Day 70: March 14, 2013 Beijing Bound

     I woke up at a decent hour today just to make sure everything was squared away for Beijing and then Jeremy AKA my Korean boyfriend to many, came by my room to help set up a router. Unfortunately it wasn’t really working because I have a Mac and I was going to have to download Google Chrome. It was taking forever and all I could think about was all of the things I needed to be doing like shower, pack, and thermo homework. Eventually Adam knocked on my door and asked if I wanted to go to lunch and we invited Jeremy to come and told him that we could finish setting up the router later. 

     He suggested a Korean restaurant but we were kind of in a rush so we went to the dining court instead. I don’t think Jeremy eats there a lot because he barely touched his food but we all sat and talked for a little while until we headed back. We all said bye to Jeremy and then I rushed up to my room to get some serious business taken care of before class. I got most of my stuff packed and took a shower before class and as soon as class was over we went straight to the dining courts to scarf down some dinner really quickly. 

     I finished packing when we got back and then rounded up the group of 8: Adam, Bryan, Jess, John, Ron, Nathan, Tyler, and myself. We walked over to the subway, already having issues of staying together, and took it all the way to the train station. We were there in plenty of time so we grabbed some snacks for the long 12-hour ride ahead and boarded when it was time. 

     We split up once we got on the train since Bryan, Jess, Nathan, and I had got beds and Adam, John, Ron, and Tyler got seats. We had our own private room, which was really nice, and the beds were actually pretty comfortable. The beds were set up nicely so that we could use them as couches to hang out before we went to sleep. Jess and Ron went down to the dining car to work on heat and mass and Bryan and Nathan worked on thermo in our room. I was further than everyone and don’t do well with homework on the move, so I just played DJ and hung out until they decided to take a break. 

     Bryan ended up breaking out the Monopoly Deal game he had bought in Tianzifang and Bryan, Tyler, and I learned how to play. I won the first round, so obviously I was a fan until Jess beat me in the second when I would have won on the next turn. After that we hung out and talked for a little and decided it was about time for us to go to bed. Jess and I took the top bunks and Bryan and Nathan got the bottom. We turned off all of the lights, locked the door, and got in bed only to talk for over an hour about the most random things like who would make a good Vampire Slayer besides Lincoln. Jess and I decided on Channing Tatum and Ryan Gosling and decided to call it a night on that and hope they would be in our dreams.

Day 69: March 13, 2013

     Today was nothing special whatsoever. A group of us literally worked on thermo homework the entire day as we had 3 assignments instead of our usual two for the week since one was delayed due to our test last week. We locked ourselves away in the conference room downstairs, or the “bat cave,” and spent all day working. We dispersed just before dinner and I read a quick chapter of my book and then we all got food. After stalling as long as we could, we headed back to the dorm and decided to watch an episode of Party Down as a little break. That turned into two episodes but then we actually turned it off and got back to work for a few hours until we were all so burnt out that we had to get some sleep.

Day 68: March 12, 2013 Surprise Visit with Letters and Jellybeans, on Top of a Great Dinner!

   Today started out as a typical day of class and went extremely uphill from there. After materials class, I came home and caught up on my online class lectures and then got an unexpected knock at my door. I yelled at them to come in but when no one did I walked to the door assuming it was the lady in charge of the dorm since everyone generally just walks in. It was a very nice surprise to see one of my sorority sisters, Shannon, at the door and I gave her a huge hug. 

     She had just arrived to visit her boyfriend, Matt, who is also on the trip and stopped by. It was great to just see her, but she made it even better when she pulled out a pack of letters from my friends back at school and a giant bag of starburst jellybeans. My day was instantly made and it was great to see another familiar face from home. We chatted for a while but I had to let them go since it was a great day out and they had tons on their agenda. 

     After they left I sat in my room and read all of the letters, which seriously was one of the most comforting things ever. Even though I am still in contact with everyone it is great to know that so many people back home care about me and miss me enough to send a letter halfway across the world just to say hi; I am so lucky. They made me miss everyone of course, but definitely put me in a great mood for the rest of the day. 

