm going to relax tonight, but tomorrow night I'll go out to some bar probably, like I did with friends two nights ago (where we listened to a nightclub singer do the Backstreet Boys better than they can) and hang out. We also have a field trip to a temple for Saturday and I'm going cell phone shopping with a couple girls on Sunday. Everyone in the program is really nice, and about 6/25 of the kids are from Georgetown, so that's cool. I'm actually rooming with a Georgetown student (Cynthia Chau, for those who know her) and we're in the same class. Okay, it's been more that ten minutes, and I have to go eat dinner with my Chinese tutor (we all get assigned one to meet with about 2x/week, mine's a graduate of Beijing U). Hope everyone's having a good summer!

back in business!

So it seems that the blog comes up on university computers, so comment away! It's nice to see my blog again, after a few weeks! I'm now living at Peking University, and Mom and Dad and Felice are leaving for their flight back to the US right about now. I'll miss them, but it's nice to get started with the program. The program puts us up on campus, in a campus hotel that's pretty much a dorm, but with laundry and maid service. The room comes standard with teacups and a hot water pitcher, and we're just down the hall from the boiling water room. Luckily, I came prepared with packets and packets of my favorite, jasmine tea. We have orientation today and I just took my placement exam, which seemed to go fine.

To update a bit, yesterday we went to the Forbidden City, which was amazing, and also to a Buddhist vegetarian restaurant for Felice's birthday--she's 19 now!--where I had the best tasting chicken of my life, even though it was actually tofu. Elena, you would love this restaurant.

Hmm, I'm already running out of steam for writing this, as we had to get up fiendishly early to take the test. I also want to see if anyone is back from the test yet (I finished early) and meet some new people. The people seem to be Ron's favorite part about his trip, so I need to make a special effort to get some new friends. I promise I'll write more. I thought I was censored, so I could write anything I wanted, but now I may keep my ideas to myself, so I can keep accessing my blog! Bye, and I hope everyone's doing well!

hello, again!

Sorry it's been a while-we've been traveling and I'm having a bit of computer problems. It seems that my blog has been blocked by China or something, because I definitely can't load it. So instead of leaving me comments, like some nice people have, send me an email. Thanks! SO we're finally in Beijing. We had a nice few days in Shanghai, including one day trip to Suzhou to buy fabric with mom and then yesterday we took the overnight train to Beijing and arrived this morning at 7 am. Instead of boring you with the details, I'll just go over some random observations of mine.
First of all, traffic here is insane. The basic rule governing the road is the same as the rule of chicken--whoever swerves last loses, which is really great when you're in a taxi, and one second you almost hit a bicyclist, and the next second you are almost run down by a bus. I don't know why they even bother to have lanes!
Another funny note. A few nights ago, we were walking in Shanghai and mom let out a loud noise (a whoop for those who know her). We saw a young guy darting away from us and thought she had been startled by his approach. It actually turned out that she had thought he was going to smack Felice, and had yelled at him! We had a good laugh, as did his friends!
I have also started to use my Chinese. We've found that without my chinese, we would not have been able to get into some places or find out some important information, but sometimes I am not understood at all, despite my best attempts. Nonetheless, it's nice to finally realize that Chinese is not a language used solely by sadistic teachers to torture poor students at Georgetown U, but is instead actually used by a large amount of people. I'm getting a lot more confident about using it, and am actually looking forward to improvign it. I'm looking forward to startign school in general, as I'm really interested to meet the other American students and get settled in.
Sometimes I'm really excited to be here, and other times I'm a little down about the smog and grittiness of the cities, and the total disrespect/indifference/rudeness of the people towards us. SOme have been nice, but others have laughed, delighted in screwing us, and have made no effort to help us. Good luck, Beijing, with getting a good rap from people visiting for the Olympics.
Today we saw the Ming Tombs, and took 7 different vehicles to get there and back. Tomorrow we'll go to the Great Wall. I'll keep you all posted and write more when I can. I'm totally exhausted at the moment.

Dad update

For all of you relatives out there, just wanted to let you know that Dad is officially out of the hospital. He was released yesterday late afternoon and we're departing for Shanghai today. We had a good last few days, with Felice and I having a delicious dim sum lunch and then going with Mom on Sunday on a boat ride in Aberdeen. I'll write more later.

good news!

So it looks like Dad will get out of the hospital this afternoon. He doesn't have a fever, he's physically much more comfortable, and the doctor says he can go if he wants. We've all been having a good time in HK, but we're getting anxious to move on to the next place. Dad's just anxious to get out of his hospital room! Today Uncle Mike visited us for breakfast and saw Dad at the hospital for a while before he went back to rest for his flight to Vietnam. It was nice to see him, and I really think it rose mom's spirits, although she has been very positive about the whole hospital experience. We'll look for tickets to fly out to Shanghai tomorrow.

