New News

I love this picture! Too bad Katia's blurry...:P It's Andy and Kim, two Korean friends (Kim is Guillaume's roommate) with whom we had dinner last night (as well as Cecilia and another Korean girl I forget the name of who speaks good English because she spent a year in the US or something).
I spoke with my mother on the phone this morning. It was good to hear the usual "watch what you eat" message - but in China, it's so hard to watch what you eat.

The name for Coca Cola sounds practically the same in Chinese, but in Chinese it means "delicious beverage that makes you feel happy." Amazing, isn't it? You'd think the inventor of Coke knew Chinese.

We would like to go swimming this afternoon.

Western toilets don't work in this country. I have to lift the toilet tank's lid to manually flush my toilet. It was the same in my room in the student dorm. It was the same at a friend's place who doesn't live on campus. There's always something wrong with them. Toilets are finicky things...

Zippers don't work either. The zipper will most likely break within one or two weeks of purchase, whether it's the zipper on a handbag or a coat. Even the zippers of two pieces of clothing that I brought over from Vancouver broke when I was in China. That's how powerful the Chinese influence is.

I bought a dialogue book today for 10 yuan (just under $2). I get to choose my textbook for next semester's classes so I went looking for some today. Not much luck, unfortunately...

Now I've got to work and prepare for next week's classes since this week-end I'm leaving for Chengde (staying only a night) with the French crew.