Workin' girl takes a break

This weekend was fairly uneventful, mostly because of some terrible timing and miscommunication. Friday night I went out with "the guys" from work--Dan and Brian, plus Stephen, John, Peng Li, and a couple of other men, who are all permanent employees. I was the only girl, but I had a pretty good time; we went down to the outdoor barbecue and bar area where I ate with Tim last week.


Later, Dan, Annie and I went out to a bar on the other side of town. It was called George's, and Dan learned from his amazing search skills that the bar was just opening that night, and they were serving free drinks. I had a few delicious (and small, since they were free) girlie drinks, and I even had a "glass" of Johnny Walker Red Label whiskey that was served "the right way" with a ball of ice. Overall, not too shabby, and the bar itself was definitely classy.

We were out pretty late, though, so we slept in the next day. I was assigned to see a couple of films across town at 7:00 p.m., which required me to leave before 6, so our plans to go to Summer Palace were ruined because we slept late, but we decided to go the next day instead. I spent Saturday reading until I got a headache, and then I took a nap until it was time to leave for the theatre.


The films were far less engaging than the last one I saw, but they weren't bad. They were both documentaries, one about children who had been abandoned and the other about a farmer and his wife who are the last people living in their village that has turned from a lake into a desert. I wrote a story today that should be up somewhere on china.org.cn tomorrow.

As a side note, I discovered that ramen in China is so much better than ramen in the U.S., and at 2 Yuan (30 cents) it's fairly similarly priced. It's cheaper and yummier than most things I've had, and I actually finish the whole bowl of food. Of course, I'll still be eating out, but it was a nice find.


Sunday I woke up early because I had to let in the guy who came to fix the hot water heater. We had to take freezing showers for three days, but it's all better now. The guy raked out a pile of rust-and-clay-like muck about 15 inches wide and 6 inches high. Gross.

Then I went to the gym because half my roommates were still asleep, and I went back and took a shower. When I got out, Dan said Brian was going to meet us at the apartment 12:45 and we'd leave for Summer Palace. We waited for him until 1:30, and then went up to the office to look for him. There was no sign of him, and we guessed that he went on without us. We learned later that he meant to leave from the office, and he just went without us when we didn't show up.

By this time it was 2, and since Summer Palace closes at 5 we were worried it was too late, so Dan and I went to a park that's about a 30 minute's walk from our apartment. It was really nice; it was quiet and peaceful, even though it's right in the middle of one of the most populous cities in the world. There was a huge lake, and beautiful willows and lilies, and lots of couples and families. Dan and I took books and blankets and sat in the grass for the afternoon relaxing.

Here are some photos I took while I was there. The second one really shows how close we are to everything.

After the park, we were starving, so on the way home we stopped at this restaurant. I think it was called Xao, but the font was weird so I'm not sure. It was a noodle restaurant, and apparently fast food. We walked in, and were it not for the big photos of noodle bowls I might have thought we walked into a McDonald's. I ordered something that looked like noodles and green beans, and Dan got something that looked like hot peppers and rice. As it turned out, mine was really spicy and his was not, so we swapped. It wasn't bad, but I don't think I'd really want to go back.

That was about it for Sunday; the rest of the evening was spent with laundry, reading, and sleeping.

Today was pretty busy at work today. I worked on my story, which took quite a bit more research than I expected, because I thought that the papers I got at the film would be helpful (but since they were in Chinese I had no idea). It turned out that they were not about the films I saw, so I had to have my new friend and deskmate Fiona help me look online for the films' background information, which was scarce to begin with since some were made by students.

Dr. Charlie Tuggle, a professor from UNC who teaches video production among other things, arrived to the office today. He will be here for three weeks lecturing to some of the staff, and Dan and I sat in on his "class." It was interesting and informative, but I have had the same lecture before when he visited one of my classes this spring. He'll be lecturing over the next few weeks, so hopefully I can continue to attend and pick up some things about video, since that's one of the two things I wish I could have learned more about in the J-school.

I also edited a "story" today that goes on the "Learn Chinese" section of the website. It was awkward, because if you're learning Chinese, I think it's best to learn the literal translations, but they wanted us to change the English to be more how we would actually say it.

After work I had swim practice. The competition is Wednesday, and I plan to fail miserably. I couldn't even make it two lengths of the pool today, and they expect us to do four. Oh well. After that I went to the grocery store and bought a pack of chrysanthemum tea. I'm having a glass now, and it's delicious.

Despite the swimming, I feel like I had a pretty good day.