Yantai! I like it so much better than
We got on a bus and drove onto the school campus where we dropped off our stuff at the international hotel/dorm we’re staying in and then went and had breakfast. Breakfast is the worst meal of the day in terms of things that I like to eat and
The place we were eating at was hosting a wedding after party and were putting up decorations and goodie bags. They were also doing a sound check on the stereo system was hilarious since they guy just went, “Wei? Wei?” for a solid 7 minutes.
Breakfasting having been finished we returned to the dorm where we unpacked and/or took showers. I did both, though taking a shower was very unpleasant. In hindsight I feel stupid since my roommate found out how it works (not that she could figure it out. She went down to the front desk and had them show her). The knobs are not entirely the same here and so I couldn’t get it to something other than scalding hot or ice cold. I ended up taking an ice cold shower-I hear they’re good for your health. I’d rather be sick.
That bathroom shower is also a little weird in that it’s the entire bathroom. It’s called a wet shower and has a drain in the corner so you grab the hose and bath anywhere you like.
However, I must thank some higher power for the Western style toilet in our bathroom. We never did figure out the sense of a swatting toilet in a moving train. (And you know how kids always imagine that when you go to the bathroom in a plane it just goes to the ground? Apparently, Chinese trains really do that)
I’m definitely getting a less than sanitary sense from this country. In a bunch of ways. Nothing that really makes me shudder but yeah…anyway.
Took a nap and then joined some other students in a foray to the beach. It really is only about a five minute walk from our dorm. It’s not the nicest beach I’ve ever been to, but it’s also not the worst. The others complained about a smell, but I didn’t really notice anything. I think I’m a little used to beaches smelling like sea and stinky fish (as they called it). The sand was a little greenish, but I believe that was due to the fact the tide was out. I’m not going to ask questions. But like I said, not the worst and not nearly as bad as people we leading us to believe.
After the beach we waited a little while then went to dinner. We were starving because we’d napped through lunch. Seven of us went out the West gate and down a row of shops (soon to become a favorite stopping place of mine). It had a bunch of little places to eat and outside sea food vendors. Like skewered whole squid. I think I’ll try some tomorrow. There’s also this roasted bread with sweet spread on one side and salty on the other. We had some for dinner and I ate mine, and two other classmate’s who didn’t want theirs. Then I went and bought another one later this evening. It’s like heaven…bread on two wooden skewer sticks.
Dinner was at this little sketchy looking restaurant that served phenomenal food. It was also really cheap. We got several things of tea, bread, 7 dishes, and some beer for 83 kuai (11 kuai a person or a dollar and a half). And it was GOOD food. I mean, really excellent food. We’d really like to order some of it again, but we don’t know any of the names. Other than clams. I’m going to eat a boat load of clams in this city.
There was also a bakery next door where some of us bought desserts of various kinds. I’m waiting to go back for the tiramisu cake slice.
We came back and hung around for a while. Spent some time on the lobby’s computers. There’s no internet available in our rooms until after July 1st so we have to use the three public computers in the lobby. And they’re in Korean. There’s a huge Korean population here in Yantai, both as immigrant restaurant workers and students. It’s only about an hour flight and however many hours by boat from here to
We played cards in the lobby with some of them. We were playing Egyptian Rat Rummy (a fun game complete with physical violence. Just kidding-there’s only card slapping) and two guys came down to use the computers and began to talk with us a little. We asked them if they’d like to play and they did, along with a girl friend of theirs. One guy got really into it and was pretty funny to listen to. Trying to explain a semi-complicated card game in a language that’s not native to you to people to who it’s not native either can be complicated. Luckily, someone along the line invented hand gestures, the solver of all ills.
I also found out that women really exist with the high pitched voices you hear in some anime cartoons and movies. I was pretty well floored to hear the pitch of one girl using a computer next to me while she was talking to a friend. I’d figure it’d be painful to talk that high.
Later I went out with another group of people to the Yantai night market, something really interesting. Basically a market where people sell a lot of the same stuff, complete with fruit, cigarettes, fried stuff on sticks, Chinese burritos, and socks. Once you got into the alley ways where more complicated food is cooked, I couldn’t decide whether to look down to avoid all the “stuff” on the ground, or to not look and pretend I didn’t know it was there. As I said, some aspects of
Came back, watched them play a little more cards and then I tried to figure out why the DVDs I bought weren’t playing in my computer. They were about 90 cents but I want them to work, darn it! The other bootlegged copies I bought worked. Why isn’t it easy to get illegal things to work properly?!
People stare at us a lot. And say “Hello”. I guess they don’t see a lot of foreigners. One thing I didn’t see at all today was any other non-Chinese or Korean person. Not a single blond/natural red/light brown colored hair style to be found. In
The final match of Euro Cup soccer is on tonight. I wanted to watch it but it’s too hard to find a working TV. Hopefully
Tomorrow is our
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