It’s been one month since my last entry. Much has happened and I had started jotting down keywords to remember what to write about until I inevitably gave up days later.

During this past month I have met a ton of people- done a ton of things but admittedly, nothing worth mentioning. I have had more fun during the past month than I did in the beginning and I have solidified friendships, pretty much chosen my clique (and unfortunately have also been chosen by certain “people” I would never hang out with- not in a trillion years but certain conditions, situations render me with no viable options in this case. Damn it! Not for long.

The other day, came the day I have been avoiding at all cost here in China and in my life- a hangover day. Alfred (a classmate, opposite neighbour and friend from Papua New Guinea), Sara and I went to Beijing Language and Culture University’s “Beer Garden”. We took advantage of the “cheap beer” until they told us they were closing. I then have no recollection of the period between entering a taxi and our arrival at “Lakers”. Apparently, I was the one who instructed the taxi to return to our University and we went to the right gate. I do remember however, asking Sara before we left Beer Garden if she’s ever tried “Shisha” and then in a flash, there we were in Lakers ordering strawberry flavoured tobacco.

So my last weekend of the week public holiday was spent drinking way too much and nursing a terrible hangover (my stomach still feels all battered up and this is the second night). I also find that the best time to “quit” smoking or at least take a break from it would be during a hangover- when (for me at least) cigarette smoke is the grossest thing I can think of.

I still haven’t sorted my internet yet. With my initial intention to leave, I didn’t really bother with that. I have been using my phone’s Bluetooth to access the internet with my PC and it has been costing me quite a bit in terms of credit though. I’ll definitely try sorting it out tomorrow.

On the 7th, it started getting cold here in Beijing. We now have to wear jackets when we go out. I do love the cold! I spend a lot of time walking around on my own, trying to get lost and finding out that I just seem to be making a round and end up where I started. I decided to stay in China and endure the year I have here… only about 11 months left actually.

I went to my department to sort out my classes. I met up with the dean of the international students’ in the department and she was quite friendly. She told me that she too graduated from my previous University and asked me the names of professors I still remembered. She told me she graduated in 1998. She told me that I could start classes immediately and I had until end of next week to confirm the classes I wanted to take for the semester. I decided to start on the 13th instead (12th is a PH).

I went for dinner at this Western “Coffee” place with Sara. We had our usual beer and shared a pizza. After dinner, we parted ways and I went to buy myself a coffee flavoured mook cake! There are so many flavours of moon cake; in preparation for Moon Cake Festival (中秋节). Sadly, the only flavor I want so badly is the one I can’t seem to find; the one with the dried yolk in it!

On the 8th, Sara asked me to help her buy clothes for winter. We went to this large marketplace where bargaining is how you buy things. I avoided buying anything at all cost but in the end, I gave it to a night gown and a sweatshirt. We then went for a light dinner at this Chinese place near the Uni. After that, I went for coffee opposite our Lanhui dorm with Ben, Tahera and Bryan who I first met from Connecticut in the US. Bryan is 25, worked in Spain for a bit, then Taiwan (and he says Beijing women have nothing on Taiwanese women).

We all live on the 5th floor. It’s always nice to hang out with new people, especially when these people are willing to share their stories. Ben shared a couple of stories from his life, a rather eccentric character but always fun to be around (except for when I have to hear him shouting in the corridor at 4am in the morning on his way back drunk). Tahera talked about her Delhi life and Indian sweets! How I LOVE Indian sweets! I don’t think I have any interest in any other country but India for now. Everything else can wait!

I didn’t really do much on the 9th; I walked around, checked out the nearby Wumart (China’s copy of Walmart?). I had planned to go out with everyone else who was going to Propaganda but then Sara and I decided to stick to a nearby place instead. Reena and Tina told us to meet them at Lakers which was very nearby so we had dinner there and had a few drinks. Lakers is like a small restaurant-pub and people dance in the middle if they want, usually on Fridays and probably Saturdays as well. The music, in my opinion was actually quite good, they had a DJ who played the latest music.

We wanted to join Britta at some other place with live music but in no time, Sara and I were tired and retired by 23:30 leaving Reena and Tina partying in Lakers.

