Dinner at le lure

Our first night in California, having dinner at the lure, swordfish here I come!

Busy week

Sorry, this week will be lacking in posts, we have tests coming up. I'll be studying.

Until next time

-Ben

The Olympics!

I'm guessing the Olympic Village was more interesting during the Olympics. Having a 2400 meter long 160 meter wide walkway is great, unless there's not much reason for people to be walking on it. Although it was far from a ghost town, full of tourists, mostly in-country tourists.

It didn't help things that the pollution level today was pretty high too. Trying to get clear pictures was near impossible, and with the size of the stadium, also known as bird's nest, the pollution was evident inside as well.

The architecture of the stadium is pretty interesting, but it's old, faded and rusted in parts, and generally seems uncared for. They charge for admission to walk around and see the inside concourses, and the field is large, you can get a great view of the occasional segway races held for tourists around the infield track, but other than that and videos about the olympics, there isn't much else.

There's also the water cube across the way. But during the day, it's just a blue box with weird circles on it.

The long and the short, I was unimpressed with the 'tourist' site. I don't doubt it was exciting during the event, but now it's just gathering dust, almost literally.

-Ben

The more the merrier

Today, a new student arrived in Beijing from the University of Kentucky. His name is Reid, and he's come to intern in China for a few weeks. I managed to catch up with our KEI partners as we had lunch, and helped Reid get a rundown of the campus. I'm worried about him, since he doesn't speak a lick of chinese. He should be ok, but it isn't the easiest thing to just jump into a society where your communication is troublesome. We'll be going to see the Water Cube and the Bird's Nest olympic installations tomorrow. I'll bring back pictures.

In other news, I spent a long time talking with my close friends Brandon Swanberg and Maja Fus, (separate instances) it's good to catch up with old friends. I also managed to meet up with Cherry and we talked for a good while about many things. Other than that, I spent my day studying and drafting notes for a short story I'm writing for a friend.

Apologies for the lack of big news in this post, today was uneventful, although the weather continues to be stellar,*knock on wood*.

-Ben

Another day in the life...

We started a new book in class today. Our final exam only covers our first book though, so I'll be spending the next week reviewing for that test. I've got a good freling in regards to the final.

Apparently, my study company partner thing, KEI, has a new student coming in, so I'll be meeting them tomorrow, I'll let you know.

Other than that, today was pleasent and uneventful, and the weather was very comfortable.

-Ben

Dragon Boat Festival, 端午节

Today was the Dragon Boat festival, a holiday that celebrates the suicide of an ancient poet and statesman known as QuYuan, 屈原，and also celebrates the turning of the year and such not. People eat ZongZi, specially prepared rice, and have boat races with crew teams on boats with dragon-styled prows.

I spent the morning sleeping, awakening to a phone call at noon from Crystal with an invitation to hang out for the day. We were joined by XiaoBai and spent 3 hours+ sitting in a coffee shop talking and making up stories together, it was a great time. Before everyone else arrived, I spent time perusing the bookstore nearby. When I was about to leave, a man kindly stopped me and asked me to help him find a book to learn english with. Being a bookseller at heart, I didn't hesitate to search around with him until I found a certain type of book I'd used myself which had chinese and english side-by-side.

When I got back to the dormitory, I was greeted with a wonderful sight. Enjoy,

I hope that pasted,

Ben

The simple things

People talk about the things we take for granted all the time, and I always brushed it off and said that I truly appreciated those 'simple' things. Surprisingly, that is not the case. Of course, the 'simple' things I'm about to talk about aren't very simple, but they're staples of everyday life I've come to expect. 

First and foremost is reliable internet. This was important to me before, and any kind of hiccup with my connection would irritate me, but living in China, where connections are usually slow, limited by a firewall, with infrequent connectivity, has given me a new opinion.

This opinion has multiple parts, 

First, I've learned to live without, for the most part, since internet is never assured, I've realized that the things I used it for previously were inconsequential, since I get by just fine when it isn't available. 

Second, that I really rely on the internet for certain parts of my life, like news, communication and entertainment. While in China, my access to english language news is restricted to my ipad and the internet. Or out of date magazines that have biases, like the economist. So, as a result, I've started paying more attention to news stories, after discovering the ability of an ipad or other mobile platform inaccessing it (when I have internet). 

Looking at news from a perspective outside of america gives it a vastly different tint. For example, take the recent news of PRISM, most people are concerned with it being used on domestic targets. No one seems to consider the fact that it is targetted on alien subjects, non-americans. Think about the population of the world, and realize how many people that covers. I've heard several friends scoff at the restriction of companies like google, facebook, yahoo, etc. who aren't allowed full functionality in China, those services instead served by native companies. In terms of business. It is a isolationist tendency, but when you see things like this program of spying, you begin to understand why China might want business based in China.

People sometimes wonder why America has negative publicity in other companies, without thinking about why other countries may dislike us. If you're worried about someone spying on your personal activities for no reason, imagine someone who finds out they may be surveilled simply because they aren't American. 

But it's not as if America only does negative things. I recently had a chance to talk with a man fom Serra Leone. When he spoke of the US and China, he condemned china for what he explained as a selfish approach to wealth, and praised American help in constructing hospitals and defending civilians in his country.

