On Monday I discovered the work expected of me and definitely had a bit of a shock. We have class four hours a day plus study time with my language partner for an additional two hours. This is up from the three WEEKLY hours back at Northeastern.. So mom and dad will be proud at the amount of time I spend studying. I ate lunch in the school cafeteria for around 8￥, roughly a little more than a dollar! I came back to my room to read a little before taiji. That being said I'm not sure what we did was taiji as we ended up doing relay races with many curious onlookers...
For dinner Duncan, Alec, Johnathan, Brandon and I went to an awesome ramen house with the fancy wooden counter and everything! We ordered from a machine...I got spicy noodles and sake. Good choices. We ended that first night the right way, watching a hilarious movie called Kung Fury.
Tuesday I went into class a little anxious, remembering how rough Monday was. My Chinese isn't as strong as Brandon's, the only other person in the class so sometimes it gets really rough. As luck would have it, Tuesday was a little easier than Monday and I felt a bit more comfortable, but there's still a long way to go. We went to a seafood noodle place for lunch. Even though I botched ordering, I still ended up with some delicious clams and noodles! Johnathan has been telling us we have to go repeatedly because it's one of his favorites. I'm not sure I feel the same... But I also have a lot more to explore before return trips! After that, we visited the Dream. An American emigrant running a froyo and waffle shop two doors down from our hotel, Mensa met a group of us the day before when we were on our way back from class and introduced himself. Today, we found ourselves listening to stories about Chinese business and racism in the far East. Then it was time for folk dancing/meditation (I'll let you guess which one I'm doing). This was followed by working with my language partner and a beautiful walk through the park surrounding a nearby lake. It had everything from bamboo groves to shrines to massive Chinese chess gatherings. I need to go back! That night we went to a small traditional Chinese restaurant where I ordered beef fried rice and found it delicious.
Today (Wednesday) I woke up late, after Oakley called at 4:30 to ask me something about summer housing, it took me a while to get back to sleep. Rushing around at 7:30 I was out the door by 7:40 and buying weird cream-filled bread to switch up my breakfast routine from just dumplings. Needless to say it wasn't much of a breakfast and between classes this morning Brandon and I ran back to the hotel for some baozi (dumplings).
Today we had a four hour break for lunch and after a trip to the cafeteria I took the opportunity to get some homework done and watch some Chinese TV. While not as immersive, I needed a little solitude today. It helped keep me same during paper cutting that afternoon and deal with the mountain of homework my poor language partner helped me through.
After that ended around seven, I met up with some different people than my usual crew and we went to a pretty awesome place a few streets away where I was able to order entirely in Mandarin! It was fantastic! I even ordered Coke just because I knew how! On the way back, we ran into Duncan at the $1 boba place at the corner of the street our hotel is on and he reminded us how to order milk tea. When we got back I called Dad for a bit and read The Mountain Shadow until I finished it. It was incredible. I will already recommend that and Shantaram.
I think I'm starting to ease into life here. It took a couple days but I'm starting to fret a little less about interaction and am more open to trying things. Let's hope it keeps up!
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