Lady White and the Mid Autumn Festival

So in case you haven't noticed. I am a horrible blogger. I didn't mean to write what I wrote about two days ago. I meant to share a folktale that takes place in Hangzhou, specifically the West Lake. But I did I. No. Also, the Mid-Autumnal Festival was this past weekend. Did I even so much as mention that? No.

So sorry about failing.

Alright. So. The story from West Lake. Just to let you know, it's Hangzhou's equivalent to Romeo and Juliet (which we all know just ended so well), and the story is set during the Song Dynasty, when Hangzhou was the capitol of China. Also, if you really want to know, Leifeng Pagoda is actually the pagoda me and my friends went to two weekends ago.



I thought about rewriting it myself, but I actually just found a pretty decent retelling of the story. In some versions Xu (the man known as Blue) and Bai (Lady White) met when Xu was just a boy, and he had actually saved her life. But apparently that was added on or something. So his retelling of it is fairly accurate. So please go to this site to read about "The Legend of the White Snake".

Now. Mid-Autumn Festival, or rather, Mooncake Festival.

For those of you who don't know, tt's sort of like the Chinese equivalent to our Thanksgiving holiday. The festival is always held on the 15th day of the 8th month of the lunar calendar, so sometime in September or early October.

It's meant to celebrate the end of the fall harvest, and the main food everyone eats are mooncakes.


They're actually really good. Well, okay to be perfectly honest there was this one kind that made me want to gag. I think it was the worst thing I've ever tasted. And I've tasted a lot of weird things. But I had one that looks like the mooncake to the far right in the picture above, and I think it was my favorite. It had an egg in it or something. Sometimes they fill mooncakes with meat, or bean paste (everything is bean paste here. Don't get something just cause you think it looks like chocolate. Twelve times out of ten it will be bean paste, not chocolate. It's never chocolate). But like I said, they're pretty good. Just avoid the ones that have an especially dark color.

There's also a legend that's associated with the Moon Festival. So I'll tell it to you. Or write it to you. Cause my computer can't transform me into a hologram.

Chang'e and Houyi the Archer
Chang'e and her husband, Houyi, were immortals that lived in heaven. One day, the ten sons of the Jade Emperor had transformed themselves into ten suns, scorching the earth. Because his sons would not stop even after he ordered them to, the Jade Emperor asked Houyi for help. With bow and arrow in hand, Houyi shot down the nine sons, sparing only one son to provide light to earth. The Jade Emperor, displeased with Houyi's violent solution to stopping his sons, banished Houyi and Chang'e to earth, to live out their days as mortals.


Having lost her immortality, Chang'e became extremely miserable. Houyi, concerned for his wife and wanting to see her smile again, began on a long and perilous quest to find the pill of immortality so the two of them could once again be immortals in the celestial plane. He finally met the Queen Mother of the West who agreed to give him the pill, and told him each person would only need half the pill to be fully immortal.


Bringing the pill home, he stored it in a case and told Chang'e not to open it. He then left home for a little bit. Chang'e, her curiosity getting the better of her, opened the case and found the pill just as she heard Houyi return home. Afraid that Houyi would catch her discovering the pill, she accidentally swallowed the entire thing. Because she swallowed all of it instead of only half of it, she began to float into the sky, eventually landing on the moon, where she would live for the rest of her days as the Goddess of the Moon.


So yea. That's what I've been meaning to write/tell you about. Hope you appreciate it.

In other news, everyone here smokes between classes, so merely leaving the building during the 30 minute break is probably taking minutes if not years off my life. Oh you Europeans, smoking. Sure, you may think you look cool now, but just wait until they have to cut a hole in your throat and you lose you ability to speak on your own and have to sound like a robot. I'm sure that will attract all the ladies. Or men. Depending on who you are.

That reminds me. Here, the bathrooms don't have a security wall that's usually in boys bathrooms. So yes, I did see a guy, his back turned, using a urinal. It was great. Awesome even. Superb.

