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.