Home Sweet Home

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Our apartments are in the South Building of campus. There is a big gate that is locked every night that guards the back courtyard area. We are looked after by the shirfu. He lives in the little hut in the courtyard with glass windows. The courtyard has several plastic chairs (like an old bowling alley) and an outdoor pool table (a la Drew Carey). If we are out past 11pm when they lock the gates, we can either wake up the shirfu or climb the wall. The wall in question happens to have shards of glass embedded in the top of it.

The International Offices of the campus are on the first floor of our building. My place is on the second floor right at the top of the stairs. Sarah is next door to me to the right of the stairs. To the left, we have Dr. David Seamen and his wife, Barbara. David is a French professor from Georgia Southern University. They will be here for only the first semester. Katie and Laura live upstairs about Sarah and I, and Alexes will be joining them when she gets here in a week or so. Nick and Dan have their own private stairway to their rooms on the 2nd and 3rd floor, respectively.

I have the “Mansion” (as Katie affectionately refers to it) because I have an extra bedroom. When you walk in the door, my “office/lounge” is immediately to your right. The living room/dining room is dead ahead (note: the fridge is in this room). My Kitchen is down the hall to the left of the living area. I use the term kitchen loosely. It is the size of a walk-in closet and it has one small sink and two burners for cooking. My fridge (a large one) lives in the next room. I have some shelves in the kitchen on which I was left some silverwear, a few mugs, plates, bowls and a cutting board. The bathroom has a western toilet (though you can’t flush the toilet paper) and a tub/shower that doesn’t drain very well. I have yet to figure out how to get any hot water so I have taken very short, very chilly showers. My washing machine is in the bathroom. I tried a test run last night sans clothes to try and figure out how it works. All I managed to accomplish was nearly flooding my bathroom. I still have a few weeks before I am out of underwear, but I know that I will need to figure it out before then 😊

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Photos

Courtyard
I am determined to have a very merry Unbirthday party at that long outdoor table with the whimsically colored chairs.

All My Bags
I felt like I had so much stuff when I was hauling all this through the airports (and paying an extra 544 kuai-$70-for my overweight bags). Once I had unpacked, my place was still empty.

Living/Dining
My living room has a TV, microwave and fridge.

Kitchen
My Almost-Kitchen. The door leads out to one of my two clothes drying porches.

Comments

[Amanda Connon]

WOW! This is incredible!!!!! :D

[Bob Tallitsch]

Cori: While I did my sabbatical at CCNU I lived where Sarah is living. The apartments look quite similar -- some things improved -- others still their "quaint" style/format as 5 years ago! Your pictures bring back lots of fond memories of my time at CCNU -- enjoy -- it will be a fantastic experience! Love ya Bob

[Amanda]

Wow...that place looks incredibly familiar...weird!

[Ash]

Yeah... it does look really familiar... isn't that odd...