"Shang che, shui jiao; Xia che, pai zhao; Jiao dao, bu zhi dao"

This past weekend we took our midsemester trip out of Beijing. We had the choice of going to either Xian or Datong. Since I had been to Xian five years ago with my dad, I figured I ought to go to Datong. It ended up being a great decision! Before I get into this blog post, I should explain that the trip itinerary was posted on the bulletin board in the classroom, all written in Chinese. So basically I had no idea where we were going. To my surprised, we ended up going to three different cities! First Datong, then Ping yao (my favorite), then a third which I don't even know the name of...our teacher taught us a funny saying in Chinese: "Shang che, shui jiao; Xia che, pai zhao; Jiao dao, bu zhi dao." It means "sleep on the bus, get off the bus and take pictures, but when you arrive you don't know where you are." Yes, it's another one of those sayings that only really works in Chinese (because it rhymes). But you get the idea. 


We left Friday afternoon at 12:30 after our exams to head to the Beijing train station. The train station was CRAZY. So many people, just everywhere. There were not even close to enough seats at our gate, so everyone was either standing in a huge clump or sitting on the floor on top of newspaper. Also, seemingly everyone carries these bags full of snacks when traveling. Snacks, or xiaochi (literally "little eat"), are very popular here. Each city, region, province, whatever, has their own special snacks that feature a local flavor or ingredient. In Beijing, one of the snacks is a small cookie/candy hybrid that has a chalky consistency. There are many different flavors: green tea, vanilla, chocolate, strawberry, etc. We tried a couple of these in the train station. Pretty good! Anyways, back to my point, their snack bags contain other small snacks like this, and my personal favorite, fangbian mian. Fangbian mian translates to "convenient noodle" and is basically Ramen in a disposable bowl. Just add hot water and eat! The train (actually everywhere) has hot water, so it is indeed quite convenient. I have yet to eat one of these bowls, I just like the name. You can buy them in every convenience store here, so I'm sure I'll have one soon enough. Moving on, our train ride to Datong was more or less six hours. We were on a sleeper car, which means there were triple bunk beds (three levels), plus tiny folding seats in the aisle that attach to the wall and fold down when you sit on them. We all had tickets for the actual beds, but some people just get tickets for these tiny seats for the whole six hours. However, when walking through the cars looking for the bathroom, we discovered that the cheapest tickets are not seats at all. People just stand in the aisles next to bunks. Wow, six hours is a long time to stand.
Anyways, after I tried unsuccessfully to sleep, I descended from my middle bunk bed and joined a couple of my friends sitting on a bottom bed. We started talking to a moshengren, or stranger. His Beijing accent was very heavy, and he spoke pretty fast. Needless to say, I couldn't understand a lick of what he was saying. But my two friends (who I should mention are white) are third years, so they had a little more success talking with him. Eventually the conversation shifted to me, the silent kind of asian looking one. He asked me if I was Chinese. And after awkwardly asking him to repeat himself multiple times and then eventually looking to my friends to help me out, I told him that my Dad was Chinese. At which point this man got really excited and asked why I spoke Chinese badly. So I told him that my Dad couldn't speak Chinese because he moved to America when he was very young (which isn't even true but I don't know the word for "born" so I couldn't say he was born in America). He became very offended, I guess is the best way to describe it. He started speaking very loudly (borderline yelling) and pointing his finger at me, saying that these white people can speak Chinese better than me...the conversation moved on, but sometimes he would make a point, and ask me if I understood. When I said no, he would point his finger again and speak loudly. A couple of classmates came over who are in even higher levels of Chinese, and they were slightly embarrassed for what he was saying to me. But of course I was nice and oblivious because I could just tell that he was frustrated. Granted, I realize he was  just poking fun at me, as the other moshengren sitting in an nearby seat kindly pointed out, but my friends said that he was starting to get legitimately frustrated. Whoever thought Chinese heritage could be a limiting factor in China...

