Chinese Style "Dryer"

My Beautiful Apartment

Qi Pu Lu: Fake Designer Brands Galore!!!

A couple weeks ago we visited the well-known qi pu lu to pick up the latest in designer handbags. What started as an innocent shopping trip soon became something along the lines of a Taken movie (without the being "taken" part). One of the first shops we went into was quickly evacuated after the police showed up and started yelling at the vendors. We stayed for about thirty seconds and then realized we didn't want to be around when the hand cuffs came out, so we silently scooted away in search of purses that weren't being pursued by the fuzz. About an hour later we run into a woman wandering around with pictures of purses in her hands, but she doesn't seem to have a shop- just these pictures. She asked if we were interested in her merch. Well at this point we were all a little frustrated because the fake purses we had been finding were all terrible quality, and we were looking for something that could pass as real back in the States. We decided to take a gamble and follow her. She leads us to this locked door and pulls our a huge set of keys. The first door opens toward us and underneath is another door that slides up and then a heavy curtain is revealed and behind the curtain is a last door that opens to reveal a dark room. We stare silently into the abyss when suddenly lights fly on revealing the most beautiful fake Prada and Channel we have ever seen in our lives!! It was quite an exciting find.

Lantern Festival

Last Saturday Elizabeth, Yan Ran and I made the two hour trek to Yan Ran's house in the "countryside." We were technically still within the city of Shanghai and there was no shortage of buildings in this town within a city, but there was the peculiar addition of little farms interspersed between homes and shops. Yan Ran's hometown is very clean and beautiful, and looked nothing like the Shanghai we are all used to seeing on the TV and Internet. Elizabeth and I got to see trees for the first time since arriving in China which was certainly a sight for sore eyes. It was a short drive from the subway stop to Yan Ran's house (her mom picked us up in the family car). Yan Ran and her parents live in a nice apartment complex complete with a million beautiful portraits of Yan Ran. It is pretty common for parents to become very involved in their children's lives since the onset of the One Child Policy. We spent most of our time at a friend's house which was VERY spacious although sparsely furnished. Over the course of several hours we consumed most of a ten course meal. The homemade dumplings were DELICIOUS and Yan Ran's family and friends even taught us how to properly eat sugar cane (it involves a lot of chewing and spitting). The best part of the evening was playing Mahjong with some of the aunts and uncles. Everybody gathered round to watch the white girls struggle to keep up with ancient traditions, but it was definitely entertaining for all who were involved. After several rounds I was asked if I had become addicted to Mahjong and I answered with an enthusiastic YES! Which is true by the way...I still don't fully understand the rules and if you sat me at a table with a pile of tiles I would not know the first thing to do with them, but nonetheless I am addicted. We ended the night with a fireworks display that could rival those at Disney World...keep in mind this all went down in a drive way surrounded by trees, buildings, and small children on roller skates. I let our a scream when the first fireworks started exploding from ten feet in front of me. Elizabeth and I had not expected to be thrown into a war zone that night. The men of the family piled all the fireworks next to each other on the driveway and then proceeded to smoke and mingle within feet of the explosives. There were also a variety of handheld fireworks (which were always pointed at someone when being lit), baby fireworks, sparklers, and of course the infamous Chinese fire crackers. There were times I feared for my life and limbs, but at the end of the night I was just so overcome with joy. There were about twenty to thirty people gathered to celebrate and everyone treated us like family (we even got to hold the newest member of the family- a tiny/fat baby who giggled and drooled whenever Elizabeth and I tried to explain to her that we were now her American aunties). Yan Ran's mom even told us to consider her as a mother and we should visit on weekends whenever we have the chance. She also sent us off with a TON of sugar cane for our apartment.

Lantern Festival Festivities of Celebration and Happiness

I have some pictures and stories, but these will have to wait till another night when I have more time. So I will leave you with this cliff hanger for now :) XOXO

Note to self:

Never assume packaged goods are NOT expired. Is that a double negative? Well you can do that in Chinese... Apparently you can also continue to sell anything well past its expiration date as well.

