Level 4 -bring it on.

New book explaining grammar

Old book explaining grammar (spot any differnce?)

I went to pick up the books for my new uni course yesterday.... that was, ehum, interesting. Except for one Indonesian girl that I studied with last semester I didn't recognize any of the other students lining up to register/ask questions/buy books/complain about the characters in their books being too hard (?).

Eventually it was my turn to sign up to a class (there were only 2 classes to choose from for level 4, last semester there were 3 -I guess the students are getting less and less the higher the level u study) and get my books. When I later came home I flicked through some pages of my grammar book just to get an idea of what I was getting into, and I noticed the following:

Bad news number 1: there is no English explanations in my new books. (except for the list of new words that obviously has an English translation). In terms of texts this shouldn't be any problem, but in terms of grammar I think it's going to be really hard only to have new grammatical terms explained in Chinese.

Bad news number 2: I have to take another essay writing class (I reluctantly took one last semester) as this class is part of the program. This just feels so meaningless. If they'd let us use the computers when writing it wouldn't be so terrible, but handwriting?! Seriously? It's just too hard, not to mention time consuming?!

Bad news number 3: All books are heavy and thick: that means we'll be studying quite fast. Yikes!

Bad news number 4: In the 'speaking class' text book there's about 35-40 new words per chapter. In the grammar text book there's at least 70 (!) new words for every chapter. One word often consist of at least 2 characters. That adds up to being quite a hefty sum of characters to learn. For every chapter. Whoa.

So, these are all the bad news I can think of a.t.m.

Good news, however (because there has to be some good news... right? Or so I tell myself): I am moving forward in this slow, and painful 'learning Mandarin process' and I'll probably be able to pick up heaps of new stuff this semester. (It's all about attitude, right?)

Little muscle guy strikes again

Yesterday at the gym I ran into a certain "guy" (read my post from June 19, "Attempted pick up (?) at the gym") which I have almost successfully been avoiding since then. Only thing that happened after his attempted pick up (?) at the gym is that we met at Starbucks and he convinced me to give him my mobile number. After a lot of excuses I ended up giving him an old Shanghai number (I considered giving a phony number but since we hang out at the same spots I knew that wouldn't work. Also, seeing that he knows that I have a bf I figured that maybe he simply just wants to be friends afterall...), and soon after that I went on a holiday, so I never had to deal with the rest.

Yesterday, however, he 'caught' me, and I had to talk to him.

-Hey, have u moved to Shanghai? he asked (hm.. seeing that we were standing at a gym at 7pm in Suzhou I couldn't help but feeling that this question was a bit stupid?!)
-Nope. Still here. (In flesh and blood as u can see, I almost added).
-Well I tried to call you but your phone was off?
-I've been on a holiday overseas.
-But the number you gave me is a Shanghai number.
-Yes, I have 2 numbers since I often work in Shanghai.
-So you should give me your Suzhou number.
-Ehum... nah, I don't think that is necessary.
-Why not?
(WHY NOT?! Geeez... not getting it, are we?!) -Well, I still use the Shanghai number so that should be enough.
-But come on, give me your Suzhou number (by this time we were in the middle of the gym and he had taken out his phone, ready to get my number. I felt like a complete fool as a smaller audience -including my trainer friends- were watching).
-Ehum, u can just use the Shanghai number... I said (probably looking like a tomato by that time). I better go now!
-But last time I tried it it didn't work?
-Well that is because the phone was turned off?! I have been abroad!
-Ok then... well I thought we could go for coffee!?
-Eh, I am late for my class, BYE!!! And so I escaped to the changing rooms.

Holy crap. I am having big regrets of convincing myself that giving him my number -as a FRIEND- was OK (although I know this was a terrible mistake. I should stop being so damn nice all the time and just say: NO!). If he still calls I don't know what to say to be more obvious? Or, is this just some sort of gym-behavior he's doing, walking around with his phone and collecting phone numbers so that he can look cool to the guys and like a dickhead to the girls? Anyways, I know I won't be picking up my Shanghai phone for a while.

