Blogger fucker

Well.. Blogger is acting up not uploading all of my posts .. So chances are that this one won't too. But. I'm still alive and when I get back home the posts will props be popping in, in a random order? I can't edit them either. Weird. 

Here's a two am selfie on Thursday/Friday July 18. 

Night xx 

A good week!

Now I got all my classes fixed so that I have the right ones. I now have the speaking class first and then the writing class. 

I feel really good about my self now. I feel like I get some thing done right. I'm good in the speaking class and the teacher corrects my tones like I'm crazy or something. But I guess she just do it to help me. Although sometimes it a bit annoying since I feel like a have a way better pronunciation than some of the others and they get "非常好！" (really really good) and I get a mere ＂好＂... But again.. I'm here to learn and I am learning stuff! Even though the pace is really slow for this class compared to how we do it at home! 

This class is a great warmup for the writing class. The teacher talks a lot faster and doesn't always translate to English. So when I've had 90 min chinese talking and listening warmup I can get most of what she says. 

My main goal for being here is actually to get better at understanding what there's being said to me. I can read up on my characters and practice speaking by my self. But not listening and understanding. That's where I'm the most troubled. So I'm getting better! :D

  

Monday 7/7 2014

I didn't get any sleep last night.. Like maybe.. 2 hours.. Even though I was really tired for the first class I was a happy camper. Bc you. 

I did mess my article up today though. We had to write about what we like about Saturdays and what we usually do on Saturdays. I started out fine: I like Saturdays because I can sleep in. Then I proceeded to write about my school days. Like from 8-12 I have classes and then lunch and so on.. I was half way through the assignment before I realised it and had to start over. By then the time was up and I only handed in "I like Saturdays" and "I'm sorry, I'm really tired" :p haha

Next up was my new class, elementary chinese. She has decided the class into two groups. Advanced beginners and semi beginners. I got on semi beginners and it was lovey and easy. We have to buy a book for this course. This class starts at chapter six in the beginners book and the other class starts at chapter 15 in the next book. I took a look on that one and that seems like (still below) my level back home. So I asked if I can try that class tomorrow. I could. So I bought the book and in my lunch break a prepared chapter 15. It's really weird to have pinyin beneath the characters again. I totally only read the pinyin and not the characters. It was done really fast. I even had time for a power nap!

Well.. Today I dropped the last course. The marriage and family one. Not because it wasn't interesting. It definitely is! Really ! It's just that it takes too much time from me studying chinese language and that is the reason I am here. It is really important to me. 

So yeah.. I dropped it... 

Tonight I'm getting all greased up in fried.. Food. I honestly have no idea what's inside this. Don't think it's anything fish though. I guess is chicken or pork. I don't know :b

Here's a selfie from my lonesome dinner :b

Bonus selfie without the tilted head :o

Toilets in China

Toilets in china

Hi there! Now here is the story aka out how my life got twisted upside down. I'd like to take a minute just sit right there I tell you all about how I forgot about the squat toilets of china .. Dhu dhu dhuudum.. Dhu dhu dhuudum .. 

Yeah. I totally forgot a bout those suckers since I was here last year. It's just a fancy hole in the ground.

Then there was this one. Pretty smart. This was the pee doesn't go all over the floor and especially your feet! 

I get the idea of not wanting to sit on a toilet seat full of germs.. But.. This just seems even more.. Eew! 

 

Weekend

Weekend. Ahhh...

Nope.. Not really... Slept most of my Saturday away.. Actually.. All of it. Typical me! >.< 

Sunday, on the other hand.. Phew! I got up and then I studied.. Say whaaaat? Yeah. For the exams back home. I only did it for an hour or two befor the characters started melting together and I was still really exhausted. I sleep really bad here. My bed is a metal plate with three cm of "mattress" on top.. Yeah. So comfy I could just snuggle there all day!

Wait.. That's what I'm doing.. My body hurts soooo bad. I literally get bruises from sleeping on this bed. Yeah - that's right. On it. Not in it..

My bed.. Oh my lord it's a crappy bed. I miss my own so much!

Well.. After I studied, with Bella! I got back to bed slept for a while.. Them got up to eat dinner. Today's special was spaghetti.. Eating it with chopsticks felt funny :b

And then I met up with my group from my other course: marriage and family in china. We have to do that presentation on Wednesday. They want me to do some of the talking and I clearly doesn't understand the topic. I hope I can either get to understand it, or get out of it being me to do the talking.

I hate doing presentations when I'm not 100% in the stuff. Lol.. That's a lie.. Back at home it's like 50% is enough for me.. But there I also understand the topics.. Well.. It just don't make sense to me for me to present and have a discussion when I'm blank as what we are talking about.. 

The topic is dating in china. And tv shows about dating and whether or not we should judge those who marry for money over love. Not the actual judging. Just wether or not we should judge. Seems weird to me.. 

Well.. Here I am at 4 am.. Can't sleep even though I'm about to die of exhaustion.. I'm down in the hall/reception area. One of the guards is sleeping. The other one watching a show as far as I can hear.