     With that I headed outside to enjoy the great day and played some volleyball and football until I had had enough of Bryan slamming balls at me and we were all worn out. Once I got back, I hopped in the shower and got ready for yet another night of a delicious dinner. Joe and Catriona’s moms are in town visiting and offered to take Bryan and I out to dinner at Outback Steakhouse with them, which we happily accepted. We took the subway to their mom’s hotel and met up with them in the lobby. They were both happy to meet us after hearing so much about us and it was funny to see how much they were each like their children. 

     After they rounded up their stuff we headed over to Outback and got seated in no time since it wasn’t very crowded at all. I think I have only been to Outback in the states once or twice so I really didn’t know what to expect but my expectations were blown out of the water. We all ended up getting the meal special that included bread and butter, a bowl of soup, a salad, your choice of steak, loaded baked potato, vegetables, dessert, and free refills for about $22 when just a steak was only about $5 cheaper. Realizing what a great deal it was, we all went for the same package. My full meal consisted of a shared bloomin’ onion, bread and butter, cream of mushroom soup, Caesar salad, Denver cut steak, a loaded baked potato, veggies, and crème brulee for dessert. I don’t know if it was just the fact that I haven’t had a steak in 2 months but everything was absolutely amazing. I left the meal probably more full than I have been since I got to China and couldn’t have been more satisfied.

     

    After agreeing that we would definitely have to come back, we headed over to their moms’ favorite part of town, Tianzifang, which turned out to be a really cute area. We went into this DVD shop that is definitely the most impressive I have seen since I have been here. All of the DVD’s were in legit cases and they had so many options that I just had to buy something. I ended up with Friends with Benefits and Silver Linings Playbook for only $4! Bryan got all 7 Harry Potter’s, 4 Rambos, Les Miserables, and Slumdog Millionaire for a pretty great deal as well. After forcing ourselves out of the store before we bought more, we headed into the actual shopping area. There were tons of cute shops and restaurants with all kinds of food so we looked around with Joe and Catriona and their moms for a while until they were ready to head back to their hotel after a long day. 

     Bryan and I decided to stick around for a little while until the shops closed. Bryan somehow managed to eat a piece of pizza, while I am on the verge on not being able to walk I am so full, and then we looked around bargained for some watches I liked but never actually got one. After deciding we would definitely have to come back to look around more, we got back on the subway and made our way back to Minhang. With the rooms to ourselves, Bryan and I took full advantage of just lounging around for a bit and going to bed early.

Day 67: March 11, 2013

     The highlight of today was definitely getting internet back, which was pretty amazing. I got to Skype with my parents and Mandy, which was much overdue. In between I grabbed some lunch and then met with Bryan and Jess to discuss some plans for our extended break and decided we were definitely going to plan on Chengdu to see the giant pandas and then to Mount Emie for a cool hike and to see a bunch of monkeys. We looked into flights and got a tentative plan based on our online exam that may or may not interfere. 

      After that, 8 of us headed into the city to meet Nathan’s parents and sister for dinner at the Shanghai Brewery back by our old campus. The subway ride was pretty entertaining with all of us and we got to the Brewery in perfect time to meet his family. We all introduced ourselves and his mom told us how great it was to put a face with everyone’s names. We all ordered a beer for happy hour and after much debate on everyone’s parts, decided on what to order. I ended up getting a burger with feta, pesto, and grilled mushrooms, which was one of the best combinations on a burger I have ever had. 

     Everyone seemed very pleased with their food and we all had a really great time talking. We listened to Nathan’s family’s initial reactions to China, which is always entertaining, and then gave them a few pointers for the next week. We talked quite a while about all of the differences from America and after a while we had to head out because they were exhausted from their trip here, which was anything but ideal as they had a ton of delays to work around. They were too nice and took the bill, which we were all extremely appreciative of especially since we had such a fun night. We all said our goodbyes and wished them safe travels and jumped back on the subway until we were back on campus. Once we got back I finally watched the season finale of American Horror Story, which I wasn’t all that impressed with but wasn’t bad. After that I just spent the rest of the night hanging out with everyone and just enjoying the internet, which I now realize I am so dependent on.

