Friday, January 6
This week has been going so well and then tonight happened! Things have been going really well at the school, even though we've not gotten a day off since New Years. My classes have been really nice (basically because in the beginning of the week, all my trouble makers were absent). I've been a little sniffily but it hasn't been affecting my week too much...I just spent yesterday lying in bed surrounded by tissues watching episodes of How I Met Your Mother and NCIS.
Last month Vicky (the TA) & I went to Passport Office and we were told to come back later when it was 2 months from the time I had to leave (Feb 12). So we went back today, and I was was unpleasantly not surprised. I have become used to the fact that nothing in China occurs the way it should. So even though I've been told at least 4 times that I will be able to extend the visa until February. But of course, when we went in today we were told that the system was down to allow me to extend for 2 months, since it is more than one month until I leave.
Thursday, January 12
Ugh, cold is still here in full effect. As with every Chinese person I've been told to drink tea & hot water. Shishi gave me some tea over the weekend which she and the TA's told me would cure my cold. So I took the tea over the weekend and spent the whole night up coughing...well more like hacking up a lung. So after 2 days, and my cold getting way worse I stopped taking at and have switched to drinking tons of water and have continued to sit with tissues near me at all times. It is getting better but I am hoping to be less congested by the time I have to board a plane next week. So excited that mom is landing on Sunday!! So excited to see her. Buying train tickets to Beijing to pick her up was an experience. It was the first time i'd done anything like this totally by myself in China. I took the bus down to the train station during my lunch break on Saturday, but when i got there they said I could buy a ticket more than 8 days in advance. So I went back on my Sunday lunch break and after a few snafus I purchased my ticket to Beijing and then mom's and my tickets back to Cangzhou! I had my TA, Carol, write a few sentences for my in Chinese to make purchasing tickets easier. But still they weren't going to let me buy mom's tickets because I didn't have her passport. So I stood their frantically saying "no, no she's in mei guo (America)" and then promptly waved my Ipod with mom's passport number on it. After a few moments they let me buy her ticket. The next day I had to do the same thing on Monday morning and again they told me no because I didn't have mom's passport but I worked it all out and successfully purchased tickets to take me and mom back to Beijing on Monday!
Aside from getting ready for vacation and Mom coming I've been dealing with my visa. Shishi has been telling for the past 2 months that it will be easy to get extended. But in the last 2 months I have felt like a ping pong ball being smacked around by the Chinese officials in the passport office. I've been told to come back, that the computer system wont allow me to extend for 2 months and then today I was finally told that they can't extend an American visa for more than a month. So they have my passport to extend for the next month. I am very happy to be getting it extended, but there is a bigger back story about how I am getting it extended but not for the internet.
Well as with 90% of the days in Cangzhou it is nice and smoggy....and really cold! Sitting cozy at the table watching NCIS and doing some scrap booking.
Friday, January 6, 2012
Sunday, January 1, 2012
New Years 2012...Beijing Style
New Years Eve was EPIC!!! We'd been planning and re-planning new years for a month or 2 and plans kept being forced to be changed, but i'm so glad it did! We had a absolutely amazing time in Beijing. When we couldn't get tickets to Shanghai we decided to do an all-nighter in Beijing and I found a list of the top parties. We emailed the top 3 about buying pre-sale tickets and times and only one party got back to me, NOVA. I had been emailing one of the coordinators for a week about buying tickets and logistics and stuff. He said he would set aside 4 tickets at pre-sale prices!! So we got all excited about going to an actual party and getting all dressed up!! Edwina and I had been talking outfits for almost 2 weeks lol.
Abi, Edi and Ali had to work Saturday night so I met them at school and we took the 8:53pm train to Beijing. We had a fun train ride playing 'ring of fire' to pre-game. We must have been so loud from laughing but no one minded. We got into Beijing around 9:30pm and caught a taxi to the party location. On the drive there we were having fun driving through different parts of Beijing and seeing all the lights, and all of a sudden it hit me....I am in China haha..it was the weirdest thing. But the taxi ride was fun, we were all so giddy that there was lots of talking...i even tried out my Scottish accents by saying "my cow needs a mirror for Hogmany" just the way Abigael does...rolling the 'r's and everything....I first asked if Edwina wanted to use my mirror to put on lipstick and it led to a 5 min convo with all of us saying mirror in our various accents...so funny.
