The Melting Pot

The holidays are still here and our family is going to have a party, which means my mom is going to invite some of her closer business friends over to do some kind of White Elephant gift exchange kind of party. They're usually not too bad because I know most of the adults that she works with.

Today, I went to The Melting Pot. It was super cool. This restaurant, located in Larkspur, is situated inside a large keln, in which many of the bricks used to build houses in SF were made. It was pretty cool, but for obvious reasons, even with the lighting, the restaurant was dim. The food was really good and the way they made it was really original and surprisingly really good tasting.

http://www.themeltingpot.com/

For those of you who don't know what the melting pot is, it is a restaurant that, I think, is located all over the United States and serves fondue. The cheese kind, the broth kind, and yes...the chocolate kind. It was really good. For the cheese portion, we ordered one of the specials on the menu, but right now the name is not coming to mind. It was Wisconsin cheddar? and some other really good ingredients. Even though the taste of the cheese was really strong, you could tell it was really good cheese, not the kind you would normally find prepackaged. We ate it with bread, vegetables, and apples, which is surprisingly a good mix. Cheese and apple, who woulda thought? At least I didn't...



The second course was the salad, which I guess makes the cheese portion the appetizer. I got a caesar salad, which was really good. However, I always feel like these salads are never complete without an anchovy or two on them. I hear that the original ones even had a raw quail egg cracked on top to get the right consistency for the dressing and the salad as a whole. The salad was good.

Thirdly was the entree. It was a broth base with mushrooms and a pitcher of wine. We were worried at first that the shear amount would just overpower the broth and dye all the food, but after it started boiling, the alcohol burned out and just a little of the taste was left. The food did get died, but it didn't matter because I could only visibly see it on the potatoes. Along side the entree we were given our selection of meats, vegetables, etc. The vegetable dish was free and consisted of potatoes, mushrooms, and brocolli, which was some of the best part of the entree. We also picked two dishes, one called Land and Sea, which I guess most of you could assume is Surf and Turf (balsamic vinegar marinated beef, chicken marinated in something else, and some shrimp). We also ordered the French Quarter, which I thought was better. The meats consisted of shrimp, filet mignon, and chicken. I thought this one was much better because the taste was more catered to what I like, a cajun-y taste. We spent a long time with this one because all the meat was cook yourself, which I like because it is kind of like hot-pot. It was exciting to try all the things and cook our own food and then choose among 5 different types of sauces, which included a ginger one, a bleu cheese one (nasty), and other flavors. They also gave us a baby Tabasco bottle.



Lastly, and since my brother and sister told the waiter it was my birthday, came the chocolate fondue. Most of you know that I'm not very fond of chocolate in particular, but this time I tried some since it was my "birthday celebration". However, all they did for the birthday was put a candle on the deserts that we paid for that come with the chocolate fondue. It was very good, it consisted of the chocolate, which was then flambeed with some kind of alcohol that they lit on fire and poured into the chocolate, then put on graham cracker flakes and gave us things to dip. Among the things (because it was a S'mores order) were Oreo marshmallows, graham cracker marshmallows, pound cake, cheesecake, rice crispy squares, etc. All I ate out of this was the marshmallows, which turned out to be really good. I didn't eat much though because the chocolate was overwhelming.



If any of you ever get the chance to check this place out, it's definitely worth a try. It also has free valet parking, what a deal! The atmosphere of this restaurant is reason enough to try it out. Very different from your usual sit down. At the end of the meal, they top it off with a nice mint...and it's not one of those crappy white and red ones either. This one was quality.

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Christmas!

It's Christmas, which means lots of presents to open. I got a good lot of gifts today, the best including an iHome from my brother. It's pretty sweet. We also got a Wii Fit for the family that we've been playing all day.

I love Christmas, it's always so fun and no one is ever anything but happy.

Anyway, check out this video of the Beijing Fuwa's fighting. The two stole the panda's shoe and he's getting even:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0GKFUHVXwis

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The Funniest Video I took in China

The other day, I was looking through my pictures and videos, showing my family the things that I'd seen and the events that I'd gone to.

This is among the best/funniest videos I took in China at the USA vs. Greece Basketball game.

Enjoy:

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Back Home

It's weird. I don't know how to explain it. Just coming back from the airport to my house felt so strange. I was soon shown the likes of SF traffic and everyone speaking English to me again, but thinking about waking up tomorrow and not really having to decide how many layers to put on or what Chinese food to eat really throws me off.

I've spent the last 6 months in a foreign country, adopting a thusly foreign demeanor and attitude, all of which were adapted to the style of living in that foreign country. Then, all of a sudden, I'm back again, to the same routine of living that I was set in, in the United States. It's really disorienting. I've heard people get reverse culture shock sometimes, some people even get depressed. I, on the other hand, was very excited to get home. However, while 10 days before departure I was itching to get back, the day before our flight I was starting to feel sad that we would leave China, most of the friends we've made there, and a lot of the places and experiences that we had been through. It's to think about sometimes. But then if you think about all the good experiences you've had and the lasting friendship, you become happy and grateful for all the fun that you experienced as a study abroad student in China, but also happy to be home with the friends and family that you missed from day 1.

I won't say that I won't miss China, of course I'll miss the food, the cheapness, some parts of the dirtiness and Beijing attitude...hearing Chinese, speaking Chinese, etc. But I am really glad to be back home, unpack all my stuff and actually have a place that's clean, comfortable and not as freezing cold or extremely hot as Beijing is during it's seasonal phases.

And with having come back home, there are a few things I must get done on my list. Firstly...food! Thanks to all you pranksters out there who did this:


I guess I'm going to be eating Chinese and Barney's tomorrow. It shall be exciting. But now, I need to start unpacking everything and putting things in their place, washing my clothes, and wrapping Christmas presents.

