Day 11: Lazy Saturday

I decided to not do much my first day off of work.

In the morning, I got up for a video call that never happened, so I decided to skype call another friend. I also messaged a bunch of friends from home, and read some more pages out of the book from yesterday. For breakfast, I had some rolls, milk, half of the dragonfruit we had gotten from Walmart a while back, and some double chocolate Pocky (which didn't taste more chocolatey than regular Pocky, unfortunately).

Inside of the dragonfruit

I also decided to start learning Python, which is a programming language, on the website Codecademy and watch some videos on YouTube.

Around 2, I decided to go out and get some lunch.  I biked over to campus, where Dom said that he, Nick, and Will were. Before that, I had to use some of Jessica's cable to tie my basket back on, but I did it easily. When I got to campus, they said that they were going to head over to Campus A to explore, but I decided to stay on Campus D to get some relaxation time. My lunch was some sort of spicy chicken and sausage mix with rice and some sort of white vegetable, which was pretty good.

We engineer better, and today's lunch

After that, I went to the campus store to get another flash drive, so mine didn't get corrupted by some of the Chinese viruses. I found a very cheap one that also read SD cards and smaller disks, so I bought two (one for here, to leave for the other TAs as well, and one to take home), and a really cute wallet. Going to check out, there was apparently an issue with the wallet, and walked away to find out the total price. Waiting, I looked at the candy, and grabbed a rose petal white chocolate bar that looked interesting. She came back and they started talking to me in Chinese. I apologized, and then they punched some numbers into the calculator. Apparently one of the gems on the wallet had fallen off leaving a discolored patch, and they were giving me a discount. I was really impressed at their honesty, since I hadn't noticed it myself, and I was made happier by the discount.

 My loot, and I was amused that they called the restroom the WC (as in the British Water Closet)
I explored for a bit, going back to the same pond from the other day, hearing a cat along the way. (Some of the cats here will just meow for hours to get attention....) I sat down by it, reading some more of my book, disappointed that I didn't see the swans from yesterday. After a little bit, I decided to draw the view of the part of the pond in front of me. After about 10 minutes of that, something came running out of the bushes at me. Startled, I thought it was a snake, and got ready to run when I saw it was pretty large. But it was shorter than a snake, and was a small furry mammal. As I watched, it burrowed under the rock directly behind me. I quickly realized the adorable fuzzy thing was a baby mole! I felt blessed to have seen the normally shy, nocturnal animal in the daytime.

Then some time after that, I noticed a woman trying to take pictures of the pond, so I tried to move out of the way. Then she was surprised, and asked if she could take a picture. I was surprised that she wanted to take a picture with me in it, and asked her if she wanted me looking at the camera or drawing, and she wanted the latter. So I went back to drawing, and she happily snapped her pictures. (I suspect it was because of the blonde, curly hair....)

After drawing some more, I wrote 2 poems, and read a bit more. To my delight, I discovered the swans had returned as well. However, the weather had gotten colder, and I was getting hungry. Giving into my carnal desires, I went back to the apartment.

I talked with Jessica a bit, finished my leftovers, and started watching some Doctor Who, Cyanide and Happiness, and Steven Universe the best I could with the slow wifi. The rest of the night, I just kind of chilled, talking again with people, typing up my poetry, watching stuff, and this blog.

I was looking forward to another relaxed day tomorrow!
-Zoe

Day 10: Finally Friday!

The first Friday of my first co-op started with a series of disasters and ended with a fantastic party.

I was going to get up at 6 and get ready for the day, but my alarm didn't go off, since for some reason, my phone restarted and reset the date. So at 6:45, my roommate knocked on my door, asking me if I was supposed to be up by now. I grabbed a little bit of food, including the oreos and the rest of the tomato bread from yesterday and ran out the door.

I made it to the 6:58 bus with a couple minutes to spare, but was still slightly panicked. Sitting down, I decided to try to rest once I caught my breath. But my fate was not to be so.
A professor sat behind me, and started planning out his class with his graduate assistant in English, which surprised me a bit at first, but quickly turned into annoyance. He was mentioning cover papers and writing, so I figured he was an English teacher.

But then he started complaining about the Chinese students and how they don't know how to work hard.... and about how the University of Cincinnati sucks, and how the students were all worried about co-op, etc. (At this point, I figured that he taught English to the JCI freshmen.) Then he also mentioned how UC TAs sucked, especially the one he had had the previous year, and I was mildly offended. At this point, he decided to tell his whole life story to his GA, and he said that he grew up in the 1950s in America to a Spanish speaking family and that he had to learn English himself, and that the Chinese students should do the same. He even disrespected the Chinese culture by saying that not defying their parents (by choosing a different major) was a sign of weakness. I was sitting there thinking that, no, respect for their elders is ingrained into their culture, you moron....

