(Drew)I feel like so much has happened since i last wrote an entry, perhaps thats because this is my first entry in Hangzhou!! It feels like a whole different trip not traveling around with the gang. Ok so right before i got here i was pretty nervous about several things. I hoped i would get a great host family that i would get along with well and have fun with, this has already been confirmed as i will talk about later i got two awesome host brothers. I also hoped that i would enjoy the food that we eat in Hangzhou because until now we hadnt been eating home made food only generic restaurant food which i think we were all very acclimated too and maybe starting to get a little bored of. The food i have been given is great! My family started throwing snacks at me as soon as i got in the house. In the middle of our home we have a table infront of the T.V. which gets stocked with all the snacks i like. Sometimes i have to be careful what i say that i like because as soon as i say i like somthing it mysteriously appears on the snack table the next day. The snack table currently has the most delicious apples, clementines and strawberries. Each night we eat dinner pretty much exactly at 6 P.M. Some days my host brothers grandma comes over for dinner (im not sure if its his moms mom or his dads mom i didnt ask). I used my english-chinese dictionary to show my host mom which foods i like. She has also discovered this book and is trying to study it and learn little phrases.
The first night i went out and got some oatmeal for breakfast along with various other groceries with my brother (English name Mark, Chinese name Liu Min Chao, i just call him mark) and mother. There is a large supermarket about one minute walk down the street. My current house is in a nice location, about 10-12 minutes walk from the school. My house is located on the same street as the school so its very difficult to get lost. This is also convienient because i have started running every day after school. Mark goes home and starts his homework and i spend about an hour after school doing a workout on the track (which is 300 meters, as opposed to our 400m track which really throws me off) and then head home with enough time to shower and rest for a bit before dinner.
So the first couple days at the school were a little overwhelming especailly because the second day i played soccer after lunch and got dehydrated enduceing a rather agonizeing migraine which took me out of my last two classes that day and prevented me from running after school. I think i am beggining to be able to navigate my way around campus though. Luckily we do not switch classrooms like in DS so when in doubt i just go to our classroom or the english teachers office where Terry is working or another one of the english teachers who i have come to know very well already. All the english teachers are so nice and helpful and took an instant interest in us. My english teacher (michelle) had me talk infront of my host brothers class in english about myself, colleges (the american university system which is much different than the way chinese university works), Dover Sherborn, my impressions on china, answered a few questions and basically anything else that popped into my head. I also had cady guest speak in my class becasue she is in the next class over in geometery which means she wouldnt understand it anyways and i was a bit nervous to talk infront of so many people by myself. Plus, cady loves to talk...
So the weekend has come and gone but it has been a lot of fun. Friday me, cady, her host sister eve, emily and penny all walked around west lake at night. West lake is amazing, well of course it is but you dont quite understand until you see it. There is a one kilometer long causeway across the lake that we walked across. At night there were many couples hand in hand or with thier arms around eachothers shoulders walking along the scenic strip. We made a quick stop at KFC for icecream and did a little more walking before we took a taxi home. Saturday we went back to west lake with some teachers from the school, this was more of a school event for us. Im not sure which is better west lake at night or west lake during the day... hard to decide. After west lake we made plans for a movie with our host siblings, we saw atonement which i had never even heard of but I ended up liking a lot. It was subtitled in chinese so it was basically like just watching a regular movie because you just block out the characters at the bottom after a while. Today (Sunday) we woke up early again to go fly kites with my classmates who had invited me and given me a kite which looks like a combination of a pheonix and a chicken. One of the girls who came brought a lizard which i think was a water dragon but im not sure, it was very spiky like somthing you would find in the desert. She put it on my shoulder and i walked around with it for a while, so cool!! We flew kites in wu hill square where a bunch of other people were also flying kites. I forgot that you had to run around with the kites to keep them up in the air and i got tired pretty quick. Two hours of flying kites and we took a taxi home before heading to eves apartment to make dumplings with the girls (emily, eve, cady, penny and one of thier classmates). We had a delicious lunch which was cooked by eves aunt. Eves apartment is huge! After dumplings the girls went shopping, of course. Me and mark narrowly dodged that bullet by going to play badminton with my other host brother joe and one of his classmates. We played badminton for about two hours and i was completely exhausted afterwards. I think my ping-pong skills tie in with badminton because joe, who is also good at ping pong was also good at badminton. We went to KFC afterwards because i was starving after so much running around.
