Wow, it's busy here! I finally managed to buy tickets to Shanghai for National Holiday. It took four trips in total, even taking student translators with me, because you can apparently only buy tickets ten days in advance for the train in China - no early bird prices to be had here - and the demand for travel next week is so high. But we've got tickets now for a sleeper train leaving ZZ on 30th September in the evening, arriving in Shanghai after lunch the next day. These were, supposedly, the last available tickets for either the thirtieth or the first! It's a sleeper train, so we'll have bunks, but the description "Hard Sleeper" sounds ominous...
Last night we went to see Inception, in English with Chinese subtitles at what seems to be the only English-language showing of any film in the city this month. When the lights came on after the film, I was half-surprised to find myself in China, having zoned the Mandarin subtitles out for two hours.
We still don't have internet in the apartment block, so I'm spending a lot of time in the International Studies office over the road to prepare lessons, drink coffee and check emails. It's actually quite convenient as I get more done here than in our lounge. The staff are also really friendly, and enjoy teaching us short Chinese phrases. They've named me Gao Sen Sen, which roughly translates as Tall (or Big) Forest. The symbol for 'sen' looks like three trees arranged in a triangle. Photo of my attempt at writing it to follow shortly. There is also an English Club - second- and third-year students with a good level of English who help the foreign teachers around the city (buying train tickets, negotiating in markets, getting buses etc.) in exchange for extra help with their English.
My first lesson is looming. I'm fairly well prepared, I think, I hope...
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