At some point, I just needed to know what this ignorant idiot looked like, and let him know that I was bothered by his incessant complaining. I turned around to see a guy in his sixties, bald with a thick gray mustache, and who had been steeped in academia so long he regarded his opinions as fact. I resisted the urge to say anything, and resigned myself to my fate. When we pulled up to Campus A, I practically ran off the bus to rid myself of him.

Going to class, I told Pablo about what had happened, and he didn't know the guy, but said that his TA that he didn't like was probably from JCI. I sat through heat transfer (which, for a fourth year class, I'm understanding pretty easily) and then stuck around for embedded systems (a fourth year EE class, but I was intrigued by it nonetheless, and would like to learn more of the elementary concepts behind circuit gates as well).

Then Robert, Suri, and Celia (who had come for embedded systems) offered to show us where to fill our card with more money. We went over, and I learned how to do it for next time.

Form to put more money on my student card

Then we went to a different dining hall than before, and I got a variety of interesting options. I got rice, a potato, pork and green mix, and then some tomato chicken. The chicken however had a very very sweet tomato paste on it, and it tasted like someone had dumped a bottle of ketchup on it. At first, it was ok, but it got disgustingly sweet as time went on, and I couldn't finish it.

 Heading back to campus, I decided to make my way to the library to get the wifi. I got lost for a bit, and sidetracked by the gorgeous pond again and other cool things around campus, but I found my way quickly. I'm still getting lost on the CQU campuses occasionally, but it's less frequently, and I can find my way back more quickly. It turned out I could get 7 Gigabytes a month for 15 quai, so I went ahead and purchased that.

this type of walkway is pretty common (jumping from block to block) and possible failed experiment

I wish we had this at UC, showing which classrooms are open

Campus D library

 Right after, I sat down for an hour and tested it. The UC vpn even worked with it, so I could access all my favorite sites from home. Then, I decided to head back and grab the snacks for the Star Wars party that we were planning on having later that night.

Once I was home, the UC Vpn decided not to work (possibly because they were doing maintenance, since it was early morning in Cincinnati), so I eventually gave up and got 76 pages into a really good book called Firefly Hollow on my e-reader and ate the leftover Kung Pao chicken from yesterday. But my phone data did work now, thank goodness.

Around 7:00, our guests showed up, including the 4 UC TAs (myself, Jessica, Dom and Nick), the four JCI TAs (Celia, Alexandra, Suri, and Robert), Pablo, and Suri also invited my friend Rebecca, who had been a SOL with me the past summer. And they also brought snacks, which was even better!
Dom and Nick went out for food, and we all stood around talking until they got back.

Then we started to start the movie, and we ran into a lot of technical difficulties (10 engineers in a room still can’t play a movie on a laptop without 15 minutes of technical issues…..) But we eventually got started. About 2/3 through Star Wars Episode 1, they had to head out, to take the last shuttle back to Campus A. I talked to Rebecca a bit longer, and then she went back to her apartment as well.

After they left, us four UC TAs finished the movie (only halfway paying attention) and then we cleaned up, putting extra food away as well.

Another successful day had, I cleaned up, finished up some online work, and went to sleep, planning to have some video calls in the morning.

-Zoe

Day 9: Third Day of Classes

For the third day, I didn't have any mandatory classes to go to, but I could go sit in on another class to make some extra money.... so I decided to go to the class.

It was Prob and Stats on Campus A, so I would get paid for the time riding the bus too, which was a double plus. Getting up early, I finished off the buns that I had gotten a while ago, and tried the milk that I had gotten the day before. To my surprise, it wasn't sweet at all, unlike most of the drinks here, and it reminded me of milk at home.

Starting my day off right, we all got on the bus. Waiting for Will almost made us late, but he showed up at the last second. I talked for a bit, and then relaxed. All of a sudden in the middle of the ride, the bus driver honked his horn, which was the most shrill thing you can imagine. Now, in America, honking a horn is a sign of anger at the drivers around you, but in China, the ubiquitous horn honking has led me and the other TAs to believe that's it's simply a signal of

We went in the room, and the remaining students finished their introductions that weren't finished from Tuesday's class. There was another couple odd and/or humorous names, from Lightning to Fiona to Bob. During the break, I went to go fill up my water bottle in the aptly named Tea Room. Since the water in China isn't clean, they had water that was 100 degrees Celsius (if you don't know.... that's boiling temperature of water). I needed water, so I decided to go ahead and try it. What's the worst that can happen, right?