On the 10th, it rained quite a lot here which only made feeling the cold worse. The cold penetrated right into my jackeI went walking around until I found a LotteMart, pretty much like a Walmart also. I saw this Sponge Bob bath sponge and had to buy it for Sabrina. She’ll love it, it’s hilarious.

Yesterday, I went walking around on my own as usual. I have this bench I go sit on sometimes just outside of campus and on the opposite side of the road is this Shanghai Volkswagen showroom. It’s quite nice and peaceful watching people pass by. I can never get over old couples still holding hands just strolling. I seem to see this only in China, quite often too. Where will you ever see an old Seychellois couple holding hands strolling in town? Nope, the guy would be drunk outside and the woman would be drunk inside. Haha.

Yesterday I went to sort out money Sabrina sent to me from my account in Seychelles. I have not been paid by UNESCO/ NHRDC/ CSC yet which is fine and in a way I have been overspending my own money. We used Western Union. I found out that a nearby China postal savings bank offers this service too and it was quite easy for me to get the cash. Sadly, like every other bank in Beijing it seems, I had to wait for over an hour for service.

I then went for lunch at 真功夫 which offers Chinese fast food. It was quite good actually; a bowl of rice, mushroom and chicken, vegetable and a soup. I even ordered Papaya pudding for desert and they gave free Wrigley’s Xylitol chewing gum for after the meal. For dinner, I met up with Sara as usual and we went to a South Korean restaurant just near her dorm.

I woke up this morning by a text, followed by a phone call from Caisha, telling me that she was coming over to pick me up on her bike because she needed help with her internet which was not working. I had planned to look for a big bookstore selling foreign books and visit it with Sara. Caisha met me outside my dorm but we both realized quickly that her bike was way too small to carry the both of us so we decided to just walk back to her dorm.

When we got to her dorm, her internet was working. She gave me bread, honey and milk for breakfast. I texted Tina asking her if she knew a bookstore (I might not have mentioned before, Tina is Chinese from Gansu province, and she’s of another ethnic minority in China. Weird enough, she has natural dark blonde hair). Tina told me that there was a popular one in Wangfujing. Wangfujing’s quite far from here so I texted Sara telling her that it was far and we can make it another day.

Caisha wanted to go to that marketplace to check out jackets and some other stuff. Sara agreed to join us so we met up with Sara, Sara and I had lunch in front of Caisha (who was fasting) and then we started bargaining at the market place. Ban texted me when I was at the market telling me that he was in my Uni and he wanted to meet my roommate. I texted her to tell her to meet him (since she insists she wants the friendship, knowing very well he has ulterior motives).

A few days ago she took his number but never called him so I was playing middle-man. I then texted him telling him that he would have to sort it out with her from now on because I don’t want to be in the middle of this, especially since they are both “taken”. It usually is the people who are taken who seem to be more available than single people! He apologized, thanked me and texted me a few minutes later telling me she agreed to go out with him (literally, not the expression). He texted me after their meeting, telling me he liked the outing and bought her some stuff.

Caisha, Sara and I parted ways and I went walking around further on another side this time. On my way home, I went through the University and I saw a cat with similar prints as Printz. It was a huge cat, more white on it though and it had a very lazy but hostile face; very cute!

I got home and I saw that true enough, my roommate had a couple of new things. I don’t know which were bought by Ban but I saw fruits, vegetables, and new speakers for her laptop.

I planned to meet Sara at 8pm for our usual dinner. A few minutes before the time, Tahera texted me asking if I was going for dinner. I told her I was and asked if she wanted to join us. She said she did. A few minutes later, she came in with her new roommate; Simona from Naples, Italy.

Tahera’s had an interesting ride with roommates these past 2 weeks. She first had a girl from Sweden who she said was the perfect roommate. They bought carpet, wallpaper and had planned to decorate their room. One day, Tahera received a phone call from her roommate telling her that she was moving out to her own room within the next 20 minutes. A few days later, Tahera said she had a new roommate who was Japanese, very nice etc. The next time I went to visit her, she told me she didn’t have a roommate anymore. Her Japanese roommate had apparently informed the reception that as much as she likes Tahera, she cannot speak English and Tahera cannot speak Chinese and she would prefer to be with someone she could communicate with. Tahera was alone again.