Ok well these are my first expiriences in Hangzhou, im having a great time and cant wait for whatever else Hangzhou has to offer. Zai Jian until next time.
The first night i went out and got some oatmeal for breakfast along with various other groceries with my brother (English name Mark, Chinese name Liu Min Chao, i just call him mark) and mother. There is a large supermarket about one minute walk down the street. My current house is in a nice location, about 10-12 minutes walk from the school. My house is located on the same street as the school so its very difficult to get lost. This is also convienient because i have started running every day after school. Mark goes home and starts his homework and i spend about an hour after school doing a workout on the track (which is 300 meters, as opposed to our 400m track which really throws me off) and then head home with enough time to shower and rest for a bit before dinner.
So the first couple days at the school were a little overwhelming especailly because the second day i played soccer after lunch and got dehydrated enduceing a rather agonizeing migraine which took me out of my last two classes that day and prevented me from running after school. I think i am beggining to be able to navigate my way around campus though. Luckily we do not switch classrooms like in DS so when in doubt i just go to our classroom or the english teachers office where Terry is working or another one of the english teachers who i have come to know very well already. All the english teachers are so nice and helpful and took an instant interest in us. My english teacher (michelle) had me talk infront of my host brothers class in english about myself, colleges (the american university system which is much different than the way chinese university works), Dover Sherborn, my impressions on china, answered a few questions and basically anything else that popped into my head. I also had cady guest speak in my class becasue she is in the next class over in geometery which means she wouldnt understand it anyways and i was a bit nervous to talk infront of so many people by myself. Plus, cady loves to talk...
So the weekend has come and gone but it has been a lot of fun. Friday me, cady, her host sister eve, emily and penny all walked around west lake at night. West lake is amazing, well of course it is but you dont quite understand until you see it. There is a one kilometer long causeway across the lake that we walked across. At night there were many couples hand in hand or with thier arms around eachothers shoulders walking along the scenic strip. We made a quick stop at KFC for icecream and did a little more walking before we took a taxi home. Saturday we went back to west lake with some teachers from the school, this was more of a school event for us. Im not sure which is better west lake at night or west lake during the day... hard to decide. After west lake we made plans for a movie with our host siblings, we saw atonement which i had never even heard of but I ended up liking a lot. It was subtitled in chinese so it was basically like just watching a regular movie because you just block out the characters at the bottom after a while. Today (Sunday) we woke up early again to go fly kites with my classmates who had invited me and given me a kite which looks like a combination of a pheonix and a chicken. One of the girls who came brought a lizard which i think was a water dragon but im not sure, it was very spiky like somthing you would find in the desert. She put it on my shoulder and i walked around with it for a while, so cool!! We flew kites in wu hill square where a bunch of other people were also flying kites. I forgot that you had to run around with the kites to keep them up in the air and i got tired pretty quick. Two hours of flying kites and we took a taxi home before heading to eves apartment to make dumplings with the girls (emily, eve, cady, penny and one of thier classmates). We had a delicious lunch which was cooked by eves aunt. Eves apartment is huge! After dumplings the girls went shopping, of course. Me and mark narrowly dodged that bullet by going to play badminton with my other host brother joe and one of his classmates. We played badminton for about two hours and i was completely exhausted afterwards. I think my ping-pong skills tie in with badminton because joe, who is also good at ping pong was also good at badminton. We went to KFC afterwards because i was starving after so much running around.
Ok well these are my first expiriences in Hangzhou, im having a great time and cant wait for whatever else Hangzhou has to offer. Zai Jian until next time.
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