sleeper car, folding seats were in the little hallway on the right

train station...now that's a lot of people

We arrived in Datong without further incident, wandered around the streets for a little, looking for some dinner. While searching for a suitable restaurant, we stumbled upon a restaurant with a foreigner in it. We talked with him briefly in English. But then I decided that dinner there would be awkward because the restaurant was empty. So I loudly said "THIS IS AWKWARD." I'm so used to being surrounded by Chinese people that I forgot the English guy could understand me. Oops. We left. Or should I say backed away slowly...we ended up eating at a restaurant with all its chairs and tables outside. Allison and I got some yummy local noodles. The sauce had eggs and tomatoes and some other things probably. Not completely sure...sometimes when eating street food you eat and then just don't analyze too much what you've just eaten. It's the best policy. I also had meat on a stick...my friends said it was chicken, but there was a piece that was certainly not the consistency of chicken. I just ate it really quickly and tried to forget about it. But later one of them said they were mistaken and it was actually pork. Thank goodness. The next morning we headed out to a series of caves located in Shanxi Province (province we were in). This was an hour and a half bus ride. Let me take a little time here to explain the unfortunate tour guide situation. We had a tour guide for the trip. Which was great. She was nice. However, we are under a language pledge, so we aren't allowed to speak English. Which means the teachers didn't want the tour guide to speak English to us. So basically we couldn't understand anything she was saying, and consequently were very confused about many things at the places we visited. For instance, I know literally nothing historically about the caves. All I know is that there are were a lot of Buddhas carved onto the walls. And that I know because I saw them. Later in the weekend she started speaking a little English, I think because the teachers realized we couldn't understand her. But it was frustrating for sure. So the caves...sorry, don't have anything historically interesting to report. After the caves, we bused another hour and a half to lunch at a restaurant located near the Hanging Temples. Let me also say here that I consistently thought our bus rides would be shorter than they were, because I kept on getting "yi ge ban xiao shi" and "yi ban ge xiao shi" confused. One means half an hour, the other means an hour and a half. But don't ask me which. The Temples were pretty sweet, but once again I don't know why they were built, or when, or who built them, or if people actually lived in them, etc. The highlight of this part of the trip occurred while Allison and I were walking around in the temples. We heard someone behind us say "wai guo ren, ting bu dong" which means "foreigners, they don't understand Chinese." We kind of half turned, and then Allison mumbled "ting de dong" which means "we understand." Haha they were surprised at first, but we had a little conversation with them. Later on, another man walked up to us and asked where we were from. In English. We answered him in Chinese, which he thought was amusing. There happened to be a teacher standing nearby, so thank goodness we used Chinese. They take the language pledge really seriously. For example, later in the trip when we had free time in the city they said "Di yi ge: bie shuo yingwen, di er ge: zhu yi an quan" which means "first: don't speak English, second: be safe." 

caves

lots o' Buddhas, big and small

Allison and I in a cave

Hanging temples!

view from the temple

After visiting the Hanging Temples, we were all standing in the parking lot waiting for the bus. One of my friends said I might want to use the bathroom because we had a four and a half to five hour bus trip ahead of us to get to our hotel. EXCUSE ME WHAT? Literally everyone else knew we were driving to a different city. I spent the whole weekend in the dark apparently. Ping yao, our next city, was absolutely awesome. There is an inner city and an outer city. The inner city is contained by a large wall, and preserved. All the buildings are one or two stories, streets are stone and narrow. For anyone who has ever been to Toledo, I found it eerily similar. We wandered a little at night before our hotel closed for the night, but we did most of our exploring the next day. We spent a little time up on the city walls, and then visited an old courtyard which used to be a bank. Which is literally the only information I got from the guide. Took me a significant amount of time to even realize it had been a bank. Anyways, what came next was the highlight of the day. We got an hour of free time! When skyping my parents, I accidentally told them that we got to go without "the guard," instead of saying "the guide." Freudian slip for sure, because while teachers are great, its also nice to be out from under them for a while. So we browsed the countless shops lining the streets. I bought a couple xiaochi, as did Allison. A good time for all. 

Ping yao at night

view from the city wall

some parts of the street were real crowded

street performer

After Ping yao, we drove another hour and half (once again thought this was going to be thirty minutes) to another city. City will remain nameless, because I have no idea. We visited a park/temple area which was beautiful, but it was raining, but it was still beautiful. There is a tree there that is really old (I forget how old, the guide said the number in Chinese, in one ear and out the other). One of my classmates was wondering out loud (quietly, because there are always teachers lurking!) how they knew how old it was...to which I said dendrochronology! Thanks Patrick for that knowledge, knew it'd come in handy one day.

old tree

More than once on the trip, my camera said "blinking eye detected." Nope we're just asian.

"He isn't wearing clothes!"