Simona came just a few days ago. She said she had no plans on leaving Tahera alone. She only has 6 months here unlike most of us who have at least a year. Simona can speak Italian, French, German, English and Chinese. Most people here speak at least 4 languages up to a decent level.

Every night on campus, there are a group of people (usually older ladies) dancing as a form of exercise. Everyone is welcome to join. Simona and Tahera have agreed to join tomorrow and I have offered to take photos and probably videos!

A few days ago, Ban told me that Zhang tie told him he wanted to visit Beijing for a short holiday. Zhang tie told me by SMS today that he wanted to come see me in Beijing saying “去那就是看你”. Zhang tie’s always been nice to me; I have known him since Changchun. He’s probably the only guy in CC I did consider getting into something with because I did like him to a certain degree; he has a lot of good qualities, good-looking, good chemistry etc.

I ended up deciding that I did not want to be involved with anyone at that point in my life. Zhang tie is a business-minded guy. This is typical of most Chinese guys today. It’s all about the money. I met him when he was selling speakers and computers at a mall in Changchun. I was bargaining with him to buy speakers for my country-mate. I forgot my phone at his workplace and that’s how he tracked me down; through a friend- my last phone call. A few months later, he owned his own little computer shop; selling and fixing computers!

I haven’t written in a few days. I have been quite tired with short outings but I think because I haven’t rested properly in a while, I just can’t seem to cough up the energy for a new day.

On Sunday 4^th September, I was supposed to visit Ban’s University; Tsinghua University. I had dinner with Sara the night before and I asked her if she wanted to tag along. The next day, I asked Caisha if she wanted to join and she said she would but only if we accompanied her to a mosque. Caisha, Judy, Suzan, Sara and I then went to visit a mosque. Caisha is Muslim and wanted to know where the mosque was. We went to the Niujie Mosque （牛街礼拜寺）by bus. Sometimes when we would ask for directions, some people would ignore us, walk quickly away and once, this guy sitting down somewhere saw me approaching and shooed me off.

We finally reached our first stop and took pictures with the head scarf and everything. We had to pay RMB 10 to get in because it was somewhat of a tourist attraction. When it was time to go eat lunch, Sara and I said we didn’t mind where to go eat but the others were insisting we went somewhere cheap. In China in general, food is considerably cheap compared to Seychelles and because of this, in my opinion, RMB 30 for a plate of food is a decent price. This would be equivalent to Sr 60 (conversion is usually x2).

I was quite offended though because Caisha told me that because I am given an allowance by my country on top of UNESCO and CSC’s allowance, and I am on a full scholarship, I am not in the same situation they’re in where they have to survive on the allowance from the CSC (RMB 1700 for Masters). I should point out that RMB 1700 is enough to survive for a month in China but on a rather tight budget i .e. you might have to buy the cheapest clothes, cheapest bag for school etc. cheapest and poorer quality. China seems to be more expensive than Seychelles now… of Beijing at least! Caisha is here as an exchange student and insists that every cent she spends is her own hard-earned cash.  But at present, I am using money I saved. I have not been paid yet by Seychelles, UNESCO or the CSC.

I understand that I am getting an allowance but I feel her attack was slightly out of jealousy. So what if my country gives me enough money to eat in McDonalds or a pizza once in a while? So what if I spending Sr 25 on taxi is preferred over spending 0.40cts on the bus when I still don’t know the roads or to avoid the hassle of walking 1km to the appropriate bus stop?  It’s not my fault that my country offers free basic medical care and scholarships for tertiary education! She even teased saying “is Seychelles really Africa? The government spoils you people like in Europe”.

We took the subway from the mosque’s area to Beijing University. We met Ban there. We walked around, took pictures and he then got a friend of his with a car to squeeze us all in and drop us near Tsinghua University. Caisha was freaking out because there were 6 of us at the back of the car and it is illegal (of course)! It turned out that Tsinghua University’s visiting hours was over. We then just took the bus and headed straight back to out University.