Oh, one more thing: On the way back from the airport was the first time I'd ever seen a full rainbow. One side to the other. While driving along a freeway, we saw a rainbow outside the window over the Bay, in full flex from one side to the next. I wasn't able to catch pictures of the entire rainbow in one shot, but I did take both sides in hopes of maybe making a panoramic view.

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Waiting in the Hong Kong Airport

I know I promised that I would do an update with pictures of the snow and all the glory, but I didn't have very much time. You know, with all the packing and all the last minute shopping and last goodbyes, it was pretty hard to get everything situated and, on top of that, write a blog. I promised to put pictures up and maybe even a Youtube vid.

Anyway, for those of you, my family, who are picking me up, you might be wondering how I am blogging right now. The HKI Airport has FREE WIFI! It's sweet and even better connection than what we had in the dormitories, it only takes 1!, that's right, 1! try to get onto AIM. It did take a little while for configuration, but in the end using the Intel PRO Wireless works better than the stupid Windows Wireless program. I feel so professional on the internet in Hong Kong.

The last night we spent playing mafia with the remainding people and Norman and Hilda, who came to visit from HK. They came during their break, but he's supposed to go back to HK to finish out a year. It's crazy to heare that other people from high school are also going abroad and studying, it seems to be a trend now that there are more and more economic problems in the states. I don't know if it's just an escape or a trend that tends to take form during the sophomore/junior year of college. Who knows?

Waiting for the plane now, going to leave at around 505 PM, HK time. See you at home!

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Breaking News!

It's official. I saw snow in Beijing, and it couldn't have come at a better time. 2 days before my departure from China, back to my home. Details and pictures to come, pending time that I'm not spending getting in the last little bits of experiences in Beijing as a study abroad student.

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9 Days

It's strange, having the feeling of leaving a place that you've lived in for 6 months to resume the life you had before. I think before I kind of described how I felt stagnated here, that things weren't really moving despite seeing all the news and even experiencing the presidential election overseas and the economic collapse. I can't help but feel that only when I get back to Berkeley, to the United States, can I get back to the way things should be and the way that things usually progress.

Anyway, I have 9 days here, 3 more full of class, 3 more full of final exams, and the last 3 for weekend last shopping, seeing friends, and probably a going away graduation ceremony. It should be an eventful last 9 days. I'm pretty excited. But what's also NOT exciting is having to study for these finals, and after seeing the midterms, I know it will NOT be a walk in the park.

To backtrack to the last post I had about snow. Let me tell you: I missed it. I stayed awake for hours, hoping to see it snow. Tammy even woke up at 8 am especially to see it in the morning, but no avail. The sad part was, it was snowing at that time, just such small amounts that it was not noticeable from outside our windows. It was sad. There were students that told us they saw it, because it was an important first day of snow in Beijing, but most people said it was nothing. Very microscopic pieces that only lasted about 30 minutes. We waited in anticipation for the snow to come back because all day on Weather.com and on our widgets it said it was snowing, when it obviously was not. This might be due to the fact that the reader is at the airport, which is a little farther north (may I add, NOT THAT FAR). It was sad. We had waited in anticipation for it, but we were let down by its minimalism. It was very, very sad. Yesterday, we had another spark of hope of seeing this elusive snow (well before January, anyway), but today that too was crushed, it WILL NOT snow on December 20 like it said it would on Weather.com for a short day.

Just to show you what we were hoping for, YEARNING FOR:

A guard in position in front of the Forbidden City. There are always guards here regardless the weather. And no, I will NOT get a picture like this the way the weather is going.

Another shot that is not mine of the Forbidden City during the snowing/winter season.

This is a place in Northern China called Haerbin, or what Americans and other calls Harbin. It's a place that hosts winter festivals every year and makes structures like this completely out of ice. It's amazing, just like the ice hotels in that James Bond movie. We did plan on going here, however the limits of our visas and the change of plans for the date of the finals messed up our plans to go here. After all, it is only a day's trip on a train, which is totally worth it to see this.

In other news, I will do some more reviews of things that I've found on the internet and programs that I've recently come across, starting first with:

1) Mint.com

What a great site, I hear it was named some kind of site for the better of mankind or something, an award that is selectively given to websites. In earlier years, these winners consisted of Google and Mozilla, among a few more. The reason I like it is because it's so simple to use and it allows people, the common lay-people, to figure out how to save their money, where it's all going and how to manage it in ways that would otherwise take a lot of time and effort. It's easy to use and has an Web 2.0 interface that's really nice and friendly (lots of buttons and nice effects). It took me about 5 minutes to get all my accounts on there, and don't worry about putting your information on their to your accounts, they have pop-ups that inform you about how it's safe. But then again, if you're good with your money and know what you want to do, you don't really need this site's help or monthly or even weekly updates on your accounts.

2) ZDT

This program is amazing. Well, I admit it has some flaws, but the function is great. It stands for "Zhongwen Development Tool" and it's made by someone with the intentions of giving Chinese learners a tool that's convenient and really helpful. The basic functions are an annotator that gives pinyin from characters, a dictionary, which you can update with plugins that are easy to download, and best of all a flashcard program that you can program individual chapters from your book from school and test yourself without ever having to hand make a flashcard again. Of course this takes away from the practice of learning to write characters and stroke order, but this program does its purpose of helping people memorize characters and learn them by using this simple dictionary for reference. It takes up little memory on your computer and is very friendly. There is even a website that hosts a forum, where the creator listens to the users and makes changes and fixes the program very often.

That's about it. Also, the latest episode of Top Gear, Season 12 Episode 5, was sadly not that great. Oh well, I'm going home!