But to get back to the original topic,

The second thing I miss is safe food. I never really think about the safety of food in America, but just assume it is safe. Here in China, I just assume the food isn't safe. For instance, I recently bought some pineapple from the campus supermarket, and was happily munching away on the delicious, golden fruit, until I felt a weird taste in my mouth, and a sensation akin to numbing or prickling of my nerves. I immediatly stopped and looked up the safety of pesticides used with pineapples. What I found convinced me to probably never eat a pineapple again, in China, and perhaps in America as well.

The problem with pineapples isn't just that some of the pesticides used to make it juicy and golden are unsafe, it's also the effects the cultivation of the fruit have on communities and cultures. For instance, in Costa Rica, the fruit barons like Dole are still exploiting the poor, politically weak residents of Costa Rica and Nicaragua in order to produce cheap fruit. In America, how often do you think about where your food comes from? Maybe you should do some research, or look at the way the animal who's muscle you're eating is raised. Who knows what you're putting in your body?

Third, when someone tells you a price of a service, or that you can't do something, are they trustworthy? Before, I just assumed if someone said they couldn't do something, that it just wasn't possible. Now, when someone says no, I no longer think, 'ok, guess not,' I think, are they really not able, or should I ask a different way, or offer them something. Maybe I was simply too trusting before or something, but now I look at a no more as a 'for you, no.' The reason being, sometimes in China, if someone says something isn't possible, it could just be apathy speaking, and if someone who is from China comes along and asks for the same thing, and persists in asking, they get what they wanted. I don't just feel that this is a difference of culture, I think it's part of culture everywhere, to an extent.

There may be more revelations I've had during my trip, but we'll stop here for now, and see if I can get some internet in order to upload this post.

-Ben

Sleeping like the dead

I spent the majority of my Sunday sleeping, falling asleep after a very late night out and waking up late. I ate, read, studied and talked, but it was a slow, lazy, rainy sunday. The rain was soft, but fell constantly. On one of my brief forays out, I found a world shrouded in dusk, clouds dark grey and cloudy. The rain fell softly upon my slightly disheveled hair with a featherlight touch. The normally slightly tarnished state of Beijing was transformed to a damp, shiny set of slightly tarnished, but wet buidlings. Despite the cool weather, despite the falling rain, some female students still wore high-heeled sandals, short cut dresses, and would still hold on to their boyfriends arm, just like if it were sunny. The umbrella they use is even the same. Protection against the sun, precipitation, all wrapped in one well designed package.

I've not got very much more to say for now, but here you go.

-Ben

Living large and in charge

 Now, you might be wondering, "Ben, what are you doing up at 1:45 AM when you have classes at 8:00 AM?" I would, of course, polite reply thusly, "Why, my dear reader, it is because I've only just returned, and I made a promise to write a new blog post daily. Promises are important!" To which the insightful reader (read: you) would exasperatingly reply, "No, not why are you writing, what did you just get back from?"

To cut to the chase, and to stop controlling what you would say, as I'm sure that is irritating, I've just returned from a 'livehouse'. A livehouse is a music venue featuring live music, every night of the week. Rules are, if you come, buy a drink, some gigs cost money for entrance. Simple enough for even a foreigner to understand (it helps that almost everyone spoke english). Now, to proceed with this story, I have to tell another one, bear with me.

Last sunday, around 9:00 PM, I got a call from my friend Juanjuan. She told me there was a student concert on cams, and encouraged me to attend. So, being the adveturous, music-loving, sex, drugs, and rock&roll soul that I am, I jumped right up out of my chair, leaving my chinese textbook unattended in the white zone (loading and unloading only) and zoomed my cute, little behind over there.

The concert was vastly entertaining and fulfilling. Listening to people from several different countries sing in chinese and english. But the details must wait for another time, this story is too long already, due to my wordy mood. At this concert, there was a girl. She had short hair, played bass, and stole my heart. Ok, maybe the last one was an exaggeration, but her voice is stupendous, and she sang english as though it was a native language to her. Obviously, I was impressed and asked Juanjuan who she was. So Juanjuan introduced me to her, and I got her phone number.

Right, moving along, story waits for no man. So, and this is another story shortened for the purpose of telling the original story, she invited me to come out with her and friends this night. Of course, my (see long self-praising list from above) and lazy self went out to meet her. I found the place easily, and entered to find the small bar absolutely packed with people. I made my way to the bar, and got a beer, then started looking for JiangNan, 姜楠, (Gee-ahng Nan). Found her pretty quickly, but there was a set going on, so beyond exchanging waves through the small crowd, we didn't get a chance to speak for a bit.

After I met her two other band members, 蓝han LanHan (I'm not sure what character is his first name, so just han for now) and 木帅 MuShuai, I found out that tonight, the bar had 7 bands playing in sucession, because the drummer who was in each band was leaving to return to Australia tomorrow. 

I heard jazz trios, chinese rock&roll, samba, flamenco, erhu, piano and sax trio and more. The drummer was quite talented and capable in different styles. And even though my ear and musical education are both lacking, I enjoyed myself Immensely. There were times I just closed my eyes and listned to the soulful melody of the saxophone played by a young student. And needless to say, the drummer was a treat, it almost made me want to start playing drumset again. Who knows, maybe I will so I can join a band next time I'm in Beijing.