Highlight of the evening happened while Thanh-Ha, Allison, and I were walking to the cafeteria for some dinner. Here at the university, the boy's dorm doesn't have showers (I guess?), so they all carry their toiletries/clothes to a large bathroom/locker room (once again I'm not sure, never been in there) where they can shower. Here's an unrelated thought to set this story up a little better...anyone who knows me knows I'm not a huge fan of kids. I mean they're cute sometimes I guess, but they don't really do it for me. I've discovered here that the exception is little kids speaking Chinese. MOST ADORABLE THING EVER. Even cuter when I can actually understand them. So back to the story. We were walking to the cafeteria and some guys were walking next to us and one of them had his shirt off because he had just showered. A mother and her probably 4 or 5 year old daughter walked toward us, and when they got closer the little girl said "他没穿衣服！" which means "he isn't wearing clothes!" Hahaha so funny to hear her say it in her little voice. Everyone, the guys, us, her mom, started laughing. It was a great moment.


Another busy, busy week (surprise) has gone by, and we find ourselves facing the daunting task of studying for our final exam this Friday. It will mark the halfway point of the course, one semester of Chinese learned! To properly study, we'd have to study the first week's material on Monday, second week on Tuesday, etc. plus the four new chapters we are learning this week. Which sounds almost doable, until you realize that each week here is equivalent to approximately a month of Chinese at Duke. And then it's no longer feasible. I wish I could follow this up with a clever way I've thought of to study errything. But no such way...


On Wednesday a group of six of us went to the Houhai area after classes. We took the subway, which is by far my favorite mode of transportation here, or should I say 交通工具. We got subway cards a couple weeks ago, so now I just feel like a pro when I walk past the people struggling with their single ride tickets and use my card. Before coming to Beijing, I'd heard horror stories about the crowded-ness of the Beijing subway. However, I've found it to be not that bad. It's pretty comparable to the Duke buses at class change time, so we're accustomed. The subway stop is not too close to the heart of Houhai, so we walked for about 15-20 minutes to get to the hutongs surrounding the lake that make up the beautiful area. There were countless cute small shops, cafes, restaurants, and bars. We had a great time checking out a few of the stores, and eventually settled down in a cafe to work for a few hours (yes, we brought our backpacks sightseeing, we're so cool).  We found a Vietnamese restaurant for dinner, and enjoyed pho (3rd tone! or so Thanh-Ha tells me) on the rooftop. We later found out (via the interwebs) that the Vietnamese restaurant we went to is one of the best in Beijing. What a great find!

a cute stationary/postcard/notebook store

hutong opens up onto the lake

Houhai

On Friday it rained and was actually a little chilly. Thanh-Ha and I woke up at 5 am and went to the 24 hour bakery next to campus to get coffee and study about 2 hours for our test at 8. At some point during our studying, Thanh-Ha made the insightful comment "wait, doesn't it rain every Friday?" Basically, Beijing is dripping with pathetic fallacy (see what I did there: Friday = test day = gloomy). 

For Chinese table on Friday, our teachers took us to a hot pot restaurant close to school. For those of you unfamiliar with hot pot, it’s a delicious Chinese tradition where you cook your own meat, noodles, and veggies in a large pot of broth set in the middle of the table. The meat is brought to the table raw and thinly sliced. At this particular restaurant, each person got his or her own small pot of broth. I opted for spicy, because so far here in China I’ve been embracing the spicy. Before coming here I was pretty ambivalent about spicy food, but for the past month I’ve really been eating a lot of it. For some reason, hot pot amplifies spicy, I think because the broth is both temperature hot and spicy. Couple that with the fact that Chinese people don’t really drink beverages with meals, and you got yourself a pretty hot situation. Whenever I eat hot pot, I end up sweating my way through the whole meal. But lunch was great. My friend Anna’s mom and sister were visiting Beijing this past week, so her mom wanted to take some of us out for dinner. Where did we go? Another hot pot restaurant. That’s right. Hot pot twice in one day. When does that ever happen? Never. This time, we cooked all the food in one communal pot in the center of the table, which had a spicy side and a not spicy side. This spicy side was quite spicy. Let me tell you. Nonetheless, we (by we I mean two of us) ate it and it was great! Here’s an unexpected fact I’ve discovered about hotpot. You might think that the beef would be really spicy after cooking it in the spicy broth, or maybe the tofu. No, false. It’s the cabbage you have to watch out for. That damn vegetable soaks up all the spiciness and heat and burns my tongue every time. 