That night I had a snack when the others had dinner at the Muslim canteen and we were talking about polygamy. Every day, Caisha have a debate/ discussion and my opinion would be rebuffed. Caisha believes that it is an option especially since women supposedly out numbers men in the world. In her opinion, every woman should have the right to a man who can support her/ fulfill her needs. I then told her that using that logic, since the men outnumber the women here in China, women should be allowed to marry more than one man then. She said that would be “disgusting”. Sara and I saw eye to eye on this, where we believe that despite the fact that men and women are not biologically equal, we should be given equal rights. I’m all about equality. If a society allows polygamy, then it should be an option for both men and women!

I went home for a 2 hour nap and met up with Sara at 8.30pm and we went to the Lakers for dinner.

05^th September: Update on Course Issue

I went to the foreign students’ office and met a guy from New York called Devin while in the elevator going up. Devin lives on my floor and I first saw him when I was on my way home and he was outside his room talking to Ben just a few minutes earlier.  We had a nice chat and I found out he was 21 years old, been here for 7 months before “bumming around” and is now planning to take his Chinese course a little more seriously.

Many foreigners come to China wanting to learn Chinese but end up realizing that it’s a lot of fun to hang out, meet both locals and foreigners and end up losing track of what they came here for in the first place. They go home being able to speak only a few words but because most people in their home country wouldn’t know the difference between good and bad Chinese if you don’t know the language yourself, they would think these people have learned quite a bit!

I found out that the CSC cannot change the UNESCO-Great Wall scholarship from scholar to a degree course. Apparently the UNESCO-Great Wall scholarship do not offer degree courses. I decided to withdraw.

06^th September

I decided to walk to anywhere and ended up in what looked like a poor, underdeveloped area of this vicinity. I found a Xinjiang restaurant and ordered some food. I felt like a beer and decided to order one. The waiter told me there was “Yanjing and Tsingdao beer” and something called “kou bei”. I decided to get some and found out it was like “Bai jiu” i.e. something like spirit. I took a couple of sips and decided I had had enough! Feeling a bit of a steam and sleepy, I went back home for a while.

At 2pm, met up with Sara and Caisha and we went to Carrefour at Dazhongsi. Of course, we got a bit lost thanks to me. I wanted to take the taxi, but Caisha said if we took the taxi she wouldn’t come. We then decided the bus would be cheaper and a better experience. Still, after getting lost, we had to take the taxi and spent even more than we would have if we took the taxi the first time.

I have thought about withdrawing and reconsidered. I was persuaded by my family, UNESCO and NHRDC to stay for the experience. NHRDC’s CEO informed me that they will amend the bond to reflect 1 year and not 1.5 years.

It is also about having been given a chance for this course and no doubt there are many people who wanted it but did not get it. I can persevere for one more year and maybe apply for Masters another time. The advantage of course would be more money in terms or allowance+ amount that can be saved, as well as the experience. The disadvantage would be the bonding period as well as the fact that I could have been doing Masters. It doesn’t matter though. This could be fun.

At 2pm after the opening ceremony, the foreign students were told to assemble at the west playing field. While we were waiting for the activities to begin, I found out that there were gym equipment and a lot of it around the playing field; outdoors and can be used for free.

I bumped into Tahera and while we were talking, we were given a card with our group number on it; group 4. We then bumped into Caisha and a few of her friends and they all asked for group 4. When the groups assembled, it was nice to find that we had people from all over the world; 2 Chinese helping with all the explanations, one who was majoring in Astronomy and the other in her 4^th year BA in Japanese language. There were people from the US, Japan, Belgium, Romania, Spain, Uganda, Tanzania, India, Indonesia, Italy etc.

We were instructed to choose a name for the team and a motto. Somehow, someone came up with the name “Rice Bunnies” and the motto was a disappointing English one: “Hop all the way, and then we say yay!” I was quite embarrassed to begin with because not only do we have to shout our motto when we were to present our team to the other teams but we had to hop while shouting it! I eventually swallowed whatever pride I brought with me from Seychelles and decided to just do it. It would have been nicer to have a Chinese name and motto though, most of the other teams did. This is China after all and most of the foreign students are here to study Chinese.