Day 66: March 10, 2013

     I woke up this morning at 5:45 to my phone ringing. Bryan was calling to wake me up to go catch the sunrise over the Bund, which I forgot I had agreed to the night before. I got up and changed clothes as quietly as I could so not to wake my roommates and met Bryan and Tyler to walk down the street to see the sun rise. It looked to be a pretty hazy day but we stuck around anyway in hopes of a somewhat decent sunrise. It was freezing compared to the day before and after about 30 minutes Tyler and I called it and headed back inside and into bed after we could tell there was definitely not going to be anything somewhat resembling a picturesque sunrise. 

     Once again disappointed by the Chinese sunrise, I got back into bed for a couple hours. I was in and out of sleep for a while because my roommates were in and out of the room every 20 minutes but by about 9:00 they were gone and I got another solid hour of sleep in. Still exhausted, I managed to get out of bed only for the incentive of an American breakfast from the hostel, which ended up not being open. 

     Very disappointed, we headed over to McDonald’s to try and catch breakfast, which we unfortunately missed. We ran into some of the other guys in the group and were glad to hear they had had just as crazy of a night as we did and concluded that about 50 % of the group was vomiting by the end of the night. After grabbing some lunch and heading back to the hostel to check out, we got our group of 8 that is going to Beijing together and made our way to the ticket office to buy train tickets. Half of us decided on sleepers and the other seats, which was very confusing to explain to the person behind the desk. After probably 15 minutes of charades, we eventually got everything worked out with 8 tickets to Beijing on a 12-hour train and 8 tickets back on a 5-hour bullet train. 

     Once that was taken care of the group split up again and a few of us just headed back to campus making stops at the grocery store and a street shop for noodles. We were relieved to be back in our dorm after such an eventful couple of days, but were greeted by the unfortunate news that the internet was STILL not working. With that I literally had nothing to do except think about all of the things I could be doing with the internet like watch online lectures, thermo and materials homework, or watch the season finale of American Horror Story I never saw. With none of that as an option I actually picked up my book for the first time since I got here, or since this summer for that matter, and read a few chapters. Eventually Adam and John came in and asked if I wanted to join them to watch some Party Down and we managed to watch a solid 5 or 6 episodes that were pretty hilarious. We kept watching until it was late enough that we could go to bed without being completely embarrassed, and then called it a night early.

Day 65: March 9, 2013 Jess's Birthday Celebration

So I ended up waking up at 1 after apparently sleeping through Bryan and Schwenk walking in and just went back to sleep until 4:30 when I woke up pretty rested but still had nothing to do so made myself lay in bed until 8. After deciding I couldn’t possibly sleep any more I got up and showered and then with no internet still had nothing to do. I read some travel books on Beijing for the upcoming trip until it was late enough to get John up so we could head into the city for the day. 

We grabbed a quick lunch at the dining courts and got on the subway until we were at the cloth market with quite an agenda. We had to find a fabric to get John’s girlfriend, Meg, a dress made out of, a place to recreate a lost ZBT flag for Adam, and then some stuff for ourselves. We didn’t even know where to start so I suggested just trying to find a fabric for Meg’s dress. We stopped in a few stores until eventually I found one that I really liked and John thought it was really cool too. He handed the man at the store the dress Meg had sent him with, told him to copy it, paid a deposit and it was a done deal. 

From there we decided to work on the flag. We went around to a few stores who pretty much just laughed at us when we asked them to make a flag when I spotted a store that made curtains and furniture covers. I figured that was kind of similar and was something totally different from all of the clothing shops so it was worth a try. After a long conversation about details they said they could make the flag but it was going to be pretty expensive. We took a card and figured we could always come back if we didn’t find anything better. We headed downstairs and decided to talk to this one lady just because she spoke such good English. She also said she could make the flag and for a very decent price. She was extremely helpful and talked with us for a while explaining how she could tell we were American just from our accents, which we thought was pretty cool. 

After we got everything squared away with the flag we could finally go get some stuff for ourselves. We stopped by to see John’s girl, Lin Fen, and he got a pair of khaki shorts made and I got a pair of grey dress pants. After that I went to a store I had found last time I was there and got a black blouse made and then we were good to go. After a successful stop at the fabric market we decided to just continue our shopping streak and head over to the fake markets since they were only a few subway stops away. We did really well there too, as John got a brown “poopy” hat and I got some Ray Ban sunglasses. I also got my brother a pair a beats but that took longer than expected as all of them that I would listen to had awful quality and some of them didn’t even work. As soon as I found a pair that was somewhat decent I jumped on them. 

