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  Chengdu, China
Monday, September 1, 2008

Sunday was my orientation/training at the Crayon English School where I will be teaching. It is a cute little place. There was a lot of information and I am worried that I will not remember it all for tomorrow. But I figure that if I just a) keep a smile on my face b) be energetic and c) don't show them my nerves that I will be fine.

I looked over the lesson plan (which I don't even have to plan myself unless I want to change something to be more comfortable for me) and I really only need to know things like "book" and "boy/girl." The lesson for tomorrow is "This is hers/his" and "How much is it?"

I think I have around 5 kids in the class. We'll see. That will be an interesting post.

So yeah after that experience I came back and decided to get cracking on the 4 pages of workbook homework that was assigned on Thursday. I think I spent 8 hours on it and still didn't finish. It wasn't so much that I didn't understand, it was more that I forgot a good deal of the characters. I don't know how many of you have used an online Chinese dictionary to look up a word when all you have is the track pad on your computer to draw it out, but let me tell you. It sucks.

I spent 30 minutes looking for this one character, and I finally just gave up. After my marathon studying, my neighbors, roommate and I headed over to Chicken Spot. I don't know if I mentioned it the last time I was here but it has really good fried potatoes that I can just feel going right to my waistline. Anyway, this time I actually tried something that wasn't rice. I had fried rice (which is nothing like the fried rice in the united states. It is like white rice with scallions and egg and something else that i never bothered finding out because it's damn good), sweet and sour chicken (but I am not sure which part of the chicken I was eating. Seriously though, I was too worried about getting it to stay on my chopsticks. That sauce makes it so slippery!), the really good fried potatoes, and the best green beans I have ever tasted.

These green beans (which I found out today in the Lonely Planet guidebook that I had read a long time ago) are one of the things Sichuan is famous for. Their are like fried (maybe?) and served with spicy peppers (of which I also tried and immediately afterwords downed a half a thing of water). I can't even explain their goodness, but they are the first real vegetable I've eaten willingly since I've been here.

That night we had an interesting experience. The hot water was out again so Tristan and Genna (two of my roommates) when to the roof (if you are just joining us, this is where my water heater is located. such a good idea huh?) to see if the pilot light was out again. Instead they found boiling hot water shooting out all over the roof from a release valve. We called Wen Tao (which sucked because it was midnight) and she called maintenance to come and turn it off (which took a while for them to get back here). None of us knew anything about water heaters and we didn't want to do something wrong and either a) be blown up or b) break the thing, b being the more reasonable option.

So he came turned it off and today a guy was by but Caitlin who was the only one home speaks very little Chinese so we don't really know what he said. But Wen Tao does and that is the important person.

So today I am sitting in class when one of my classmates asks if I want to get an electronic dictionary. I was planning on it but waiting till my money came in, but after last night I was reconsidering. Sang (my classmate) told me that he was going back to Tech Tower (a HUGE technology mega store thing) where he got a good deal yesterday. He proceeds to tell me all the good deals he has finagled since arriving including but not limited to top of the line bikes, computers and translators. So after class four of us went down to Tech Tower which can really only be described as a candy store for tech people. Just being in there made me want to build a computer.

I think it was 7 floors filled to bursting with technology things. Computers, laptops, cameras, speakers, cds, dvds, etc, everything was there. I ended up getting a 2000(something) RMB translator for like 1550RMB which sounds like a lot of money but it is really like 200 USD for a normally 300 USD translator. The best part? I has english menus. Oh so nice! I've been playing with it since I've come home. It will save me oodles and oodles of noodles... urm, time in the long run and was totally worth the investment if only for the fact that I can carry it with me everywhere and communicate with people!

Now it is time for me to go to sleep. I am exhausted. Oh! In case you heard about that earthquake over here, it wasn't anywhere near me. I didn't feel a thing. I guess there was some aftershocks yesterday too, but I guess you have to be trained to feel them because I felt nothing. Not even a little shake. So no worries! All is well with me anyway.

Tristan, the roommate mentioned earlier, goes to Tulane though. All of us over here are getting our Gustav news from BBC (which was recently unblocked! Hooray!) I am keeping everyone effected by these natural disasters (and other natural disasters) in my prayers.

I hope you are all doing well. I read each and every comment. Shoot me an email and tell me about what is going on with you!

Zai jian!

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