Anyway, that's why I'm so late. 

Love traveling,

-Ben

Cats and Dogs

Today it rained, again. The weather is cool, and cloudy, almost like Kentucky in the spring time. Speaking of rain, I have a fun story to share.

Earlier this week, a friend of mine from ShangHai was in BeiJing on business, but she managed to get a free evening to spend with me. We ate together at a XinJiang restaurant, Uigher-style, with kebabs and everything. We went with two friends I've made from our Chinese Corner class and we spent several hours talking. After that, we joined my classmate Andy to go out and eat chuar, 串儿, basically, more kebabs. We were sitting in the dusk of 9:00 PM, drinking beers and talking about many things when the sky began to ripple with lightning in the distance. Being the curious sort, we watched it for a bit, then went back to eating. This happened a few more times during our conversation, and we began so see several of the outdoor restaurant cart owners setting up tents. Luckily enough for us, the tents were up pretty quickly. While we were chatting, in a matter of seconds, the weather went from cool and clear to drenching rain. We dived under the questionable cover of the tents, saving our small stools as well. The rain continued for about 10 minutes, worming it's way under the cover of the tent and still managing to drip on people. Being the hardy sort, we were willing to wait it out, and then resume our merriment.

While waiting, I got a good look at the street, and when I say it was pouring, it felt like what I imagine rainforest rains do. Part of the street was up to about 3 inches or more deep of water, and as cars would go by, they made waves in the lake collecting at the entrance to our small alleyway. Andy began telling us a story about the previous year where he'd been caught in this type of rain, only that time the rain continued for 10 hours. Cars were submerged, he was trying to run in the street with water up to above his knees. Sounds like fun, to me.

Anyway, it remained off and on, steady rain after the initial opening up of the sky, but we still had a good evening under the tents, and we parted with smiles.

Turning over a new leaf

Instead of posting long, infrequent and partial recollections of my erstwhile adventures in China, I'll try posting a minor story every day, as a way to remind myself not only of home, but to help me structure my day better.

So, to begin, as you always should, at the beginning, today is June 6, 2013, and my subscription to TrainChinese has run out. TrainChinese is a company that maintains several useful applications for reviewing and learning Mandarin, among them, writing practice, listening practice, flash cards and more. However, more important than the company or what it does is the fact that I originally purchased a 3-month subscription around the middle of March. This really emphasizes to me that time has passed, without me even noticing it. Friends back home have graduated, my nephew has grown up from a newborn to a thriving 4 month old toddler, and my fluency with Mandarin has improved enough that I almost can't believe that before I was so confident, despite knowing so little.

3 months turns out to be a long time. I came here with the intention to improve my Mandarin as much as possible, and though it has improved beyond my expectations, I know I can still push my limits, and if I'd spent more time studying, and less missing home or goofing off, I would be even better. At the same time, focusing on studying for such a long time, on top of 7 hours of class daily, with organized trips to famous places on the weekend, and frequent meetups with language partners and chinese friends, the result is that I am almost always tired. 

Add to that that almost every day of the past week has seen me waking up for no evident reason between 4AM and 5AM with no real desire to go back to sleep, and I suppose it's no surprise my focus is slipping. 

Anyway, that's enough for today, I think, look forward to my post tomorrow.

-Ben

聪聪, my new internet name, because I'm certainly not 本本, although I am Ben.

Tianjin (Tee-an Jean) 天津

On tuesday, our class took a group field trip to the newrby city of Tianjin, we visited one of the officially designated sightseeing spots, an old culture street. The architecture has been maintained, but the stores there now all sell knickkancks, paddywacks, and if you're aavvy enough, maybe even a bone or two. But they also have a lot of really cool stuff too.

This was the opening alleyway, in the background, through the haze of pollution, you can see a modern skyscraper, if you look hard enough.

My classmate, and fellow amerian allstar, Andy Burns.

We found a small sculpture exhibition gallery. The artists have preserved their craft through 6 generations, and their method of craft I must admit admiration for, even though sculpture typically leaves me cold. The sculpture pictured below is a tableau of mthe 8 d(t)aoist immortals. I'm planning to visit the major daoist temple in Beijing in a week or two, I'll give more detail then.

My Indonesian classmate, Yonkie, he's a great pal.

Hiding behind a stranger is my spanish classmate, Christina, or as she's called in china, MoDi

After the chinese culture street, we went to visit the Italian Style town, which had a whole of of places to take pictures, but not much else, besides coffee places, knickknackeries and a few italian restaurants.

It seems even statues aren't free from the terror of typos, 'the travesl of marco polo' indeed.

More of my lovely lovely classmates, from left to right, front to back, Jenny, Febby and Maria.

Long time coming

I know, I know, you want to know if i'm still alive, and haven't died from a nasty bout of chickenflu (H7N9). Let's start with the big news stories I've been hearing about from within China.

1: First and foremost, the bombs in Boston. Mst rcent news I've heard is a bit bloody, but here's the link ( http://my.chicagotribune.com/#section/-1/article/p2p-75509677/ ) sorry about that length, I can't do nifty hypertext links from my Ipad. Anyway, looks like they havean ideawho did it now, and will soon have it wrapped up. More importantly, my wonderful sister, Sara, my brother in law, Matt (also wonderful) and my nephew Asher (cute) were unharmed.