Here we go!

Classes are getting a tinsey bit harder now, but still not bad. We have our first test on Friday. Bring it on. Dinner at an AMAZING hot pot place. The best hot pot I have ever had was in Dongbei last semester, but this comes pretty close. That is impressive because I am very picky when it comes to hot pot, but then again Jayson will tell you I'm picky when it comes to life. Lunch was wonton soup. I didn't even realize they had wonton soup in China, I thought that was an American Chinese buffet thing, but I guess not. Regardless, these wontons were to die for. I talk a lot about food, don't I? Well part of living in China is just becoming immersed in food culture. It is all about making friends, meeting new people, developing guanxi (relationships, particularly professional relationships), and just enjoying life. I think Americans need to adopt this banfa (method). Meal time equals happy time. Done.

MEXICAN FOOD!!!

There is a man from Hong Kong who lived in California for several years who set up a Mexican restaurant about a 20 minute walk from campus...his quesodillas (how do you spell that?!?!) and burritos are so legit!!! We will have to become regulars here. His English is really good too and he makes custom margaritas so that is not too shabby. Shanghai just continues to get better and better everyday!! Who could ever leave? Hint. Hint.

Snowy Shanghai.

It snowed. That is rare, people. This is a good omen!!! Also I can tell my Chinese is really improving because I am able to order food at restaurants with a lot more ease. I'm not just pointing to pictures and saying baby sentences like "I want eat this picture food"....so glad I am done with that phase. My bargaining skills are also becoming more lihai (fierce).

First Week of Classes: Success!

Love my classmates, love my teachers, love everything about the Alliance program so far. One week down and we are already so close...much different from last semester with 75 students as opposed to this semester's 15. This is the way life should be: fun, educational, challenging...cheesy. So lets talk about Shanghai weather. Freezing. Blue skies....yes, this is actually true. Freezing. Rain. That pretty much sums it up. It has been raining a ton, but when the rain stops the weather is truly beautiful and sunny. I am starting to think the clouds floating about Fudan campus are actually made of condensed water droplets (or something sciency) and not little cancer cells mixed with factory dust waiting to attack every unsuspecting lung. Class starts at 9:00 am which is really cool, so I have been getting a good amount of sleep so far, but that didn't stop me from once again catching the infamous Chinacold. Hopefully this one won't last two months and 300 years like the last one. We are out of class by 2:30 and since I only have Chinese classes that leaves a little time to rest or make a quick shopping run at the nearest fake market.

So much to catch up on!!!

Wow, I am a really terrible blogger. Sorry to keep everyone waiting on updates! Here it goes.... After our taking the placement test (and feeling really good about it, by the way) I finally placed into 300 level Chinese!!!! Yay!! Last semester I was in 255 despite it being my third year taking Chinese at the college level, but that was where I belonged and I'm glad I had that chance to build a strong foundation in the language. Now I'm feeling really good in 301, and actually we found out that 301 at Alliance is the equivalent of 4th year Chinese in the States. Sweet. Same as last semester we have a 24/hr language pledge on campus which is not a problem at all. I'm to the point where I can actually have conversations with people in a mildly conversational manner with only the occasional accidentally-offensive mistake. Also in the first week I explored a near-by bookstore that has the most adorable stationary I have ever seen in my life, just another reason to be obsessed with China. Jayson and I also had dinner at KFC the night before Chinese classes started to celebrate the last day of speaking English...but to be honest I would have rather eaten at one of the BAJILLION Chinese restaurants in the area because they are just so DELICIOUS. Looks like I'm never coming home guys, sorry bout that :)