Angela, Anna, and I

yum gotta love hotpot (check it out I'm eating the cabbage like a champ)

that's spicy

Saturday marked a trip to another out of town destination. This time? Long Qing Xia. We asked our teachers beforehand what we would be doing there, etc., and all they told us was that there were mountains and water. Haha. That proved to be correct, but Long Qing Xia was a much better trip than our time last weekend at Shidu. First of all, we got to escape the teachers and go off on our own. Always a plus. Also, I enjoyed the scenery a lot more. We took a huge escalator up to a lake at higher elevation (pretty neat), then took a ten minute boat ride to a different area, where we got to hike up to a pagoda with an amazing view. Gotta love the variety of transportation though: ginormous escalator --> boat --> legs --> boat --> downhill drippy tunnel. 

some of the group

we're on a boat

(Thanh-Ha on) steps on steps on steps

pretty sweet views

Well, I need to head off to bed to get ready to tackle what will undoubtedly be the most difficult week of the program thus far. 


Know what I realized yesterday? I haven't used a fork since May...

考试，口试，开心

It’s been a week since I’ve blogged, but oh boy have we been busy. Also, I haven’t really had anything of significance to write about, because during the week we pretty much study. Every Friday the two things that stand between us and the weekend are a written test and an oral test. The written test is pretty standard: 2 hours of listening comprehension, reading, writing, multiple choice, translation. The oral test, on the other hand, is really difficult. They give us the topic the day before, and we have to prepare a 5-6 minute oral presentation using at least 12 new grammar structures and as much of our new vocabulary as we can fit in. It's supposed to be  memorized, but I wanted to take notes in. But then my notes turned into me writing the whole thing, so I just took the entire essay in to the classroom. Which may I mention has two to three teachers, sitting there watching you and taking notes on your pronunciation and delivery. Needless to say, 每个星期五我很紧张. So, the title of this blog post in pinyin is "Kaishi, Koushi, Kaixin," which means "written test, oral test, have a great time." Yes, the chinese has more of a ring to it. Also, it is a chronological progression of events; I'm not suggesting that tests are a great time. 

First page of "notes" for the oral test, grammar structures highlighted

Allison, Thanh-Ha, and I decided to check out the nightlife in an area of the city called Sanlitun (pronounced "Sanlitunrrrrrr" in the Beijing accent) on Friday. We basically proved that we are the worst bar hoppers ever. Since this is China, outside of each bar there was a guy who would try to convince us to go into their respective bar. Each had pretty much similar methods. They would first say something in Chinese, then as we walked by they would start walking along side us. Once we were almost past the bar, their last ditch effort would be to literally get in our way, I guess trying to herd us into the bar. So it goes without saying that walking past this strip of eight bars was kind of a pain. Because we couldn't choose what bar to go in, we ended up walking by all the bars like three times. By the third time, those guys outside the bars didn't even pay attention to us anymore. We eventually selected a bar that was loud and happening, but was filled with old people. By old, I mean the youngest people besides us were 30. We were hesitant, but decided to check it out. It ended up being a great decision. These "old" people were dancing on tables and the DJ was really good. Later on  a band came on. But the best part of the night was meeting a woman named Emma, who is a Chinese grad student at a university in Beijing. We (Allison) started talking to her, and she was really nice and thought we were so young and cute (but not in a creepy way). We got her number (look at us, making moves), so hopefully we'll actually be able to go out to dinner with her sometime. 

Me, Emma, Allison, Thanh-Ha

On Saturday we went to Shidu, which is a town/area located two hours north of Beijing. But that’s two hours without traffic. For some reason we got stuck in a huge traffic jam, and the drive took five hours! Let’s be honest, it’s probably because this past week one of our lessons was about the traffic in Beijing. So while we were sitting in traffic, we were able to say 在北京，每天堵塞堵得厉害, which means, "in Beijing, there are terrible traffic jams everyday." Woo so worth it. Highlight of the trip was one of the boys in our group getting off the bus, going to the bathroom in the shrubbery on the side of the road, and then getting back on the bus. That's how slow we were moving. But the best part is that the bus driver even opened the door, got out of the bus, and stood on the side of the road waiting for the kid to come back. Ha great times. Anyways, Shidu was scenic, but honestly confused me a little bit. It was a weird combination of hiking trails and fun activities like motor boat rides, slow traditional style boat rides, horse rides, a zipline, and people squatting on the banks of the river having what I would call the equivalent of a barbecue. Probably eating meat on sticks. It was a fun trip, but I'm not sure it was worth the 7 or so hours we spent on the bus, of which I slept 6.5. That night we went in a group of ten or so to get 北京烤鸭, or Beijing duck. Thanh-Ha really really wanted to eat this, so we went to a nice restaurant that we had been to on the first day of the program. When we were ordering, the funny phenomenon happened where the waitstaff only wanted to talk to the Asian looking people at the table. When, ironically, the three white people at the table are a higher level in Chinese than any of the Asians. Frustrating for them, but funny to watch us struggle I guess. We ordered a lot of food, but when we split the bill it only ended up being about $4 per person! Not too bad, not too bad at all. Although, my lunch today at the cafeteria cost 1.5 kuai. That's $0.25. A new personal best.

so many activities!

