i’m back

Apologies for my absence from blogging lately.  I have now relocated from LA to Seattle and spent the first few days doing touristy stuff.  It was a whirlwind which included a Mariner’s game, trip to Mt. Rainier, a day in Vancouver B.C., and hitting just about every site in downtown Seattle.  And of course leaving some time to watch the Olympics.  There will be more details about everything in future posts, I am just waiting for the pictures to accompany my words.

unemployed

What exactly was I thinking when I decided to study in China for ten months without any source of income?  Add the month prior to departure when I will be in Seattle, and a month after the program to actually find a job and that is a whole year that I am not a member of the working class.  Pretty scary thought now that the realization has hit me.  Yesterday I was so worried about it that I was seriously considering only studying for a semester rather than an academic year.  Figured I would be refunded some money which I could add to the savings, it would be less time that I have to support myself with that savings, and wouldn’t be stressed about finances every day that I am away.  Plus have a little extra to do some traveling afterward.  Good plan, right?

Then I thought, how much will I really learn in four months?  I have read in multiple places that you have to give China at least six months before you even begin to scratch the surface of the country and its culture.  So I did some math and figure I can make it on a $50/wk budget.  Yikes!  (All tuition, lodging, and insurance is already paid for.)  While that is less than I am used to, I think I can do it.  I am actually looking forward to it in a way, it is like a game to me.  Still, if I can somehow get a job while I am there (don’t know if it is allowed) that will be a huge relief.  Until then, feel free to yell at me if I post about any shopping sprees in China.  (That doesn’t apply for when I am still in the US, I gotta buy stuff to be prepared!)

packing procrastinator

Remember that time in an earlier post when I called myself proactive? Yeah… apparently that is not true when it comes to packing. When choosing my last day of work I gave myself a whole week to tie up loose ends and pack before flying to Seattle. Somehow it got to be Thursday and I had barely made a dent. Now, I could analyze the situation and say, “maybe it is because i don’t really want to leave” or I could just admit that I am a lazy bum. Whatever the case may be I finally got motivated today because I really did not want to spend tomorrow, my last full day in LA, doing what I had all week to do.

As the pile of boxes kept growing I was getting more and more concerned about how I was actually going to get them to a post office. Life without a car has been great, with the exception of moving day. I had two options, the first being to call a taxi just to load, drive a mile, and then unload. I figured this would make the taxi driver very unhappy. So the other option was to walk to Target, borrow a cart, put the boxes in the cart and wheel it to the post office. This is actually what I had decided on doing until the amount of boxes I had grew beyond what would fit in one cart. Really at a loss of what to do now, I was ecstatic when my prince of a boyfriend appeared! Without me saying anything to him that day of my troubles, he drove the 20 or so miles from work on his lunch break to surprise me AND save the day. This one’s a keeper!

So that’s it, now it’s done. Seven boxes containing most of my possessions are in the hands of the US Postal Service on their way to Seattle. I just hope the rest will fit in two check-in bags and one carry-on!

the joy of firewalls

I just found out that China could very well have a firewall against wordpress sites. I’ve spent all morning trying to recreate my current site on blogspot, but have been unable to come up with something I’m satisfied with. So I am going to put that on hold for now and just hope that this was a unique case and I will in fact be able to log on to wordpress from China. If not, you all will be redirected to a new URL in the near future. In the meantime though just keep coming back here until I figure out what to do.

random checks not so random?

Yes, I am again writing about the metro and I again encourage everybody to pay for their right of passage. While waiting for the train to arrive at Wilshire/Vermont station this morning I noticed two metro officers walking around also waiting for the train. Funny thing about this situation is I swear they were scoping out the people on the platform betting each other on who didn’t have a ticket. Perhaps that is how they choose the car to raid. (If I didn’t make it clear in the earlier post, they seem to only check one car and then hop off at the next station.) I can’t be certain this is what they were doing because they were speaking Spanish and I don’t understand Spanish, but judging by their facial expressions and body language I really think it is. Maybe that’s because I would probably be doing the same thing if I were them. Gotta keep the job interesting somehow, right?

the big question

Day two at the consulate proved to be even more fun than yesterday. First of all, I guess they “gave me the wrong price” yesterday. I am not entirely sure what they meant by that since I did end up paying the $150 they quoted. I think it means my visa was not actually ready though they never said as much. Reason being it took her awhile to find my passport then she took it to the back room and told me to have a seat. In my mind, this proved they do make mistakes so it helped build the confidence to argue for the correct visa which I had been debating about doing since leaving the consulate yesterday. So I made a bit of a fuss but nothing came of it. While they admitted to having my letter of invite I gave to them back in May, they refused to go look for it. Not that I can really blame them as it was over two months ago. Sure, I probably could have put up even more of a fight, but I felt like causing a scene at the consulate was not in my best interest. I would assume they have the power to revoke any visa they did give me. Perhaps it was for the best because having three different visas in my passport issued around the same time, two of them with CANCELLED stamped across the middle, might look a bit suspicious.