Last Day of Orientation

Language placement test this morning, I think it went pretty well. I could definitely feel a HUGE improvement from last semester's test which was an interesting train wreck. After the test all the Fudan Alliance students were dropped off at the old French concession area of Shanghai for a scavenger hunt that ended in hours of walking in circles finding nothing but the Fu Xing Park. At least we all had a couple laughs! I enjoyed some fangbianmian (instant noodles) for lunch and then collapsed for a short nap before KTV. Most of the Alliance students and our Chinese roommates went out for karaoke, and I must say it was the most fun I've ever had at KTV. Our group just gets along so well!!! Three hours later we had all lost our voices but still were ready to hit the clubs. We ended up at a place called Mint, which is on the 24th floor of a fancy hotel. The club has a guest list and dress code, neither of which we were prepared for but it seemed to be a slow night so the bouncer let us go in anyway....really incredible due to the fact that most of us looked like slobs who had just spent three hours jumping up and down in an extremely warm, dark room singing songs from the 90's. The club was absolutely beautiful, but wayyyyyyyyy to fancy for my taste. And once again, expensive. I left not long after arriving with some other friends who were expecting more of a dance party rather than a bar/lounge for the rich and extravagant of Shanghai. Although we heard from a Chinese roommate that the club does pick up around 12 or 1 and becomes a dance party, so we will have to try again after Spring Festival. I watched an episode of Elementary before going to bed and getting to sleep in on Sunday. Monday classes start along with the language pledge...I'm both excited and a tinsey bit nervous.

My Roomies!

Yan Ran, Elizabeth, and me on the famous Shanghai Bund.

Tonghe Apartments

Day Three: Orientation

The day started off with a group trip to the famous Shanghai Bund- the area where a river divides old, colonial Shanghai from new, modern Shanghai. Personally, I thought the architecture on the colonial side was more beautiful (albeit, built with Opium money) even though Shanghai is most famous for the new city which was entirely built in the past twenty years. Lunch as a group was delish, same place my roomies and I ate last night for dinner because there are only two restaurants open remotely near campus due to Spring Festival. Then some of us walked to the closest fruit stand-I am still getting used to Shanghai being generally more expensive than Beijing...my fruit (and almost everything else) costs about double the Beijing price, even the subway!! We followed this up with another orientation meeting about how awesome it would be to end up in Chinese jail...or maybe it was the other way around. After dinner on our own we got to go to a Chinese acrobatic performance in the Shanghai Center (a really, really, really, really swanky building with expensive stores and men in expensive suits and women in gorgeous heels). The acrobats were UNBELIEVABLY impressive, but the show in general was very gimmicky. The colors, music, backdrops were all reminiscent of a preschool playground. That bothered me a little but not enough to think the acrobats were mediocre in anyway. The show ended about 9:00pm and almos the entire group of Alliance Fudan students went clubbing afterwards. Since we have such a small group it makes it infinitely more possible to do group activities that include everyone, which was really great! Even Yan Ran came!!!! The club was ridiculously expensive, but recommended by another foreigner we met at a bar. She said Maya (the name of the club) was really popular amongst locals rather than foreigners (the first place we went was entirely foreigners), so that was nice. When in China, do as the Chinese!! Overall a great day!!!

SHANGHAI!!

