Now I have your attention I should probably elaborate before I have my parents calling people and people calling my parents. T'was a cold Tuesday afternoon when, unable to get a place to study at the library, I began a fateful stroll home to my apartment. iPod blaring out some sweet Shakira in my ears (don't judge), I was blissfully unaware of the police van at the entrance to our apartment complex until I was hauled inside it. Registration papers were demanded, thankfully in English once they realised my Chinese consisted of me saying 'Sorry! Sorry! I don't know! Sorry! I don't understand! Sorry!' However, my papers were tucked away in the very apartment I was trying to reach, which earned me a solid finger-pointing talking to. Luckily I was registered, and once I was found on the extensive database I was released, shaken and thoroughly told-off. Jordyn then thought I was trying to break into the apartment, and was very reluctant to both come to the door and then actually let me in. Just living up to my 'just been arrested' lifestyle change I suppose!
The weather continues to get colder, with snow this morning! Unfortunately the fall was brief and had melted by the time we got out of class to go and frolick. With the brief snow came the coldest day so far, which led to a rush to our market this afternoon for scarves and mittens. I have my haggling down to a fine art- I pretend I don't know what is going on (which isn't entirely pretending) and repeat my price until they get so sick of me they just agree. You can get everything for about 60% of what it is offered at, so my scarves went a little like this:
"(in broken Chinese) How much?"
"58 kuai"
"Sorry, I dont understand. I give you, 30 kuai."
"(cue fast paced reasoning as to why such a price is simply impossible)"
"Sorry. I speak Chinese very bad. I give you, 30 kuai."
So on and so forth, until I ended up with 2 for 65 kuai ($10) and a pair of mittens.
Unfortunately, when ordering in restaurants I would find my Chinese still to be inadequate- While I thought I had successfully communicated my vege-ness at a Korean restaurant the other night, my soup which was ordered with no egg or meat came out delightfully garnished with both. However, things are starting to look up- at a street-side baozi (steamed bun) stand a lovely, heavily-bundled lady gave me a selection of vego baozi, and while sometimes I may be overkilling it a little- telling the lady who only sells vegetarian noodles yesterday at lunch, quite unessecarily that 'I don't eat meat', at least I am becoming more understandable.
An amazingly cute Asian thermos has been a godsend for early classes, hot hibiscus or jasmine tea makes 8am starts bearable AND cute. Giving a speech about Australian sports to the rest of the class was quite a hoot, as they don't have words for cricket, netball, AFL, or kiteboarding, though I didn't find this as distressing as the poor French girl when she found out they don't have a word for 'petanque'.
Here are just a few snaps from the past few days, I hope that everything is awesome down under.
Will write again as soon as I have something of note to report- getting arrested, etc.
Much love, Lu Fei.
The weather continues to get colder, with snow this morning! Unfortunately the fall was brief and had melted by the time we got out of class to go and frolick. With the brief snow came the coldest day so far, which led to a rush to our market this afternoon for scarves and mittens. I have my haggling down to a fine art- I pretend I don't know what is going on (which isn't entirely pretending) and repeat my price until they get so sick of me they just agree. You can get everything for about 60% of what it is offered at, so my scarves went a little like this:
"(in broken Chinese) How much?"
"58 kuai"
"Sorry, I dont understand. I give you, 30 kuai."
"(cue fast paced reasoning as to why such a price is simply impossible)"
"Sorry. I speak Chinese very bad. I give you, 30 kuai."
So on and so forth, until I ended up with 2 for 65 kuai ($10) and a pair of mittens.
Unfortunately, when ordering in restaurants I would find my Chinese still to be inadequate- While I thought I had successfully communicated my vege-ness at a Korean restaurant the other night, my soup which was ordered with no egg or meat came out delightfully garnished with both. However, things are starting to look up- at a street-side baozi (steamed bun) stand a lovely, heavily-bundled lady gave me a selection of vego baozi, and while sometimes I may be overkilling it a little- telling the lady who only sells vegetarian noodles yesterday at lunch, quite unessecarily that 'I don't eat meat', at least I am becoming more understandable.
An amazingly cute Asian thermos has been a godsend for early classes, hot hibiscus or jasmine tea makes 8am starts bearable AND cute. Giving a speech about Australian sports to the rest of the class was quite a hoot, as they don't have words for cricket, netball, AFL, or kiteboarding, though I didn't find this as distressing as the poor French girl when she found out they don't have a word for 'petanque'.
Here are just a few snaps from the past few days, I hope that everything is awesome down under.
Will write again as soon as I have something of note to report- getting arrested, etc.
Much love, Lu Fei.