2: Bird Flu returns to stalk the streets of Cina, striking fear into the hearts of everyman. Sort of. KFC may be taking a massive hit in sales, but the outbreak itself is small. From what I can gather the disease most dangerous in live fowl-markets, something I've only witnessed in person once, while I was in ChongQing 重庆 (choh-ng chee-ng). The World Health Organization (WHO) says chicken that is cooked at a temperature above- I just went looking and can't find the page anymore... Anyway, supposedly if you cook chicken at proper temperature, it burns the virus off easily. I'll still be playing it safe for now, and keeping an eye on the WHO website. http://www.who.int/influenza/human_animal_interface/influenza_h7n9/en/

( in a totally unrelated note, I just figured out I can dictate to my ipad and it will display the correct characters if my intonation is correct.)

3: North Korea
Dunno what to say here, only that it's been on the mind, been the subject of international students discussions and I wonder what will happen.

That's the big international events front. On the more personal front, I've got midterms next week, then I'm headed to Nanjing and Shanghai for a week off. A sorely needed week. I'm starting to not want to do anything but sleep when not in class, even when I'm around my girlfriend, I just fall asleep. Studying can really take it out of you, you know?

I'll put more fun things in the next post, like ordering Mcdonalds, pizza, taking chinese medicine, buying train tickets and wTching movies in Chinese. Stay tuned.

五道口 wudaokou (whoo dow koh)

五道口 Is a place in Beijing with a lot of universites nearby. Consequentially, it also has a preponderance (your english word of the day) of bars, clubs and restaurants than other areas. Some friends and I are making plans as we speak (well, if you're reading aloud, as you speak, I don't talk to myself when I'm writing) to go there for a night on the town tomorrow evening. Last weekend was quite enjoyable, my cooperate sponsor, Tracy, the kind intern who escorts me to tourist places invited me out with some friends. We met her hometown friend first, who's name is 李娜，lee nah, english name: crystal. She is 24 and working on food safety in china. She informed me that often, in china even though a foodstuff maysay it is safe, it's not always true. Her job is to try and correct that.

Brief interlude: here in China, moreover in Beijing, it's important to be able to tell the difference between real and fake. In america, you can pretty much take it for granted that if something says genuine, it better be, otherwise, some money-grubbing walking hazard of a citizen will find a way to make money off the false advertising through a lawsuit. This is one perspective. Another is, a concerned citizen assumed that if someone claimed something was in fact, genuine, then it was not. Upon realizing the deception, this emotionally and potentially physically injured individual sued the company making false statements for the equivalent value of money to damage dealt. In this fashion, the majority of statements in america are relatively accurate. Relatively. Anyway, here in China, such widespread accountability does not exist as of yet.
When you think about how many people live in Beijing, and how little money most people have, it should come as no surprise that some are taking advantage of this opening.

The chinese terms are 真的 (zhende) and 假的(jiade)。Real and bogus, jen duh or jeeyah duh. Most will freely admit 假的, since you're familiar enough to ask. Not everyone though. Sometimes, it can be hard to be aure as a consumer, as well. While it may sound too good to be true that those fancy Dr. Dre beats headphones only cost 20$, it could just be that the man selling them has a sister working in the factory that can get her hands on runoff. So, while a land of peril (potentially) Beijing is also a land of potential treasure. So many things are actually made China, after all.

So, with that said, I don't feel overly concerned with whether the food I eat is zhende safe or jiade safe. If I'm eating near campus, or as usual, at the campus cafeteria, I should be fine. If I decided to randomly eat from a street cart, the risk would be, do I chance this delicious taste for a terrible gut destroying disease? Usually, I say "No", even though the risk is lower than it seems.
It just seems like a safely hedged bet to me not to eat potentially gut-destroying food.

So, after I met Crystal, we joined two more friends of Tracy's, Henri and 小柏 (Xiaobai she-ow bye)。Henri is Australian, 小柏，obviously, is Chinese. When I first heard Henri speaking, I was astounded at how fluent and casual he sounded with english. His parents are chinese, but live in Australia, so he's here studying Mandarin.

We had a blast dancing with an absolutely crowded dancefloor. When I say crowded, I mean options for arm movement were close to the chest, or above the head, people were packed in so close. You may think that sounds unpleasent, but with cheesy, bad american pop playing, where I know absolutely every song because my friends all listen to it (I'm looking at you, Reuben) and everyone is having a good time without worrying over much about how they dance, (I've seen better, but that's not the point.) the energy of that setup is wonderful. You are all familiar with how light my frame is, so imagine me bouncing around off bodies in a small pinball machine, and you'll get a wildly inaccurate, but fun idea of how the dancing went.

Anyway, we're planning to go for round 2 this time around.

On another note, we had our first chinese test today. I was sick yesterday and didn't even try to attend class, but felt well enough today to get up and move about. The test wasn't terribly challenging, but the sheer amount of new words I've been introduced to over the last 3 weeks (somewhere above 600 and counting) makes studying them all challenging. Luckily. This means I'm learning a lot. But, afterward, I joined my friend 许娟娟 (Xu Juanjuan shhh-ewe jew-ahnjuhwen) at the library, and from 10:00 am to 5:00 pm, we studied. There were food breaks and talk about english and chinese breaks, but for the most part, it was good hard studying. I'm turning out to be better at the student thing than I'd thought!