Lol. Sorry for the feet XD 

I have classes from 8:00 till 5:30 tomorrow.. And breakfast is at 7.. It is now 4 am.. Three hours till I have to get up. Great.. Gotta go try and get some sleep.

Super tired selfie from just now. 

--- out! 

Friday and the French

I had my regular writing class this morning and after I had my new class: elementary chinese.

This class is so much better for me! I get to use the chinese I know and learn a bit more / refresh what I have forgotten (sadly that's a lot of it) :(

Then I finally made it to my third class: marriage and family in china.

It a chinese teacher but she speaks very well English. She had like 108 slides to go through, but we only went through 40 or so on 3,5 hours. Yes... This is a damn long course! From 2-5:30! Ever Monday,  Wednesday and Friday! Gonna be tough! But it's not all bad. I really like the content of this class so it's all good! I learned a lot of great stuff!

Bad thing is that she gave us a presentation to prepare, and I am in the first group to present. So that would have been Monday. Like only a weekend to prepare. But she postponed it till Wednesday. So we have to hear two presentations on Wednesday. 

After school I call home. Finally got my viber to work, and after that I was like seriously hungry! But I didn't have any more cash and the ATM in the dining hall was broken. So it took me like 45 min to track down some cash. Then I sat down in a cafe on campus called circle. When I'm hungry I get mad. Like.. Really mad and cranky! I now feel sorry for the waiter. 

He didn't have lasagna.. And then I felt like my world broke down... No.. But.. I was pissed... :b

So burger for me and a Heineken. Them I saw 4 guys playing cards, and I was all alone, so I asked if I could join them while eating my dinner. Sure I could. Turned out they were French.

They invited me along for later. They were gonna go see the game (Germany-France) in the city with some friends. Sure.. Why not? They hadn't had dinner, neither their friends, so we went to a street market where they had some food and some beers and then we were gonna take the subway to the bar where we were gonna see the game. Too bad we forgot that the subway closes at like 10:30.. So we decided to walk. Then after some time, they decided to take a cab.. A bit difficult... Ad there were some mistakes made and it was really hard to find the place. I don't know why, but it had to be this specific bar and it look expensive and they smoked inside.. Eww...

Well... It was all in all a good night. Even though France lost, and that night I was French... 

 I was home in my bed at 3 am I think.. Up since 7 am. 20 hours and no nap! ..

I really need to get control of my sleeping..

Xx

Shopping

So thursday i had a half Day. Only classes from 8-11:30. 

The early class is still fun and I can do the exercises fine. But the second class was ... Not fun. 90 min of pure chinese that I could not understand. Well.. The most of it I couldn't understand. 

So after class I hurried over to the office and got some papers to drop that course and was told I had to talk to the other teacher before I could get admitted to that course. .. So far so good. 

Then I had some lunch. I picked what I thought looked like chicken, but it was some mushrooms.. Buhu! I didn't like them. So I just had rice and bread for lunch.

Then I went shopping, by my self. On my way to the mall there was this hobo of a chinese man, with an umbrella. He swung it around and tried hitting people, including myself, with it. Not nice. 

I walked two malls thin. Like two (to me) huge malls and some stores under ground connecting the two malls.. And then I got to a supermarket that was my actual destination, to buy some more dried mango! Yummy! But I can't eat that much a day, or my tummy will get upset :/

I found a place selling mango juice with yogurt. Sounded delicious, so I went for it. I think that was my first encounter with bubble juice... Anyways.. There was bits in it and that I did not care for, so I threw it out...

I bought some dresses and different stuff before walking home. 

Then I just came home to my bed and instantly fell asleep.

First day in school!

I woke up about 6 am, thinking that I should prob get a shower before heading to class, starting at 8. But then I realized that I don't have any flip flops, and I really don't want to barefoot in those shared showers.. So no shower for me. I got my dry shampoo and a washcloth that'll have to make do, until I buy some shoes.

Then I had a lot of time free, I decided to go for breakfast a bit earlier than planed. I was the only non-chinese person in the canteen.  

How the canteen looks at 7 am

How I look at 7 am

When I had to choose my own breakfast at the chinese canteen. The only place open that early!

Bun with fishy stuff and cabbage? Thanks, but no thanks..

Then I had my first class: pre-intermediate chinese writing. It was great! Even though its a chinese teacher only speaking chinese. No.. That not fair. Some words she translates.. Like.. The simple words, that I 100% understand in chinese :b

We went through some slides and then had to write a bit about ourselves in what she calls book A. Then hand it in to her, and tomorrow she will give it back to us and them we have to re-write it I'm book B. I think we have to do this every day. We talk a bit too. It's great, since I'm really bad at understanding a conversation, so that I practice here. 

My second class was semi-intermediate comprehensive chinese. Design for those who've studies chinese for 6 months to 1 year. Unfortunately the class was filled with peeps (from the same school, I think in Iran) that had studied chinese for 3-5 years.. That was a bit too difficult for me and the level if the class is not as described :( 

****NOTE: as I'm sitting in my bed my roomie farted... She's chinese.. It's is so wierd!*** 

I'm giving that class another shot tomorrow and if its still to difficult I might ask to get transferred to elementary chinese.

