Hope all is well with you since i last posted. Yet again i sit by my balcony stealing wireless internet and being blasted by my new awesome fan. Its pretty sunny and blazing hot...which may i add is quite perfect for my new found desert friends. I purchased three cactus plants and they now reside on my window sill. They are cute... (Lauren would be so proud)
First things first, if anyone decides to call me. This is my phone number here: 13416100829. If you would like to call me, remember that to make any international calls, you must dial 011 and the country code for China is 86. Therefore to call me you should do the following:
011 + 86 + 13416100829
Don't worry about taking up my minutes because (lucky for me) I get free incoming calls! Which means that I can talk to you as long as your calling card holds out! If you want to know what time it is here this is what you do: add 3 hours to the time at home and make it the opposite. Example, if it is 3:00 pm in Cali, it will be 6:00 am (of the following day) my time.
So, i made my title of this post quite proud in the past two days. I have been supporting the economy here quite well and aspire to keep doing it for this upcoming year. Our new friends Alex and Gertie have been showing us around and getting us situated to the way of life.
Yesterday morning Gertie took us to Guangzhou University which is about a 15 minute walk away. There we ate some fried duck over rice and it was delicious. Afterwards we went and purchased phones and sim cards. The phones here are prepaid and with minutes it came to about 60 dollars (NOT BAD AT ALL). After that we went to a huge Wal Mart type store that is underground and resembles a bomb shelter. It was very large and we were able t pretty much buy everything we needed there. Gertie was quite embarrassed with my shenanigans and tended to walk ahead of me...apparently carrying a broom on your backpack is not fashionable here. We headed back to our rooms and rested for a while before our next adventure.
Mike, Maria, and Spencer are the former students from CSULB to study at GAFA, they were friends with Alex. Alex has been kind enough to take us under his wing and pass on to us some of the past exchange student's belongings. They left us a bike, tea sets, and a bug zapper. The bike was a perfect fit for Jessica, but what about me!? Alex took us to the painting department and the village. The art department is very impressive with many talented representatinal painters. It is a bit intimidating, but a higher caliber will make me work harder. The village is a small community that has art shops and restaurants. We ate there again. Beef, vegetables, and rice...and it was terrific again. Alex was having his bike worked on so i went bike shopping and found a beauty. It was 235 Yuan with a basket installed. That comes to about 35 dollars. This spray painted second hand beauty stands tallest around all other bikes on campus. They had to raise my handle bars and seat to the highest point. We stopped at some art shops and i picked up a Lucian Freud book. We then biked back in a hurry to meet up with Gertie again.
Gertie took us to the pool that is about 200 feet from our dorms. I have a feeling that Jessica and i are going to be visiting it often...and many small Asian people will scurry in fear of my hairiness. Again she took us for a walk and we saw a small temple as well the rest of the village. It is full of fruit stands and restaurants. I picked up some cactus plants there and then we had dinner. Pepper chicken over rice. Spicy and amazing again.
So today we returned back to the store and picked up some last things. I am almost completely settled into my room and only need some art supplies. once my room is all organized i shall load some photos.
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