It was a disaster.... I started to put the water into the bottle, and the bottle shrunk before my eyes. Not entirely, thank goodness, but enough where it was making a mess. To make things worse, I couldn't touch it for a minute, because it was just that hot. I was just glad no one came in and saw that. Walking back, holding it by the lid, I told Nick and Jessica what had happened, and they were astonished. I couldn't even drink it for a while, either because of the temperature.

Sizes of the bottle before and after the incident....

After the class, I ran across the street to try to grab some cash from the Bank of China atm, since the one on Campus D was broken. I wasn't able to do so, though, because the only open ATM was for deposits only, and I didn't want to miss the shuttle bus. The shuttle almost left me.

Unfortunately, Will didn't get on the same shuttle back, so we had to wait to get our SIM cards until later. On the way back, I read my fuzzy logic book.

At the bus stop, we met up with Apollo and Dom to go take care of wifi. It turns out that you have to pay a certain amount of money per month for three different plans of data. I eventually decided on 6 gigs for 25 a month for the first month, and then I would see if that was enough for the other months. We didn't have much money on our card, so we had to reload it, but the place was closed, so we decided to come back another day. We headed to the dining hall, and I caught up with Apollo about our respective lives.

Gorgeous trees about to blossom

 At the dining hall, Dom pointed to a random thing, and got it. I got the same thing, and Apollo informed us it was Kung Pao chicken. I also got a Pepsi that was spelled Pspsi for some reason....
Apollo told me it probably wasn't safe to drink the water in the melted bottle, with all the chemicals in it, so I got a new bottle from the convenience store in the cafeteria.

Kung Pao chicken

 We headed over to the bank afterwards. The atm was still broken, but Apollo informed us that there were more ATMs inside. After getting some money, we headed home, saying goodbye to Apollo for now, thanking him for all his help. Dom decided to go to the gym down the street and get a membership, but the rest of us headed to the apartment.

The dual trash and recycling cans (which they should have in America too)

 On the way back, Nick stopped by the convenience store to get some snacks, where we saw some strange items for sale...

Mini fruit cups with two pieces of fruit in them

hopefully this is to cook with.....

We headed back home to wait until Celia was free and gave me my phone that she had sent to her apartment. I worked on my Linked In account, sent some emails, worked on some scholarship stuff for next year's living expenses, applied for funding for my research in the summer, watched a couple videos, etc. I finished off my sesame sticks from home, which are my favorite snack, ate some of the mint thins (which are the same as at home), and contemplated eating some of the orange mango oreos (which are surprisingly good).

Then Celia messaged me, and I got Will and the gang of TAs together to head over to the TA office, where she was waiting, and then the phone store. I had to use some of the yarn that I got yesterday to tie the bike basket that was falling off.

Making our way there, we went over a lot of speed bumps (like normal), and the yarn broke.... I engineered better (a reference to UC's engineering slogan) and used the bike lock to put it back together for a bit. We then split up, with everyone but me and Dom

Then we found Celia, and she gave me the phone. We all walked over to the phone store, and FINALLY got the SIM cards working in the phones, but we found out that calls and texts do cost a bit of money, although the data is still an amazing 500 Mb a day. Our service would start the next afternoon. I paid Celia back for the phone, since it was indeed working, and we headed over to the dining hall after looking in the store next door for zip ties for my bike basket (unsuccessfully)

We were up to our usual shenanigans, messing around with each other with puns and the like, and Celia accidentally ordered Jessica a huge bowl of noodles, that was bigger than her head. And then, going back, she had to pay for a to go bowl. I tried a bun with dried meat floss on top (not sure what type) and some bread that tasted like tomatoes and herbs, as well as mint coffee.

Going home, we almost stopped by a hardware store to get zip ties, but Jessica realized she had cable. Getting home, we finished the roster for statics, and Jessica and I had the longest, most satisfying roommate talk, and we found a lot of common ground.

After chatting with some people online (which is always hard with the wifi disconnecting constantly), I headed to sleep.

-Zoe

Day 8: Second Day of Classes

My second day of work started a bit different than the first.
I got up around 7, had breakfast and took my time waking up, and then I got to bike over with Jessica, Will and Nick to statics class around 8:10.