Beijing duck

- Here is a typical day for me, for those who are interested:
6:30 - wake up, get ready for class, review characters
7:30 - stop by the store on the way to class to buy a yogurt (at 4.30 kuai, sometimes this costs more than lunch!)
8-12 - class
12:30 - 1:30 - lunch with friends. we usually either go to the cafeteria, or a restaurant within walking distance of campus
2-6 - free time, during which I do homework and occasionally nap
6-7 - dinner with friends, once again we go to the cafeteria or a restaurant
7-8 - meeting with my language partner
8-9 - workout. I like working out at night here, because it's cooler and the pollution isn't as bad. 
9-? - finish (start?) studying. bedtime is usually between 12 and 1.


- I never thought I'd say this, but the eight or so characters we learned a day at Duke seems a little silly now. Jumping from learning eight to forty characters definitely took some time to for me to adjust to (I'd say approximately two weeks) but now that I'm in the swing of things, I actually kind of like learning this much vocab. It's all very applicable here. For instance, Thanh-Ha and I took the subway yesterday, and realized that we can actually read a good number of the stops. We even corrected our pronunciation of our destination by reading the characters. Pretty cool. Who would have ever thought such annoying little things could be so useful.


- Today after we ate lunch and were walking to our one-on-one sessions, Thanh-Ha and I realized that we had been completely speaking in Chinese the entire meal. Go us. Even though it has only been two weeks, we are already halfway through a semester's worth of Chinese, so we think that's where the improvement is coming from.


- Buying things at the store near the dorm can be nerve wracking. For two reasons: when the woman says how much my food costs, sometimes I don't understand. Whether I understand or not, I have to pay. And fast, because there's always a growing line of Chinese people behind me. They pay with their student cards, so I'm that American paying with cash that holds everyone up. Which brings me to reason number two. The cash system here still confuses me when I'm flustered. Like digging for 3 mao (similar to 30 cents) in my wallet always seems to end in disaster. Sometimes the lady gets impatient and reaches into my wallet and gets the bills out for me. Now that's embarrassing. Even more embarrassing, this morning she gave me my change but I dropped it during the transfer, so she had to pick it up off the floor. Then she literally threw it onto the counter for me to get myself. Then I couldn't pick up the coin because it was flat and the counter was flat. 糟糕.


 - Tonight I met with my language partner outside in a tiny park on campus. These other two couples came over at one point and sat close to us. And listened to our entire conversation. And then that thing happened (which happens to me occasionally, only during moments of intense stress) where I can't understand a foreign language. She asked me what American influences could  be seen in China. And suddenly I couldn't remember any Chinese vocabulary. And both couples were straight up staring. 尴尬.

Thanh-Ha and I at Shidu

Great wall, 798, meat on sticks, awkward moments

Well, it's been a long week, but thankfully the weekend finally arrived. We went to the Great Wall today, which was a lot of fun! I think the game plan for this blog post will be Great Wall, 798 Art District, and then random thoughts. So read on!


Great Wall: This morning we met in the lobby at 7:45 (which sounds early, but I actually woke up an hour later than I usually do for class) and got onto two tour buses, the kind  commonly used in Asia (surprise). It was funny to be a passenger on one of these buses for once, instead of just watching Asian tour groups pile out of them. Anyways, after an hour and a half ride we arrived at the Mutianyu section of the Great Wall. This section has cable cars, and a toboggan slide which you can take from the top of the wall down the side of the hill towards the parking lot area. It was really hot today, so walking up all the steps to the top was pretty arduous. However, once we were on the wall it was amazing. The views were the same as I remembered them from five years ago. The thing that surprises me the most about the great wall is just how massive it is. Not only is it wide and tall, but it stretches off into the distance as far as you can see in both directions. We were on top of the wall for about two hours, taking pictures and such. Highlight of the day was a Chinese couple asking to take a picture with Anna. Haha so funny. We decided to take the toboggan slide off of the wall, which was 60 kuai. Definitely worth it, because it was 10 minutes long! Some people in our group bought a few souvenirs in the slew of small shops along the path, all selling pretty much identical products. Anna is pretty good at bargaining, so we didn't get ripped off too badly. Then again, we were talking today about how we don't mind getting ripped off, to a point. For instance, there's really no point in trying to haggle down a price 5 or 10 kuai more. That's really just a one US dollar difference, but to the people who sell the goods, it's their livelihood. We left to go eat lunch all together at a restaurant ("free" meal!) and then headed back to the university.