Also they told us if we're late 40 minutes, it's the equivalent to missing 2 classes. So why come into class at all? Some kid today came in late, and that's all I could think about.

In other news someone called me a foreigner in Chinese, "laowai". But that's all they said when I passed. Thank you old Chinese dudeman. If I knew more Chinese I would have said yes, but I don't even know that. The Chinese language is very different from English. A lot simpler actually. They don't have male/female/nuetral forms of words or articles. Thank God. I hated that in German and Latin. Ugh. Dear Lord. The Latin. Endings in Latin are horrible, even if it's not spoken. It's horrible. HORRIBLE.

So have fun with your life and stuffs people. Until the next time I decide to actually tell you something about China.

Chinese classes went great

So I'm currently on season 5 of Doctor Who. I do like Matt Smith, but I for realz really miss David Tennant. I think he was by far the best Doctor. Eccleston just... seemed lame. I don't know. He didn't have what Tennant had.



I would keep going on and on, but the majority of people who read this probably don't watch Doctor Who, so everything I would say would just go over your head. I might as well just be talking to myself. Or a big stupid monkey.

In other news, my classes started yesterday. I wish I could say it was wonderful, and that I comprehended the Chinese language right away and am now fluent. However, if you live in reality and would like an accurate portrayal of what I felt like by my third class yesterday, then here you go.



You see, in our first class (listening) we had to get up in front and introduce ourselves, which really wasn't all that bad. Sort of weird, but not horrible. We had 10 minutes to kill, so our teacher taught us the tones. Then by the second class (grammar) we went over some words and stuff, and in the last 20 minutes we went over tones. Then by the THIRD class (speaking) we spent the ENTIRE hour and thirty minutes reviewing the four tones. It was worse then being stuck on a purgatory island. It was dreadful. I envisioned running from the room screaming. I kept moving around in my chair. You looked at the time, and realized you had only an hour left when it felt like forever had already passed you by. I was hoping the Daleks would suddenly decide to invade earth. Cyber men. Giant babies. Anything.

However, nothing of the sort happened. I took a three hour nap afterwards. Then I found out I had an article due tomorrow for That's Zhejiang. I'm very happy I knew about this well in advance.

In other news, I'm getting sick of people staring at me. I like to wear my sun glasses, just because it gives me an excuse to stare back. Maybe some of you think it's wonderful that people would stare at you so much, and that Chinese people seem to think Westerners are so beautiful while they themselves are not. But when you think about it, it's almost racist. Placing people of white color on such a high pedestal. I hate it actually. There's a lot of white people in advertisements, and at first it's comforting to see white people, even if it is in advertisements, but then I realize I'm in China, and for them to see that, it's the equivalent of us having to look at skinny models who never eat everyday in our advertisements.

Sometimes I wish I wasn't white. But that is probably also racist. I wish there wasn't a minority. I wish everyone was on equal terms. I wish people would stop staring at me cause I'm white.

And by stare, I don't mean casually glance. I meant you're just walking down the street, and the person ten yards in front of you stares. And they don't STOP staring at you until they've walked a good couple of feet past you. 

Anycrap, I need to practice writing some Chinese characters for class, so I should probably go. Also, I realized I've been here almost three weeks. I'm supposed to be keeping a journal for my intercultural studies advisor and write a journal entry every four days. So I should have at least written five entries.

How many have I written you ask?

Well it's the equivalent to the number of great works of literature Stephenie Meyer has written.

By that I mean NONE.

I would write more, but I can't focus. Also my hands can't seem to type properly today, and I sort of want to throw my keyboard into the fires of Mount Doom every other word.

So I'll end with this video that combines two loves of mine. And you thought I wasn't going to mention Muse at all, didn't you? ALSO APPARENTLY THERE IS A DOCTOR WHO EPISODE WHERE A MUSE SONG PLAYS. JUST THOUGHT I WOULD MENTION THAT.