I'm still disoriented by the fact that when locking your bikes, you don't have to chain them to a tree or pole, but just put the lock in the wheel so no one rides it away. In the US, someone would pick it up and walk off with it if you did that.

Going into class, we introduced ourselves again, and the students helped us with the attendance rosters. My friend Apollo was in the class (and I talked to him about the phone and wifi situation). There were also more interesting names in the class, including Hardman and Black.

I talked to Celia about the phone thing, since she came in for the next class. She said that she'd check with Jessica if the unlock code worked (since she FINALLY got an email back from Consumer Cellular), and if it didn't, she'd order the phone online and I could pay her back.

I decided to go relax and take care of some business before getting lunch. When I finally got into the food court, I wasn't actually sure how to get something. Most booths had no pictures, and those that did were a bit precariously high, and far enough away from the counter, where something could get easily confused. I eventually decided to go with a place that had a lot of different options sitting out, and I just pointed to one that looked like tofu. It turned out to be a great choice, because she kept putting more and more stuff on my plate until it looked like the picture below. (And the somewhat spicy chicken....or I think it was chicken, anyway..... was great as well!). The soup was a bit too sweet for my taste, but it was still good.

After lunch, I went to get a couple notebooks from the on campus convenience store, but they were closed. The ATM was also broken, and I needed money for the shuttle to Campus A for the next heat transfer class. So I biked back to my apartment, and stuck around for a bit.

I then got on the 1:00 shuttle, and fell asleep pretty quickly, despite my best efforts to read my book about fuzzy logic. I made my way to the class slowly, grabbing a can of coffee to get me through the class. Talking to Prof Mora again was pretty exciting, as we share a lot of common interests. He was also an international student himself, as he is from Ecuador, so he was excited that was one of my passions. He had also taught at CQU last semester as well, so after class, he showed me the copy center and a place to get milk and yogurt (since dairy products are in short supply in China). Waiting at the bus stop to go back, I was once again wondering what type of tropical trees were in the middle of the turn around.

On the bus, I transferred lots of photos to my computer, and got some fuzzy logic reading done. (If you don't know what fuzzy logic is, please look it up, it's a fantastic mix of science and technology that I will be doing research with with UAVs starting in the summer.)

Once I got off, I started walking home. I noticed the little outside snack shop, which was a novel idea. That would be a great idea in the US as well, but it wouldn't do well in the winter.

I decided to go to the bookstore on my way home, and got some notebooks, double chocolate Pocky (which I've never had before) and some yarn to fix my bike basket which is coming off at the moment.

My spoils

By the time I got back, Jessica was slightly freaked out, thinking I had gotten lost, while Dom had realized that I was just exploring. They all went for dinner at a chicken sandwich place, while I stayed in and had my leftovers from lunch. I also found out the code did not work in the phone, so I asked Celia to  I vegged out in front of the computer for several hours, finally catching up on blog stuff, uploading some pictures, trying to watch some videos (but the wifi is verrrryyyy slow here, so it didn't work too well) and chatting with people online.

I finally headed to sleep once I was done, ready to start all over again tomorrow.
-Zoe

Day 7: First Day of Classes

Day 7 started bright and early, with my first class at 8 am on the campus all the way across town.

As a result, I got up at 6 am, in order to eat some breakfast and catch the 6:55 bus to Campus A.
I got to talking too long with a friend online, and had to sprint out the door, only to find that the bus left at 6:58, so I was still early. When I got on, the bus actually left at 6:57, which was a bit concerning, considering that if I was running late, the bus would definitely be gone.

To pass the time, I looked out the window a bit, transferred some pictures from my phone to my laptop, and took a short nap.

We got to Campus A around 7:45, which made me pretty happy. Trying to find the classroom, I turned the wrong way for a moment. Orienting myself, I found the classroom and a much needed restroom. Traditional Asian toilets are holes in the ground, and that was a little bit disconcerting, along with the lack of toilet paper and soap, but I was able to hurry up and get to class right next door with a few minutes to spare. (Sidenote: Most Chinese restrooms and restaurants don't have napkins or toilet paper, because most people carry tissue packs with them.)

Getting into the class, which was Heat Transfer, a fourth year class, I was able to introduce myself to the class, which had 16 mechanical engineering students. They all introduced themselves as well, and the classroom leader put together the student roster for me to use when taking attendance in the future. Some of the students had entertaining names, like Sucre. He named himself after the guy in Prison Break, not knowing it was the French word for sugar. (Still haven't met the person named Nevermore though....) It turns out the professor (Pablo Mora) was an aerospace engineer, so he started off with rocket and airplane examples, which helped me like him immediately.