There were a series of games each team had to complete within 10 minutes (each) and all the minutes are then added together and whichever team had the lowest combined total minutes would win a prize. There were about 14 teams, no set amount of students in each team. Some teams like mine had 21 people; others had a lot more or a lot less.

Team 8 was a little different though. It was made up of our foreign students’ office teachers. They were quite nice and instead of singing the “Beijing huanying ni (Beijing welcomes you)” theme of the Beijing Olympics 2008, they sang “Beishi huanying ni (BNU welcomes you)”

The 1^st game was called “Circle Circle”. We had to hold each other’s’ hands and form a circle. We then had to have two hula hoops moving in different directions by fitting through the hoops manipulating and shaking them off us and onto the next person without using our hands/fingers.

The next game was called “blind shoot”. The team works in pairs, one is blindfolded and the other uses words to direct the other to kick the ball up to a certain line and then shoots it from that line. In my team, nobody scored anything, except for me; the ball entered someone else’s goal! Caisha and I worked in pairs for this one.

After this we played “population explosion”. We were told to fit in a demarcated rectangle (which was more like a 1m x 1m square. This one was too funny. I pitched in a strategy by saying “we should have the thinner people in the middle and the fatter…..” the second I said this, I just heard a number of “ohhhhhhhhhhh” and I had to apologize by saying “Oh I’m REALLY sorry, um, larger? Bigger? Wider?” and some people were pitching in trying to find a politically correct word so I said “okay, let’s just call it big-boned”.

The final game was where each team member was given a character out of a Chinese poem and we had to run to a part of the field where they stuck the characters on the ground, touch it one by one in order then run back. Many students were still completely zero in terms of recognizing characters. After this game, I realized I had lost my sunglasses! This is the second time in 3 months that I have lost a pair of new sunglasses. Sucks! I wore it only twice too!

After this, Caisha, Judy from Tanzania, Sara from Spain, Suzan from Uganda, a girl from Thailand and myself went to visit the muslim canteen. I didn’t eat there though but I’ll try to make a stop soon.

After this, the Thai girl left us and we went with Caisha to try sorting out her dormitory issue. Caisha wanted to change rooms and she managed to get priority. There are about 5 foreign students dorms for BNU foreign students; No.1, No.2, No.3, Xinsong apartments and Lanhui apartments.

Caisha lives in No. 2 dorm building and in there she shares with an American girl. She has asked to be moved to a single room and got it (despite having been at the bottom of the waiting list). According to the lady at the reception, there were 16 people before her. After finding out that it would cost her approximately RMB 2000 for her to have that single room for the rest of the semester, Caisha asked if she could think about it. The receptionist was quite frustrated and gave Caisha a deadline of tomorrow to think about it. She insisted that there was nothing to think about. We then went up to check out Caisha’s room and I think we convinced her she shouldn’t move. Her roommate respects her religion and is never home according to her anyway. Also, her room looked quite new. The entire floor I saw did.

Sara asked me if I could help her go put her name down for a new room. The rest of the girls went to Walmart and I went with Sara. We asked the no. 2 building and they said they were no longer accepting adding people on the waiting list to change room. This happened for all the other dorms with the exception of my dorm; Lanhui.

In Lanhui when I asked, the receptionist was about to pull out the waiting list while asking me which dorm Sara lived in. When I told her she lived in the No. 1 building, she apologized and told us that it isn’t possible for someone living in the 1^st building to move to Lanhui; the reason for this being that Lanhui costs more and CSC students were not allowed to live here, not even if they were willing to pay a percentage. This answers my question on where all the African students are! The no.1 building!

The no. 1 building has communal showers with ONE drain for all the showers (which means either you allow other people to see what you want drained or you get to see what other people want drained), communal toilets, one washing machine in the communal bathroom and a very small room. After visiting all these dorms, I have to admit, I’m quite happy with mine! Lanhui seems to be a bit older but the rooms are bigger, we have a laundry room with 3 washing machines and lines at least and shared bathroom facilities are definitely better than communal ones. Among other things we also have cable TV!

In my new comprehension of things, even when chances are the CSC is paying for all our scholarships, there is a bigger budget for students who have another agency for instance UNESCO (in my case) involved.