One of the best things I discovered today is that as most crass youngsters in America often do, crass youngsters in China often do the same. For instance, we crass youngsters all like to joke about people who are fond of order as being slightly OCD. The chinese term is 强迫症 (Qiangpozheng Chi-ahn-ge poh gee-uhn-ge). According to 娟娟, if you said this to an older person, they wouldn't understand.

Other than that, I just want to ask, would you like me to continue providing my self-created guide to pronouncing pinyin? It's becoming harder and harder to know how to make certIn sounds using english letters instead of just using pinyin, because that's just the way it sounds, right?

Anyway, will write more soon.

Long time no see, 好久不见，Haojiubujian (how jeeoh boo jee-an)

I've not posted in a while, and some of my readers have bugged me about it. So, in order to quiet the peanut gallery. I'll give you some news of dear old Ben. In the storied lands of China, there are many many things to do, and the last 2 - 3 weeks have been spent very busily.

I'm sick right now, we have a test tomorrow and it's cold. But I'm still having a blast. There are too many good things to write them all now. I'll get to it eventually.

In the meantime, I'll share a small story.

For lunch today, I decided to venture off campus. As I made my way to the campus gate, a screwdriver fell out of the sky into the street, at my feet. Then, because of it's momentum it bounced about 3 feet and flew off behind me. I'm not sure where it came from, but my suspicions is the dormitory nearby, from an open window, 7 stories up. I don't know where else it could have come from with the same trajectory and velocity. No one stopped to even look, besides me. Apparently that's common in China. Maybe it rains screwdrivers sometimes, here, who knows.

Eating at a korean restaurant, with indonesians, in China.

So, an american and 4 indonesians walk into a bar. Andrew, his sister Mariska and their friends Andrian and Christian invited me to go eat with them at a korean restaurant a short busride away from campus. The bus was fun, like trying to stay mounted on a bucking bronco, except since it was a bus, it was like trying to stay standing while someone trys to take your legs out from under you. Like I said, fun.

At the restaurant we went to, [insert name when known], they served you several little dishes of different food, vegetables, fruits, crabmeat. All sorts of different appetizers. It was all free. After that, they keep you waiting for several minutes until they brought the main course. I'm sure not everyone has to wait, but we did. Regardless of the service provided (negligable) the meal was fun.

When the meal finally arrived, it was several dishes of uncooked meat. I should mention, in the middle of our table was a small firepit, a stove, with a smoke vent above us. We cooked our meat ourselves, from raw and bloody to questionably cooked (in my opinion) all by ourselves (everyone but me helped, since I don't know the first thing about cooking out). The food tasted pretty good, but I didn't think there was very much of it. We had lamb, pork, chicken and beef. Which segues into an interesting thing about the english language. We have different names for our meat than our animals.

Sheep-Lamb, Mutton
Cow-Beef, Veal
Pig-Pork
Chicken-Poultry
Rabbit-Rabbit
Squirrel-Squirrel

The reason behind this has to do with the different social classes. The lower class, poor and hungry, would eat cheap, easily hunted meat, like rabbit and squirrel, while the landed gentry and such could afford the meat of stock animals, but, because they were a higher class, they couldn't use the same names as the peasentry that raised the animals did. Another, perhaps more telling aspect of this is that most of the higher class meat names come from french, while the lower class words come from german.

Or something like that. Look it up if you're curious, and let me know.

And so, our story begins...

Emily told me Registration begins at 8:30AM. I woke up early, showered, dressed, and went back to sleep until 8:20AM. Never a moment wasted for sleep, in my book.
When I made my way downstairs, registration was in full swing. It had started earlier, apparently. Emily and I got in line, filled out all the paperwork, (as in she helped me a lot (as in she did almost everything) while I got to look at a slew of international students (ladies) as we waited in line) as we reached the last line of redtape, it turned out we needed passport sized photos. Something I'd neglected to bring.
This led us to a small photography place across the street, where for 20元, we got about a zillion photos of my smiling mug. Which we then used to get my registration completed, with Emily sneaking into the front of the line, and quickly resolving the issue.

And then there was the test.

I'd thought the language proficiency test was next monday, so I'd only studied a little, planning on using my whole week to prepare. Turns out, it was today. I would have studied more if I'd known. But, all in all, it was a fairly simple test, where I was asked to read a passage in Chinese and didn't recognize all the characters in it, but was better suited than the lower level of textbook, that I recognized everything easily in. And that was it. Class assignments are posted Saturday.

After that, I took another long walk to the north of campus this time. I saw a few places, Helen's, PBD, and more restaurants. I walked out to 4th Ring road, a massive river of traffic and fumes, with concrete walkways over it to the attractions located on the other side. I'll be checking those out next trip. There's a Pizza Hut over there. Which, in China, has become a fine dining eventspace, serving a varied menu, wine, high quality pizza, younameit. I still prefer american Pizza Hut pizza though, from experience.

When I returned, I discovered something wonderful! I had a new roomate! But he wasn't in at the time, so I left a note and wandered off again. As I was on my way out, I came across a man trying to carry his suitcase up the staircase, and having trouble with the awkward size of it. Being a good chap, I helped him carry it up to the 6th floor, only to discover he actually had a room on the second, which was another trip down. He introduced himself as Vincent, and we parted ways.