Anna, Thanh-Ha and I on the Great Wall

I'm sure this is what they had in mind when constructing the wall 

haha Anna with the Asian tourist

All ready to toboggan (is that a verb? maybe)

woooo

798 Art District: Yesterday, a group of ten of us or so went to the 798 Art District in Beijing, which is about a 20 minute cab ride from the university. Soon after arriving, we split into smaller groups. My group (Allison, Thanh-Ha, and Zach) decided to pretty much aimlessly wander through the district. I'm not sure exactly how to describe it, but it does not look like Beijing at all. All of the buildings are two stories, some are maybe three. Most of them are brick, and look like warehouses. But the buildings themselves are not what are interesting. There are statues, and murals, and graffiti, and other works of art seemingly randomly placed on walls, or down alleyways, or outside of studios. Most of the studios had their doors open, but some required an admission fee (we didn't check those out). During our wanderings we saw many interesting things, but unfortunately we didn't have a guide book and there were no explanations for any of the art, so we were in a sense left hanging. Nonetheless, it was a really cool place to go for the afternoon; certainly a unique experience to have in Beijing a little off the beaten path (I'm looking at you, Great Wall).

Thanh-Ha and I, Asian tourist style (which seems appropriate)

one of many murals

Allison, Thanh-Ha and I. Shortly after this picture was taken, the shopkeeper came over to the window to creep on us...we turned around,  and she was just standing there...

Random Thoughts:
- street food: Tonight, Allison, Thanh-Ha, and I went to dinner at a baozi place a two minute walk from the university (baozi are kind of a mix between dumplings and buns, best way I can describe them). We each got three baozi and a plate of vegetables. After we left the restaurant, we decided to walk down the street a little and maybe try some street food. We came across a man and woman pouring what looked like a corn mixture into a large-ish machine with a motor. In went the mixture, and out came these long sticks. We were intrigued, to say the least, so we asked the woman if we could buy just one stick. Everyone else was buying large bags, so she laughed at us. But agreed to sell it to us for 2 or 3 kuai. Surprise, it was like eating the Kix cereal, but in stick form. Weird, unexpected, but definitely good. Next, I wanted to try some of the meat on sticks that street vendors all over sell. We coincidentally ran into a group from the school who had just bought a dozen sticks of meat or so (they're really not that big), so I got to try one. I think it was pork (?) and it was pretty spicy, but once again really good. We next encountered a man cooking fish balls in what looked like muffin pans (once again, best way I can describe them). He would add oil, and then slowly rotate the fish balls in their individual slots in the pan until they were perfectly round. Then, he would put six in a little container, and put some kind of sauce, mustard, mayonnaise, ketchup, and dried fish on top. I really wanted to try one, but the sign said four or six. I asked if I could only buy two, and he said no. But we explained to him that I only wanted to try them, and had a brief conversation with him, and he agreed to give me two for 3 kuai. They were also very good! So in conclusion, street food is good, actually very good because there is such a variety. We walked past people selling more meat on sticks, fruit, tofu, noodles, more meat on sticks, some kind of pancake type things, oysters, and yet more meat on sticks. In fact, there were just tables and chairs set up on the sidewalk with people sitting all over the place eating their meat on sticks. I'll have to eat more meat on sticks, apparently it's a thing here.