On our way back to Lanhui, before we asked the recptionist about Sara wanting to change rooms, Tahera called me wanting to meet up for dinner. I then invited Sara to join us. I showed Sara the cafeteria on the 2^nd floor and we bumped into Ben who was on his laptop. I introduced Sara to him and he proceeded to speak in Spanish to her!

Tahera, Sara and I went to a nearby Chinese restaurant for dinner. I received a text from Ben telling me that if we weren’t tired, we should join him and his group and go to “Propaganda”. Sara and I decided to go but Tahera had other plans.

The waiter was putting on some charm and before we left he asked me if he could get to know me better in front of the two ladies. I asked him if he worked there every night and he said yes. I then told him I’ll see him around some time then. When we exited the restaurant, Sara was encouraging me to give the waiter a chance!

On our way back to the dorm, we got lost on campus! We eventually found our way by asking students around and walked Tahera back to Lanhui. By this time, Sara and I had decided to bail on the clubbing and cross the road out of campus for some coffee. Thankfully for me, Sara is 28 too and as “old” as I am. Ben is also 28, but he’s a “young” 28. I had a Maccha ice shake which was fantastic.

Sara and I parted ways after and we’ve agreed to meet later on at 9.30am to visit Tsinghua University. Tsinghua is the No.1 University in China and is pretty much a tourist attraction as well. I’m going to visit both the University and Ban who is there. Ban admitted to me he likes my roommate and asked me to bring her along but when I asked her she told me she had other plans.

I’m not really sad anymore. In fact, I’m almost feeling quite alright but almost left out. Everyone is going to start classes and looking forward to the next few months here (this migh change) but I still have the change of course issue to sort out. Did I mention being in limbo sucks? Leaving might be a little more difficult now. There are enough nice people and 1.5 years would be just enough to get to know them and if I hate them, I don’t really have to put up with them. Many are leaving within the next few months though.

Off to bed, 2.22am and I’m supposed to go exercising with Judy later on at 6am.

This is one event I regret not bringing my camera to. The new foreign students were told to assemble at 08.50am at the “Jingsong Building”. Present were the vice president of the University, vice president of the Chinese language department and a few other teachers.

It was a nice event. We found out that this year, there were hundreds (I forgot how many) new foreign students from 78 countries and at any given point, BNU has approximately 5000 foreign students here for short or long term, studying Chinese or other courses.

There were students translating the whole event to English, Japanese and Korean. It was actually quite nice. I remember in NENU they would translate everything to English only. We were then divided into groups by language, put in other rooms and given presentations on the  law, rules and regulations in China. We were even shown actual pictures of previous BNU foreign students who were expelled for being involved in fights, deported because of visa problems, detained for drugs and killed in motorcycle accidents.

At 2pm, we are supposed to assemble again at the playing field. We’ve been asked to wear our BNU T-Shirts and wear suitable sports shoes. This should be… interesting?

Ben approached me in the cafeteria while I was checking my email. We chatted a bit and he told me to join him and the Columbian girls tonight. They are planning on going to “Propaganda”. This is supposed to be among the hottest clubs in Beijing from what I have been told. I told him as much as I would like to, I don’t really go clubbing much. This course issue is stressing me out so much I just don’t see fun as being fun!

Today was a rather busy day. I went to try sorting out my course issue but I still have to wait for attestation from my University. It’s easy to have said that the course can be changed easily but clearly, there are so many channels to go through, and the worst part is that the teachers are busy with student registrations. For the foreign students alone, there were over 15 teachers involved and over 15 foreign student volunteers. One can only imagine how busy it would be then for other departments. The worst part would be that they will have to involve the Environment Department as well. If there is one thing I know about China, there is tremendous bureaucracy.

I also have my mum texting me from Singapore asking me why I did not settle this whole course issue in Seychelles. I did try!

On my way back to my dorm, I bumped into Caisha. She was on her way to see my roommate. Ban came by just a few minutes later and seems to have a small crush on my roommate. He thinks she is really pretty.

I went with Ban and Rina to the Bank of China opposite the University’s North gate. It’s about a 15 minute walk from our dorm room. Rina needed to sort some stuff out. When she took a number, the ticket wrote that there were 65 people waiting before her. She decided to stay and Ban and I returned to the dorm because we needed to help Caisha to find out the cost of  second hand electric bicycles.

