Mai Dang Lao (McDonald's)

Hi again!

Our second day was pretty good. In general, I'm feeling a lot better about every aspect of the program. First, we went through all the same things for class. I get a little frustrated because I feel so handicapped when it comes to memorizing characters. I can't stay up too late because jet lag has been making me shut down, so I just wake up early and cram. Not a great strategy, as we have a 2 hour exam on the week's material in addition to an oral presentation every Friday. Yesterday, by my afternoon individual session, I couldn't even remember the words I knew in the morning. Definitely a little upsetting, but until I adjust, I don't know how else to go about it.

After class, our teachers took us out to lunch. The 2nd years get to do this twice per week. The meal is paid for by HBA and tends to be at a nicer place with real Chinese food. It's a good opportunity to get to converse with your teachers and actually get some time to speak with other classmates. The restaurant we went to served us the most delicious food. I stayed away from the cold dishes, as they have warned us, but the hot ones were incredible. We had some real Gongbaojiding (Kung Pao Chicken), broccoli, some other spicy chicken, duck with little pancakes to make wraps (my favorite), and a spicy tofu. It was so delicious that we could not express it. All of us students would take bites of new things, turn to each other, and just open our eyes a little wider to show how much we were enjoying the meal. The food was served on a big spinning dish. Pro: you get to eat/reach everything. Con: if you like something, it's going to leave your part of the table, so you have to be quick. All in all, it was a great lunch.

Next, I had my individual session and calligraphy (shu fa) class! Calligraphy is a weekly workshop and I wasn't sure if I really wanted to go because I was so tired. But, it was well worth it. Just learning how to hold the brush was a lot harder than I anticipated. You want it to be perpendicular to the paper, so you have to make sure you have your second and third fingers around the brush with your thumb pushing against the brush in the opposite direction for stability. Hard to describe, but the only detail that matters is that you're only using 3 fingers, so there is a feeling of having to hold tightly -- but, like all artistic skills, there is also a degree of relaxation required in order to create something that even fractionally resembles beauty. We then worked on one character, fu, which means happiness/prosperity/good fortune. I didn't save any of my fu paintings, but I drew my own name on extra newspaper we were using. I hung it up in my room because the walls are so white. Here is a picture:

That's pretty much what happened yesterday. Oh! Except for the most important part: we went to McDonald's! I wanted to avoid McDonald's while I am here, but one of my better friends here LOVES McDonald's, so we decided to humor him and go. I had some great chicken nuggets -- I won't lie. At 20 yuan, it was more expensive than most of my other meals (about 10 yuan = just over a dollar!), but definitely a fun one-time experience. The best part yet: they translate the slogan "I'm lovin' it." I don't know why, but that had us in stitches. We couldn't stop laughing/singing the McDonald's song.

Anyway, that's pretty much all for now. I'll write back with more later tonight. Hope everything is going well...I miss you all a lot. Bye, for now!