During the break, I talked to Vivi (one of the old TAs that I mentioned earlier who took us around the neighborhood around Campus A), and Jack, who was a previous SOL, from the first CQU SOL class (2014). The professor also came over and talked to me, asking how I was adjusting. I told him that I was adjusting ok, since I was used to having international friends. It was just the language that was giving me trouble. I also told him that I was a volunteer for UC International, and that I had completed a documentary for Worldfest Week the previous year about international student troubles, and he was interested in seeing it. I also told him that I'm a total aerospace and astronomy nerd (and president of Astronomy Club), but chose mechanical because I learn the most.

Then Will came in to teach his Prob and Stats class, and I decided to sit in on it to get some more hours. After that class, in which we all introduced ourselves and our hobbies, we went to get lunch.
The meal I had was the worst meal I have had yet in China. I got a seaweed and beef soup, which had great seaweed, but the meat was mostly bone. I also got rice and put a bit too much vinegar on. I then dumped the broth from the soup onto it, worsening things. The strawberry milk on the side was absolutely disgusting....bits of strawberry in it, and it was sweet in all the wrong ways.
The only good part of it was the sesame roll with bean paste that I decided to save for later.

Humorous sign on Campus A

 After lunch, we all parted ways. I got a little bit lost on campus and decided to wander around for a bit, taking photos as I went. I also started singing to myself. Ironically, my subconscious chose things like "I'm a new soul living in a strange world", and Steven Curtis Chapman's "Long Way Home".

The modern meets the ancient

Random pull up bars in the middle of campus

Walking along, I came across a pond by the main building, and I desperately wished that I could sit along its side, rather than it being surrounded by bars.

 Walking along a bit further, I got my wish! I saw a park called Foreign Languages Reading Park. Intrigued, I went in and found a gorgeous pond. I satdown with my legs over the side of the wall above it. I pulled out my sketchbook and started to draw for a bit (I will upload a picture once I have more progress). After about 20 minutes though, the birds pooped on my pant leg and a little bit on my sketchbook (not enough to do damage though), so I decided to leave and save myself and my sketchbook.

View from where I was sitting and looking up

Second view of the inspiring pond

Other view of the inspiring pond

 After the pond, I went to Walmart, picking up fruit, toilet paper, tissues and some additional chocolates, including some mint patties.

I tried to cross the street closer to Walmart, but was prohibited by the barriers that divide lanes in China, which is a strange concept to an American used to open roads. I had to walk further on up to cross the street, to my chagrin.

Getting on the bus, I expected a solo ride back, but someone yelled my name outside of the bus after I got on. Looking out the window, I saw Jessica and Nick. It turns out the class that they were trying to sit in on doesn't start until next week. They also reminded me that we had to get off at Campus D and walk back, since that bus didn't go all the way back home. On the bus, I fell asleep, but I woke up just in time to get off. We walked home, with the both of them helping me with my groceries.

 Will tried to help me get a phone online, but found out after lots of searching that you needed a Chinese credit card to deliver to our apartments, even though most delivery people took cash. His credit cards for China were all canceled, so I told him I would ask the Chinese TAs.

The four UC TAs then went to Sunny Block for McDonalds. Getting there, we found the McDonalds was a tiny ice cream place, and it had no real food, so we decided to go to Pizza Hut, which had lots more selection on the US, but had pizza that tasted exactly like the Pizza Huts in America. I got a Hawaiian pizza, lemonade, and tiramisu, all of which were really good. Nick got fish pizza, which looked pretty interesting in and of itself, with shrimp, octopus, and fish eggs on it. The waitress didn't speak English, but we communicated mainly by pointing at pictures and via Dom's offline translator.

Nick's fish pizza

 Then, the others wanted to go outside and get the ice cream from the dessert Mcdonald's place. There was one of several random doors in the wall I've noticed on Sunny Block nearby (maybe they're storage closets?) and again, we had to improvise, taking pictures of the menu and

Slightly different packaging for the McFlurry

Getting home, I worked on my blog and a video call back home. I was trying to get the phone and wifi stuff together for a couple hours, but wasn't making much progress. It is frustrating, but I had faith that everything would work out in the end.

 I had to get up for statics with Prof Will Wang first thing in the morning, so I made sure to get some sleep too.

-Zoe