When we got to the party, first we were totally excited about the location. It was in an old oil tanker in the art/industrial district. When we got in and I gave my name and told them I had been talking with Dion...they just let us in!!!! No payment, nothing.....we were so excited haha. I felt like such a VIP. Abigael and Edwina got in fine when I said they were with me, but Alistair got stopped and so I ran back and said he's with me and they let him through, haha...it was so fun!! We got in at about 11pm so we got on the dance floor right away...and didn't stop until 3 am!! It was all techno music with many DJ's and ton of westerners!! It was wonderful!! One topic of conversation here in China is always the bathrooms and we got a kick out of the fact that the toilets here were port-a-potties that were... squatters!! haha, only in China would they make squat port-a-potties. But since we were just there to have fun and not get trashed the squatters made no difference to us. We danced and danced and danced... 12 hours after leaving my feet are still sore haha.
We left the party around 3:30/4 and then had a little adventure trying to hail a taxi. It was so cold outside and no taxis were stopping....so we had to walk down the block and cross the street and catch a taxi going the other way...by this time all of our fingers were frozen. When we got the the train station at 4:30am we were dissapointed to see that the station didn't open until 5:30, so we joined the rest of the freezing Chinese crowd in waiting. It was the coldest hour of my life....I half expect for my toes to freeze and fall off they hurt so bad. As you can imagine, after being awake for 18 hours on little sleep and then dancing for 3-4 hours straight...we were exhausted so the next few hours were not the best. We were freezing..even when we got into the train station. We sat in KFC till 8am just because it was the warmest. We had an 8:20 train ride and all of us sat down and crashed for the hour train ride to Cangzhou. When we got back (6 hours ago) at 10am and found I couldn't go to sleep. My body was exhausted, but apparently coffee at KFC is very strong. I finally got an hour nap from 1-2 but until then, NCIS & photo editing kept me entertained. It'll be good though that I didn't nap..I will sleep better tonight and be refreshed for my 10am classes tomorrow morning. Even with the freezing and being totally exhausted in a train station it was the best New Years eve! Such a fitting way to start 2012 and end 2011, a year that has been so exciting for me. Hopefully 2012 will be just has amazing as the start of it has been.
Abi, Edi and Ali had to work Saturday night so I met them at school and we took the 8:53pm train to Beijing. We had a fun train ride playing 'ring of fire' to pre-game. We must have been so loud from laughing but no one minded. We got into Beijing around 9:30pm and caught a taxi to the party location. On the drive there we were having fun driving through different parts of Beijing and seeing all the lights, and all of a sudden it hit me....I am in China haha..it was the weirdest thing. But the taxi ride was fun, we were all so giddy that there was lots of talking...i even tried out my Scottish accents by saying "my cow needs a mirror for Hogmany" just the way Abigael does...rolling the 'r's and everything....I first asked if Edwina wanted to use my mirror to put on lipstick and it led to a 5 min convo with all of us saying mirror in our various accents...so funny.
When we got to the party, first we were totally excited about the location. It was in an old oil tanker in the art/industrial district. When we got in and I gave my name and told them I had been talking with Dion...they just let us in!!!! No payment, nothing.....we were so excited haha. I felt like such a VIP. Abigael and Edwina got in fine when I said they were with me, but Alistair got stopped and so I ran back and said he's with me and they let him through, haha...it was so fun!! We got in at about 11pm so we got on the dance floor right away...and didn't stop until 3 am!! It was all techno music with many DJ's and ton of westerners!! It was wonderful!! One topic of conversation here in China is always the bathrooms and we got a kick out of the fact that the toilets here were port-a-potties that were... squatters!! haha, only in China would they make squat port-a-potties. But since we were just there to have fun and not get trashed the squatters made no difference to us. We danced and danced and danced... 12 hours after leaving my feet are still sore haha.
We left the party around 3:30/4 and then had a little adventure trying to hail a taxi. It was so cold outside and no taxis were stopping....so we had to walk down the block and cross the street and catch a taxi going the other way...by this time all of our fingers were frozen. When we got the the train station at 4:30am we were dissapointed to see that the station didn't open until 5:30, so we joined the rest of the freezing Chinese crowd in waiting. It was the coldest hour of my life....I half expect for my toes to freeze and fall off they hurt so bad. As you can imagine, after being awake for 18 hours on little sleep and then dancing for 3-4 hours straight...we were exhausted so the next few hours were not the best. We were freezing..even when we got into the train station. We sat in KFC till 8am just because it was the warmest. We had an 8:20 train ride and all of us sat down and crashed for the hour train ride to Cangzhou. When we got back (6 hours ago) at 10am and found I couldn't go to sleep. My body was exhausted, but apparently coffee at KFC is very strong. I finally got an hour nap from 1-2 but until then, NCIS & photo editing kept me entertained. It'll be good though that I didn't nap..I will sleep better tonight and be refreshed for my 10am classes tomorrow morning. Even with the freezing and being totally exhausted in a train station it was the best New Years eve! Such a fitting way to start 2012 and end 2011, a year that has been so exciting for me. Hopefully 2012 will be just has amazing as the start of it has been.
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