What a Week

Wednesday, February, 12^th, 2014

This was travel day. We traveled 8 hours by training to Nanjing. Then we took an hour bus ride to Zhenjiang. Then we took a 45 minute car ride to Yangzhong. It was a long day. We played cards on the train. Spencer, Brad, Charlene, Sierra, and I played Skip Bo I ‘m not good at playing that game. Many of us played Wits and Wagers I really enjoyed being on Spencer’s team. I didn’t think it was as fun playing by myself. I ate a lot of crackers. I wasn’t smart planning food to bring on the train this time.  This picture was of a card game going on in my car. The bottoms were converted into seats and the tops were for our luggage. This was a really nice train. It even had western toilets on it. I totally walked in on an old man because he didn’t lock his door. Great….

Our schools met us in Zhenjiang. We were rushed away from each other so fast we didn’t have time to tell anyone goodbye. Glory (my liaison) and her boyfriend picked me up from the school that we were dropped off at. There was a lot of good conversation on the ride back. She told me that my school was a five hour walk instead of five minutes. I asked what and she caught her mistake and couldn’t stop laughing. She’s 24 and one of the best liaison of the group!!! I love her!

I was asking about her boyfriend’s job and she joked saying he was her driver. She is actually studying to get her license. They have four tests and she’s on the last test. I taught her the word chauffer. I told her it was a fancy word for taxi driver that it’s a driver for rich people. She started calling him that. She thought it was really funny.

Later I texted her perfect and she used it in a conversation we had after and she told me she learned that word from me.

There is a huge fish. If you google Yangzhong, China you will see the balloon fish. I guess it’s a famous food here. This is Glory’s hometown but she says she won’t eat it because if you scratch your neck to much you will get smallpox. That was a new one for me…

Glory had to go to her apartment to get my phone and key. I tried talking to her boyfriend while we waited he said his English was poor and handed me a snickers to eat so I’d stop talking to him. It made me laugh.

We had noodles for dinner. Then her boyfriend picked up my 60-70 pound suitcase and ran up four flights of stairs. I was impressed. I was exhausted but my place was freezing so I didn’t actually sleep a ton.

Thursday, February 13^th, 2014

On the way to the store there is a place that sells flattened pig heads. I’ll have to get a picture. We got cleaning stuff and food. Charlene bought another heater and we decided to sleep in the same room to share body heat. (It worked quite well actually). I called my dad. Kaylee has been letting Addys and I use her computer. She’s so nice!

Friday, February 14, 2014

The other girls have been doing a lot with their liaisons. I haven’t done anything except for that first night. Oh my cord made a pop and a huge flash of light and killed the entire floors power. I blew a fuse. It destroyed my cord. The wires were hanging out (this was yesterday). I was worried because Kaylee paid 600Y or about 100 dollars for a new cord. I don’t have that kind of money on me. I texted Glory and she took me to get a new one. Luckily half of my cord still worked. I got a Chinese plug in though so I’ll have to buy another one in America. It works in the outlets here though. It was 15Y or a little over 2 dollars! I was so relieved!! =) I’m thinking I might go sleep in the other room. It’s not bad if I hold still in here but I’ve been alone almost all night so I just want to hang out. There room is way warm.’

Oh I met an English teacher named Kelly. She was so kind to show me a few restaurants since I have not eaten a real meal since Wednesday night. Now I know where to get food =) Oh she also showed me where we can take our trash. On the way to dinner I saw a paining classroom. Each student had an easel. I want to go see it when I have time and the lights are on. It was cool!