ME. EXCITED. NEVER.

But this song is pretty good, except I don't like the intro part with Uprising when the alien tune from Uprising is playing at the same time the alien tune from the Doctor Who theme is playing. It should be one or the other. Besides that it's pretty alright.

Procrastination Initiated

Guess what I'm doing?

Procrastinating.

And I'm quite good at it.

Like I just spent about 30 minutes trying to find a decent Doctor Who quote to put in my facebook status.

Time well spent.

Ok, to be honest, I should be writing an article for my internship at That's Zhejiang. These two British guys (one's in charge of the paper version, and one's in charge of the magazine version) are sort of our bosses I guess? Anyways, Taylor and I both thought our first day would just involve us editing other people's articles. Then we found out, since we're "newbies" to Hangzhou, they want our first impressions of the city. Or an outsider's view. Fresh stuff.

So long story short, I've got 154 words out of the 300 word minimum.

I know, I'm halfway there, whoaaaa...


I'll tell you what I wrote about if it gets published. Don't worry, I'm not feeling any pressure. Especially since there's only like what, 6 million people who live in Hangzhou and could potentially be reading this?

Psh. Whatevs dudeman.

In other news, I bought three books at this massive bookstore called Booku for 98 Yuan, so 16 dollars? I think? Yea? I realized I have like nothing to read. So I figured a 1000 page volume one of Sherlock Holmes stories would help solve this dilemma.

In other news I just finished episode 12 in season four of Doctor Who. I might be borderline obsessed, mostly because I've been watching it so much, and also because the past few episodes have been SO GOOD. I think Catherine Tate (or Donna Noble as she's known in the show) is probably my favorite companion thus far. Martha just... I dunno. Annoyed me somehow. And Rose was pretty cool, but I think I only liked her in the most recent of episodes she appeared in. I must say I'm slightly jealous of her and her life. In the show.

Spoilers? Don't worry.

Did I even mention anything about China?

Well I have a phone. We went to a museum today. I'm currently sitting in the apartment alone, and it's midnight. And I should really finish this article. I've probably written more than 300 characters already. Blimey.

Oh and the moon festivals in like four days, so I should have something exciting to report. Did I mention we're going to a theme park? We were all excited, cause we're going for free cause this other newspaper whose name has escaped me that writes a lot about international shenanigans is taking westerners out on the 11, because well it's the tenth anniversary of 9/11. Although none of us are sure if theme park means rides, or the opposite of rides. I tried looking it up on google, but I kept getting hotels. And I'm pretty sure we're not going to a hotel.

Alright, I'm gonna stop procrastinating and looking up Muse videos on youtube and funny moments of various shows I love.



Alright. New tidbits.
-You can't flush your toilet paper, but must throw it away.
-Exit signs here are green.
-I ate my dinner in a dark alleyway. I'm pretty sure it was because I was white. Also, the restaurant (which we've called Pacman for the red Pacman sign out front) was crowded.
-All the coffee here... is instant D:

So have fun with your life and stuffs. Until next time. When I write something worthwhile.

The Furious Eight

Sorry. I just really like Simon's Cat, and he recently brought out a new video, so I felt inclined to share it.

You know what I love even more than that though?



Alright, I feel like maybe I should introduce the people I will be studying abroad with. Or rather, am studying abroad with. At least, in the way I imagine them. If I was artistic I would draw cartoon versions of them, complete with the captions I've created for them. But I'm not.

The Guys
Balasz, the Foreigner
Peter, the 31 year old
Justin, the garbage disposal

The Girls
Guiliani, lover of Korean dramas
Kelsey, the kung fu artist
Taylor, the Sigourney Weaver look-a-like
Carey, the Backstreet Boys groupie

We just recently found out Peter is 31. None of us had any idea. Balasz is 24, so we though he was the oldest in the group. Until Friday night, when it was discovered that Peter was the oldest in our group. Everyone's mind was blown. We thought he was 24. He doesn't even look 31. You want to know who else is also 31?