We waited for Caisha on the 2^nd floor while I checked my mail. I managed to exchange a few emails with Sabrina, had a latte and when Caisha came we went walking around looking for second-hand electric bicycles. We didn’t find any but we saw a lot of new ones. I remember my small stop at Walmart the other day; I saw electric bicycles for RMB 1700+. The ones we saw on the street were also being sold for around the same price but can be bargained down.

I did want to buy one if I stayed. It’s quite convenient seeing that the Environment Department is a good 15-minutes’ walk away! It will be a hassle, especially when the cold comes. I have no intentions of using it outside campus though. I am just way too paranoid!

We also saw an indoor marketplace with fake phones. The iPhone 4 replica was being sold for RMB 1000.

I just bumped into Rina and Tina while typing this and they wanted me to join them for Jiaozi! Sadly, I had just ordered dinner… cheese sandwich:-). How I miss eating Jiaozi though. The last time I had this was at the Chinese New Year party last year at our place.

Tomorrow is the foreign students’ opening ceremony… 8.50am in the morning! I have no idea what it will be about, I am guessing it will be teachers, students, no food and no booze.

I’m becoming quite fond of some new friends here. Their “Oh so Jolly” nature seems to be quite nice now. Off to try to get a card to call Sab.

I’m on the 2^nd floor at Lanhui Café with a Latte and I’m about to start my day. The internet isn’t connecting though. Usually I’d be quite alright at this hour but today in particular I’m feeling quite unmotivated as I sink into a deeper depression. So far, my depression hits me at mid-day, goes away then comes back at night but today, I woke up depressed. So much so I feel that ache in my chest that goes all the way to the pit of my stomach.

If I could put myself in a particular mindset, it would be about last year this time, when I was job-hunting and just waiting for a job offer.  The only stress I had was that of getting a job. Still, a little earlier than that I didn’t really have stress; that point just after graduation or just before; no stress, no pain anywhere and now, I have pain in every sense of the word. My backache from last night has not disappeared; classic sign of bad posture coupled with aging. Despite my attempt at rational thinking and manipulation, my heart refuses to heal. If time heals all wounds I hope to God this sorts itself out. Hope is one of my greatest strengths and naturally one of my greatest weaknesses as well. It is thanks to hope that I am in this classic situation. This is a familiar place for me. In fact, it’s the place I’m most familiar with.

Classes haven’t even started and I’m faced with so many problems; typical of my life in China. Every little thing that can go wrong has gone wrong. Well, almost everything. I’m still alive. This hope is currently the cause of my pain and suffering. What’s worse than being on the other side? It’s being on the fence, or being in limbo. It’s important for me to have answers; to know what will happen, how things will be so that I can structure or ease myself into the situation and not just wait. Death almost seems like a relief.

Thankfully, I still have this unfaltering hope!

Internet is back, just enough time to post this blog. I now have to go sort out my issues mentioned before and the UNESCO has emailed Seychelles requesting that I seek attestation from this University that they can allow me to change the course. Headache. The advantage of having more than one problem, is that they distract you from each other. I can only imagine how stressed out parents are because they have both their own problems, their kids and their kids’ problems!

After posting my last entry, I was about to leave the cafeteria on the 2^nd floor. I saw this girl on YouTube so I decided to approach her to ask her which VPN she was using. At present, YouTube is blocked in China (since around 2007) and Facebook too is blocked along with many other sites including Google’s very own Blogger.com.

It turns out Rina was using her University; UCLA’s VPN. She’s Kenyan but immigrated to the US and is an undergraduate in UCLA but here for a short, 6-month Chinese course along with 80 other students from the same University. I believe they are spread out across Beijing or China Universities; not sure. She’s been here for 2 months already and has 4 more to go. I found it weird those 2 minutes after we started talking, she said I was “so pretty, no; gorgeous” and wants to fix me up with her brother. I was quite embarrassed because looks is very subjective. I don’t want her saying “hey bro, I know this gorgeous girl you’d be perfect for” and when he sees the picture, I’m in his opinion ugly. I have had my fair share of compliments but no doubt I am seen as ugly by my fair share of people as well. I am completely okay with this. I just don’t need to hear it. Ha! It’s refreshing receiving compliments in Asia of course and the best is when they are from Asians themselves. It’s normal to be complimented in a country where you are considered “exotic”. In a country where you look like everyone else, the compliments count more to me.