I spent a pleasent evening pestering friends asleep in Kentucky with texts at what was 5:00 AM for them, and returned to meet my roommate. His name was Andrew, and his sister was already studying here. He'd just graduated from Illinois, and was here to learn Chinese.

Turns out Andrew and Vincent are friends, and were previously roommates. Small world or something like that, right?

Where did all the time go?

So, I had two free days until registration. I spent it watching chinese movies on CCTV5, some of which were very fun, and silly, some of which I consider to be works of art. (Lethal Hostage, a Chang Er film.) I started and finished both Jim Butcher's Cold Days, a pulp-fiction collection of snark and fantasy. The absolute trash kind of read that countered my homesickness. I skipped a lot of passages, without missing anything. It was a pretty good story, too, but there was too much talking, in order to give characters facetime. I also read The Order of The Scales, by Stephen Deas. That was a work of art, as fantasy goes. It is a book in the same vein as George R.R. Martin's Fire and Ice series, but without the massive amount of characters who just get in the way with their own, albeit interesting, but unimportant stories. Ach, all my prejudices about fantasy are coming out of the woodwork here. Anyway, in a beautiful tragedy, that actually made me sad, the book ended with a finality I've not seen recently. Far too often, people either don't know when to end a story, or don't want to, so leave open ends, or drag it out. Stephen Deas bites the bullet and cuts the arm off right when it needs to go.

But more about China.

I worked up the courage to meander into a cafe known as 'Blogger's Cafe,' in English, without my Ipad. The irony is rusting up my insides, I promise. I could easily have been in a cafe here in the states. I had beef noodles, which were good, and two cups of coffee, which were ok, but each cost more than the noodles, go figure.

I also visited SingKing BBQ. It boasted an impressive menu of various kebabs and meats. I tried the mutton, which was mouthwatering delicious, and the beefballs, which were not. The place seemed more designed for nightlife, with an impressive selection behind the bar.

Then there was Lakers, a pub down the lane, offering american style food, burgers, pizza, hotdogs. Apparently, that's american cuisine, our contribution to the global food scene. Anyway, they had heineken, so I got a heineken, and a burger. The burger was meh. The heineken was a heineken. But what was most interesting was the people at the bar. There was one pair, of your typical male, non-frat guy, with their large ballcaps and loose, overlarge jackets. They were trying to order, making a minor mess of it, nowhere near my imaginative fiasco. They did lean over to one table nearby with cute girls at it and ask them for help. They obliged, but didn't bite the hook when the guys asked them, is it shei shei? (Its she-eh, she-eh, for the record) to say thankyou. At this time, next to me, some new girls came in with cups of dice they were betting on, a game i've known so long I've forgotten it. They ordered a 3 foot tall pitcher thing of beer. I'll take a photo next time I see it to share. I was quite excited by it.

Next there is Sculpting in Time cafe. The first place with wifi I discovered. It's quite nice, like Coffea in Lexington, but with a more open feeling, and higher ceilings. People were smoking inside, something I haven't seen for years in Lexington. Businessmen greeted each other next to students relaxing for the day. Their password for the wifi was ilovebeijing.

Directly across from there, through campus, is 猫眼, cat's eye. A small, cosy cafe seemingly designed for couples. Even though I wasn't a couple, I discovered their pizza is pretty damn good, and it was the first place that had real coffee, not just lattes and diluted tea. Where is the drive for purity in caffeine! Anyway, that's about that for the days leading up to today. Sould be caught up now.

Facing my fear, a one act play.

The Foriegner or The Incident During Dinner Rush.
Benjamin Kandt

Please note: This was created when I began imagining how ridiculous my fear of entering a restaurant was, so I decided to write it into a play and embellish it a bit. Only a bit. Fears are rarely rational.



Characters:
外国人：The Foreigner
八 大学生：8 students waiting for a table
服务员: The Hostess
服务员二：The Waiter.
新男朋友和女朋友: The new couple, out for a romantic evening.

Act 1

[The curtain remains drawn, lights dim. We hear the chattering of voices and the honking of cars as they splash by in the rain. As the curtain rises, we see one figure, lit by blue spotlight with a flowing river of people breaking gently around him. He stands in front of a Chinese restaurant, looking in the window. Inside, the lights are orange, the people all smiling gaily. The sign above the door is bright red neon, with one character occasionally flickering. The characters only resemble real chinese characters, warped and incomprehensible]

外国人： she-ow... She-ung

[A large group of students, smoking and chatting boisterously stroll pass, brushing up against the foreigner. He reaches toward his fanny-pack, as if to reassure himself they didn't take it.]

[He turns back to the diner. We hear his stomach growl.]

外国人： Aw, fuck it.

[As he tries to enter, the river of people becomes a solid wall, keeping him away from the diner. He eventually forces his way through. The people look after him as if he ran into them all.]

[He enters. The heavy blanket falling into place behind him, cutting off the sound from outside.]

