Home soon

On Monday I start my journey home. Have to spend one night in Guangzhou, and then on Tuesday I will come home. I've also just got back from my little holiday, but I will post pictures when I get back home, because now I'm busy packing and stuff. Or at least I should be. I'm actually watching the women's final in Australian Open. Cheering for Li Na of course, but she has gotten off to a bad start unfortunately...

Happy New Year!

A bit late, yes I know. I feel like whenever I haven't written anything in a while, I just push it away, and think I'll just do it later. On Friday I go on another little holiday, so I figured I ought to publish a post before I go, if not, the one after my holiday would be way to long!

A lot of people wonder "what was your Christmas and New Year like!?" I think the best word to describe it is "absent". I went to a little Christmas party that one of the guys on my football team arranged, but I did't really get in the Christmas mood. I guess being away from home ruins it for me. Because people from different countries celebrate Christmas in different ways, so unless I'm at home in Norway with family and friends, Christmas will be absent for me. And what about New Year? I didn't do anything. I had school in the morning, and in the afternoon I played tennis. By the time I got back home, I was so tired I couldn't do anything. So I ended up going to bed at 10 p.m.

So what has the New Year brought me so far? Well, last week I had my last Chinese lessons at the university, and this weekend I went to Dali with my teacher for a little holiday.

Now I'm in Kunming again, but on Friday I head for Guangzhou, Hong Kong and Hainan. Only have like 20 days left in China now. So strange! But I'm sort of looking forward to going back to Norway and Bergen as well.

Latest events

Since I came back, I've attended school and done normal things again. The only exception is the track-and-field competition I took part in. I ran the 100 m at won! But it was very even. Ran on 14.02. Which I think is the best I have done. And considering I'm not used to using the starting thingie, and I was the last one to start, maybe I could have run a bit faster.

For winning I got a diploma and 30 kuai (ca 30 NOK)

Nice weather and nice trees at my campus!

Back in Kunming

So last week I was on holiday! An awesome 10 day trip where I went to see some of the most famous tourist attractions in China, and met a whole lot of cool people.

First stop was Xi'an, which was capital of China before Beijing. Because of this it had a lot of old and typically Chinese buildings, but what the city is most famous for are the Terracotta Warriors. I had read about how great they were, so when I saw them I didn't find them so incredible. Of course it's impressive, but if I hadn't had my student card and gotten the discount on the entrance fee, I would have felt it was a waste of money.

Terracotta Warriors

Bell Tower

Wild Goose Pagoda

Xi'an City Wall

After Xi'an, I went to Beijing. This city is great. If I come back to China I think I want to live there. At least for a little while. And the hostel I stayed at was very good as well. The common room was so cosy it was tempting to sit inside all day, just drinking tea! But I managed to get myself out of their comfy couches and went to see the main attractions.

Ready to hike a part of the Great Wall

Very steep at some places!

And it really is very long... 

(you can see it better if you click the picture for original size)

The Forbidden City

The Summer Palace

Two of the many amazing people I met; Paul and Christin

Some of the people I met in Beijing 

(the two guys I first met in Xi'an, and then also in Beijing)

After some great days in Beijing, I went to Shanghai. If I were a rich business woman, I think I would love that city. But since I'm not, I just found it OK. Might be because the weather was really bad though, that usually gives you a bad impression. But in saying that, while I was in Shanghai, I took a fast train (at one point 355 km/h) to Hangzhou, and even though it was raining like hell, I felt like that was a city I would really love if the weather was better.

The Bund

Nanjing Dong Lu

Hangzhou

not so much exciting going on...

So why am I so bad at updating my blog? Because I don't have that much to tell. If I wrote every day that I went to school, ate, studied, did some exercise, that wouldn't be so interesting. So here's a short list of other things that have happened in the last, I don't know, weeks?

• Booked tickets to go on holiday in December. A 10 days trip will take me to Xian, Beijing, Shanghai and Hangzhou.
• I've so far had 3 "exams" which all went quite well. 
• I've started taking some private Chinese lessons to speed up my learning. I've had 6 lessons now, and it's really helping. At least with the speaking. I'm still having problems remembering the characters from these lessons.
• Yesterday I had the cheapest haircut of all times. I payed 10 NOK. And I don't look like an idiot. Sometimes I REALLY like China.

Anyways, here are some pictures to make this post more, ehm, interesting.

I've eaten chicken hearts

The closest I've gotten so far to making my own pizza

Bought a lot of chewing gum...

Fancy shoes with rabbit fur? No thanks...

Green lake park

This is Green Lake Park, the park that's like a 1 min walk from where I live. Went there to study a bit one of the days the weather was nice. Actually got a bit of sunburn that day. But now the weather is bad again. And it's a bit cold. Think I'm gonna knit some gloves to match my hat.

Had a mid-term "exam" today. "Exam" because the teacher wasn't very strict. People were talking and cheating, and he could have done a lot more to prevent it. The "exam" was also very short. Finished in about 20 - 30 minutes. I know I didn't get everything right, but as far as I'm concerned they weren't mistakes that would have serious consequences in real life anyway.

The lesson we were supposed to have after the "exam" had been cancelled, so I went home to eat some breakfast, and then I went to do some exercise! I went to the university's sports ground and I ran the 100 m. Used my iPod to take the time. 15.41 sec. At first I was impressed by myself, but then I did some research (a simple google search) and found out that the women's world record holder ran on 10.49. So if I ran against her, I would be like 15 m behind her when she finishes. So now I'm not so impressed anymore. 

lazy

This week has been a lazy week. Was planning on going to the supermarket on Tuesday, but I ended up doing it yesterday, cause I was too lazy to do it earlier. Weather has been great the last few days though. Even got a sunburn yesterday. Next week I have my first midterm exam as well. Have to know about 110 Chinese characters. So today and tomorrow I'm going to be revising.