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Tian An Men Flag Lowering

Last weekend, three days ago, I went with Tammy to go check out the flag lowering. Though it wasn't as glamorous as some of the reviews made it out to be, it was still some what of a surprise to me. Here we are, in negative degree weather, withstanding cold with about 100+ other Chinese people. What I don't understand is, where in America is there such a place or such a symbol that is so important that people from the city even (because I know they were not from out of state) would go out of their way and in the cold to see it being lowered.

When Tammy read up on it, she told me the ceremony consisted of the guards coming out of the Forbidden City and, while playing the Chinese National Anthem, lowered the flag, folded it carefully and marched ceremoniously back across a busy street intersection that is blocked off, and into the Forbidden City again. It's pretty cool, considering it happens EVERYDAY and Beijing traffic is really nothing to mess with. I marveled at this spectacle. As I said, it wasn't that amazing a sight or an experience in itself, but watching so many people come out in the cold and having to designate a time everyday where a busy Beijing roadway was blocked, now that's some national pride, more than I've seen in the states by far. I guess that's also another thing that separates China from the US, and other countries at that. It's the little things that they do, maybe even if its only for 10 minutes that shows how much Chinese people really take pride in their country, maybe sometimes to too great of a degree.

Regardless, I can't wait to see the flag raising, I hear it's pretty glorious. I hope it's not as anti-climactic as the lowering. I've already built it up, let's hope that the actual thing can actually muster what I feel like should be a worthy use of time.

After we saw the flag, taking pictures and a long video, our hands were frozen and Tammy bought me a pair of FAKE, but warm, "North Face" gloves. Haha. It was awesome. We then went to check out Qian Men, an area of China that has recently been reopened for business. The sense I get from the area is very "yuppie-ish" if you can call things yuppie in China. The buildings remind me of the clean cut buildings you would see in Santa Row or something. Very mediterranean looking, with the beige-ish color. Of course it was dark so I didn't really get to see very much, or very clear, but it was definitely different from what it used to be or the surrounding areas. It wasn't as traditional looking as other places in Beijing. Either way, the area was relatively barren, aside from the occasional 5 star + restaurants that are famous in Beijing/China. For example, there was already a Quan Ju De (the famous restaurant that we were served Peking Duck (Beijing Kao Ya) within the first week of arriving). They had a couple more, but the areas that were hopping were the inside streets of Qian Men, the more dirty and more traditional-hutong looking areas. Hutong directly means a narrow street, the exact measurements I forget, but it's very precise.

These hutongs had side streets that parted down alleyways and the back around, housing toy shops, restaurants, souvenir stands, candy stalls, the works. I thought it was quite cozy, though some place that I didn't really want to eat at very much. Though what they served looked good, I've "xiguan-ed" (gotten used to) living cheap in Beijing and the prices were tourist prices. Though they were relatively cheap, I know I could have found cheaper and better in our usual places of dining.

With less than two weeks left now, I'm starting to get more ancy. I can't wait to get back and celebrate Christmas and take a couple weeks off before I start school again. This trip, looking back (again), has been an amazing experience and my Chinese has improved so much. The range of words I now know can cover conversations about the government, discrimination, politics, the economy and much more very useful topics. I actually can't wait to get home and practice with people and see how useful it is, though not in Oakland Chinatown because I know they only speak Cantonese, GOSH.

Like usual, the damn PICTURE UPLOAD won't work because Chinese internet blows. It was even off the entire day yesterday. But, I'll upload pics ASAP.

Tiananmen Square

Guards in Tiananmen

Me freezing, in the (empty) line to see Mao's body (because the exhibit was closed already). The line usually wraps around the Square TWICE. It did last time I was here.

Qianmen lit up at night

One of Beijing's Drum Towers

Cold.

Not as cold.

In other great news, SNOW! Tomorrow! AND THE DAY AFTER, and the day after, and the day after. Hopefully, who knows with this Chinese weather.

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Coming close to departure

I've lost my motivation to work! Help me!

As time gets closer to the day that I go back home, I get more and more lethargic, call it a Senioritis of sorts. I am, after all, graduating from BNU in the end of the Fall semester with a diploma, so why shouldn't I feel lazy. Well, it really depends. I haven't missed a class yet, but every time I encounter a morning class, which is Tuesdays and Thursdays, I seriously consider not going, but once I get to the class it's fine.

Not only am I getting closer to going home, but the other day when I went with Tammy and a couple of other friends to buy last minute gifts, Xiu Shui Jie (Silk Market or Silk Street) was already playing Christmas music, and this was in the beginning of December. They seriously get a move on things, probably to market to the everlasting flow of foreigners. It was extremely hard to bargain their, because of the foreigner flow that I just mentioned, so the salespeople knew that they could sell to other people for prices way higher than what we wanted. Either way, I think we're going to stick to the less popular, but still higher quality shopping districts to get our fix.

Also, there is just an overflow of changes in Beijing, the winter weather is starting to kick in, global warming ain't got nothing on Beijing winter. Actually, starting tomorrow, the weather is going to drop about 10 degrees for both the highs and lows. So today, the low was around 1 degree Celsius (which I admit is cold) and is going to move down to negative 13 and then negative 13 for the next day, followed by negative 9. Now THAT is cold. Not to mention that the highs are going to be around negative 1 to 0, consistently. Hopefully, we'll catch the snow and our wishes will be answered, you never know.


But as I mentioned before, how we are going home in less than 20 days, this also means that we are getting ready for our final exams. They are testing us on chapters that we aren't going to review with the teachers, how lame is that? Listen to this, in the time that we stay here (a whole month less than the other foreign students) we are going to test on 5-8, but then the other students, leaving in late January are going to test from 5-9. Does that seem fair? Testing on only 1 more chapter, with 1 month duration. I don't think so. An average chapter takes about 1 week to finish because we only have the class three times a week. I don't know about you, but that seems pretty unfair to me. I guess I'll just have to study extra hard. It's all for the better anyway.

