Home

I am home. Well, I am in a small room in an apartment I am sharing with my host grandmother on the eleventh floor of a building near Tsinghua and Peking Universities (and, as it happens, just around the block from the hotel we stayed in for IMUSE). Home for the next three months. Before I go any further, I suggest you listen to the song "Home" as you read the next part because it will make my writing seem a lot more entertaining.

My host family consists of the grandmother, who lives in the same apartment as I, smokes all the time, and is incredibly difficult for me to understand (she doesn't have teeth and doesn't wear dentures, so she slurs a lot), the mother, who is a lawyer and who seems like the head of the family in my estimation (or at least the instigator of hosting students), the father, who also smokes incessantly and who I haven't really gotten to know that well yet, and the son, who is a twelve-year-old only child. The rest of the family lives in an apartment one floor up. The smoking in the house is hard for me to get used to, but there is no polite way I can think of asking them to stop. I have played Xiangqi with the son, Jimmy, for the past two nights, and have really enjoyed that. I ate dinner with the family both nights, which they don't have to provide, but which they kindly have offered. They parents and son speak at least a little English, but they have thankfully spoken Chinese except to explain difficult words for me. I think the family will be a lot of fun to get to know (I will provide pictures soon, but for now you'll have to do with HK pictures and a picture of my room).

I was going to live with another W&M student in this apartment, but the grandma decided to return to Beijing from the countryside at the last minute, so it will just be me, which I prefer, since it will hopefully be more personal and more Chinese. If you're interested, here is an interesting story about foreigners in China from the Economist. I think it does a really good job showing the issues and differences foreigners find in China. I'll try to find the positive side to the debate for my next post.

We immersion Chinese students got our class schedule for the next semester:

Class Schedule for Immersion Track

(Fall 2012)

Time	Monday	Tuesday	Wednesday	Thursday	Friday
9:00am-10:50 am
11:00am-12:00 pm	One-on-One	One-on-One	One-on-One	One-on-One	One-on-One
Lunch Break
1:00pm-1:50 pm	Comprehensive	Comprehensive	Comprehensive	Comprehensive	Weekly Quiz 1:00pm-3:00pm
2:00pm -2:50 pm	Comprehensive	Comprehensive	Comprehensive	Comprehensive
3:00pm - 4:00 pm	Drill	Drill	Drill	Drill	Language Practicum 3:00pm-5:00pm
Dinner
6:00pm-6:50pm	Discussion	Discussion	Discussion	Discussion
7:00pm-8:00pm	Spoken Chinese	Spoken Chinese	Spoken Chinese	Oral Test
Note: There will be a total of 27 in class hours each week for immersion Chinese. Minor changes might occur due to unforeseen circumstances. One-on-One session includes 10 minutes pronunciation tutoring.

It looks like quite a workload that deserves its tough reputation. I like that I will be able to sleep late/talk with friends and family in my morning and their evening. We will also avoid traffic, which saves tons of time (when we took a bus to Tsinghua or Peking during rush hour in IMUSE, it took us about an hour to get to a place that should have taken five minutes). I'm psyched.

 My room. Not unpacked quite yet - I am going to talk with my host mom about getting a dresser

 During one of my last days in HK, I went to Peng Chau, a small outlying island, and hiked around the beautiful scenery

 It felt wonderful to be able to scramble over boulders and beaches without worrying about my back

 The view of Mirador Mansion, the building where both of my hostels (as well as dozens others) were, from the inner courtyard

My tiny little single room (though I did have a bathroom to myself). Yes, that is Nutella on the suitcase. Mmmmm...