Then I have a confession: I didn't go to my last class :(

After the difficult class, I went for a nap, a thing I do a lot. A lot! I didn't register when my alarm went off, so I slept till about 5:30 pm. And the class started at 2 pm and ends at 5:30 pm.. I'm a baaaaaaad student! :(

I met up with Bella around 6 and then we went to the opening ceremony. I think it is really silly and weird that they have the opening ceremony after we've already started. There were some speeches and then some students played so e traditional chinese music. I really liked the music. It was beautiful. It was really funny, that none of the speakers were good at English. Eventhough there was an aussie/American (didn't get that) and a guy from Ireland, they didn't speak clear enough for me to understand all that they said!

Oh well... The ceremony started like 45 mins too late and I was already starving since I hadn't eaten since 7 am. So after a couple of songs Bella and I went to get some dinner. I think Bella had already eaten though. She told me yesterday that she eats dinner at like 5 and it was 8:20 or something by then. But she had some dinner with me and she ate everything too.. Wow.. Chinese peeps can eat! I ate like 1/3 of my meal and then I was full. Cheap it is! Like 26 yuan for dinner and 5 for a can of coke.

We ate well and talked and then we headed home to our own dorms.

Here I am writing it all up at 11:34 in the evening. 

First day in Beijing

The flight was like 40 min late, even though nobody informed us (in English or anyway I could understand) about it. So I was afraid that my partner might had left without me. 

I got out of the plane and into passport check. Took long enough! And then on to getting my suitcase. It wasn't the last one to get there, but I felt like a lot of peeps got their bags before I did. I was starting to think it got lost in transit or something like that.

I hurried over to the exit with my case and there was a huge line to get out, since you had to get your bags scanned to get out. Hmm... But when it was my turn, the security guy started passing chinese people through. Not having their bags checked. I was lucky! I got through that way too! Not that I had anything to hide, but it's just a lot faster!

When I got out I had some trouble finding Bella (my partner from RUC) but I found her and on our way we were! 

We took a bus and then walked a bit to get to campus. Then I got my room and then I found out I needed to buy some stuff. So I changed from jeans to a dress (it was semi-hot) and then we went for some lunch in the canteen followed by a campus tour and some shopping. I was too tired to go real shopping, so just some basics - like toilet paper and a towel. And a icecream! Yummy!

Lunch with Bella 

Me in front of RUC 

Cupnoodles! With weird guys on them!  I find this really funny! :D

Them it was about 5pm and we remembered that we had to check me in a different place too! So we hurried over to get me some wifi and check in for my courses. 

Then I just went straight to bed and slept till 6 am ! 

The flight

Okay. This is a 7-8 hour flight, so I've got soooo much to tell. Or.. Wait.. What?

I got the seat 26G, and aisle seat in the middle. The layout of this plane is three-four-three. So I got an aisle seat in the middle section, beside some, they told me, Korean guys. Weird thing is, that he just started speaking Korean to me? Like? What?! For once: I'm white and then: we're going to china - why should I speak Korean? If anything I should speak chinese. And I do speak some chinese ;)

Anyways..  Really shy guys and it took them all their courage to ask me if I wanted to switch seats with their last friend, who'd gotten a middle seat in the three section. I was glad to switch, since I got more leg space! Yay me!

On board selfie

We got dinner an hour or two into the flight. I don't know why peeps complain about plane food. I really like it! A three course meal and everything. 

For a starter I got a small piece of salmon and some veggies.

The main I could even choose what I wanted - fish or chicken. I went with chicken. It was marinated in something delicious and there was a small piece of broccoli and some potatoes in it too! It was hot! :D 

For dessert there was cake and tea.

The girl beside me ate like she hadn't had a meal in days. Gulp! It was gone before I was done with my starter! :b

Then we got breakfast.. But it was the same as I got for "lunch" at the first plane.. Hmm.. Not the most interesting food. Some meat and some bread. And ofc the cheese... The damn cheese! Why is there always cheese? It's like; come on peeps! You can live for a few hours without cheese!  

There's one hour till we land and this is first now I check the movies offered on board. Omg I'm so stupid! They have the hobbit 2! And I never went to see it in the movies :'( and Netflix doesn't have it yet...

But it's like 3 hours long, and I've only got one! Buhuuu... :'(

Fancy tv and stuff!

But I, really exited to meet Bella! Bella is a student from RUC (Renmin university red.) and she's been writing me for some days now, like a penpall! It's something the university sat up so that I got one to show me around and such. She keeps telling me how exited she is to meet me, and the closer I get to Beijing, the more exited I get too! It's not really real to me yet.. That I'm gonna be in china for a month! 

But probs we gonna get some food and she'll show me around. I hope she can help me studying for my exams back in dk! And hopefully she'll show me the good places to shop too! :)

Well..  Since I couldn't watch the hobbit, I found some Disney music on the plane playlist. Only bad thing is the damn headphones... But I love Disney music! :D

Xx