And So it Goes

September 6, 2008

I’d better give a run down of all my progress since the previous article, hopefully I can remember all of the important stuff as it’s all starting to get a little vague. This time I will break it up again into lots of 3 days.

I should also mention that writing straight to Word documents in OpenOffice ensures that I am void of any spell checker. It’s free software so I can hardly complain. >_<

Friday through to the end of the weekend were particularly quiet days since I just wanted to wind down a little and to be honest I didn’t know how to shoot through the next few things on my To Do list. I’d already figured out where to eat, get money out and the rest of it, but I still needed to form a system for organising everything online such as news, media and blogs. More importantly though I needed to wash my clothes and felt greatly obliged to clean my room and the bathroom next door as well. I didn’t really need to do any cleaning but I’d rather just power ahead and do it for my own well-being.

Friday

Since I’d just invested too much time into writing the article about the first three days in China, I wanted to get it up ASAP since it contained basically everything I wanted to tell everybody at home. So on the Friday morning I woke up - been having solid 9-10hrs sleeps since I got here - and prepared everything that I wanted to upload. Also somewhere around that time I wrote down a second list of things to do, I’ve been updating and rewriting this list continously since I got here.

The editing and organising of my entires took a few hrs so once I’d finished I went to the canteen to get lunch. In the canteen I met Mr Guo (or should I say he met me), the man who had served me up the QingDao beer and also works for the exchange office. He asked me plenty of questions (again too fast and in Chinese) about how I was going, I retailiated with a bunch of my own and had left with instruction on how to get to this “downtown campus” where I’d be studying. He bettered me though since the instructions were in characters.

At some stage, I sat down and read the 8 txt messages I was bombarded with when I originally activated the phone. Turns out that most of them are advertisements, I get one almost everytime I turn on my phone. Most of them are from China Mobile, informing me of promotions and such, so it isn’t too bad.

For the rest of the afternoon I would have predominately been uploading the stuff that I wanted to post online as there was a lot to get up in a short amount of time. The time at the internet cafe was well spent as I managed to sort most of my affairs including uploading photos, blog posts and managing my emails and RSS feeds. This was a he relief as I had a secure internet stream to upload, read and manage my content (photos, blog posts, editorial pieces, news etc).

By the end of the day I realized that I’d burnt out my 50 yuan phone credit in about two days. I wanted to recharge my phone but didn’t know how to do it and since it was past 5pm at the time, I didn’t think that Mrs. Hua would be on duty, and I didn’t want to nusiance her some more either. In this case I’d phone for help but I couldn’t do anything but wait until the following Monday when she’d be around to ask.

I also decided to go walk-abouts around the university and quitely concluded the day with more blogging, reading and maybe some Chinese television.

Saturday

Saturday was much the same. I woke up and formed a list of all of the cleaning agents that I’d need and translated the list into Chinese. I also looked into anything to kill the nasty bugs. Once I completed my list I went down to local supermarket to buy most of those supplies; gloves, moth balls, detergent and sponges.

Later that day (it could have been Sunday, I’m not sure) I enquired about the washing facilities on campus and found a free to use top loader. Questions about ironing though were still shrugged off.

I reckon that I probably had a chat with the Nigerean guy in the room next to me. He told me a bit more about himself and the predicament he is in. Basically he’d been on campus for about half a year and wanted to move out in the following days since he couldn’t get his classes taught in english.

With all of the obligatory survival activities aside (ie. eating), I probably returned to the internet cafe (they started aksing for ID as well) and spent most of the afternoon blogging as there wasn’t much else to do.

I reckon that I also got stuck into some of the independently produced games that I had downloaded and started Grim Fandango sometime as well. Grim Fandango is as I envisioned it 10 years ago, a cleverly written masterpiece that draws it’s comic relief - naturally the game’s crux – from classic noir, South American culture and the ‘Land of the Dead’. Most pleasing.

Sunday

Sunday was again, much the same.

I returned to the internet cafe as it was the only form of contact back home, I also got my cleaning tips finalized when there. Afterwards I went back to my favourite super market, talked to the staff - on-tap and ready to assist - about buying bleach and washing powder. Supposively the liquid washing detergent doesn’t work for all fabrics so I bought Omo powder on the lady’s suggestion. She also said that my Chinese was great, I wish they’d stop lying to be polite.

While talking to the ladies I found that I could buy a bus card from across the road and hence did so, the lady there was certain to explain to me how the card worked. Unfortunately not much got through, she seemed frustrated.

On returning home I discovered that the canteen is closed on Sundays and hence had to scrounge around for food. At that time I’d also felt guilty about staying indoors too much, blogging and being a loner. I decided to ease my guilt by wandering the streets of YangPu. I wish I hadn’t though as the conditions around here only get worse the further you travel out.

Having felt justified about being a loner - this still bothered me but in reality there was little I could do - for the rest of the day I finalized my critiques on fl0w and Kyntt Stories as well as some DS stuff. I felt obsessed about polishing these articles and then polished a little more. I wonder if they’re any good though?

I’d also began watching Chinese TV at night, usually until the terribly cleched acting got on my nerves, that or the suferflous amount of advertising. I’d also decided that Monday would be the day that I get stuck into cleaning, travelling and all of the other stuff I’d been avoiding. Also Mrs. Hua would be available again to help me with my amounting problems.

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