January 2008 Journal
The Year is 2008! - Saturday January 5, 2008I'm 15 hours ahead of Colorado, so my friends back home were in 2007 for 15 hours after I hit 2008. I called people at home and made the expected lame joke: "I'm calling from the future! It's all war and chaos, robots everywhere!" etc. (I'm sure my friends were expecting such tomfoolery.)
Anyway, I love new years. I made peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, I went to Jiaoshan Park, and I spent the first day of the new year having a nice picnic by myself next to the Pagoda of 10,000 Buddhas. The night before, we had a small party complete with balloons, champagne, and formal attire. I had a bit too much to drink, we set off some fireworks, and I Skype-called the past. Great times!
This week in class, we reviewed and took photos together. On Wednesday, a girl named Wendy from my Monday class was hovering around outside the classroom door until my class was over. After the other students left, she came in (shy as could be!) and gave me a birthday gift. (I turn 25 on January 7th.) She made me a wool scarf by hand. Isn't that amazing?! She also gave me one of the sweetest letters I've ever been given. Here's just an excerpt from the letter:
"It's cold and I don't know what present you need. Aha! So one day I see some wool in a shop. Maybe knitting a scarf is a good idea, but I never did it before. So I would like you to like it. It wasn't very good. Frankly speaking, when I finished knitting the scarf, I was very happy. As a whole, it isn't so bad! A great 25 years for an outstanding person."
Wendy bought wool yarn and learned how to knit just so she could make me a scarf. It's done really well! It's the first time someone other than my Mom has made me anything hand-made like this. I'm both flattered and embarassed, she's such a doll! I was so excited that I gave her a full-on hug, and I think that embarassed her, too. Here's a photo of me, Wendy, and my great new birthday scarf:
I took a lot of photos this week in class. I got pictures of each class as a whole. After class, a few of my favorite students stayed behind and we took photos together individually. Here's a photo of Nikki, the winner of the Postgraduate English Public Speaking competition:
And here's a photo of Bryan and a few of his classmates. (He's immediately on my right. I went to Nanshan with him, and he might take me to Huai'an for the spring festival with his family. He owns a car!)
And one more photo. It's Sara, the girl who I taught how to make pancakes. I named her after my sister.
This is my last week teaching. Then I'm going to Beijing on the 13th and staying until the 21st. I'm not sure what I'm doing after that ... I might stay around Zhenjiang so I can spend Spring Festival in Huai'an with Bryan and his family. Maybe I'll get bored here and travel around Jiangsu a little more - I kind of want to see Lianyungang (I almost took a job there). It's on the ocean, too, so it'd be fun to see the Pacific from this side looking East.
On Wednesday evening, I went out to dinner with two of my students, Toshiba and Sky, and their research supervisor, a professor in the Chemsitry Department who spoke really great English thanks to studying abroad in Japan for 5 years. It was strange - as soon as he spoke, I noticed a Japanese accent instead of a Chinese one. I didn't even know there was a difference until that moment. Anyway, highlights of our meal included a giant lamb leg that we ate like a chicken drumstick, some great egg roll things that tasted like chicken but weren't, and of course, some kind of coagulated animal blood. I'm tired of eating blood.
There's that German girl Anne. We've been spending a lot of time together lately. I like her. We're casually an item I think, but we're both painfully aware of the fact that neither of us is in a time or place in our lives where a serious relationship is feasible (at least I'm aware of that fact!). I think we'll continue to hang out and have some fun, and I'm definitely going to keep in touch with her when she leaves sometime in the next 8 weeks. I keep laughing at life... I'm in China falling for a German girl. I did NOT see that coming!
Well, that's everything to say. Except that the new Batman movie looks pretty awesome. I'm glad I'll be home in time for its debut.
Happy birthday to me. w00t! 25 years old. (You'd never guess based on how mature I am! hahaha)