Bet you didn't see that one coming.

Alright, here's the part where I say something about China.

Today is my first day at my internship. If I had a Tardis I could easily have come back in time to tell you how it went. However I am not the Doctor. Although I am currently in the fourth season, specifically episode 6. Also, the tenth doctor bears a close resemblance to a certain lead singer of a certain UK band.

Alright China.

CHINA.

I WILL WRITE ABOUT CHINA

Well, to be honest there's too much to write about.

I say that all the time, but I'm being for-serious here. I'm also busy half the time, and I haven't written my blog in a while, and I sort of forgot to write to my parents for a week because the internet wasn't working and we were busy... so I probably won't get daughter of the year cause they probably thought I was dead on the corner of a street somewhere.

So because I fail-boated, and haven't written in a week, here's a succinct version of my weekend, followed by a brief recap of the previous week.

Saturday. Went to West Lake. Walked around for 3 hours cause I can't read a map. Found Leifeng Pagoda. Spent 40 RMB and climbed it. Got some pictures of West Lake. Hailed and took a taxi for the first time in my life. Went to some section of town where kids were learning how to roller blade. Kelsey was invited by her Chinese friend August to help promote something. So me, Kelsey, and Guiliani went. Found out that, in Chinese, they were promoting their school to parents, telling them we were the teachers. We then got paid 100 Yuan.

Earlier last week. Went to a Tea House. Ate a lot. Like, a lot a lot. Apparently people stay there all day. Did laundry cause I was running out of clean underwear/socks. Went to a restaurant the next day, where I got a free sandwich cause the waiter couldn't remember who had ordered it. It was a veggie sandwich. Tasted like a tatter tot between two pieces of bread. My friend Kelsey dropped a slice of pizza on the table. I grabbed it, telling her there were starving children in China. Then I got excited cause I realized I was talking about myself.

Um. None of that is exciting. This is a very poorly planned blog post. So sorry about that. I'M BUSY ALRIGHT. JUST DEAL. Next time I promise the post will make more sense, and be more interesting. Actually like an hour after I post I always think of a bajillion better things I could have written about. Then I forget about those bajillion ideas the next time I post. I promise I'll try to think the next time I write.

In the meantime, here are some interesting tidbits
-Everyone air dries their clothes.
-They like weird flavored things. Like blueberry chips.
-Many children start to learn English at the age of 3.
-Old people here are much more, respected I guess you could say. At least, the old people here don't scare me like in America. I don't know how to describe it. Like I feel like because of the way Americans are it's easy for the elderly to just not to anything all day and slowly lose themselves, but here everyone is active. Like super active.
-Not everyone has a dog here. I don't think a lot of people have pets actually. I've only seen maybe three people with dogs since I've been here?

I forget what else I've written in the past. But last night I saw a pretty bright star, and that makes the fifth star I've seen so far since I've been here.

So have fun with your life and stuffs peoples. Until next time.

Satoshi

Today, we visited a bookstore. To sum it up, I bought a J-Pop CD, and the first volume of Pokemon in Chinese. I can't read anything in Chinese. However another girl in our group Kelsey (who understands enough Chinese to read it a little bit) just informed me that Ash's name in the book is Satoshi. Hence the naming of this post.

You're welcome.

I know you are dying to know, and yes my "Tohoshinki Single B-Side Collection" is basically everything I wanted it to be and more. I was slightly disappointed, cause the CD I originally wanted had a far superior album cover (the five of them appeared to be jumping in midair, hands posed to attack an unseen enemy to the audience's left) then the one I ended up buying. However, that CD only had like 4 songs on it and was 42 Yuan (divide that by 6 and that's how many US dollars it is) and the CD with the boring cover I bought has 12 songs and cost 37 Yuan.