- buying my passport picture: To make a long story short, I messed up when I applied for my visa and miscounted the days that I will be in China. Instead of putting down 61, I put 60. So my visa is one day too short, and apparently that would be a problem when I tried to leave (but what would they do? deport me? ok good I was leaving anyways. thanks for expediting the process). My teacher was helping me out with the problem, but by helping I mean that she was exclusively speaking in Chinese. She wrote me a note telling me what to do to apply for a new visa here at the university, but that too was in Chinese. Oh well. Anyways, I needed to get two passport size pictures taken for the visa application, but I had no idea where to go. After class on Tuesday, I walked to the street right outside of the university, determined to find a Kinko's. After about two minutes of walking, I realized that it was pointless to look because I probably wouldn't even be able to read the characters for Kinko's if I found one (by probably not I mean 0% chance). So I walked into a bank, because I figured the bank employees would be friendly, and willing to help someone speaking really bad Chinese. I was correct! I asked them where I could buy a passport picture, and three of them started talking with me trying to help me figure it out. I thought I was doing ok in the conversation, until halfway through one of them turned to me and asked if I understood Chinese. Cool, I've been speaking to you for like five minutes. Anyways, they gave me directions and said it'd be a five minute walk. I followed their directions, and stumbled upon a Kodak store in a smaller alley! Once inside, I told the man what I needed, he took the pictures, I paid, and left. I was (am) so so excited, because all of the speaking, with the bank employees, with the Kodak man, was in Chinese. Baby steps.


- bubble tea: I have had bubble tea every day that I have been here. It's Saturday. That's 8 consecutive days. I'm a champ. And have no intention of breaking that streak.


- awkward moment of the week: I've written about this before, but I have a language partner here at the university, and we meet together Monday-Thursday for one hour each day. We had agreed to meet Thursday night at 7 pm right outside of my dorm. So two of my friends and I were walking back from dinner, and it was a few minutes after seven as we were approaching the dorm. My language partner usually calls me right about the time we are going to meet just to make sure I'm ready or on the way. So I was expecting a phone call. I saw my language partner standing outside of the dorm, on her phone. My friends and I were speaking english (what rebels! but actually...) and I told them "look! I told you my language partner would call me!" and waved at her. She waved back. As we walked up, I started to tell her in Chinese that I was going upstairs to get a piece of paper but would be back downstairs in a second. But I couldn't construct that sentence so I asked my friend to tell her in Chinese for me. And she did, and then I told my language partner to wait a second, I would come back down shortly. As we were walking away, she said "don't speak english!" (in Chinese), which I thought was a little odd, because my language partner seems pretty chill, not the kind of person who would care if we were breaking the language pledge. As we were walking away and about to walk into the dorm, my actual language partner walked up from a different direction. Yup, that woman that we were talking to before? Not my language partner. Actually, she was one of our teachers. And that was why I recognized her. The moment when I realized that we had just straight up spoken English to a teacher...a teacher who I had never spoken to and who was probably very confused as to why I told her to wait one second I was going to get a sheet of paper and I would be back down shortly...awkward moment of the week.


p.s. my language partner has no name in this blog because I haven't figured out how to pronounce her name/can't remember it/can't read the characters/can't even write the characters correctly. And now it's that amount of time where I've known her for too long to ask again. Awkward. Oh well. The strategy here is to bring my friends to meet her, and get her to introduce herself to them, and then get them to report back to me later as to what they think her name is. I'm thinking maybe a spreadsheet or a Doodle poll to compile their answers. You can't say I'm not determined.


p.p.s. for those of concerned for my wellbeing, do not fear. My friends figured out what is wrong with my ridiculously hard mattress. It is upside down. 

A new perspective

It's amazing how much can change in a day.
My thoughts this morning: why am I here? Why did I think I could study abroad in China? When can I go home?
Now: can't keep a smile off my face.


Ok end of blog post, just kidding let me flesh this out a bit. The last few days have been both overwhelming and rewarding. The chinese course is really intense. Our schedule Monday through Thursday is:


8-9:10 - Lecture, which has 10 people. There is a quiz at the beginning
9:20-10:10 - Drill 1, which has 4 people
10:20-11 - Drill 2, same 4 people
11:10-12:30 - 1 on 1 session, during which each of us gets 20 minutes with a professor


The student to teacher ratio here is really impressive. For the 30 2nd year students (that's me), there are 9 professors! On every Friday, we have a 2 hour written test, followed by an oral test. Talk about stressful. Since this course is designed to fit a year of chinese into 8 weeks, each day of class/homework is equivalent to what we did in a week at Duke. So in the afternoons/evenings, I have at least 3 hours of work to finish. I never thought I would have to memorize 50 characters a night, but here I am after two days of class, already with 150 flashcards made up. To give you an idea of the workload, here's my to do list from Monday: learn 50 characters, written homework assignment, record myself reading a passage and email it to the teacher by 9 pm, listen to the vocab and text audio files, read the text multiple times, prepare for meeting with language partner, meeting with language partner (1 hour), write up for time spent with language partner (100 characters), read the grammar notes for class tomorrow. Today I went to a nearby bakery that has a lot of tables in it, and worked there from 2-5. It was actually really nice, because my desk chair here is not too comfortable. I picked the studying back up at 10:30 and studied until now, 11:30ish. And I'll wake up tomorrow morning at 6:30 to review characters before the quiz.