[We see the set turn with him, and now we look out of the same window we were looking into. Inside, we see several groups, each spotlighted in turn, only acting when the light is upon them. There are couches for waiting, and they are all filled, with a group of students greeting each other and catching up. Outside, as someone sets of a firecracker of red lights, their faces glow with enjoyment, and one girl points excitedly, tugging on her boyfriends arm. The 外国人 jumps at the sound. Next, the light highlights the new couple, standing in front of the hostess, arm in arm, the boyfriend asking if they have any open space. The girl is wishing they were going somewhere classier and she complains loudly. The hostess is smiling gently.]

服务员： 几个- [Her eyes widen as she sees the 外国人] 人？(How many people?)
男朋友： 两个。[He turns to gaze upon his girlfriend, catching the 外国人 out of the corner of his eyes. He tightens his grip on her, and turns back to the front, quickly.] (Two people.)
服务员： 跟我来。(Come with me)

[They exit.]

[The 外国人 looks around with wonder, like a newborn child. He begins to remove some of his layers, and his snow goggles, and his three hats. No one else is dressed so warmly.]

外国人： Knee How! [He brays like a donkey]
八大学生： [They wince, then smile] 你好。你是哪国人？(Hello, where are you from?)
外国人：Uh... [He fumbles with his massive fannypack, pulling out a thick, heavy phrasebook, thumbing through it] shhhhhhhhhna... Shhhna...
八大学生： Where are you from? [They speak without any accent.]
外国人：Oh, thank god, someone that speaks English. I'm from America.

[服务员 returns]

服务员： 你们的几案准备啊。(Your table is ready)
八大学生： Baibai.

[八大学生 exit]

服务员： 几个人？(How many people?)
外国人： Uh.... I'm 美国人。(American)
服务员： 不是。几个人？(No, how many people?)
外国人： Uh.... Can you write it? Oh, shit... [He consults his guidebook] Knee Kuh Yee ... Sheeea mah?
服务员： 一个人。跟我来。(One person. Come with me)

[She leads him to a corner, away from other diners, and hands him a menu. It's written in gibberish, and most dishes have a direct english translation, like heaven's red slippers, instead of a description of the food. There are pictures though.]

等一下。(Wait a moment)

[She exits. The 外国人 puts the menu on the table, which is a wooden box piece over a plastic crate, and pulls out his phrasebook. He looks for a bit at the options.]

[服务员二 enters.]

服务员二：What you want?
外国人： Uh, I want sweet and sour pork.
服务员二： What?

[The 外国人 points at a picture and grunts, making the same needy noises as a child.]

[The 服务员二 exits.]

外国人： All in a days work. [Dusts hands off.]

Fin

The morning after...

I slept like a log. I think I must have mentioned to a few people how hard the beds are in China, compared to what I'm used to in the states, but I don't know if I also mentioned how easily I sleep on them. I woke up at 6:00AM to beautifully clear skies, filled with a beautiful sunrise, awash in rose colors. I didn't think to take a picture then, but I'll get one one of these mornings. I met Emily in the lobby, and she took me on a tour of the campus. UIBE is decently sized, not huge, but not small, either. I guestimate walking from one end of the campus to the other might take me 10 minutes, if I chose to meander. Despite that, the dorms on campus house large numbers of students, in buildings many stories high, like 40 stories, at least. There are lots of stores and restaurants on every side, offering a plethora of cuisine options. Of which I'm starting to sample.

Back on track, so, I met Emily, and we went to see 后海, one of the man-made lakes settled into the suburbia of Beijing. Which, btw, is highly integrated with the tourist business. As you walk down the street, you find yourself suddenly in the midst of one of the market streets, where the road is filled with walking throngs of people (mostly Chinese in this instance), who occasionally, absent-mindedly move to let cars through. The cars, for their part, are used to it, and honk with good cheer. In addition to the curio shops that line this marketstreet, vendors set up selling everything you could think of (not literally, but you get the idea, or rather, let me demonstrate. Gourds, bracelets, bunny-ears as hairclips, stickers of popular american bands, incense, postcards, yogurt and milktea (every 20 feet) meat kebabs, nuts, are you getting the picture? Perhaps not. Pictures will be forthcoming from round 2, I promise) and hawking their wares to passerby.

后海 Houhai (ho' high) is really quite pretty. With traditional wooden bridges built in a zigzag fashion crossing the lake, you can get a good view of the entire thing. At the moment, it's partially frozen, and I've sadly just missed the period of time where it's frozen over enough to skate on. According to some of the things I've read, some wizened citizens like to strip to speedos and go for a brisk swim in the cold waters. No eyewitness accounts yet though, so I'm a tad skeptical, but could see it happening.

We meandered around the market street for a bit, and stopped in at a shoe store, where Emily browsed, and I tried to look like I didn't not want to be there. None of them would fit me, anyway, though they were quite pretty. Some of the other stores we entered reminded me quite strongly of places like those in Fayette mall. Something about a small world goes here, right?

We returned to campus after our trip, and I took some photos along the way, don't blame me, blame the cameraman for the fingers in the way.

After we got back, I found out I would have some free time, until Monday, when registration began. So I had 2 days without adult supervision. What trouble could I get into during that time? Not much, it turns out. But we'll get to that.

That night, I was charged by myself, to find food for myself. Which seems simple, right? Until you factor in a terrifying and crippling anxiety about walking into a restaurant during dinner rush and saying, 'knee how' and having people look at you like a donkey trying to talk. Look, let's move on for now, we both don't really want to talk about it, right? I'll give it it's own post.

