Idyll's End, Idyll's Origin

I decided to take a brief break from tinkering with my old story to gather a few thoughts about the one that will begin in a day's time. After all, I've done nothing but traipse around like a carefree tourist for the past week since my arrival.

Now comes the living part. The working part. The beginnings of relationships that will need to last me a year, or more, if I so choose.

My experiences with my students so far have been slim. A lunch here, a pickup basketball game there. I can only hope I'll be of some use to them, because I aim to milk all can from my time here.

I still have yet to meet any foreigners here in Anqing aside from my roommate. I have had decent conversations at random with a few Chinese students at Anqing Normal College, but aside from them all the English is broken at best. Which is fine, because I'm trying to learn another language anyway. Now, if I can just find a Chinese English speaker who wants to improve as much as I want to learn, perhaps we can strike up a tit for tat deal, or some such.

Of all my preconceptions going into the trip(most of which I did my best to discard at the sage advice of one Dr. Holland), only one has held any sort of truth, and it had nothing to do with the Chinese. I still feel at complete peace with this decision, this journey, and this strange, yet somehow welcoming place. God has put in me a kind of strength I've never known, I guess, because historically I don't hold up so well in situations like this.

Leaving home for college. I was a worthless wreck.

Moving to DC. Fine enough, on the outside... but it was a damn ordeal compared to this.

I have no explanation for this, except that experience has certainly hardened me somewhat, and I am gripped with, and somehow comforted by, my profound need to be here. I still don't understand that last part, but I'm sure I'll get there.

Anyway. That was a rambling one. Once classes start back I'm sure I'll find my way over to the local college, where I'm almost certain I'll find more English speakers, perhaps even a few native. Maybe, then, at last, one of them can direct me to a nice low key place to sit and have a beer that isn't a brothel.

Don't ask.

Ahem. Yes, well I've figured out how to order food at least, so I'll survive. I go into any restaurant and say, wo yao niurou, or wo xuyaou niurou, if I'm desperate (I want/need beef). And let's not forget the pi jiu (beer). I just repeat it over and over until someone gets me. Not the most cultured thing, but hey, I've only been here a week. Give it time.

Now, I'm going to sleep, because I played 2 hours of pickup basketball and walked 7 miles to see the fountain in People's Park at night, only to find that it wasn't working.

10 to 1 I feel like I got beaten with a baseball bat when I wake up.