Settling In

September 28, 2008

21st September 2008

Thursday

Thursday morning I woke up at 7:45am assuming that it’d give me enough time to get to school. Auntie (the landlady; from here on I call her Auntie in Chinese) was up and already doing stuff. I’d actually woke up a few times before that at 6:30am and then 7:15am since there is so much noise in this complex. Cars honking their horns, people yelling across the street, old people chanting heavily. It ain’t the Spring Festival yet people!

Auntie explained to me some of the procedures of using the shower, like how the hot and cold dials are reversed and that I should close the window while I am using the toilet and shower. The bathroom is as I mentioned previously, very comfortable. The shower too was lovely, water doesn’t small like feces. I didn’t have much time to enjoy it though as time was on a treadmill.

Auntie was also keen to remind me to get Mrs Hua to call her about the police registration since they were all clueless from last night’s banter. She talked some more and I began to feel time running away from me.

It didn’t take long for me to find the bus stop and the right bus. The bus I catch was jammed pack, I entered from the front and realized that this bus line accepts cards from the back. It didn’t take long for me to catch on that passangers were passing each others cards and money along to the middle of the bus where it can be processed. I got off at the right stop and caught the line 1. Much to my bitter disapointment the line 1 during peak hour is even worse than I’d previously imagined. It really is butt check to butt check tight and the temperature climbs to a pressure cooker very quickly. Thankfully it cools down a little once we hit Xuhuijia.

Returning home was much more comfortable as the density of people had decreased. Once I got off at the railway station I lost my way and wandered around the complex for at least 25 minutes. This reminded me of all the other times I had gotten lost and how uncomfortable it felt. Eventually I found my way, I got off at the opposite end and had to walk through an underpass. Returning home from there was fine.

When I got home I called Auntie as I needed a key for the house. Her son answered and it didn’t take me long to realize that he was downstairs playing games so I got the key off him, this was only temporary though.

Once I got inside, I wasn’t too sure what to do. Like the day before, I had finished classes and had about 5hrs to myself. Hanxue was going to come over later and help me with the contract and the rest of it. I decided that It would be best that I work on my homework now since I might not have anytime to later. Even though my bags were still lying there mostly packed up I didn’t want to sort everything into drawers just yet.

In the down time I did some homework and slept a little, I also wrote up another to do list, noting everything I needed to know about the new place. Auntie rocked up later and told me to start sorting my stuff into drawers. She also helped me move the front loader washing machine left on my desk. From there I spent the next few hours unpacking my things. It felt great putting everything away, like things had finally turned my way.

Later on, Hanxue rocked up, the three of us did the routine talk-fest. We were going to arrange the contract and all that jazz but I later realized what it was me who had to set up the contract and not the landlord. Despite my lack of context Hanxue was already getting Ou Yan to get a template for me and would have it by tommorow.

Auntie also said a few things about me getting a webcam and doing a tour of the house for the people back in Australia. She also wanted to talk to my family, despite the different languages.

From there we went out to eat, we went to the same place as the night before, this time just the two of us. This time I let Hanxue order all of the dishes, they were all pretty good. Later on Ou Yan and Sam rocked up and joined in. From there we returned home, I showered (they encourage that I shower twice a day) and then went to sleep. I also called Xi at some stage.

Friday

Friday morning I went with Auntie down to the Police Station to complete the registration. Somehow they’d managed to work out something were I didn’t need all of the stuff on Mrs Hua’s list or something like that. I’m not too sure.

So I woke up, got ready and Auntie and waited a little for Auntie. She told me that we would travel to the police station via scooter. Scooters are extremely popular over here in China. Roads are littered with cars, busses bicycles, scooters and pedestrians. None of them really care about anyone else, they just go. Nobody wears helmets either.

We walked down to a small shed near the end of the compound and Auntie opened up the door and dragged out her scooter. She got on the front and I got on the back. I wasn’t sure where to put my hands, she said on her shoulders. From there we were off.

Ignoring the dangers of crashing and all that, being in the back, bending in and out of the early morning chaos was energising. It was only a short trip to the station. Inside I handed over my passport and signed some forms detailing my personal information. They then gave back my passport and a sheet of paper to say that I was registered along with the details that I’d just supplied.

On the way back Auntie dropped me off at the bus stop and I made my regular commute to school. After class I decided to check out an imported goods store that was recommended to me by one of my classmates. It was situated in the underground floor of a fancy department store.

Inside was packed with goods from around the world, mainly skewed towards American though. All of the sugary breakfast cereals were there, fresh meat, South Australian wines and a few Japanese goods. After searching the whole store I couldn’t find Vegemite and had to ask a staff member to direct me to where it was. I also picked up a can of ginger ale for AUD50c. I figured that I’d deserved it. No beer outside of Japan, China and the US. Tsk.

Once I got home I relaxed and played a short burst of games on my laptop. Auntie then rocked up and wanted to show me the canteens at the local university that I could buy my meals from. So we jumped on the scooter and she did a quick tour of the school. We looked at three canteens in total. A few things worried me about the university, firstly the quality of food was not very high at all, very sloppy, highly unappealing, it was much much lower than what I had been getting over in Yangpu. Secondly the method of transportation. Auntie had said that I could loan her bicycle and ride down to the university for lunch and tea. I didn’t exactly find comfort in the idea of gambling my life on the roads.

We returned home and I probably did some homework. Once again, Hanxue arrived after work to help me out. By this stage I am really unsure of how to handle her politeness, I mean ever since we met she had been helping me everything single day, as much as possible. I am so fortunate.

The three of us organised the contact, got it signed and I handed over the money. I then stored my copy away, nice and safe. We talked a little more about the plans ahead. My to do list had already shrunk as I’d figured out most of my questions (clean water, garbage bin etc.) by myself. I needed to ask a few more and got those out of the way.

Auntie knew of a quality restaurant and recommended that we go there for tea. She led the way and it didn’t take long before the two of us had found it. I was suprirsed at the calibur of this place, it was pretty classy, not quite what I am use to. Reminded me of the hotel from Home Alone 2 with the waiters hand gesturing and saying nice things to us.

Once we were inside we looked around for a spare table. I guess about 20% of the people inside began looking at me, like the foreign beast I am. I couldn’t help but ponder the kinds of thoughts running through there heads about me.

It didn’t take long for us to find a table, it needed a bit of a spruce up and the waiters did that with haste. We then looked at the menu concealed behind the class on the table. The menu was segmented into Chinese and Western dishes. I asked Hanxue if there was anything like the beef and black bean we had before, she found a ’similar’ dish and we ordered that.

I guess I should have been weary about this since it was in the westerners part of the menu but I didn’t think twice about it. We talked for a short while about why everyone looks at me and what they’re probably thinking. It was then that a waiter walked past and made some cluey remark to Hanxue. Ironi that. She said that he suggested that we drink lots of alcohol. Hmmm…

Our meals were finally served up on sizzling plates. The waiter removed the top pan and revealed what I’d describe as the ‘typical American breakfast’. It’s not really breakfast though. There was a slab of beef, pasta and egg all done up in a fatty, American style of cooking. Man, I had never had a meal like this before and it certainly wasn’t the ‘beef and black bean’-esque style of food I had thought it was.

In anycase, we both didn’t mind the meal. I really didn’t think that I’d like it but it was fine. No complaints. From the restaurant Hanxue delivered me home and said that she’d be around 9:30am tommorow to help me register for the internet. Like I said, hospitable.

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