Friday, July 16, 2004

3 minute message from China

When you're in Beijing, don't pray for rain. Or if you do, make sure you don't have to catch a train. Or if you do, make sure you are at the train station first. Chinese people can't seem to handle driving in the rain. Gridlock is insufficient to describe the chaos. Thank you.

Thursday, July 01, 2004

China ho!


Alright, folks! After a rough start, a glorious comeback, some laughs, some tears and some uncertainties, we come to a significant fork in the road for JiVE. This, I am afraid, will be the last entry of my blog for what could very well be a hiatus of more than six weeks! F'er will be leaving his native country to visit another on the other side of the world. China. As part of a cultural exchange program, I will be travelling with a small team of American college students from three regional schools. For the bulk of the program, we will be located at a university in the city of Lanzhou, where each American student will be paired with a Chinese, English-studying student as roommate. I could continue the details, but I won't. Details are too uniteresting for JiVE. Needless to say, I am anxious. And my packing is not going so well as of yet. And I'm running out of time. And I'm writing a blog entry? I suppose one of the most significant things I will miss is blogging, which includes the reading of my friends' blogs. At the same time, I think I need a break from some of the commercial and consumerist absurdities of American culture. It will be quite interesting to be in a place where Chinese food does not go by the name (in Mandarin, of course) "Chinese food" but merely "food." My friend and I had a good conversation about this phenomenon once.

Anyway, if any of you American stalkers out there were hoping to discover my whereabouts this summer and come "visit" me, you had better start digging a hole now. Or you could book passage to China.

I leave you all with a few questions...

1. Has your life been an examined one?
2. Are you feeling bloated and light-headed?
3. Am I not extremely cool?
4. In what year will the human race finally dig a hole from the United States to China (you can see I am fascinated by the concept)?