I did manage to snap a photo of the album cover, however it won't upload. I've tried like a bajillion times, which is surprising if you know how lazy I can be.

Lazy (noun)
1. When one could be achieving something that may improve their life, but they are too "tired".
2. Another word for achievers. Because they're willing to let others achieve things.
3.

Did you see what I did there?

TWANSITION

Oh Tobuscus. How I'm not watching you even here. And by watching I mean not stalking.

Behind the bushes.

Lurking.

That shadow movement?

Me.

Whoa. Ok off topic.

I also had an interview for an internship. And by interview I mean "Let's tell you what you'll be doing here even though you never gave us a resume but since you know English and are with Central College we'll still accept you. So now even though you never put ANY effort into this AT ALL you will still appear far superior to your peers when applying for a job and your potential bosses see that you worked at an internship in China when the other applicants didn't."

So the lesson here is be lazy. It will pay off. Eventually.

But the newspaper is called "That's Zhejiang" and it's just a weekly newspaper, that also has a seasonal magazine. It's just a few blocks down so I could either take the bus OR ride a bike. The fact that I potentially get to ride a bike in China excites me far more than you realize. Although this might mean I'll die in some horrible bike related accident. But you only die once dudeman.

Oh dear, there's so much more to report, but I'm probably losing your attention span. So here's a list of cultural differences I've noticed in the 6 days I've been here.

-In restaurants they don't serve all the food at once.
-Chinese don't buy a lot at once like Americans. (e.g. in Walmart, the most I saw anyone buy was maybe like 5 things)
-Boyfriends will hold the girls purse.
-When you buy something, always be conscious of making it easier for the other person to give you back change (e.g. you buy something that's 6 Yuan, give them 11 Yuan).

Also, I had pigeon this morning. With noodles. It was quite good actually. Once again, I took a picture of it. But, oh wait, that's right. The picture refuses to upload. But it's a pigeon wing. I actually wanted quail, but they had run out of it.

In other news I'm super pissed that the Leeds festival, which happened this past weekend, which MUSE was AT MIGHT have been their BEST CONCERT since their performance at Le Zenith. It was complete with NOT ONLY their "We are the Universe" intro BUT ALSO "What's he building in there" WHICH THEY HAVEN'T USED IN LIKE 10 YEARS. AGH. If anyone happens to know of someone who happens to be in possession of the Tardis, lemme know.

Also, in case you were wondering, "xiexie" which means "thank you", canNOT mean whatever you want it to mean. Not like I accidentally bumped into somebody, and knowing like two Chinese words muttered "xiexie" accidentally thinking it meant sorry but really it means "thank you".

So, have fun with your life and stuffs people. Until next time.

So I understand the Chinese driver stereotype now....

Dear Lord. I never understood why people always said that Chinese peoples are terrible drivers. But coming to China. I now understand. Like today, we rode a bus from the West Lake to a McDonalds near Zhejiang campus, and there are four lanes on both sides right? Well our bus was in the far right lane. Now in America you wouldn't be allowed to turn left in that lane. But our bus turned left. Also, cars will go into lanes with on coming traffic to bypass cars that are slow or stopping for some reason. But they will use their horns so it's ok.

Basically, I hope I never have to drive in China ever.

However crossing the street can be terrifying. Today our group played a real life game of frogger. And it was terrifying.

On a completely different note, I've had some weird dreams since I've been in China. I blame this largely on the heat. For example, I had this dream where I went to the bathroom, and suddenly realized my toilet had been moved, and the ONLY possible logical explanation was because a serial killer had snuck through my bathroom window. And as I tried to move to escape, it was at that point in the dream when you start to wake up so you sort of move slowly, and I could see the killer coming at me from my periphs... then I woke up.

Although that's not as bad as my plane ride to China. I kept going in and out of consciousness, and at one point I woke up, and could not for the life of me figure out why I was on a plane, and why there were so many Asians around me.