But in other news, because you all know how I like to talk about new products on the market, I'm NO LONGER talking about the Blackberry Storm. It's failed me and will not reappear on my blog until it has a respectable review and has proved everyone wrong about how bad it is. But, as some of you may know, I've been trying to start some kind of new entrepreneurial venture. As of now, I've gone through about 10 different ideas, one of which really caught my attention, but has died down as of now. I'm back to the drawing board and looking at other start up websites to look for Web 2.0 and web start up inspiration. My review today will consist of two sites that I think are awesome:

1)Kongregate.com

AN AMAZINGLY ADDICTING WEBSITE that features flash games that other sites like addictinggames.com and armorgames.com have, but with a twist, it replicates the system of points and achievements that Xbox 360 has, which makes it more appealing for people to return and compete against each other in ranking. It also gives more incentive and more reward for people playing the flash games that they've been playing for years. If there's one website you should check this one out, but beware, it is addicting even if you aren't a gamer. Ask Tammy :).

2)Killerstartups.com

As I was looking for a website that showcased new start ups to get ideas, I stumbled upon this website. It is a killer. It reviews new web start ups daily, says why their good and what category their in. It even gives the option to paid members to see the numbers that these new start ups are making. I think it's a good website in terms of actively reviewing up to date Web 2.0 and more sites.

And we can't forget Top Gear:

Top Gear Season 12 Episode 5 also was an awesome episode. A few season back they aired a race between home mobiles driven by touring car drivers; this episode they took those same drivers and introduced them to different style buses (double decker, single decker, "bendy" buses, etc.) to do an "accurate" measure of what bus should be, and is best, for inner London driving situations.

I also bought the last Top Gear magazine (in Chinese) that I will ever buy in Beijing, if I don't come back and buy some more later :). It's the December edition. Sweet!

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Anyone ready for Round 7?

Bare with me, I was writing my post-Thanksgiving dinner blog, but was distracted. So, I'm picking up where I left off.

I just got back from the Thanksgiving Dinner sponsored by EAP, the "piece de resistance" of the EAP arranged dining events, and let me tell you, it was really all it was hyped up to be. The hotel itself was something to be 骄傲(arrogant) about. It was called Kempinski, one in a line of very, rich and extravagant German hotels. Inside the hotel, as expected, were marble floors, huge stair cases, rich expats, and rich foreigners. But what we were concerned most about was the restaurant: Kranzlers, noted to be one of few 5-star restaurants in Beijing.

The meal was delicious. I had about 6 plates, including 1 or 2 plates of desserts, which is a oddity in my diet. I ate so much that I felt like I was going to PUKE, I seriously stood up and walked around looking at the unyielding flow of food for about 20 minutes to make sure I didn't feel too sick or disgusting. Having this dinner, finally thanks to the efforts of the annoying guys who complain about EVERYTHING, we were able to have a nice dinner and give thanks for the things around me. I really felt nice at the dinner because it had really been a long time since I was in this type of fine dining with friends environment, though this time there was no family to help celebrate it. Something about the dinner just made me feel really happy and close to all the friends that I was with. Maybe it was because I was sharing a really great meal with a bunch of friends that I'd just made from my already 5+ months here in Beijing. Though Beijing has been really awesome and the learning experience in CHINA has been amazing, I think it's about time to go back.

Things I'm grateful for:
1) Friends celebrating Thanksgiving away from their homes in a nice restaurant.
2) The Peking duck served at the restaurant.
3) The desserts, ice cream and surprisingly the pecan pie.
4) Going home soon.
5) Experiencing the wonders of studying abroad, for real. Not a vacation.
6) Learning to really appreciate what I have at home after seeing China's poverty.

I think being in China has been a really good learning experience for me, not only in terms of studying abroad but as maturing as well. I know that sounds kind of corny but I guess being in China, during my 19-20 age shift was also important. I DO feel older and more wise, and I think that's a good thing. Seeing some of the things here and hearing about the bad economic status back at home has made me a lot more humble and look at things in a different perspective. All in all, I would say this trip AND the Thanksgiving dinner were perfect.







Now for some bad news:

To much disappointment, new reviews are back regarding the Blackberry Storm. Prior reports had shown evidence and reports that the new Storm was going to be a powerhouse for multimedia AND Blackberry famous interconnectivity. NOT! It turns out that it's very slow and sub par. Nick tested out the actual thing in the Verizon store a couple days ago and reported that, when trying to flip the phone to the horizontal state to view the options horizontally, it took up to 3 seconds for the phone to catch up and send the message to turn the screen. Not only that, but it turns out the OS is also glitchy and that it makes some messes along the way. They say it still is a good multimedia phone, but there still are a lot of things to be worked out before it can be great. Looks like I won't be looking forward to getting this phone anymore, as if I was anyway. HAHA.

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目前

I take what I said before about the weather back. Today was freezing. Upon being around 0 degrees Celsius, the weather today was also extremely windy, making it feel even colder than it actually was. Additionally, I was pelted countless times by the leaves that have now fallen off every tree in Beijing! Ok, maybe not every, but the wind was so hard today it knocked over rows of bikes that were parked outside the school and the apartment building.

I saw a BUGATTI bike today. Haha. It was funny, a good brand I bet. Not. I also forgot to mention one more thing about home that I am missing right now, fresh air and cigarette free restaurants. I just got back from a restaurant that, though the food is good, the waiters and waitresses are either too timid or too greedy, probably the latter, to ask people to stop smoking (even if there is a 禁止吸烟 sign, which means Smoking Prohibited). I so miss the fresh air...err the air quality in America.

