Almost 3 weeks...

Hey you guys. I'm sorry, I think I might've deleted some of my previous posts because the site was in Chinese and I had no idea what I was doing - I was pushing buttons based on what I remembered they meant...

Anyhow, I'm on Melanie's laptop in her room right now. She's the only one who has internet connection in her room which works. I've tried getting my laptop to work with her connection (a cord in her room coming out of the wall) but it doesn't work with my laptop. I've tried configuring my computer exactly like hers and something I'm not aware of must be missing...ARGH.

I still can't view my blogger on her computer, even though it's American and everything. Must be a configuration mix-up with Chinese internet service provider - not compatible or something. I agree my humble blogger would not incite the wrath of the Chinese government...

So far so good in this land. I was very frustrated (and still am!) by the fact that I can never be sure what I buy is going to work. My students helped me buy some CD-RWs yesterday, but they don't work...:P I can't do anything with them. I should've also bought some CD-Rs just to be safe. I need to get some Word docs that are on my computer onto a computer with a printer so I can print up the worksheets I want to give my students in class on Monday. Hopefully get that sorted today.

This afternoon at 4 PM I'm meeting another one of my students who is going to help me and some other foreigners (I invited them all because there's a group of us that want bikes) to buy used bikes. The chances of them getting stolen is pretty high, but it'll be good to have a bike. We'll be buying the crummiest, most used bikes, but apparently they still get stolen...

With September came incredibly nice weather. The sky is blue almost everyday. The sun shines. The air is cool in the mornings and evenings, but the middle of the day is still hot, although less hot than before (or maybe I'm just getting used to it). I'm sleeping better although not enough (7-8 hours). I'm always tired. But then, I was always tired in Vancouver, as well.

My schedule at the moment looks like this:
Monday:
Class #1 8 AM - 9:50 AM with a 10-minute break at 8:50 AM.
Class #2 10:10 AM - noon with a 10-minute break at 11:00 AM.
Class #3 2 PM - 3:50 PM with a 10-minute break at 2:50 PM.
Tuesday:
Class #4 and #5 at the same times as class #1 and #2.

I only see my classes once every week, and I do a lot of repeating. Class #3 is different in that I don't teach university students but "continuing eduation" students - adults who have stopped work to learn English.

Not next week, but starting the week after, I'll have a class from 2-3:50 PM on Tuesday as well, then one class Wednesday morning, two Thursday morning, and one on Friday morning. That's 20 hours in total. Monday and Tuesday will be my busy days. I'm not looking forward to that. Although 2-hour lunch breaks are actually quite good.

Last Monday I met a teacher at break who invited me to her friend's house for dinner. I met her five minutes and she was already inviting me to her friend's! I couldn't refuse. Her friend is also a Chinese English teacher at the university I work at. She lives in an apartment building built around 2000 or 2001. Her apartment is great and although small, looks relatively new. But once you go into the common section, where you wait for the elevator, the building looks like it was 50 years old! Everything's out of cement, so it's stained and dirty. No paint or wallpaper on the walls, definitely no carpet on the ground...a single naked lightbulb hanging from the ceiling, and waiting forever for the elevator. This reminded me abruptly that I was back in a developing country.... Plus the fat shirtless man in dirty shorts taking up half the elevator didn't help.

The swimming pool is being "cleaned" and hasn't been open since I last went. We went a couple days ago and they told us it'd re-open in ten days...how long does it take to clean a swimming pool?

Yesterday afternoon, three of my students took me to the city. We went to Qianmen, an old neighbourhood south of Tiananmen Square. Beijing is humungous. They ordered this special dish for me - a soup using the rice that has been previously used to make rice wine so it tastes a bit like sake, and black sesame-filled dumpling-like balls floating in it. It's sweet and actually quite good. Apparently I can buy it at the supermarket and warm it up at home. It'll be good for the winter. They also ordered "baoze" - famous large meat-filled Chinese dumplings. They're very filling.

After coming back to the university from Qianmen, they helped me buy some CD-RWs at a student store. What was ironic was that the student warned me that he hadn't bought CD-RWs from the store (only CD-Rs) and so he wasn't sure they'd work. I bought two, thinking this is a student store, they're not going to rip off students, but sure enough, it didn't work. ARGH! I hate not knowing if what I buy will work or not. Very frustrating...

I thought I'd just have to repeat that story one more time...

But the DVDs tend to work. I bought five last night (5 kwai each; $1 Cdn = 6 kwai). I watched Fantastic 4 with Guillaume and Melanie. It was entertaining, although I didn't understand half of it and there was no need to understand - it was really quite stupid. But entertaining. I don't see why everyone likes Jessica Alba so much. She's not that hot in my opinion. Guillaume disagrees. So does Pierre. And just for the record because miscommunication tends to happen over the internet, Guillaume is not a love interest. Actually, something might come out of a thing between him and Melanie if I leave them alone enough...they were lying on the same small bed watching the movie together last night. ;-)

I hope to write to you guys more often. Maybe I'll be able to borrow melanie's laptop more often. After all, I did get her a fridge. Monday night's hostess had an old fridge she wasn't using and told me I could take it off her hands for free. We only had to pay for the labourers who put the fridge on a wheelbarrow and wheeled it to our building and lifted it up three flights of stairs to Melanie's room. They asked for 20 kwai and Melanie gave them 30 because they actually hadn't anticipated the stairs... So that's 10 kwai for each guy (there were 3 of them) for some hard physical labour that would've likely cost more than $50 in Canada. the delivery of a fridge is a big deal in Canada! I gave it to Melanie because I'm supposedly moving out of here in a month into an apartment that will have a fridge...and a much better kitchen. I'm hoping they'll stick to their schedule. I'm really hoping...

I should get going. I still need to get dressed and deal with this computer problem. Hope you're all doing well!