After we had just finished up our shopping it was time to meet up with everyone to go downtown for the night and celebrate Jess’s birthday. John and I beat them to the subway stop we were going to meet at so we stopped in Starbucks and got some coffee. Just as we were done we met the enormous group of 16 guys outside. We made it the rest of the way to our hostel and checking in was a little bit of a nightmare with 17 people who all had to give them their passports but after about 15 minutes we were all good to go. All of the boys had rooms together but this hostel didn’t have mixed dorms so I had a room with 5 random girls, one of which was actually sleeping when I walked in. I put my stuff in my locker and then we all made our way to find something to eat. 

Obviously people split up in a matter of seconds, and I was with the group that decided to head over to a Subway down the street. I must say the lack of deli sandwiches here is pretty disappointing, so Subway really hit the spot. After dinner we all just met up on The Bund and hung out for a while just enjoying the great view and of course the funny Chinese people doing the most ridiculous picture poses ever. Eventually we decided we wanted to go adventure around and decided to go walk around Nanjing Road. We stopped in a few stores looking for Shanghai Sharks jerseys and then gave up and headed back to the hostel. 

Jess then told us her parents had gotten the 8 of us on the list at a club called The Geisha and that we should all meet her there. We felt bad leaving the rest of the group but just went ahead and went with 9 of us hoping it would work out. Bryan, Tyler, Adam, Nathan, John, Ron, Josh, and I got cabs there and it worked out surprisingly well since Bryan didn’t want to drink, so Josh could use his wristband and we could all get it. Turns out her parents had paid for wristbands for the 8 of us so we could have all you can drink the rest of the night, which was pretty awesome. After thanking her again and again we heading upstairs to the upper deck where she had a table. We all had a birthday toast and then let the games begin. 

As the night went on the club got more and more wild as did our group. Not to go into too much detail but by the end of the night someone had thrown up on another person's lap, another in a bush, one on the walk home, and two more in toilets. Needless to say it got pretty rowdy, and we had to get some people home. I gave John my taxi card to get someone else home which then left me without a way of getting home. After not too much longer I was ready to get some sleep so I told Ron and Jess that I was leaving and got in a cab by myself and told them to take me to The Bund and then just told them a cross street I remembered and magically ended up right where John, Josh, and Adam were standing. After getting everyone into bed I was ready to do so myself but then I kept getting calls from both Ron and Jess yelling at me because I left them by themselves. Neither of them could find one another so they thought they were alone when in reality they must have been in the same room because the music in the background was the same for each of them. After enough time they eventually found each other and I was free to go back to my room of randos and snooze.

Day 64: March 8, 2013

     Fridays are also awesome without class. I got a good night’s sleep and then headed over to the tennis courts with Adam and John for the start to a perfect day outside. We played tennis for a few hours, which I thought was great. Adam let us each use his racket for a while which only made us realize how much crappier ours were but made us feel really good while we had it. We just hit around until a guy came over and started speaking Chinese at us so we just left and headed to the dinning courts for lunch. 

     After lunch we just continued the athletic streak and kicked a soccer ball around for a while until a group came over and started up a game of ultimate frisbee. A bunch of people got together every Sunday this summer to play but I hadn’t played since then so it was a really good time. After having enough physical activity for one day, I took a shower, grabbed dinner, and then we all gathered in my room since Catriona was gone with her parents. 

     We attempted to watch Modern Family until the internet decided to give out. With that we just switched over to a Planet Earth off of John’s computer and had a few beers. The plan for the night was to once again try to go bowling, which was yet another fail. This time we actually made it to the bowling alley but they were full since it was a Friday night. We had already bought tickets before we knew that but apparently we can come back and use them anytime so now we are set for next time. 

     The boys then went to meet up with their football coach to work out details for their jerseys and stuff so John and I just headed back to the dorm. The internet was still not working and no one was around so I literally had nothing to do so I decided to lay down even though it was only 9:30 and just figured someone would come home and wake me up, but I was wrong.