On a more educational note, my teacher in "Reading and Writing" or 精读 class today learned how to use a Powerpoint Presentation. Ok, I'm exaggerating, but it seems that over the last two days she's caught onto the other resident BNU teachers and decided to be just as good as they are. Seeing as how she is not a teacher from BNU, but a "permanent sub", she doesn't have as much experience or knowledge about the school's system, the tests, and what to emphasize. I think that may have influenced my grade for the midterm, but it just means all the students in my class have to work a little harder. I hope her new teaching methods will be a lot more helpful to our class because what she was doing before, just lecturing and saying really complicated stories that we all didn't understand, yeah that wasn't really working.

As for a countdown, I'm still looking for a widget to put on my Blogger. It's changed since last time huh? Pretty neat. I'm going to try to mess with the HTML and maybe modify it to my liking and add more content. 26 days left.

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Playing Gears of War 2 in Piedmont

This is a webshot I took from the conversation I was having with my brother today. He was playing Gears of War 2 and wanted me to shout profanities at the other team through his microphone. I thought it was really funny so I took a webshot. I asked him if it worked and he told me to yell and then showed me the little icon that popped up whenever I spoke. HAHA. Soo funny. Man my bro is a kick, can't wait to get back and beat him up...though it might be the other way by the time I'm back.

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EAP Excursion to Cuan Di Xia

The weather is becoming consistent now. It's not fluctuating like it was a couple weeks ago. I've gotten accustomed to the cold now, but it seems like it's getting warmer and warmer, some people say it's because of global warming, who knows. All I know is that maybe this year, snow may come later, which is sad news for me because I wanted to see it snow in Beijing, or at least have time to go North to Haerbin and see the Winter Festival.

Anyway, Cuan Di Xia is in the countryside of Beijing. We took a 2 1/2 hour bus ride, which turned into a 3 ish hour ride back, to get there. Cuan Di Xia was an typical example of what we are studying in Chinese class now, Hutongr and SiHeYuanr. It's a typical old town in the old days of China, the 古代. Anyway, it was surprisingly fun and interesting to go around and old village where people lived during the time pre, during, and post Mao Zedong Cultural Revolution. You can even see how the Cultural Revolution affected the little town, the propaganda that still is pasted on the walls of the houses, aged with time. I took pictures of the aging propaganda and what it used to look like in traditional old Chinese housing establishments.

Here are some pictures from the event, there were SWINGS, but let me tell you now...they aren't the same as the swings we have back home...

So comfortable, see.

Some propaganda.

A typical hutong.

Cuan zi.

The city.

每个中国人都抽烟.

院子里.

In other news, the Storm release is on delay...turns out there were some problems with the Blackberry OS. The new OS was having problems so they installed the old one and tried to ship it out...不行. A lot of people complained and so now they are holding back on the order and people that preordered will barely make the holiday rush. They did a good article on the happening at Gizmodo.com which describes when you are expected to get your Storm if you ordered it already.

ALSO, Berkeley SCREWED ME. My Telebears Phase 2 is the latest freakin' date for Juniors. I SWEAR. They discriminate against the Piedmonters! HUH!? Is that it! Berkeley, make me get onto the waiting list for classes that I'm a major for and then give me the last freaking spot so you can jeopardize my chances of getting into the classes I need to graduate?! AND I JUST CHECKED AND ONE OF THE CLASSES FILLED UP. AHH! BERKELEY. NO!!!

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Winter in Beijing (An Indoors Perspective) and Thoughts on Home

Last night was the worst night of sleep I've ever had in Beijing, it's not because I had a test the next day or because I would be waking up within the next 5 hours to go on a "field trip" with our UC Program. Last night I was unable to sleep well because for the first time in Beijing, I realized how bad the ventilation and heating system is inside these dormitories/apartments.

Now I know why the locals are so fond of humidifiers...you need them to give you a good night's rest. I hadn't noticed it in the earlier days since they turned the system from A/C to heating, but last night I began to see how much of a difference the heating made in the indoor environment of my small room. The constant flow of dry heat dries out my skin and makes it pretty hard to breathe at night, I was forced to open the window and let in the freezing air from outside, which surprisingly let some moisture into the room and allowed me to sleep much more comfortably. The temperature outside was not too great of a problem compared to the uncomfortableness that was caused by the dry, recycled air.

During the day it's fine. I spend little time in the room because I'm either out eating lunch/dinner or in class, but when I come back to the room to study, I end up getting really dry skin and feeling really hot, when I know it shouldn't be this extreme. I can endure it during the day, because it's nothing a little lotion can't deal with, but at night when all you do is BREATHE, the dryness makes it so impossible. This is not even mentioning the awful feeling of being dried out everywhere and walking up to a sore throat in the morning to start your day. I WOULD by a humidifier, if I was to be staying in Beijing for longer than a month, but seeing as how yesterday marked the month countdown, it would be no use.

Aside from THAT problem, midterms went horribly. Well not horribly, just very unexpectedly not in my favor. I guess the testing system in China is a lot different than the states and it's something that I have to get used to in order to do well on the next test, but it's not a little OVER-preparation can't fix. But, I guess everything else is going well considering that this 6-month program is winding down and all the students soon get to go to their respective homes and get on with their lives. I don't know if I've ever written about it before but I talked to Tammy about how this program makes us feel in a "suspended state". It's not quite easy to explain, but it's simplest described as keeping us in a place that we're not moving or doing anything, that until we get home we can't get on with our normal lives. I feel like everything is at a standstill in China. I'm not saying that it's not fun finally living out the dream of studying abroad, it's just I finally realized that it's a lot harder to pick up and move away to another unfamiliar country that I had originally thought it was.

