Eat, Sleep, Breath, Write long rambling LJ posts
Greetings, all you beautiful people. :) I got back (to Shanghai) from Beijing yesterday, so sadly, we must do this again: Observations.
The Good
~People actually speak mandarin there! Yay! I can actually understand what they're saying! And I think a Beijing accent is pretty.
~This is probably subjective, but people seem nicer and less bitchy.
~I love that huge clock-thing which counts down second by second to the 2008 Olympics. I also love how the date and time chosen for the 2008 Olympics is 08/08/08, 8pm. Hee. (For those of you who are Chinese-culture-illiterate, 8 is the luckiest number because it rhymes with "become rich." You have to buy your cellphone number here, and the ones ending with 8 or have multiple 8s in them can cost 5 or 6 times more than the cheapest ones, which usually end with 4, because 4 rhymes with “death” and is therefore the unluckiest number. [/useless knowledge])
~We went there and came back on first-class trains (because second-class tickets sell out super-quickly). Omg first class is soooo much nicer. 1)Itss fast (12 hour trip instead of 20+ hours) because it doesn’t stop at every tiny hick town with a train station. 2)Its bathrooms have toilets, are much cleaner, and most importantly, have toilet paper. 3)The compartment has a door, and inside, you can control the degree of air conditioning, lighting, music, etc. 4)You get soft fuzzy slippers to walk around in. :)
~Peking (*wince*) Duck is yumminess, even though my cousin insisted that we go to the original restaurant, which is three times as expensive as anywhere else.
~Good places we went to: Great Wall - climbing it was the single most exhausting thing I've ever done, but you feel good about yourself once you get to the very top. (And according to my dad, you can't see it from space.) YuanMinYuan - *glares* at all you British/French/Italian/Austrian/German/Portuguese/Russian/Japanese "foreign invaders, who revealed [your] true malicious and cruel nature". :p Beijing University - It's pretty. Cultural Park - It's …cultural-ful.
The Bad
~Compared to Shanghai, Beijing is like a backwards rural hick town. Seriously. The buildings are further apart, not as tall, older, in worse condition, and uglier. People are dressed less fancy and less bourgeois-looking. The subway and bus systems are so out-of-date and not air-conditioned.
~Scary people who knows we are tourists and come badger us with (most likely fake) ads for tour transportations, tour guides, etc etc etc.
~Teh Propaganda. In museums. I didn't really see much anywhere else, but the museums, gah. All the descriptions and explanations and exhibits are so ridiculously false or exaggerated that I don't know whether to laugh or cry. God. In related news, according to my cousin, their history textbooks are also full of...probably not lies, but exaggerations. The textbooks like to use lots of adjectives and strong language to make “us” absolutely good and “them” absolutely bad. When they write their history essays, they're not allowed to defend the other sides' actions or motives, and instead of analysis, they can write stuff like “I feel outraged by this event. I think the Japanese are evil, evil people.” Ugh-ness galore.
~I was looking at trip pictures last night. My cousin (who is male) has bigger boobs than me.
~*glomps jasmineblossoms* Two people thought I was mentally retarded, because we were traveling with my (younger) cousin. Person 1: “Is she a retard? I think she is.” Person 2: “*something I didn’t hear*” Person 1: “Hey! Are you a retard?” In retrospect, I should have yelled at him or something, but I've already walked past him by the time he addressed me directly, and I always think of these things only after the fact.
~Bad places we went to: Military History Museum - (It’s military history. Go figure.) Lots of aforementioned biased-ness, exaggerations, and propaganda. BeiHai - there was a lake, and some trees, and some old houses, and more lake, and more trees, and more houses, and a tower, but that costs extra, so we didn't go up there, so we saw trees, a lake, and houses.
The Uh…You Decide
~At Tiananman Square, there are MPs standing guard at all the important places, but apparently, there are also lots of plainclothes policeman walking around. My dad: “Just hold up a big sign that says “FaLunGong is great” or something and all the tourists and homeless people around you would come chase you down and arrest you. Why don’t you try it.” Hee. Also, the MPs there are not allowed to have their picture taken. (Heh are they scared of spies?) If you try to take a close-up picture of them or with them, they first tell you no, and if you insist, they turn their backs on the camera. Tis funny to watch.
~Ambiguous places we went to: My grandmother and great-grandmother's graves. Looking around, there were some really rich people with really nice gravestones/monuments. There are also some really strange people who bought graves for themselves but haven't died, so it's just blank gravestones.
I am coming back next Monday. To-do list after I get back:
1. Go to UT orientation.
2. Find a job.
3. Renew my cellphone service.
4. Find a job.
5. Get my own bank account.
6. Find a job.
7. Drop off my children at Ozzy’s orphanage.
8. Find a job.
9. Buy HBP.
10. Find a job.
For UT orientation, can people who've already went tell me 1)What time of day does it start/end? 2)What you do in it? and 3)Are lots of classes already filled? And also, how many classes can we take per semester? I looked at the EE suggested schedule and it's 5 per semester and pretty much all EE courses. Someone told me that most people take 5 courses per semester totally, so does that mean we don't have enough space to take electives? *tear* Oh, and congrats to all IBDOs. It’s official, IB doesn't cover anything AP can't cover, and most of my APs are useless anyway because it's all history and crap like that...although if my children doesn't become orphaned (what was the UT thing Alex was talking about?), I won't have to take physics at all in college (according to the EE suggested schedule), which is a freaky concept for a EE major, especially considering all I had was Ozzy physics. *is very scared*
EDIT: Nvm, I just read June's entry on orientation. So we really don't get electives?