Cool end to a hot summer

So long summer?!

The weather right now is certainly strange. 'Shanghai is wrapping up its coolest summer since 2003" I read yesterday at Shanghai Daily. And it sure is.

Last year at this time when I rode my bike in Shanghai I remember thinking "can I get away by wearing even less than I am already wearing, without looking skimpy?" It was just so fecking hot back then! (And no, the question to my thoughts was "no you certainly can't!" as I, in a pair of short shorts and a small singlet, probably already looked a little bit skimpy -u know the skin rule, don't show too much of it. But I simply couldn't bear the thoughts of wearing my shorts with a t-shirt as that would have been too much fabric for the Shanghai heat). I also remember how I desperately one day wanted to wear my jeans and convinced myself that it wasn't 'that hot' outside and wore them to uni... ahhahahhahaha... There was a little pool of sweat on my chair only after 5 minutes of the first class. (and I didn't wear those jeans again for a long time -bad karma, I told myself) But in the weather we have now, I could definitely wear jeans. I even wore a JUMPER (long-sleeved?!!!) yesterday on my way home from the gym. Now that's.... weird, isn't it?!

Don't get me wrong, I am not complaining. It is more that wonderful that the temperature has dropped. U can actually be outside at this time of the year! Last year, you couldn't. It's just a bit weird that it suddenly has gotten so cool (although I guess that 'weird' can probably be explained as: 'climate change'). Oh, and the mosquitoes seem to have vanished?! Yup that's right. Only 5 bites this summer and I didn't even use up the first (out of five) bottle of mosquito repellent?! Hello, Shanghai autumn?

Autumn time = hat time!! (yey!)

And then: Hello, scarves, gloves and hats (although it rarely gets this cold in Shanghai -this photo's from South Korea -as u already might have guessed. The sky is rarely that blue in China)

Burning hot

A bad photo (mobile shot) of a good dish.

Yesterday was a happy day as I finally managed to locate a decent restaurant in Suzhou: a spicy Sichuan joint that served up chili dishes so hot that my lips were still burning 30 minutes afterwards. Other expats in Suzhou often rave about a pricey resto called 'Zen' that serves up local Suzhou food. It might be because I am not a fan of sweet food, or, I simply thought it didn't cut it: but I have always been disappointed when eating there (especially after paying 40 kuai for a mapu tofu that's not even spicy enough).

Other Suzhou restos (except for a bunch of Korean joints) have also failed to please my (actually not that picky) taste buds, and the popular expat-hang-out-area: Xing hai plaza with places like 'Mr Pizza,' is simply bad and lacking in terms of hygiene! But now it looks as if there's hope for Suzhou's restaurant scene! I forgot to check out the name of this place, but I'll get back to you as soon as I go back (which will probably happen in the near future) to report on both the name and the dishes. Last night we ate some spicy chicken, sour and spicy potato shreds, pork ribs and a dish I don't know the name of, but it is really really good. It's small pieces of sesame bread (?) that you then fill up with beef, salad and cucumber. I think some people refer to it as a 'Chinese hamburger' but to me it felt more like a mini kebab... Anyone know what I mean? Otherwise I'll take a photo of it next time (maybe already tomorrow... hehe).

The bread looked like this although no black seeds.

A better shot of how the chicken (almost) looked like (the one we ate had more chillies)... Next time I'll bring my good camera!

How to make people panic in less than 5 seconds

Yesterday in Shanghai I was about the catch the metro from Huangpi Nan Lu just before the rush hour (so around 5pm). I was (as usual) in my own little la-la-land, listening to my ipod and thinking about what I was going to have for dinner, when the metro came and the doors didn't open. Actually, I probably wouldn't have noticed it unless it was for the fact that people started screaming so loud that I could hear them even though I had headphones in my ears. I then looked around and got to witness something quite hilarious. Since some doors to the metro (including all of those in the front of the platform, where I was standing) weren't opening, people on the platform were panicking and running around to find another open door where they could enter from. This didn't happen in silence, oh no, people were screaming and shouting to make sure all their near and dear ones got into the same metro carriage. Same thing happened inside the metro where people were almost hitting others in order to get to another door.