OK! First blog post from beautiful Shanghai! I guess you could say my China experience started on the plane ride from LAX to Beijing, when I was reminded of the serious lack of personal bubbles in China. My fellow passengers and I got very cozy very quickly and just like that I was brought back to all my wonderful (and some not so wonderful) memories of Beijing. The other thing I noticed which I find very interesting is the vast majority of foreigners on flights to China (at least from LAX) are elderly couples. Of course the plane is about 90% Chinese nationals, but looking around I figure there were a couple Europeans, what seemed like a dozen elderly white couples, and me. It always makes me smile when I see them moseying through throngs of Asians in their 80’s ski jackets and towing floral luggage. Nana and Papa always come to mind, their periodic trips to Singapore are still fresh in my mind. (On a side note: the flight from Beijing to Shanghai had a ton more foreigners than I was expecting, maybe 30-40% of the plane.) The flight was smooth, albeit long. Beijing was A LOT colder than I was expecting…I also wasn’t expecting to have to walk outside to board my domestic flight to Shanghai. There was ice on the ground and the sky was a dirty white color. I would say it was white as far as the eye could see, but that was only like ten feet. The ice was so bad we sat on the plane for an hour and a half while airport staff ran around the tarmac with hair dryers trying to keep the runway ice free for take-off. (Its unlikely this is what actually happened, but I fell asleep while we were sitting there so really anything is possible.) Arriving in Shanghai was glorious. Stepping out of the plane the airport somehow smelled like popcorn and 50 feet away from my gate I saw a Disney store….in the airport. Ok, Shanghai and I were seriously made for each other. After gathering my luggage I have now moved to the main arrival hall and am currently waiting for the Alliance people to get here and take me to the student apartments. I arrived at noon and they arrive at 3:00pm to pick up whatever students are milling about, but I figured derping around the airport for 3 hours to save $40 bucks was worth it…now I’m bored out of my mind and getting a head start on my blog posts by typing in Word because I don’t have Internet. By the time this gets posted online you can all assume I have safely made it to Fudan University. Missing everyone already!!! If I learned anything about study abroad from Beijing it is that the first three days are the hardest in terms of homesickness and adjusting, so maybe I’ll work on my positive affirmations while I wait (that’s for you, Dad…also read them on the plane a couple times). Muah!! XOXO At the moment I am starting to write blog post numero dos, but I am still without Internet. Last night I met all the Alliance students, there is a total of 15 of us at Fudan University, and I am glad to report that everyone is super cool! I can already tell this is going to be a great semester with some really great new friends. We all seem to mesh really well, and that is what I love about small groups. Last semester was a program of 75 kids, so this is TINY in comparison. Dinner last night was good, but not delicious and after getting back to the apartments I crashed at like 10pm. So our apartments are INCREDIBLE!! Absolute palaces compared to the IES dorms. This is the very first college semester I have a bedroom to myself and I am LOVING it. The apartments are on the Fudan campus (I think) and they are shared by one Chinese roommate and two international students. My Chinese roommate is Yan Ran and my other roomie is Elizabeth…and get this. She goes to school at Trinity in San Antonio. Crazy!! There are actually like five students in the Alliance program who are either native Texans or who go to school in Texas, so that is a significant number considering there are only 15 of us. Orientation has been going really well, so worries. Our program directors seem really great and my roomies all get along really well, it is just amazing how two days in and I already feel so at home. Yan Ran and Elizabeth and I went out to dinner together tonight after a trip to Walmart (yes, an actual Walmart) to buy essentials. Yan Ran took us to a place that was DELICIOUS!!! Man, I didn’t remember how scrumdidlyumpcious Chinese fried rice and green beans are!!!!! Mmmmmm….now I remember how is got so pang (fat) in Beijing. Oops! So far Shanghai is just perfect. The people, the city, the food… I actually am excited for classes to start, even the dreaded language pledge seems more inviting this semester than last. There are only three downsides at this point. One: it has been constantly raining since we arrived at the Shanghai airport. Two: there is NO Internet….ANYWHERE. Three: our apartment has ZERO insulation and even with four heaters going at full blast through the day and night our entire apartment is like a walk-in freezer. No joke…I slept in three layers last night and was still cold. I am seriously considering a heated blanket, but they are a couple hundred RMB and it won’t be cold for that much longer….wonder if I can make it. We walk around the apartment in full outdoor winter gear. I’m sitting on the couch in an over coat and wearing a scarf and two pairs of socks with furry slippers. On a side note our trip to Walmart was hilarious and we all left with giant bags of new-apartment-essentials like cleaning and cooking supplies. Walking down the street everyone was staring because shopping in bulk is STRICTLY American concept. Yan Ran was laughing the whole time because she understood just how ridiculous we all looked to the locals.