The Good
~People actually speak mandarin there! Yay! I can actually understand what they're saying! And I think a Beijing accent is pretty.
~This is probably subjective, but people seem nicer and less bitchy.
~I love that huge clock-thing which counts down second by second to the 2008 Olympics. I also love how the date and time chosen for the 2008 Olympics is 08/08/08, 8pm. Hee. (For those of you who are Chinese-culture-illiterate, 8 is the luckiest number because it rhymes with "become rich." You have to buy your cellphone number here, and the ones ending with 8 or have multiple 8s in them can cost 5 or 6 times more than the cheapest ones, which usually end with 4, because 4 rhymes with “death” and is therefore the unluckiest number. [/useless knowledge])
~We went there and came back on first-class trains (because second-class tickets sell out super-quickly). Omg first class is soooo much nicer. 1)Itss fast (12 hour trip instead of 20+ hours) because it doesn’t stop at every tiny hick town with a train station. 2)Its bathrooms have toilets, are much cleaner, and most importantly, have toilet paper. 3)The compartment has a door, and inside, you can control the degree of air conditioning, lighting, music, etc. 4)You get soft fuzzy slippers to walk around in. :)
~Peking (*wince*) Duck is yumminess, even though my cousin insisted that we go to the original restaurant, which is three times as expensive as anywhere else.
~Good places we went to: Great Wall - climbing it was the single most exhausting thing I've ever done, but you feel good about yourself once you get to the very top. (And according to my dad, you can't see it from space.) YuanMinYuan - *glares* at all you British/French/Italian/Austrian/German/Portuguese/Russian/Japanese "foreign invaders, who revealed [your] true malicious and cruel nature". :p Beijing University - It's pretty. Cultural Park - It's …cultural-ful.
The Bad
~Compared to Shanghai, Beijing is like a backwards rural hick town. Seriously. The buildings are further apart, not as tall, older, in worse condition, and uglier. People are dressed less fancy and less bourgeois-looking. The subway and bus systems are so out-of-date and not air-conditioned.
~Scary people who knows we are tourists and come badger us with (most likely fake) ads for tour transportations, tour guides, etc etc etc.
~Teh Propaganda. In museums. I didn't really see much anywhere else, but the museums, gah. All the descriptions and explanations and exhibits are so ridiculously false or exaggerated that I don't know whether to laugh or cry. God. In related news, according to my cousin, their history textbooks are also full of...probably not lies, but exaggerations. The textbooks like to use lots of adjectives and strong language to make “us” absolutely good and “them” absolutely bad. When they write their history essays, they're not allowed to defend the other sides' actions or motives, and instead of analysis, they can write stuff like “I feel outraged by this event. I think the Japanese are evil, evil people.” Ugh-ness galore.
~I was looking at trip pictures last night. My cousin (who is male) has bigger boobs than me.
~*glomps jasmineblossoms* Two people thought I was mentally retarded, because we were traveling with my (younger) cousin. Person 1: “Is she a retard? I think she is.” Person 2: “*something I didn’t hear*” Person 1: “Hey! Are you a retard?” In retrospect, I should have yelled at him or something, but I've already walked past him by the time he addressed me directly, and I always think of these things only after the fact.
~Bad places we went to: Military History Museum - (It’s military history. Go figure.) Lots of aforementioned biased-ness, exaggerations, and propaganda. BeiHai - there was a lake, and some trees, and some old houses, and more lake, and more trees, and more houses, and a tower, but that costs extra, so we didn't go up there, so we saw trees, a lake, and houses.
The Uh…You Decide
~At Tiananman Square, there are MPs standing guard at all the important places, but apparently, there are also lots of plainclothes policeman walking around. My dad: “Just hold up a big sign that says “FaLunGong is great” or something and all the tourists and homeless people around you would come chase you down and arrest you. Why don’t you try it.” Hee. Also, the MPs there are not allowed to have their picture taken. (Heh are they scared of spies?) If you try to take a close-up picture of them or with them, they first tell you no, and if you insist, they turn their backs on the camera. Tis funny to watch.
~Ambiguous places we went to: My grandmother and great-grandmother's graves. Looking around, there were some really rich people with really nice gravestones/monuments. There are also some really strange people who bought graves for themselves but haven't died, so it's just blank gravestones.
I am coming back next Monday. To-do list after I get back:
1. Go to UT orientation.
2. Find a job.
3. Renew my cellphone service.
4. Find a job.
5. Get my own bank account.
6. Find a job.
7. Drop off my children at Ozzy’s orphanage.
8. Find a job.
9. Buy HBP.
10. Find a job.
For UT orientation, can people who've already went tell me 1)What time of day does it start/end? 2)What you do in it? and 3)Are lots of classes already filled? And also, how many classes can we take per semester? I looked at the EE suggested schedule and it's 5 per semester and pretty much all EE courses. Someone told me that most people take 5 courses per semester totally, so does that mean we don't have enough space to take electives? *tear* Oh, and congrats to all IBDOs. It’s official, IB doesn't cover anything AP can't cover, and most of my APs are useless anyway because it's all history and crap like that...although if my children doesn't become orphaned (what was the UT thing Alex was talking about?), I won't have to take physics at all in college (according to the EE suggested schedule), which is a freaky concept for a EE major, especially considering all I had was Ozzy physics. *is very scared*
EDIT: Nvm, I just read June's entry on orientation. So we really don't get electives?