I also watched Kung Fu Panda 2 on the plane. Not as good as the first. Actually, I completely forget how it ends, and I think that's mostly because I was half conscious.

Also I'm proud to say I haven't used a fork yet. Not like that's an option. But still. I'm proud of myself even if you aren't at all.

Speaking of food. This kid in our group ate the head of a chicken yesterday. Brains and eyes and all. For those of you wondering, he described the brain as tasting like mashed potatoes. For those of you also wondering, yes I lost my appetite.

They serve the heads of animals with a lot of things. Mostly duck or chicken.

And dang. I had no idea how cheap stuff would be here. Like one US dollar is the equivalent to 6 Chinese Yuan. The average bottle of water or soda here is 3 Yuan. So I'm gonna be way cheaper than I normally am when I come back to the States.

Although to be perfectly honest, it's slowly hitting me that I'm actually in China. I feel like I'm just in some city's Chinatown, and I'll turn the corner and be able to read the signs again. I just can't wait for my classes to start on the 13th, because this whole not knowing any Chinese thing is getting slightly annoying.

Oh, and I'll end this blog with this. The street cleaners here sound like an ice cream truck, and they usually play the birthday song.

Alright now for realz I'm gonna stop. Cause I could probs write like a bajillion things right now. But I honestly don't feel like it. It's sort of tiring. Also I have to keep a journal for Houghton, and one for the program I'm in, and keep in contact with my parents.... so... much.... writing....

That one scene with the orc

Yep. I lied. Although only three of you know what I'm talk-sorry- WRITING about. Because only three of you read my last post.

Which is cool. I guess.

Didn't realize I was that boring.

Or maybe that just means no one stalks me?

Which is totally cool or whatever.

Anycrap.

Here's this horribly drawn comic inspired by this time I watched the entire extended version of LOTR (for like the infinity-ith time) with the people I lived with over the summer one weekend. And by weekend I mean almost a week.


Yea. This has nothing to do with pre-China jitters.

I just don't know what to feel.

Although I DO feel like a broken record. I think I've told the same thing a hundred times the past week. "Yes I'm going to China." "Four months." "With Central College." "Studying Chinese." "No I don't know Chinese." "Yes I am a Lost fan." "Team Harry Potter."

Alright so not all of those are actual answers, but you get the point. It's just weird. Sometimes it hits me. I'm going to China. Then other times I expect that on the eve of my leaving, say, while my friends are throwing me a party before I leave for Asia, suddenly my ex (which I don't have, but in this alternate universe let's just say I do) shows up. Let's say this ex and me happened to share a fun day at some theme park, and the same tape we happened to tape ourselves on is also being used to tape that night's party's events. Suddenly, a giant monster that had been woken up by a satellite that hit it the same day we were at said park, wakes from its slumber and suddenly attacks NYC, killing my brother and all my friends. Well. Let's just hope that doesn't happen tonight. Or now.

On an entirely different note, watching movies like Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon, Mulan, and Kung Fu Panda probably isn't the best way to learn about a culture. But that is what I've been doing. ("Really Brittany? You mean they don't sing and dance about how they are men over there?") However, don't be alarmed, because I had to write a ton of papers for some pre-depature class in Houghton about China. Not like I know everything. But I probably know more than the average person.

I just hope I'm not the cliched loud America. Agh. That is the least of the things I want to be.

However I am bringing my Heelies in the hopes that I can Heely across the Great Wall.

If you be hatin', it's just cause you be jealousin'.

Agh. So much rambling. BUT if you really want to know, I'm just going to stay up all night, because I have to leave at 4am to make it to Newark, which means I would have to wake up early to shower and crap, and what's the point when I have a day's worth of flights ahead of me, all of which I could be sleeping on?

So now, f'realz, the next post WILL be from China. Hopefully I will be able to access this site. If not just wait like four months THEN I will post like crazy.

So have fun with your life and stuff peoples.