I’ve been unable to update during the last few months, because of laziness, the worst internet in the world, travelling and more. But here they are, the last two weeks of my time in China. I’m so unprepared – I still have two more laaarge boxes of stuff to send back home, and I’ve been too lazy for the past two weeks to just buy in some strong tape and send them off. Needless to say, I have a lot to do.

I’m going to write about my small backpacking trip around the south of China with Monique and Nicole when I get back home (because I want to post pictures at the same time). We travelled to Hong Kong, Macau, Guilin, Yangshou, Xing Ping, Chengdu and Leshan, and I have tons of pictures and stories. In Hong Kong, we went to Disneyland – and I took so many panda pictures in Chengdu!

Also, I have a really bad cold. The throat-rasping, lung-spitting kind. Suits me well for standing over a half hour outside in cold, rainy weather and minimal clothing while trying to hail a cab. Damn the Chinese for not having a queue system, or manners enough to let the person who hailed the cab drive off in it. Every time I managed to get the attention of a free cab, some damn person came running from the side, jumped into my cab and drove off before I could protest. And that happened several times.

Manners isn’t the greatest thing with cab, metro and traffic culture in general down here, so I get happy every time I see the governments campaigns of behaving. Lately, there’s been “metro guards” in the larger metro stations during rush hour. They force the people to cue up on the sides so people can get off before the others get on, only to fail miserably when the train doors open and the Chinese get into a desperate (no, not kidding) frenzy of getting themselves as fast as possible into the train (while elbowing, kicking and screaming) – ignoring the people inside the wagons just as desperate attempts to get out.

It’s the same thing for the seats too. “The battle of the seats”. Be one second too slow, and someone else has put their ass down in the seat you were targeting. If there are free seats when the door opens, you’ll see people diving to get them. Even if there are old people needing them nearby. I don’t see people giving away their seats very often down here. It’s much more common to really pretend like you aren’t paying attention, so you can keep the seat to yourself.

I stood at People Square for a while last week, just observing. Every time the people got forced to stand in a queue (and the queue sneaks and the ones who still didn’t get it got scolded and sent to the back of it), they’d break it and start running towards the doors as soon as they opened. I’d say amusing, if it weren’t for the fact that I have to take that damn metro reaaaaally often during rush hour. I’m going to see if I can tape it sometime before I leave. We’ll. Otherwise I can just ask to borrow some videos from friends.

On another topic, it’s also really warm here now, but the temperature changes fast.. It goes from sunny 35 degrees Celsius to 25 and raining so fast that around 20 to 23 degrees seems icy with the air condition on in the metro.

Or maybe I’ve been for a while, I can’t quite say. I think it might just be a part of the entire shock of travelling so far and being incredibly far away from home. According to everything with theories, it’s supposed to be a part of the phases of a culture shock. I must still be in the honeymoon phase.

Everything is so weird, so cosy. Y’know. Except the beggar children without eyelids (the kids mother was following him around in the metro train) and the beggars in general. They’re not so cosy. The architecture, the alleys, the people selling street food, the club culture, it’s so.. oh year. I’m on a honeymoon trip. Seriously, the street food vendors?

Still, even though I’m enrolled into different Chinese classes at an EF school, I still kept my subscription to Chinesepod. Chinesepod has podcasts with lessons about the Chinese culture, the language and more. So all I need to do to repeat what I’ve learnt in one day’s EF class, is to put on my mp3-player and start listening. Learn while you walk. I like that concept. And I’m obsessing too easily.

Usually, it’s the persons mother (or in some cases grandmother) who are caring (not sure if I really agree though) enough to put out their kid’s height, weight, age, preferences, work type, current income, hobbies, and if the person’s not bad looking – a picture, on a paper sheet and hang it on the nearest bush or bench.

Their children are usually too busy working and making a career to look around for a boy- or girlfriend, and so I suppose those old people (with a wish for a grand kiddo) see it as their duty to find someone for them. There was a huge flock of elderly people in the park nearby Barbossa (a quite expensive place) on People’s Square, all of them looking to find someone – although not for themselves.

But what do the couples who end up marrying through this market say to their kids?
Kiddo: Daddy! How did you and mummy meet?
Daddy: Oh, eh, yeah. They were advertising for her at the spouse market..
Probably the worst explanation to give a kid.

I actually wanted to take a picture of one of the advertising sheets, but were told not to (by hand movements), and since I’m polite I only took one. Too bad that picture didn’t become readable.

Stuff on topic;
- I Spy Shanghai; Marriage park.

The seats were good, the food was better than the usual plane food (and you got to choose between two dishes for each meal), they showed decent movies and we all got a blanket and a pillow each. Also, no one used the seat next to me (at first, anyway), so I had a lot of space to put my things and an old, Chinese woman at the end of our three seat row. Now, that old woman is a whole other story.

Sounds good, hm?

I got really home sick about half-ways into the flight. I missed the parents, the cat, my siblings, family and friends, my music, not to mention my own room. The plane was shaking every minute, and that old lady I mentioned before took all of the pillows – including mine when I took a small trip to the toilet. She didn’t need them though – she wasn’t the old, shaky kind who needs pillows for comfort – my pillow became her cuddle bear for the last five hours of the trip. Also, she wasn’t even polite enough to wait for me to stand up and move out of the row so she could pass into the hallway, instead she stood up in her seat and walked over me, stepping on my things in the process.

