This is getting quite ridiculous!! The internet at my apartment is like the weather here... unpredictable. I can never know when it's going to work or when I'm going to have a slow (or fast) connection. Yesterday I had my first day off in a really long time so Miles (my senior teacher until Sept. 1st when he becomes my DoS), Valentina (a coworker) and I met up and walked around the Old Summer Palace. We ended up doing a lot of walking because we mistakenly thought it was smaller than it actually was. After walking around for about 4 hours, we decided that we should have lunch (it was about 2:30), so we exited the park and walked across the street to this little cafe'/bistro. We each ordered a pizza (I had a vegetarian pizza with onion, tomato, mushroom, and green peppers) while Valentina and Miles had home pizzas (I think they were the same as mine except they had ham as well). After sitting at the bistro for about an hour and a half (it was wonderful to be able to sit down and relax), we boarded the subway again and headed home. Miles had to meet his wife so that they could go have dinner with her coworkers (much to Miles' distaste) and Valentina and I went home and took naps. After my nap, I walked around the compound (Americans call them complexes) and bought several bottles of water. We've received our water cooler, just haven't set up water delivery service yet. I had grapes for dinner (it took me forever to take the seeds out of them!!) and read for a little bit before going to bed.
This morning I went to the Police Service Bureau near the Lama Temple with Charisma and Emily to relinquish my passport and get my visa situation all settled (what they don't tell you in the States is that once you get here you have to get a resident permit that will allow you to stay as long as you have a job if you're traveling on a Z visa like I am). That only took about half an hour before I boarded the subway again and headed home. I stopped at a restaurant near my apartment for lunch and had an amazing beef and mushroom rice meal. It had started sprinkling when I started to walk home from the subway station, but I needed to find a place to get my eyebrows waxed as they were becoming quite hairy. I found a really nice massage place in our compound, so I went in and paid the 10 kuai (about 2 dollars). That was the most painless eyebrow wax I've ever had because they didn't use wax. They used something completely different - maybe a laser, I'm not sure. I'm glad I came back to the apartment when I did because now (at 3:07 pm) it's pouring outside. :) I don't know what I'm going to do tonight if it stops raining. I may go out the east side of my apartment compound and walk around. Supposedly there's a Wal-Mart around here, but I've yet to see it. I know there's a Carrefour within walking distance, but I'm not willing to get soaked just getting there. I could take a cab; however, but many of the cabbies don't speak English. Well, it's time for me to take a nap (I'm exhausted!!) so that I can go out tonight and walk around (if it's not still raining!)
Much love from the other side of the world!! : )
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