Still in HK

Thanks for the comment, Zsofi! Actually, I've been spending 5 mins a day on the internet-that's why my blogs have been so short, but I know what you're saying. So Dad is in the hospital. When Felice and I got back from shopping on Tuesday, mom and dad still weren't back, and a call from mom confirmed that they were still at the hospital. Like I said, that was Tuesday. It's Saturday now and we may still be here Monday. We had hoped to leave on Thursday for SHanghai. He has a kidney infection and they have to IV him antiobiotics. He's getting better, but it's been slow. Most importantly, they don't want to let him out and find that he needs to come back. All that being said, we're having a good time here.
I forgot what we did Wednesday. Hopefully I'll remember soon.
Thursday we took the Star Ferry across the bay to Hong Kong Island (we're staying on the Kowloon side) and took a long, extremely scary bus ride to Stanley market. They had the usual tourist fare, but Felice and I also purchased each a beautiful red ceramic vase. It wasn't too crowded, and much emptier than when we last went, like everything. Last time we were in HK, we were here for the transition to Chinese rule in 1997, and the place was packed.
Friday we went to the largest outdoor bronze Buddha in the world, with accompanying monastery, on the island of Lantau. I wish I could show you all pictures, but you have to walk straight up 5 or so flights of stairs to reach a huge buddha sitting in a lotus position. From the top, you can see the whole island. It would have been spirtitual were it not for the multiple helicopters in the area assisiting in the buildilng of some random large compound.
As Felice said, we would be having a better time if we weren't stuck here, but we are taking advantage of being here. Uncle Mike is flying in today (he's a pilot for United) so we'll see him for dinner. It's been a little frustrating here language-wise because I can't tell if I don't understand them because they're speakign Cantonese or I am stupid. I will feel a lot better when we are in a solely Mandarin speaking area and I can work my Chinese magic. It is so much more Chinese now than then. Very little English is spoken compared to the past. I apologize for my thoughts being so disorganized. It's been a bit stressful having dad in the hospital. He's definitely goign to recover, but we've had to make sure we're spending a lot of time with him, and he's definitely depressed about how much he's missing.
On a happier note, I finally heard from Ron. He left for France on Monday/Tuesday, and I hadn't heard from him until I checked my mail last night. He seems like he's doign really well, and the fact he didn't have time to email is a good sign! I'm glad we'll have this summer apart to do our own thing, grown on our own, etc.
Since we've been here a while now, Hk seems a lot more like home. I know my shops to go to, what to order at some local restaurants, and the route to the hospital by heart. I'll be glad to continue on our trip, though, and I'm excited to get an even better familiarity with my area in Beijing.

Hong Kong

Here I am! I'm on our third day in Hong Kong, after we arrived Monday afternoon. The whole family is here with me for a few weeks before they drop me off in Beijing, and we started our trip in Hong Kong. It's definitely as excitign as I remembered it. It seems that there is more Chinese spoken here than last time, and Western influence seems much less. My dad is sick and at the hospital right now (he'll be ok) so Felice and I went out shopping. Oh, that sounds terrible. Really, he just has to pick up some more medicine, and they wanted Felice and I to have a good time, so we did some exploring of our own. We meant to go to a temple in town for the local gods, but we got sidetracked. We eventualy made it to teh temple, but only after some serious purchases. The prices are really good here. Obviously. Shoes as far as the eyes can see. You'd think that would make me happy. Shoes. Eve loves shoes. Shoes for 12, 13 dollars. Yeah, but it turns out I have big feet. Really big feet. Freak show feet. Oh, well. It's just not pretty to see their grimaces when I ask for a size 40. ON the bright side, I'll save some money, and Ron always says I need more shoes like I need a hole in my head.
I have to think of something else smart to write, but the pollution is really getting to my brain. I'll write more maybe tomorrow, after I've had an exciting afternoon. Bye!

5 days to go!

Okay, it's getting scary now. Only five days to go before our departure. The visa info should be coming in the mail today, which means that we have to go to San Francisco tomorrow and get it processed in one day. Hopefully that will work out. It's fun getting ready for the trip, but I'm pretty nervous. I think I'll read more guidebooks to get me excited. Wow, this blog sounds really stupid. Hmm. Or maybe blogs naturally make you feel like you are egotistical. Well, carrying on, I won't be able to update the blog very much when I'm with my family, which is until the 20th or 21st of June, but I'll try to do it regularly after that. Apparently, I can get wireless in my room in China, but that means i have to bring along my precious computer, as well as spend $40 a month, and if I get it, I will be a veritable hermit, only focused on the wonderful world of collegehumor (possibly blocked) and cnn.com (probably blocked.) So I'll just make the trek out to the internet cafes. They're supposedly dirt cheap, like most everything else in China. I have to call my credit card company, etc, so I'll go for now, and the first blog you'll see next will probably be from China. I hope everyone else is having a lovely summer. I want to hear all about it! Hello to my grandparents reading this and to all my friends out there.