Though I can't admit to ever being homesick for America, I can say that I'm slowly getting sick of China. I think that this place is wonderful to experience and live the life of a student for the duration that I am here, or maybe a little less, but I don't know if I could ever move here, live and find a job permanently. That would be a decision that takes a long time to decide. I get so excited thinking about how short the time is I have left here and I think that means I want to go home. I want to see family, friends, live in Berkeley again and be able to DRIVE. I want to feel CLEAN again and feel more relaxed, something I feel like I can't really do all too well here. I will miss the daily cleaning of my room, which comes with rent that is 1/3 cheaper than the states. I will miss all the cheap, amazingly good food that I can get for $1-3 a day. I will miss all the cool friends that I made here and the ultimately the independence that I had here. But most of all, I think I will miss all the experiences and "excursions" that I went on here. There were a lot of feelings and things lost from my "US self" when I came to live half a year in China, but then I feel like I learned a lot of things about growing up and living on my own here in China. I think the financial crisis in the states only compounded my feelings of having to grow up and experiencing new things.

Here are a few things I look forward to when I get back:

1) My mom's cooking: perkedel, baked spaghetti, lasagna, her steak, the meatball soup she makes, Indonesian fried rice, temteman? (don't know how to spell), soto ayam, rawon
2) Nick's cooking: the risotto, the steak Nick makes (which isn't as "well done"), the barbeque, VEGETABLES, and the cereal that he always taunts me with over webcam
3) Driving a car, though I hope I haven't lost that skill
4) Playing my guitar
5) Playing around on my Blackberry
6) Sleeping in MY BED, my COMFORTABLE BED
7) Going to a nice gym
8) Getting to that gym by BIKE
9) I would say my motorcycle, but I'm afraid I've given that up for my own health (haha)
10) Wearing clothes that are nicer than t-shirts
11) Machine drying my clothes
12) Going to Barney's Burgers, Zachary's Pizza, Sushi, without being afraid of the quality of food
13) Seeing friends back in Berkeley
14) Hopefully going snowboarding
15) Working, because no matter how boring or grown-up it sounds, it's something that I really missed.

I've created quite a list for what I'm going to do when I get back, but I guess on the top of that list is starting to apply to get my real estate license. I made a promise to my mom to get it, and now it's something that is really exciting me. Also, I got a message from Facebook that the STORM IS OUT IN THE STATES! WOO!


I can't wait to get back home.

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Update on the Blackberry Storm! and Random News from the States

That's a long title for this post, but there was an article that I wanted to share that my brother told me about today. It was the story about a 7th grader, now 7'3'' and still growing, while it may seem amazing to think that someone could be this tall at such a young age, rivaling the heights of Shaq and Yao Ming, he also has a lot of problems that he is forced to face because of some chromosomal abnormality. Take a look at the article I found:

http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/localnews/2008194720_brenden22m.html

In other, more happy news, the Blackberry Storm is finally making its way to production and sales in the United States, I can't wait until it does. But, I guess I can wait until the first few reviews come out before I go ahead and even consider buying it.

http://siliconrepublic.com/news/article/11685/comms/storm-price-plans-revealed

I guess that's it.

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Another Day in the Beijing Winter

We all went to Ya Xiu again to buy some winter clothes, among the things that were purchased yesterday was a fake Puma jacket, that I got for 180 kuai, I think it's not a bad price considering the quality and the material, even though it is fake. But considering they started at 680 and then were pissed off when they finally sold it at 180, I think I at least got a decent price, which I guess you would never know with them. There is ALWAYS a set price that no store will go under, which is useful since all the little clothing stores in the market sell the same stuff. So that's why if someone asks you how much you've bought something for and you tell them a really low price, unless it's above or at that "lowest price possible", they will say it was impossible and you are lying...which you are. In the end, if you leave the sales person pissed off and angry with you, chances are you've done a good job.

And back to the reason of the post. This is why I bought the jacket:


We also, on that day, went to San Li Tun, looked at Coldstones with the prospects of buying a 50 kuai scoop and then to the Apple store where we messed around with the NEW Macbook and tried to get Alex's iPod fixed to no avail.

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Beijing Weather

This is what the weather is like this week, during midterms week. I'll give you two sources just to show you that it's not just a messed up reading. And no, it doesn't EVER get this cold in the Bay Area.

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E-Mail Addresses

I've had the same e-mail address for the majority of my online life until maybe about 6 months ago. Seeing as how I was coming to China, where the internet has proved itself to be unreliable and very slow, I needed an e-mail supporter that was simple and therefore loaded fast. I've stuck to Hotmail most of my life, but until recently I was realizing how many problems they have, especially with eating my memory. Trying to load Hotmail in China takes about 10 minutes, not to mention that every 6 months they change the template and headlines, telling me that the new service is better and faster....I'm still unamazed. I still wait the day where Hotmail will maybe catch on to the simplicity of Gmail and just make it as simple and Java/memory hogging free as possible. I think though, Hotmail is going in the direction of AOL Mail or something else, but by far the most user-friendly, fast, free e-mail service is Gmail, in my honest opinion.

I'm only saying this because just now I tried to log onto my Hotmail account, discovering that they had another new template that they promised was faster, but this time, I couldn't even access the "new message" function, I don't think they've kept their word in making it faster. But I do have to admit, it does look a lot more, "beta"-y? Well, it looks new.

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在北京的情况

Everyday in Beijing feels so gloomy now. Because we're officially in winter, at least in Beijing, the nights come at around 4:45 pm and it's already starting to get dark while I end class, if I have afternoon classes. It's pretty sad considering the fact that, IF I do have afternoon classes, chances are I've slept in until lunch time, whereupon afterward I immediately go to class. So, what this means is I wake up, go to a quick lunch, go to class and while class is still in session, the sun begins to set. I guess it's not so bad since the short days are also experienced in the US as well, but to top things off, my room is FREEZING all the time, probably because the building was built with poor circulation or something, it's China, who knows?