Being so far away from home, and without a pillow it was too hard to find a comfortable position to sleep in, the homesickness got rather bad. And the crying-cliché Hong Kong romance drama they were showing on screen didn’t really make anything better. Good movie though, funny with good actors and a very handsome main actor. It was named “lies”-something, but I really don’t think I’ll find it with subtitles even if I remember the name.

Anyway, I got over the homesickness when I got breakfast, and I’ve still only had two more hours of it (the homesickness, not the breakfast) during the one week and two days I’ve been here. Maybe it’s because I’ve been so busy, or maybe it’s because I’ve managed to get some friends. Or maybe it’s because I sort of distanced myself during the time I couldn’t contact people outside Shanghai – I didn’t get an internet connection in my apartment before yesterday. I felt a bit helpless the very first day though. My EF connection didn’t give me the right apartment address (so I’m glad the EF driver knew where I was going to stay), and insisted on the schools address being my own – so I couldn’t go too far in case I managed to get lost. I didn’t know my way around, didn’t know where the store was and didn’t have anyone to contact. A girl named Yi Chu called me later in the evening though. She’s Swedish, a classmate of mine and arrived on the same day as me. We ate dinner at Kentucky Fried Chicken that night, and, even though the food definitely wasn’t good, it made me feel less helpless to get a friend who lived nearby.

I actually managed to meet one of my classmates, Nicole, from EF already on the airport. We’d both ordered a transfer from the airport and to our places, so we both got into the EF cab, and let’s just say we weren’t exactly impressed by taxi driver’s driving abilities. It’s not very common to have belts in the back seats either, but we’ve still been advised by the school to sit in the back when taking a taxi. The most dangerous seat is obviously next to the driver.

The weather down here is really damp, at least comparing to Norway. I actually started sweating on the airport (and it takes quite a lot before I start breaking a sweat back home), and the heat inside the airport was actually quite chill opposed to the weather outside. It’s almost as hot as it was at Lanzarote when I was there with my family in May last year.

You get very thirsty here and, although you can’t drink the tap water at all, the bottled water is very cheap. I usually buy the large ones costing less than 4 RMB (about the same in NOK) and then fill up a small bottle, 1.50 RMB or less, to bring along with me.

I’m going to make a post about the apartment and the neighbourhood somewhat later, but let’s just say the apartment is nice. Very nice. Wood panel floors, a ceiling with different levels, pretty furniture and turquoise sofas. It’s “a bit” worn down as well, and I’m definitely going to buy my own cups, bowls, plates, forks and such. It’s also got a gas oven, which I’m very scared to use because you need to light the gas with a lighter. A short lighter. Did I ever mention I’m scared of flames?

Also, I was rather shocked when I found out that it’s just as comfortable to sleep with a blanket in the windowsill as using the bed. If you knock on the “mattress” you’ll hear a metal echo. Ironic though, I thought my bed at home was a bit uncomfortable. I don’t get why they make beds as hard as this – it removes the point of having a bed.

Pictures are on my Flickr album!

Did we change time zones already, or have I’ve really only been sitting on this plane since 13:30? That can’t be right, and I’m so confused. Also, my dearest mp3-player, a Creative Zen Micro Photo, just died. And no, not power wise. I brought an extra battery in case that would happen. There must be something wrong with the firmware? Something certainly is wrong with it. It automatically goes into recovery modus, and none of the given options work (although I must admit I haven’t tried reinstalling the firmware yet). Hm, I need an internet connection – hopefully the airport in Frankfurt has a free one. Without music, I’m in for one verrry long plane ride. Other than that, I need hand cream (desperately) and a place to charge my netbook. The Aspire One’s only got about one hour left before the power shuts down – a three cell battery just doesn’t get you very far.

Oh, and the nice lady in the next seat gave me a carrot. ^^ Mucho appreciated.

You know, travelling far away from everything you’re used to isn’t quite as scary as some people like to think.

It’s thrilling, fun and not to mention something you can learn a lot from. Mucho self-development. Especially if you’re on your own.

Right now I’m sitting at Oslo Airport, gate 40, waiting for my plane. While this one goes to Frankfurt, my actual destination is Shanghai – and I can’t wait to get there! I’d post some pictures, but there’s not all that much to see (and the internet here isn’t free either, which means I’ll have to do something else than surfing the net). I’m staying in Shanghai until the beginning of June, so I’ll have plenty of time for both self-developing and taking pictures! My Nikon D50 is staying home in Norway though, along with all my wonderful lenses so I’ll have to get used to a small, compact Lumix instead.

There’s so much I’m looking forward to do! Like visiting the textile market, the botanical garden and the old part of Shanghai. Much more, too, but it wouldn’t be all that useful to write a long list and post it here. I’m also quite curious about the weather – I’ve heard it’s hot, humid and, erm, rainy? I’ll need to buy a new umbrella when I get there. A fancy, colourful one. ^^ And a computer lock for my mini-Acer.

Ooh, I think we can board the plane now! ~<3