So I eventually suceeded in not doing anything, and went hungry for the night. Not one of my best moments, I know, but there is nowhere but up from rock bottom. On the plus side, my pacing without entering let me see almost all the restaurants along that side of the camus, somewhere around 30 places.

But yeah, the next two days I worked up the courage to enter some places, wandered around the other two sides of campus that were busy, and read like 3 books, watched two movies on CCTV6 and practiced my Chinese. Very relaxing.

That's all for this post, more in the next.

-Ben

Oh, the places you'll go (and not be able to communicate in)

There are few things as wonderful as visiting another country, and few things as heart-stoppingly terrifying as trying to communicate with someone when you possess barely enough of their language to admit you don't know their language. Or so it seems to me. Luckily for me, there are several wonderful people who have already spent time learning my native language who also, for some reason, are interested in helping me to navigate their country. As I arrived in Beijing, blanketed with a chill and darkness, I was greeted with a smile by one of those wonderful people. With her help, we arrived at my place of residence, and began to arrange a room for me. Nw, I don't understand every word spoken of mandarin, yet, but I'm guessing that the conversation at the dezk went something along the lines of, "We're here to deliver that guy (me) to his room."
"Do what, now?"
"He's just arrived, which room is his?"
"He doesn't have one."
"What."
"We don't have him on file."
...
After a few minutes and much speaking, calling and checking of records,it turned out they did have a record of me, but not a room assingment. So they gave me one.
"Your roommate is Korean." She mentioned over her shoulder.
Sounded good to me.
A few moments later.
"And female... One moment."
Still sounded fine by me.
"Fixed now."
Not as fine, but what can you do? It isn't often every male college student gets his dreams fulfilled. Or even close to it.
So they get me up to my room, which is uninhabited, but luckily enough, has a surplus of sunflower seed shells all over the floor. Which I decide are better dealt with tomorrow.
So I make plans to meet up with Emily tomorrow for orientation, with all the other students (no one) and go right to sleep.

Up in the skies, it's a bird, It's a plane!

So, I began my trek across the territory of the avians this morning at 6:45AM EST. Now, after (6:45-10:30 add an hour for time difference)= ~5hours + (8 hours flight time?) = 13 hours in traversing, I'm finally awake. Ater finishing my first book 1 hour in, I sat and pondered the cliffhanger of an ending. Man pitted against man in a duel to the death, where only one can win. They leap off a cliff together, to fall to the hard ground below in each other's embrace, once brothers, now bitter enemies. But did they really die? Magic knows no bounds.

Anyway, Dallas Fort-Worth airport was huge, as always, with a tram that I thought I understood, until I overshot my destination. Minor problems, of course, I had plenty of time to make my gate. I even got the chance to eat at Einstein's Bagels, a holdover from my days at ASU. Mmmmmm, bagels. In the airport terminal there was a construction of plactic, funcitoning like an echoing chamber, I'll try and get a picture of it on my way back through, 5 months from now.

Wow, 5 months suddenly strikes me as a long time to remember anything. I'll be gone for almost half a year. I'm starting to get a grasp on how long that really is. Less than half of my longest relationship, less than third of the time spent living downtown, time that seems, now, to have flown by in a rush of breathless memory-making, merry-making. Perhaps this will be the same, and I'll be writing like this on my flight back, and be struck by the similarities of my situation.

Korean Airlines is very nice. The cabin is spacious, the uniformed, flight attendants sharp like the crisp fold of a freshly laundered sheet. The rows upon rows of american travelers, with their graying hair on top of their head and upon their faces. Koreans returning to visit family, having spent years away for study or work. Filies, going to visit parents with newborns, or young. A sea of expectation, all going somewhere planned. S much forethought from all these people, none simply wandering, their next few weeks a rigid plan, in orr to reach their home on time, to seal that business deal with time for relaxation,or to return home sooner to loved ones. Traveling strikes me as a quintessentially human endeavor, wrapped up in our sense of place and identity. Where are you from, serrah? Ah, you're American!
Where are you going, madam? Ah, you're a student.
What do you do for a living? You fly a plane! You must love to travel!
or perhaps I'm simply being silly.

-Ben

The day before the end of the world: Leaving Lexington

Today is Tuesday, the last full day in Lexington before I fly out to Beijing for 5 months. Until now, my departure hasn't really sunk in, but after the week of goodbyes and bittersweet partings, I'm beginning to realize that I'm really doing this. I'm going, on my own, to a foreign country, for 5 months, to learn to speak the language. I guess I should start packing now. Packing is something that I'm either really good at, or really bad at. Yesterday, when I decided to put some things in the suitcase, I found I was done after about 15 minutes, with half my suitcase still empty. My mom thinks I ought to take two suitcases, but it's beyond me how I would bring enough stuff to fill two. We'll figure it out eventually. In the meantime, I'm concluding my farewell rituals, having coffee with coworkers, hugging friends goodbye, gazing around my room, realizing that I won't see it for a long time, let alone sleep in my own bed. Perhaps that is for the best though, since my bed is so comfortable that I never want to wake up.
I started writing this post in a coffee shop in downtown Lexington, KY, and I'm concluding it in the Lexington bluegrass airport, waiting for my first flight. I'll start short, until I have more important and interesting things to write about.

-Ben