But especially right now, I'm sitting in front of my window, the coldest part of my room, with the window open. I'm only doing this because today they sprayed their third round of cockroach killing spray (the fumes are suffocating), not bad considering the first month they didn't try a single thing to fix the roach infestation problem. I think I may be to credit for this monthly spraying, I think after all the complaints and threatening to take it to the head of the Study Abroad Student Housing, they got the point and are making attempts to appease this angry American. HAHA.

On that note, let me describe how much I think I've changed since coming to China and being here for about 4 1/2 - 5 months. Now, whenever I hear English or see white people (they can be American OR European), I can't help but stare. I know it's bad, and I don't do it for very long, but I look at them as I feel like the Chinese looked at me when I had just arrived to China, fluently speaking English (though I feel like they still give me "the glare"). I've turned into one of them. Oh well, I guess that's what being in a country that's not your home will do to you.

With midterms coming up this week, I really shouldn't be blogging, but I also really wanted to show you guys a glimpse of what light, after-work traffic looks like on the "small" street outside my window. This street is hardly small, but in China they have classifiers of street widths: 路, which is a road, 街, which is a street, and 大街, which is an avenue. I guess there is also a 胡同，which they define to the meters across, I forget how wide. But, this street would be considered a 街. Something I would definitely consider much larger if it were in tiny Piedmont.

I'll give you two views:

The left view.

The right view.

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The Chinese and Election Day

The Chinese people, from what I heard on the Chinese news the other day, don't really care for the election. One of the reporters from CCTV went around Beijing, in particular, to ask people about what their insights were on the election and the win for Barack Obama. They didn't say much, aside from the fact that they didn't really care and that they don't really have an opinion. They also said, on occasion, how they didn't think that it had anything to do with them and it didn't effect them at all. Hmm...riiight...Some more involved Chinese people said they'd like to see what happens with President Obama and see what kind of things he can do with China and maybe "treat China better." This only makes me think of the policies that the Bush Administration had with the Chinese, maybe they weren't too good. The program didn't only represent that side of Chinese indifference to the election of the US President, but it also did a segment on the people from Kenya, calling Obama the "Son of Africa," expecting him to do some kind of intervention for the impoverished nations in Africa to bring them out of the current underdeveloped situation they are in...good luck. But aside from the known Chinese people indifference, there was a lot of celebration and gatherings from expats. A lot of people in China right now are actually Obama supporters, not a single McCain supporter, though I know he isn't the most popular in the US either. It was just kind of sad to hear that the Chinese didn't really care what the outcome was, in China either. It was something that one of the teachers in our class said, it's too bad that in a country full of overflowing capitalist potential that is demonstrated in the Chinese production of goods used around the world, one thing that they don't really work on is to have a voice of their own.

Either way, the Election 2008 hype died down shortly after the results came out and the speech, people don't really talk about it much now. Only the Koreans in my class talk about it with me because I'm the only American and Obama's name is funny in Chinese: Ba-La-Ke -- Ao-Ba-Ma: or 巴拉克 奥巴马.

I'm not going to lay in my opinions on Barack Obama, seeing as how a lot of people have their different views on whether he should or should not be. But all I will say is I hope he can prove to be as good a candidate as he's advertised and bring the US back to the status of stability and fix our financial crisis. I WANT A JOB WHEN I GET OUT OF COLLEGE! Either than that, it's actually quite cool to see how far America has come in the aspect that an African-American man can now become president by popular vote, something that was seen as ludacris not that long ago in the Civil War Era. Make us proud.

In other news, we are about to have our first set of midterms here at BeiShiDa. It's quite scary, considering all the overachieving Koreans are working much harder than they were when there wasn't a midterm next week, which was already A LOT. They make me nervous, I'm even starting to study a week early, something that was not even heard of from me when I was in the US at Berkeley, maybe these good habits will transfer upon returing back to the states. But regardless how much I want to study right now, I'm distracted by new things like games on www.addictinggames.com and nintendo8.com. I'm have nostalgia for retro Nintendo games. I swear it's that stupid electronic dictionary and the pre-installed Nintendo games.

The weather is also getting ridiculously cold, I'm confident in telling you guys that the temperature outside my room right now is about 4 degrees and the sun goes down at 5 pm. Even MY ROOM feels like its 13 degrees. I like how I do my explanations in metric now, I guess China really has changed my perception of the world after all. Haha. It feels like there is less pollution in the air because it's so crisp and cold, but it's just a facade that covers up the fact that the pollution and smog level is about the same as it was during the humid, sticky summer. It's maybe even worse in the winter, the small stores bust out the coal for their warmth, their energy consumption and dependency on coal turns to aobut 60%+ during the summer. I know... The weather also makes me really lazy and want to sleep all the time because I don't get very much sunlight, even during the day because of overcast. I'm so glad that I don't live on the East Coast in the states, then I'd really have this all over again, and ever year. 不行. It's also hard to imagine how I only have about 45 days left in China and the Olympics were soo long ago, about 3 months ago, to this very day. Wow. I better start wrapping things up, getting in the last friends so I can always mooch a stay at their houses around the world. Haha. Not kidding.

I got an invitation with Tammy the other day for an interview with a guy that was prior EAP class of 2005, he is friends with Tammy's sister and talked to us about a position with the US-China Forum/Symposium on Green Energy/Technology. That's not the official name but it's cool that we now might have a chance to participate in something that originated in the Bay Area, had a meeting in SF and now is in Beijing, China where we are and where Dianne Feinstein will be in a couple weeks. For those of you interested in what Tammy and I will be volunteering for, check this website out: www.uschinagreenenergycouncil.org. It'll be interesting to get involved in the states as well, knowing how Berkeley is such a big advocate for Green Technology and transformation to self-sustainance.

So I guess the countdown to 回国, going back home, begins.