Each of us was assigned a language partner. The language partners are Chinese students at the university, who are paid to spend one hour Monday-Thursday with us. My language partner is really nice, but I have a significant amount of trouble understanding her. She speaks fast, and uses a lot of vocab that I don't know. That being said, I'm already finding it easier to understand her after two days of meeting, which is a great sign. Tonight, she took me to her dorm room and showed me around. I met two of her 5 roommates. They were really nice! I introduced myself (in chinese of course), and they were really genuinely excited to meet me. Each of them wrote down their names, email addresses, and phone numbers on a sticky note to give me, and one wrote that I should call her if I ever need any help! As an example of how I don't understand my language partner, tonight at the end of our meeting she asked me when I usually eat dinner, for the purposes of planning our meeting tomorrow. After asking her to repeat the question twice, I said seven. We continued to talk about where we'd meet, etc., and at the end of the conversation I asked her what time we were meeting, because I hadn't heard/understood. And she said seven. So basically she scheduled the meeting for the one time I said I was busy. But it's ok, I'm learning here that you have to be really flexible and just roll with things.


For this summer program, we all took a language pledge, which means that we are not allowed to speak any english to each other inside or outside of the classroom. I was really worried about that, because since I have only taken Chinese for a year, my vocabulary is pretty limited. I understand the purpose of only speaking in Chinese, but some of us have been speaking English to each other...I mean we have three plus hours of class a day, and then at least three more hours of studying, and then a one hour meeting with a language partner that is completely in Chinese. I think we're getting sufficient practice.


Yesterday, two of my friends and I decided to try out one of the three student dining halls on campus. It is quite complicated, and I am still very excited that we managed to figure it out, and eat lunch there among all the other Chinese students. In retrospect, the system really isn't too complicated, but we were only speaking in Chinese, and when we would ask the workers questions they obviously were only speaking Chinese too. Some things definitely got lost in translation. I'm perfecting my "blank stare" face that I make when I don't understand I word of what someone just said to me. I've gotten pretty good at it to say the least. Anyways, I got a rather large bowl of noodles, which were really good, for less than a dollar. Well worth the confusion.


While we're on the topic of food, tonight my friends Anna, Allison, and I walked down the street to find a restaurant for dinner. We decided to go to a place that looked pretty homey, not too nice but filled with people eating. To our dismay, the menu only had pictures and characters, no english. Allison is a third year Chinese student, and Anna is fourth year, so they are considerably more advanced than me. May I also add they are white (Allison is blond, Anna has red hair). So first of all, I'm pretty sure our waitress was confused when I didn't speak a word of Chinese, and they took over order and speaking to her. She was clearly amused at our attempts to order what we wanted, and specify what kinds of meat we wanted in our dumplings. Dinner was good, but everything became hilarious for some reason once we asked for the check. Basically we called her over, but then none of us said anything because we couldn't remember the word for check. So she laughed at us (in a nice, friendly way), and eventually one of us said we wanted to "pay money." She brought the check over, and then we were confused about which bills to use, and how to divvy it up. She continued laughing at us. By this time, the guys at the table next to us were staring too. Then, we asked for her to box up the rest of the dumplings, and she brought a clear plastic bag. So then Anna specified that we wanted an actual box, and she laughed at us again and brought one over. At this point, whenever she would walk by our table, she would look at us and have to cover her mouth because she was laughing so hard; trust me, we were laughing just as much. We eventually got up and left. On the way out, one of the guys at the table next to us said "bye bye!" in a really silly voice. It was hilarious. And then to the waitress I said "mingtian jian" which means "see you tomorrow!" She laughed again, probably because those were the first two words I'd spoken to her all night. We will definitely be going back.


A random tidbit: the other day we were wondering if Chinese people eat dinner late, so I googled "when do Chinese people eat dinner?" and yahoo answers said "racist bastard." Haha so helpful.


To connect this rambling blog post to the first paragraph, today has been really good, between studying in the bakery, the hilarious dinner, and getting to meet my conversation partner's roommates. I realized, while walking back from my language partner's dorm (with a smile on my face), that I really like it here, despite the incredibly tough schedule and workload. Beijing is an amazing place, and I am so lucky to have the opportunity to study here for two months. Hopefully I'll be able to make the most of it. Now, it's bedtime so I can get my 6 hours!