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Published: February 13th 2009
Hello! It has been a while since I have updated this blog so I decided to write about some food and a little bit about what I've been up to. In addition, last week I got a publication offer for my blog site through World of Chinese Magazine--a bilingual magazine which is geared towards those who want to study Chinese in China. Unfortunately, there was no money offer, so I have decided not to take it. The only thing I would gain would be publicity, but I feel that TravelBlog is public enough.
In short...in the states, I love Italian food and I found the perfect Italian restaurant here. Across from campus, there is a plaza called Daning Plaza which is full of shops and restaurants. It is a very Western style plaza. Imagine a regular family Italian restaurant in which you order a soup/salad dish, pasta/pizza, and a lemon cake or Tiramisu for dessert. How much would be sucked out of your wallet? For a three course Italian meal at this restaurant, I have not paid more than 30 kuai (less than $5..now I really do not want to go back to the states). I have posted some pictures
of the food that we eat there. The food is cheap and excellent too. Couple weeks ago we ate there 4 nights in a row :-O.
On Monday, I had my first bus experience since we had a field trip to the Lantern Festival at Yu Garden for my culture class. Bus is the cheapest way to get around places, but I do not like it. I'm not a big fan of small crowded places, so the bus ride to Yu Garden was a little painful. Yu Garden was CROWDED. There were a lot of people and a lot of lanterns. My classes here are pretty good. Chinese class is my hardest class and Tai-Chi is definitely my favorite class. In Chinese class we have quizzes called dictations, in which the teacher would say a sentence in Chinese and we would have to write that sentence in characters. Here, I am picking up speaking and reading pretty well, but I am definitely struggling with writing characters (as well as the rest of the class). In Tai-Chi class, my teacher is the craziest teacher I have ever had, but in a good way. I feel like we're little children in
that class, because 98% of the time everyone is laughing. Since the first day of class, my classmates have been calling me Tai-Chi Laoshi (Tai-Chi teacher), because I was able to remember most of the routines and the teacher said I was really good. Locals usually look at me funny, because some my friends address me as Laoshi (teacher)...sometimes it is followed by a bow HAHA. Before we start class, we always have to do these crazy exercises. They are difficult to describe, but I always feel like I'm at cheerleading camp. Usually I just fool around and have fun with it. This week my teacher caught me and she was like "HEN HAO (very good)...you....are...oooouuuttttttstttannnddinnnnggg". Everyone started clapping and laughing and kept telling me that I am the Tai-Chi laoshi haha.
Yesterday I went shopping with my friends after class. We took the bus about 5 minutes down the road from school to an area full of vendors and markets. There were a lot of sellers following us and trying to haggle with us to go to certain stores. It was a lot of fun trying to find turns to run away from them. Once they notice that
we disappeared, they would start yelling HAHAHA. I was looking for a travel backpack so I was able to get a "North Face" camper backpack for 150 kuai ($20). I was able to negotiate the price from 700 kuai to 150 kuai. I am looking forward to using it next week for our overnight trip to Nanjing :-).
Today I had my first dinner with ALL CHINESE people (no expats) which was an interesting experience. It was a birthday dinner and we had hot pot. You're probably asking, how the hell did you end up at a dinner table with only locals when you cannot even speak Chinese? It is actually a long story that I will not get into. I'm already a quiet person when I eat out with friends back at home, so you can definitely say that I was a quiet person at this dinner due to the language barrier. Anyways, I was expecting to pay for a share of the birthday girl's dinner, but it turned out that she paid for all of us. I learned that here the birthday person usually pays for all of his/her guests, which is the complete opposite of what
we do in America.
Tomorrow we have our USAC trip to Suzhou, so I have to go to bed early. As of now, it looks like I will be going to Hainan for spring break instead of Tibet. I got some information from two different agencies through my resident director, and the prices were decent; however, plane tickets are about $1000 US which is TAI GUI LE (too expensive). A lot of people who were interested are discouraged about going now, so if I want to go I might be a lone ranger. The group that I went to Harbin with is thinking about going to Hainan (Hawaii of China). I really want to go to Hainan, and the people that I went to Harbin with were a good group to travel with, so there might be a part 2 adventure this spring break.
Expect the next blog to be on Suzhou :-) 再見
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Charmaine
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Photos
Yu Garden Lantern Festival looks nice