After a small chat, she decided to invite me and one of her Chinese friends; Alice whose major is English and minor is French for dinner in one of the on-campus restaurants called “Hollywood”. I insisted on paying but she refused. On our way back to our dorm, she told me that every Friday, many foreign students hang out at a nearby club called “Lakers”. She wants to go there tomorrow but I’m not sure I’m up to it. I refer to Usher’s “You got it bad” song.

Aside from the first day, I haven’t been sleeping well. I now have a terrible backache as usual. Tomorrow, I will sort out the few issues I have mentioned in previous posts; my visa, student card and on Tuesday I have to see what I can do regarding the medical certificate. Seychelles sent the form but neglected to send any valid certification/ documentation of my results; I now have 2 choices: have Seychelles send the certificates or re-do them. The last thing I need is to re-do an X-ray. Am I not a perfect candidate for cancer already? Do I not fit that bill with all my unhealthy living? Note to self: buy multi-vitamins tomorrow.

In other news, I might be “bad” influence on my roommate. On our first day, she asked me what I used my Gillette Venus razor for. She asked “what do you shave?” in my mind I answered “what don’t you shave?!”

Yesterday, I went around sticking adhesive hooks everywhere. I’m trying to hang as many things as possible to maximize space. I called her to the bathroom and showed her a hook I stuck behind the door and told her to hang her towel there. She said “oh, I don’t need that; I don’t use those large towels”. Most Chinese university students from what I know use face towels or hand towels to wipe themselves after a shower and so does she.

This evening, I came home to find that the amount of cosmetics on her side is accumulating. She bought shampoo, conditioner, facial wash (and asked me what it was), a razor, a “large towel” and a pail (she initially bought a small one and now she has a small and larger one like me). Another significant thing would be that she was checking out my whitening toothpaste and I don’t know what she did with her toothpaste, but she replaced it with a whitening one. I think it’s good that she is choosing to probably allow me to influence her this way (although I don’t think whitening toothpastes really work, Crest Whitestrips would be completely responsible for my “natural white” chompers).

My roommate and I get along so far. We’re not as close as I had expected (because I thought roommates would be the closest person to you in Uni) but this works for me. It means she keeps out of a percentage of my business, we don’t just stick to each other, we keep the distance and the respect for the most part and there’s still enough time to get to know each other which keeps the small talk interesting.

I felt a bout of depression just after my shower today. I still feel homesick, lost, different from everyone else and a lack of that sense of belonging. I decided to go outside, buy a beer and have a cigarette. This time I went to a nearby bench then came back. I was supposed to meet my “little brother”; Ban who I met from Changchun. When I was there, he was in Jilin University for his bachelors and will be doing his Masters in Tsinghua. Unfortunately, he was still at the train station seeing his GF off and I was too tired to meet up after so I postponed our meeting for another day. My roommate was outside somewhere with her BF who I thought had left (I only saw them when I went outside).

Finally, one little thing I forgot to mention that happened to me this morning. I washed the L’Oreal serum and night cream out of my face this morning in the shower with Proactiv Renewing Cleanser and it started burning my eye area. I have decided to keep clear of my Proactiv treatment for a week at least until and unless I feel there is a need. So far, Beijing has not been giving me pimple problems but it’s not exactly the time of the month for me just yet!

Another thing is that I bought a cheap phone; the cheapest I could find in Walmart. It’s the LG GS100 for RMB 199. It’s basically the way a mobile phone was meant to be; basic functions: good battery life, receive/ send sms, receive calls, register calls, address book, alarm, a few simple settings here and there, colour (at least) and that’s it! I actually like my new cheap phone. It’s light, small and simple and if I lose it, I won’t really feel bad. It’s a good phone for backup, or clubbing for those who get drunk to a point where they lose everything. I finally put my 6 year-old Nokia 6230i to rest… for now.