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Back From Xi'An and Feeling the End of China's Honeymoon Period

It's strange. Everyday here in Beijing, I struggle to think of a Chinese food area, local or far, cheap or expensive that I would like to go to. Everyday, before we find ourselves walking to the same place for dinner, which alternates between three places that are nearby the school, I think about how bored I am with Chinese food and the Chinese options here. Strangely enough, I think I would, just about now, prefer to eat Chinese food made in America, namely "American" Chinese food. For example, I would die just about now for food at Shen Hua on College Ave. or some place else in the Bay Area. Maybe its because I crave creature comforts of my home town and the cleanliness standards that I'm looking for that can only be had in America, the Bay Area. And this, is what I mean by exiting China's Honeymoon Phase, a phase in which everything you see is exciting and every food you see smells good and tastes so good because it's been made in the motherland. In actuality, it's not like this anymore and it doesn't taste THAT much better than America. Ok, maybe I'm exaggerating and maybe its because I've been going to the small dirty joints where all the local people go and eat as a group, but aren't these small hole-in-the-wall places supposed to taste the best and represent what Chinese food means most? Cheap and good eats? I have to admit, even after that rant that the Chinese food here is good and it is cheap, but I might just be saying this for the fact that there is little for alternatives and not very much variety in the selection. While one day I could be eating jiao zi (dumplings), the other day I can eat fried rice, etc. But I feel like even if I alternate or exchange what I eat between days, I still feel like I'm eating the same things everyday. The occasional escape to Western food does help sometimes, but the price and the extreme greasiness or feeling of eating way too much or eating some thing that is bad for you (french fries, sandwhiches, or pizza) makes me miss the sandwiches at Genova or at A.G. Ferrari or at the GBC, where you feel like even the cold sandwiches are good, and the most important, you feel clean.

I hate having to say this about China, but things are so dirty. Tammy just asked me the other day, "How do you feel knowing that you've stepped on just about enough pee on your entire trip to flood your street back home with urine?". Yeah, it's that bad, but this is also taking into consideration the bathrooms, which has standards of cleanliness that match that of outhouses back in the day, even then I think those may have been cleaned more often. I've been to nice establishments in China as well that fail to meet cleanliness standards of just smelling neutral. Every bathroom has to smell like urine here, THAT is the standard. Well, unless of course it's a really expensive place that, with the intention of catering to Western people specifically, make the bathroom and restaurant cleanliness by those standards.

Even right now, as I go to open my front door for the fuwuyuan, she tells me people are doing stuff for the phone line and they come into my room with their shoes still on and walk around the floor and move things and step on my shoes to do their job, all the while giggling and laughing, saying things that they don't think I understand. Anyway, it's just hard to deal with, I'm thinking that it's more the blue collar employees that act and work in this fashion, nothing you really see from people that are white collar employees.

Anyway, Xi'An was pretty tight, but the entire trip, we were thinking or wondering about whether or not the Terracotta Warriors were actually real...My friend, when going there before us, told me that it wasn't real and the real ones were preserved somewhere else, China just made this and put fake ones as a means to establish a place for tourists to make money, without having to risk damaging the real thing. Not only that, but the presentation of some of the uncovered soldiers seemed a little too played out or dressed up, leading me to think that it was maybe staged for tourist appreciation of some sorts, "Wow, it's so preserved they didn't even dig up some of the buried ones!". Maybe its just my cynicism or my feeling that it couldn't be like that, but if they were really real, then why does China not try to uncover the hundreds of thousands that are said to exist. Why do they build a hangar around one of the areas, not fearing that there might be some under the area they built. Maybe they had a tool that could show where they were underground, but then why do they not just continue to uncover the rest of them, they were, after all, discovered in the 1970s, how could they not have found all of them by now!? Ah HAH! I believe the actual soldiers are real, but the fact that they display them as such and make no visible attempts to uncover the rest plagues me. They say these soldiers are the "8th Wonder of the World", though I feel like China's Great Wall, which isn't even ranked in the 7, should be considered #8 (a good number for China at that). However, thinking about the Wonders really makes me want to go see the rest, if something as magnificent and vast as the wall wouldn't make the cut.

Here are the old as compiled by Wikipedia:

• Great Pyramid of Giza
• Hanging Gardens of Babylon
• Statue of Zeus at Olympia
• Temple of Artemis at Ephesus
• Mausoleum of Maussollos at Halicarnassus
• Colossus of Rhodes
• Lighthouse of Alexandria

And here are the "NEW", which I found while looking for the old (compiled by this site:http://www.new7wonders.com/):

The Pyramid at Chichén Itzá (before 800 A.D.) Yucatan Peninsula, Mexico	MEXICO
Christ Redeemer (1931) Rio de Janeiro, Brazil	BRAZIL
The Roman Colosseum (70 - 82 A.D.) Rome, Italy	ITALY
The Great Wall of China (220 B.C and 1368 - 1644 A.D.) China	CHINA
Machu Picchu (1460-1470), Peru	PERU
Petra (9 B.C. - 40 A.D.), Jordan	JORDAN
The Taj Mahal (1630 A.D.) Agra, India	INDIA

Xi'An was awesome, the food was bleh, but the group of all people from summer condensed into the 100 left was fun. The train rides were fun, the one over being a cool 4 person soft sleeper and the one back as a whole cabin full of EAPers in the same area. It was fun because we bonded with a lot of people we didn't really know during the summer and it was all through forced vacation and a good ole introduction of Mafia. HAHA. It was fun, but the highlight of my trip was going to the City Wall, which Xi'An is enclosed in and riding bikes on wall (which was 12-15 meters across on all parts of the wall, a gigantic square). I had fun with the bikes and the weather was cool (around 15 Celsius), we also took a lot of cool jumping pictures and "historical" pictures as well.

Pictures WEE!:

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