Home Sweet Home...For Two Months

Yesterday, I moved into the international student dorm at the University of International Business and Economics in Beijing. The campus is pretty large, and I haven't gotten to explore much of it at all (actually, so far just the dorm and the convenience store). The definite low point of the day was having to carry my 50 pound suitcase up to the fifth floor (no elevator, no AC in the hallways). I have zero complaints about our room; it's a lot nicer than I expected! That being said, here are a couple of observations about the room, and Beijing in general so far:
- the shower was burning, scalding hot. I could barely touch the water. I'm going to have to figure out how to turn the cold water on at some point.
- here's what the "mattress" on my bed feels like: imagine for a second a wooden table. now, put a sheet on top of said table. and there you have my mattress.
- buying shampoo and conditioner at a drug store was literally the hardest thing I have done so far in China. I don't know the characters for shampoo or conditioner, so I couldn't tell which was which. I also couldn't tell which were for men and women. And forget about choosing the right product for my hair type. I bought some with pink letters on it - that can't be for guys, right?
Here are some pics of my room before I unpacked:

There's no shower curtain or anything, but at least we have a real toilet instead of a hole!

We have a TV! I'll be watching Chinese children's cartoons because that's what level I'm at right now...

This morning we had our placement exams, which went pretty much as I expected. Meaning I knew nothing. But its ok because all students took the same exam, so I took the same exam as fourth years, who are obviously way above my level. In the afternoon, a group of 8 of us went to Tiananmen Square to check it out. The subway is a 10 minute walk from campus, and then it took us about 30 minutes to figure out the subway and then ride it. We just kind of wandered around the square, taking pictures and reading plaques as we went. Awkward moment of the day: one of the guys and I were wondering if the guards posted along the edge are like those at Buckingham Palace. So we walked up to a guard, and were laughing trying to figure out how we should pose for a picture with him. While we were standing behind him, he turned his head and looked at us, and then abruptly turned ninety degrees and marched away. And we were just left there laughing, with all of the Asian tourists laughing at us too. That's another thing: we all posed for a group shot later, and two Asian guys took pictures of us, which was pretty funny.

Check out that smog

Some of the group

A guard, similar to the one we tried to take a picture with

Blue sky!!! A rarity, or so I hear

Outside the mausoleum

artsy

Tonight my dad and I went to visit a relative who lives on the outskirts of Beijing...it's such a huge city that the taxi ride was close to 40 minutes, but we were still in Beijing! Tomorrow we have the "opening ceremony" for the program, meet our language partners for the summer, and take the language pledge.

p.s. Here are a couple close up shots of a water buffalo that I forgot to post (muy importante):