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Published: September 4th 2013
It’s 12:30 a.m. I’m awake because hunger has taken over. It’s definitely time for some dinner. This has been the schedule for the last few days. We wake up around 6 a.m. and go back to bed around 4 or 5 p.m. Then we sleep until 12 or 1 a.m., get up for a couple of hours, and go back to bed. I’m hoping it’s jet lag and that it will pass. By 5 p.m. yesterday, Lauryn and Ava looked like zombies; pale with bloodshot eyes and vacant stares. Zac and I power through to boost team morale. He has really been the team leader more than me, but sometimes he forgets that the rest of the team are a bunch of girls who need to stop frequently for food, water, and bathroom breaks. Still, I love his “Get ‘er done” attitude and impeccable sense of direction.
Today, we went to Mae’s office. Mae is my next-door neighbor and was in charge of picking us up from the airport and taking us for our medical tests. We went to her office to write emails to our parents since we haven’t had any contact with them and supposedly will not have
internet access in our apartments for at least 2 more days. It took forever for her computer to boot up and I was only able to write in the subject line of my email, which was a bit frustrating. Hopefully, “We have arrived safely. Will have internet in a few days” was enough to satisfy my mom for now. We haven’t seen any internet cafes or anything with wifi anywhere.
After sending my stellar subject line email, we decided to be brave. The four of us hopped on a bus all by ourselves so that we could go to Walmart. We need fans if we are going to survive this heat and also hoped to pick up a few grocery items as well. The bus here costs one yuan, which is roughly 17 cents. We could take a taxi for 40 yuan, but the bus takes about the same amount of time and we don’t have to try to explain ourselves in Mandarin. Luckily, the stop was easy to find because it was the very last stop on the bus line. We got out of the bus when everyone else cleared out and found Walmart with a reasonable amount
of ease. On the way, there were people selling things along a covered bridge that went over a busy street. There was a man with a crate of puppies. Ava said, “I didn’t get my shots, so I can’t pet the puppies.” I agreed with her and was proud to see she showed so much restraint. But then she added, “Mom, can you just buy one for me and then I can pet it because it will be ours?” I had to tell her no and that we weren’t allowed to have pets in the apartment. The puppies were very tiny and cute though.
Apparently, Walmart is high end shopping here. There are at least two women to every department who followed us around shoving product in our faces. I found this really unnerving. I wanted to buy a pot or pan because the Teflon is scraping off the one in my apartment. Ava and I had to pick little black flecks out of our noodles this morning and she was less than happy about it. However, I cannot compare prices and quality when some woman keeps shoving pans in my face and going on and on in Mandarin
Welcome 2013!
The main entrance to NITabout the quality of the pan. I need to stand back to compare and hold the pans in my hand to feel the weight of them and just have a few minutes to collect my rapidly fleeting thoughts. This was impossible though and so I left without a pan. We did manage, however, to buy fans. Mine is blowing on me right now and it feels worth the effort it took to carry it back. We also looked at rice cookers and decided that we would go back tomorrow and get them to break up the carrying of heavy items. After checking out, we were famished.
I very naively believed that ordering food at KFC would not be a challenge. I mean, it’s an American company, right? Well, I was really wrong. I pointed up at the seafood burger and believed that would be enough to explain my desires. But it wasn’t. After asking each other if they could speak English, they decided to hunt for an English menu. I pointed at some things for Ava’s kid’s meal and then again the seafood burger and explained that I would like a small Pepsi. The total came to less than
$7. I was a little worried by this because there was no way it would be this cheap in America but the food came and it was what I had ordered. We all seemed a bit revived after eating and headed back to the bus stop. The ride home was successful. On the way, we passed what seems to be a very large farmers’ market. I would really like to stop there tomorrow on the way back from Walmart. Hopefully, we can get an early start and try to escape the afternoon heat.
So, it’s about 1:25 a.m. and I think I will try to make some noodles and wake Ava so that she can have some dinner. I hope that she can get over her jet lag before she starts school. It would also be nice to know where here school is located. Maybe tomorrow I can find out. We’re running out of free days before school starts. Each day, I unpack a little more and clean another part of the apartment. I definitely like my apartment, but it needs to be cleaned more. I have included a video of the apartment below. Hopefully, everyone can access it because I am unable to use YouTube in China. Also, Facebook is out for now. I downloaded a VPN, but it can't get past the university system. Oh well, I hope everyone is staying cool wherever they are in the world!
Video of the Apartment: https://vimeo.com/73764915
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simonatuconn
Meng Wang
Looks like you guys are picking up some Chinese. I am glad to see you guys are adapting fine so far. The jet lag will be gone in five days at most, maybe 3 days for Ava. Be careful with the food since the weather it is still hot in there, which will last for another month probably. Let me know when you get a phone number. Say hi to Lauryn and Zac. Good luck.