Days 73, 74, and 75: Showing Sean Around Chong Qing

Friday started in a panic, as Jessica knocked on my door at 7:10 to wake me up. I realized that I had not set my alarm the previous night, and I had overslept as a result. The bus had left at 6:55, so in order to get to Heat Transfer, I needed to run to the subway station.

I had to run out the door and grab a taxi to get to the subway. I had a bit of trouble communicating that I needed to go to the subway. I showed him my subway card, and said the name of the station, and he eventually got the point. Getting to the station, I got on the subway around 7:30. I realized that by the time I got to the station, and then walked the rest of the way to campus, I would be a bit late to the 8 am class. I sent a message to Pablo, and silently willed the subway to go faster.

I got to the station around 8, and made it to the class at 8:15. I settled in, taking notes. When the mid class break occurred, I double checked that Pablo had gotten my message, and he said that he had, and he had taken attendance already. I copied the day's attendance into my roster, and settled back in for the rest of class. I decided to sit in for embedded systems afterwards, working on the final exercises of JavaScript.

I headed back to campus, discovering that Wei Wei was doing the same. I got on the crowded bus. We had our supervisor meeting later that day, but he had a break before the next class he taught, so he was going home, and I was going to lunch.

I ordered a random vegetable, and bony meat mix, and ate most of it while reading my book. After lunch, I went to the TA office to relax, taking lots of pictures along the way. I started to unlock the door, and then the others came to the door to let me in. It turned out that Celia, Robert, Dom, and Nick were already in the room.

They were halfway through Robert's bootlegged copy of "La La Land", but his computer was dying. My charger didn't work for his computer, but he transferred the copy to both me and Celia, planning on using one of our computers. I still had manufacturing midterms to grade, so they decided to use her computer so that they could finish it while I worked. After the movie was over, Celia decided to head back to Campus A on the bus, and Robert, Dom, and Nick played a game of "What If...." that was pretty amusing.

At 3:30, I went to the office to meet Wei Wei for the co op supervisor meeting. We started talking about if I had met my goals for the semester, and then we got to talking about the cultural differences between China and America. I mentioned that people here seemed to be a lot more open with their emotions here, as I'd seen people sitting on the sidewalks with heads in their hands. Wei Wei then told me that people can try to "trap" people into helping them here in China. If people stop to help someone, they might get jumped by a group of people. I was shocked to hear that, but then we started talking about defenses. Talking about gun laws, mostly back in the US, since the gun regulations here are pretty strict. We agreed on pretty open gun laws, but agreed that rifles were unnecessary (although laws against them might not do anything against it).

We got to talking about actual work stuff again eventually. I brought up the coffee hour that we were trying to hold to help students with the TOEFL test (the English literacy test so they could go to America). He said that once we got the paperwork together (they were trying to get us to have a syllabus for it), we could start it up. We also got to talking about things that the program could do better, such as the language barrier, and training before we came to China. Jessica went in after me, and I found out that she said most of the same things about the program.

After the meeting, I decided to finish up grading the Manufacturing Processes midterms. Tallying up the rest of the scores, I then went to go scan them all in at the print shop. Walking to the building, I couldn't help but think that this is exactly what a building based on Coldplay's song "Yellow" would look like.

Yet another poster with the Chinese Communist party principles

I went to the shop, using my translator to say that I needed the paperwork scanned in.The guy asked "PDF", which apparently is the same regardless of language, and I confirmed.  I also got another paper printed off, and signed for the charges to go onto JCI's account.

Cool space age robot that reminded me of a Dalek

After everything, I decided to go home, and work on various things. I finished JavaScript, among other things, and rested the remainder of the night.

Saturday started pretty lazily, working on various things, and making a Skype call. But at 2, us 4 American TAs headed out with Sean to show him around Chong Qing.

It was a beautiful, albeit a bit chilly, day, and we walked down to the subway station, chatting the whole way. Apparently there was a bicycle race outside below us.

We made our way to Ciqikou, the "Ancient Town" once more to show Sean around. We got off the subway and were immediately hit with the pungent smell of the area.

We made our way down to the market, going in a different gate from normal. As we were heading in, the number of people in the crowd became painfully apparent.

As we got shoved along, we all decided to stop and get some food to hold us over. Jessica and Sean got meat sticks, I got some pineapple juice (that actually turned out to be mango juice), and Nick got some rice with pineapple glaze that was in the bottom half of a pineapple. I tried it myself, and it was pretty good, but I've had enough rice to last me for a while, so I didn't want a whole bowl of it.

We continued exploring, going into various shops with Sean. I saw a few things that caught my eye, but I decided to wait on most of them for a while, especially when most of the vendors were refusing to bargain that day. If I still wanted them later, I reasoned, I could always come back.

unexpected American literature reference

I stopped at a shop that had more pressed flower charms (for necklaces, keychains, etc) to finish up gifts for the last couple people on my list. I tried to get the price knocked down even more since I was buying a bunch, but I only got 10 quai knocked off of the total. Resigned, I got them anyway, and Jessica waited with me while he tied the knots for the necklaces. We discussed the nearby houses, and how we thought that the shopkeepers might live in some of them, even though many of them were indeed "ancient".

Continuing on, we saw a couple stands with interesting things, such as bracelet beads, and hair pins. I had stopped in a couple stores to try to find a hair pin for me, but most of them were ridiculously expensive or didn't suit my tastes. One of the older ladies was selling hair pins that were just what I was looking for, and I ended up getting a peacock hair pin to take home for just 15 quai.

We went down further to try to find the others, and we were surprised that they hadn't gone far. They had stopped at a coffee shop, and Dom was unsatisfied with their false advertising, so he was inside trying to get a refund. While we waited on him, the others got ice cream waffles (though I decided to abstain because I hadn't eaten a real meal in a while).