I just stood and stared (it was actually a bit entertaining) as I wasn't keen to rush to another door and get inside an already over-crammed metro. I simply decided to wait for the next metro. People inside the metro, however, didn't think I realised what was happening around me and started to point and scream to me to head to another door. Ahhh.. it might not sound like fun but I'm not kidding you -it was HILARIOUS just to stand and watch the scene! Say what u want about Chinese being rude when it comes to cutting line and pushing themselves to the front when stepping into an elevator/on a metro... but they sure are keen to help you when the think you are a lost laowai! As I didn't move from my spot the people inside the metro went from screaming to watching me with a compassionate eye, as if I had no idea of how to move on a platform. Awwww... people! I couldn't help but feeling a sting touched.

Time to get serious

Photo from the 'bridge race' (a half marathon) between Danish capital Copenhagen and Swedish city Malmö. I ran this race in 2005 and scored my best running time so far.

Registration is now officially open meaning there's no turning back anymore: Shanghai (half -for me) marathon is getting closer and closer. Since I didn't train as much as expected during my holiday in Scandinavia (do people EVER do something that they have planned to do during their holidays except for drinking a lot and spending time in the sun?!) I am a bit behind with my schedule and I think my ridiculous goal of running the half marathon in 1.5 hours has to go... Well, no, 'think' is an understatement. This stupid idea is now just a stupid idea from the past. I am, however, planning on running this race faster than my personal best 1 hour and 50 minutes (this sounds a tiiiiiny weeeeeny bit more do-able...) so I still have to continue to train hard (although I didn't train as much as expected during the summer I still trained... so it is definitely still possible to do some fine tuning). One annoying bit about this, however, is that I have a birthmark I have to remove (I have postponed it for too long now) and that means I won't be able to train for what -1 or 2 weeks?! Annoying! But better to be safe than sorry I suppose.

At the gym, some of the trainers have found out about my running goal and they are now trying to help me to prepare in the possible best way for the race that takes place on November 30.

Meanwhile one of them is giving me diet advices (he wants me to eat a lot of rice, quite a lot of veggies and no meat -hm... sounds tasteless?!) the other one is trying to get me to attend classes like 'bodyjam', 'bodypump' and 'bodystep' as he believes this will help my running (? -I suppose he is thinking about cross-training although I think it's a little bit late for that now). Since he was nagging so much last week I decided to try out the bodypump... That was, ehum, interesting. The most interesting part of the whole class was that my trainer friend, the soft-spoken and friendly trainer, turned into a crazy, loud (we are talking a lot of screaming here?), energy-ball on stage when he was leading the class. It was... well, quite different?! And very interesting! Straight after class I went up to talk to him and then he instantly turned back to being the slightly shy trainer again?! Talk about mixed personalities?!

Anyways, a good thing about preparing for this race is the fact that it has cooled down a fair bit outside and that I soon can take my runs to the streets where everybody will look at me as if I am a mad person (running or sweating is not really hip over here. Forget about those respectful glances u r used to getting from non-runners you bump into while you're on your sixth lap in the park...) but well.. that's just how it is.

Anyone else thinking about running Shanghai marathon (or the half one?) in November?

Grease bomb = unhappy stomach

Good -in a while

However happy I am to be back in China my stomach isn't and I am getting a flash back of those uncomfortable stomach feelings I used to get after lunch during my first few months in China. The other day I had a really spicy, but oily meal, and the next day the stomach felt like a blown up balloon, and I felt really heavy. Darn, I thought all of this was over by now? Sure, in the beginning or when u first come here it takes some time before your belly gets used to the new bacteria culture, the chillies, the oil (yuk) and the MSG (double yuk), but since when do u have to go through that phase again and again?!

Yesterday I had Korean bibimpab for dinner and no heavy feeling appeared afterwards... it's got to be the oil. I guess I just have to suffer for a while before the belly learns how to handle large amounts of grease again.

Good stuff -always