I’m here. July 8, 2008
I am so jetlagged I can barely see straight. After taking the most fantastically hellish flight EVER, which included a non-English speaking child continuously kicking the back of my seat, an inedible meal that included microwaved salad and a rubbery substance that I can only mildly suspect was once the flesh of a living creature, and all of the straight-to-DVD movies that Matthew McConaughey has ever made, I am in Beijing.
We’re staying in a college dorm a few miles outside of the city’s center, which actually isn’t too bad, if you ignore the fact that your toilet and your shower occupy the same 6 square inches of space.
Look closely above and to the right of the toilet. That’s my shower head. And on the floor? That tiny circle? That’s the drain.
The rest of the room is somewhat typical, but pretty nice.
There are a few dining halls on campus, a restaurant, a teahouse. And a supermarket, which features the most random, wonderful, cartoonish shit I’ve ever seen. Like these vacuum packed chicken wings:
Just…gross.
Nobody on my program really speaks Mandarin (besides mispronouncing some basic words here and there), so we’ve been doing a lot of pointing and miming. Which works when you’re in a restaurant, and doesn’t when you’re in a store that’s being guarded by two security officers, and you’re trying to mime “cigarette” but end up gripping your fingers like a joint, and then accidentally say “Do you want?” instead of “Do you have?”. This, as my smoker friends discovered, leads to the Chinese police thinking that you’re asking them to go get high with you. Ah, language.
Haven’t left the campus yet. We hung around here for awhile after arriving, and everyone unpacked, drank a few mystery beers, and went to bed. Tomorrow should be more exciting.
On a high note, the Olympics apparently sponsors drinking, as evidenced by the beer we bought tonight
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