After that, we saw a sign pointing us to "authentic food", so despite the others just having had ice cream waffles, we decided to head up that way. Heading all the way to the top, we were slightly disappointed to only see some ancient houses. A lady popped out of a house, giving us a disapproving look, and we joked with each other that we were just ignorant Americans, walking wherever we wanted.

Us in the historic alleyway, and the peacock hair pin

We continued on, seeing a lot of cats wandering in and out of shops, alluding to the fact that they lived there. We also ended up finding a lot of calligraphy and Chinese artwork shops. Some of it looked mass produced, so I tried to avoid a lot of it, especially since a friend of mine had already given me some that his grandma had made. Some of it looked really nice, with some silk screens, and various other paintings, so Dom ended up getting a scroll with a picture on it. We went into another shop with similar things, and there was a bundle of bookmarks with gorgeous drawings on them that I ended up getting.

a gate we passed as we exited, and the bookmarks I got

Heading out of Ciqikou around 5, we went to the subway station, and while Nick and Sean tried to get subway cards (since the booths to get them were almost always closed everywhere else), I headed upstairs to the restroom. There was no restroom, unfortunately, so I stood there to wait for the others. Apparently two girls in traditional Chinese clothing came by, and Dom and Jessica took pictures with them.

We made our way to Jiefangbei, enjoying the beauty (or humor) of the various shops, and their decorations. I told Sean about milk tea, but he decided to abstain, because he doesn't even drink regular tea to begin with, let alone any variations of it.

Random kid with a smiley face shaved in the back of his head....poor guy

We finally got to the river, and my breath was taken away once again by the beauty of it all. The pirate ship statue is so realistic, I really thought that there were people climbing in it for a few minutes. Staring at the opera house, I remembered that several of us wanted to go to an opera at some point before leaving Chong Qing, and looking at the bridge, we all wanted to walk over it at some point.

We went down to Cactus, the Tex Mex restaurant again, and ordered Irish Nachos (fries with nacho cheese, bacon, and tomatoes) to share for an appetizer with the others, a vanilla latte for myself, and a meat lovers pizza to split with Jessica. We stayed for a while, enjoying the food and each other's company before deciding to head out.

I had told Sean about the clay figures, including the Nazi minions, and we went down to see them. I bought three more figures, completely finishing my gift list. We continued exploring, enjoying all the lights emphasizing the beauty of the area.

We went into Hongya Cave to show Sean around. Although it is a small cave, it is very beautiful, with a waterfall, and a small river, as well as a spectacular view of downtown.

As we exited, there was an impressive bell there, which looked as if it was historic and brand new simultaneously, so we all left it alone. We were down by the road, near the river, and we hung out there for a while, taking pictures and talking.

After a bit, we decided to head home, and made our way back to the subway station. We saw the art deco building with the red beams again, although we don't know what it's for, as well as a plethora of lit up buildings.

We got separated from Dom, since his shoes kept getting untied, and he told us to go on ahead each time. The last time we lost sight of him, we waited a few minutes, and then just went to the subway. He sent us a message saying that he was looking around, and wasn't going back to the apartment yet, so we just shrugged and went back home ourselves.

Getting off the subway, there was a fruit stand that we stopped at, and I bought two new types of fruit, two mangosteens, which Sean described as the "queen of fruit", and a bunch of rambutan fruit.

A mangosteen

Rambutan fruit

Sunday was a day for me to just rest, and I decided to start out my morning with making an omelet and trying one of the mangosteen fruits. I tried to peel it, to no avail, and realized that I had to cut it with a knife. Doing so, I discovered that the brown fleshy part around the main part was wayyyyy too bitter to eat. Pulling out the white fleshy part, I discovered it tasted like a mixture of kiwi and mango. It wasn't the best fruit I've ever had, but it was pretty good.

After a couple hours, I decided to go out and get some fresh air. It was raining again (I'm still not used to living in a place with an entire rainy season), so I just decided to go to campus.

I

After I got back, we went out to get groceries. Walking down to Sunny Block, umbrellas in hand, we enjoyed each other's company. I tried to get some money out of a different ATM from normal, but it didn't allow withdrawals from my card. We went to the grocery store, got what we needed, and then we stopped by the pet store afterwards. I was sincerely tempted to adopt the little black and white puppy who kept nibbling at my hand through the bars, but Jessica helped me keep my head on straight.

I got some money from the other ATMs, and we stopped to get a drink at a different place than Coco's. Me and Jessica both got cappuccino floats, which were well worth the 6 quai.

Trying to enjoy my cappuccino float in the rain

We started walking out of Sunny Block, but the vibrant yellow flowers next to me caught my eye. There were an abundance of them by the mosaics in Sunny Block. I knew (and Jessica confirmed) that they were weeds, but they were beautiful all the same, and I couldn't help but stop for a few moments to admire them.

We were stopped by a girl in a raincoat, who spoke a bit of English, but relied on written words too. She told us that her and her classmates were raising money for poor children in the mountains to go to school. We weren't sure if it was legitimate, and we asked her if she would be around later. She wasn't going to be. There were lots of signatures on the sheet already, so we decided to give 10 quai each to give a bit, but to be safe in case there was any funny business. They seemed authentic though, and as we left, I wished them well.

We headed home, putting our groceries away, and we had our bible study. Jessica introduced a new technique to me, in which people can read 10 chapters of the bible a day through splitting the bible into 10 different sections and then reading one chapter of each of those section. As a bonus, since the sections are different sizes, you'll get different perspectives on God's word together every day, as you'll never read the same things together twice.

Satisfied with bible study, we went to work on our various projects, soon heading to sleep.

-Zoe