first weekend in nanjing

This is my new best friend:

His name is 拖把 (Mop) and he lives in Behind the Wall, the Mexican place near our dorms and I'm gonna figure out how to get him home with me.

In unrelated news, a cab driver and I got into a lengthy conversation about Chinese and Westerners and Japanese. I stopped understanding him when he started going off on the Japanese and just nodded and smiled and agreed (对!). He told me that he could tell my ancestors were English because of my skin, my yellow hair and blue eyes (even though he originally thought I was French, and told me I was his first 法国朋友 [French friend]).

Anyway, my roommate Duo Wei (or as my mom calls her, Dolly) me and Erin went to this tiny, hole in the wall restaurant a few days ago and she told us a little bit about herself. She's 23 and she loves Lady Gaga, 50 Cent and Alicia Keys and when a mosquito made its presence known in the restaurant she picked up a chopstick and mimed stabbing at it, saying "Die, die!" So of course we're getting along fabulously.

















So yesterday I was walking to the dorm and I noticed this guy holding two giant pitchers of water and giant bucket kept turning around and giving me nervous looks. I didn't really think a lot of it, since everyone gives me some kind of weird look (I have yet to get an old Chinese grandmother to smile back at me--I'm determined to get at least one to smile back before I leave in four months).  But every couple of steps he took, he turned around to see if I was still behind him. This guy legit thought I was following him! So of course, me being the creepstar that I am, I kept grinning at him every time he turned around. Needless to say, he scurried away from me down a side ally.

We start classes on Monday, which is going to be...interesting. Have a great weekend everyone!

nanjing

Sorry for the late post...I had to finagle my way around the Great Firewall.  It was a battle of wills for a while there but I'm confident I've won.

We drove to Nanjing yesterday since it's only about a 3 hour drive from Shanghai.  I thought we were going to see a lot of the Chinese countryside buuuut no. It went like this: Shanghai--Shanghai suburbs--Shanghai outskirts--10 minutes of countryside--Nanjing outskirts--Nanjing (Nanjing has no suburbs). We saw some cool stuff like a pagoda on top of a mountain and a Christian church in the middle of a rundown village, but of course I was too slow with the camera.

Moved into the dorm today and met my roommate.  Her name's Dou Wei (my mom calls her Doorway...my mom also named my Qingdao roommate Sunshine because her name was Feng Shan) and she's a really sweet Korean girl.

Yesterday me, Mom and Erin were trying to go to this Italian place called Ciao Italia (literal translation: 你好意大利餐厅) and we ended up on what we have named the Street of Life. Because there's a Sephora and an H&M and a Donut Time in this one mall on this street.

















Oh and check this out:

Alas, Peyton and Eli were not inside.

herro from china

We're in Shanghai!

The flight sucked. At one point there was turbulence so bad that I woke up long enough to think we were going to die and to tell Erin, "The island wants us" (it's a Lost thing). 

Anyway, China still has Facebook blocked, which is not okay because I have crops to harvest and stalking to do. I did manage to get around the Great Firewall enough to access Twitter and this blog.

There's not much to tell y'all about. Shanghai is amazing, the shopping's great and the weather is perfect. Oh and our hotel is down the street from the Shanghai Skin Disease and STD Hospital. In case we get a little too rowdy.

Pics later, promise.

see you on the flip side, america

This is it, everyone. T minus 9 hours until my flight leaves Memphis, and there's no looking back. My room has never been so clean.

Here's the plan for the next few days:

Friday: get up at 5:30, go to the airport and flyflyflyflyflyflyflyflyflyfly (hopefully this means I will sleepsleepsleepsleepsleep)
Saturday: We'll arrive in Shanghai Saturday night China time, Saturday morning Memphis/Oxford time.
Sunday: explore!
Monday: explore!
Tuesday: go to Nanjing, explore!
Wednesday: explore!
Thursday: move in the dorms, meet new people, explore!
Friday: kind of a mystery, but we will definitely explore!

I will be taking lots of pictures to document our exploring and probably annoying Mom and Erin in the process (which means more fun for me) so be sure to check back soon!