When I asked the girl behind the window (who was all too ready to be rid of me) if I could change an L visa to an F visa while in China she said she did not know and to call my school. So that is what I did. Turns out that, because of the Olympics, China is no longer even giving out letters of invite for F visas. The very helpful guy who answered the phone said that all students were just getting tourist visas now and would extend (which you can do twice) or change them in China. He even seemed surprised that I had been issued a 60 day one and said I was “better off than most.” For some reason knowing that there will be other people in my group whose situations will be more of a hassle than mine makes me feel infinitely better. Does that make be a bad person? Anyway, this guy on the phone said that after the Olympics the visa process should return to normal.

I have been corresponding with a guy I found through his blog (http://www.bridgestochina.org/chinagold) who is currently in China and works for a program similar to the one I am traveling through. He recently took some people through Tibet and had this to say:

“Regulations on Tibet change faster than the winds and nobody knows what things will be like after the Olympics. If something goes on in Tibet during the Olympics things will get tough over there, and I feel after the Olympics they’re going to have to start a whole new security process in Tibet, but it should be open to foreigners.”

The big question seems to be, “What will China be like after the Olympics?” Nobody knows for sure, but everybody is hoping for the best. The exciting thing is that I will be there to experience it first hand. If things get easier for foreigners then that is wonderful because it is less to worry about. If they become more difficult then many things are going to be a challenge but I will grow because of it and come out with some great stories to tell. Sounds like a win-win to me.

complications at the consulate

Being the anxious, sometimes proactive person that I am, I went to get my chinese visa back in May. The experience was a breeze, I was the first person in line when I brought in my application, first person in line the next day when I went to pick up my visa, and was in and out within five minutes both times. I was all smiles until later that day I was examining the new addition to my passport and noticed that the “Enter Before” date said August 29th.  Not good when I don’t arrive until September 9th.  Apparently even though they ask you on the application when you plan to arrive they don’t pay any attention to it and automatically put three months from the date you apply. That is all well and good for people who do things last minute, but not for me.

So since my first experience at the consulate was swift I waited until my last week in LA when I was no longer working to go back and get this fixed. Things weren’t so easy-breezy this time. I no longer had all the documents I needed because they kept them the first time around and I did not have the forethought to photocopy anything other than my application. Instead of recognizing their error they said I could not have the F visa for 90 days. Instead all they could offer was a tourist visa for 60 days. This seems really stupid to me since I obviously had the paperwork for them to issue it to me the first time. Since I was going to have to change/extend my visa once I got to China anyway, I am really hoping I can do the same thing with this new tourist visa. And in addition to all that, I have to pay another $150! This all seems really unfair, but as long as they are letting me into China I guess I can take it from there. I hope.

long way

If you have any interest in travel, motorcycles, or Ewan McGregor you will want to check out Long Way Round and Long Way Down if you haven’t done so already. A couple of years ago I watched the Long Way Round mini series on DVD where Ewan McGregor and his buddy Charley Boorman travel East from London to New York on motorcycles. Apparently they enjoyed their adventure because they recently did a follow up called Long Way Down where they take their motorcycles from Scotland to South Africa. Having heard about this awhile ago but being unable to easily acquire the DVD, I was super excited to find out that last Thursday they were going to play a two hour director’s cut at selected theaters across the US.

Obviously this series, being mostly in Africa, had somewhat of a different vibe than the last one. In both adventures the team partners up with Unicef and will stop by to offer help at a few sites along their route. While there is devastation everywhere, so many of the countries in Africa are just heartbreaking. Here is what Ewan had to say after visiting a school in Kenya that had been a massacre site a couple years earlier.

“You can’t conceive what happened here, you can’t possibly imagine what would drive people to do that. They stole all of the villager’s livestock, they killed 60 villagers and 20 children, attacking the school. You can see the bullet holes.

I mean the most horrific thing is that all the ones that were old enough to understand when the teacher came out saying ‘run, run’ ran, and all the little totty ones were just standing here, didn’t really understand, so they didn’t run. And that’s just too much. And they still don’t know why. They still don’t know why – who did it or what for.”

And this was just Kenya. There are stories from Rwanda, Uganda, and others. But after shedding a tear you can’t help but be uplifted. It always seems that those who have the least are the happiest and most content. The smiles and laughter and music and dance that come from those who’ve suffered so much loss is inspiring. When I was eighteen I got a tattoo on my back after reading the book Stolen Lives to serve as a constant reminder not to take things for granted. I have lived a privileged life, but sometimes I can be guilty of forgetting that. Perhaps I should have gotten the tattoo in a place I didn’t have to look in the mirror to see.

OK, despite how I have made it sound LWR and LWD are not downers and I highly recommend them both. The commentary between Ewan and Charley while on the road is laugh out loud funny, the scenery is breathtaking, and like I menationed before, the people they encounter are inspiring.