Maral in China -

February 2

Sup.

So last night I went to the internetcafe with Ricky.

The other 27 people went to the bar.

I know that its a big no-no of me to do this so early

(not follow on activities with the group) but honestly.. cba.

If they find it rude or find me strange. Couldn't care less.

I'm not here to make people love me. I'm just gonna be myself,

and in time they will notice how much of a geek I am anyways so

there really is no need to do something I don't really want to do.

I'm not saying going to the bar is boring. It's fun, and the people

truly are great, I'd love to go to the bar with them.

I just really missed Jesse, That's all.

So we went there, stayed for a good hour or so. Ricky skyped with

his girlfriend (as usual) and Jesse wasn't online so I played some

Devil May Cry 4. I've already completed the game so wasn't really fun.

Besides, I completely sucked at it on PC (no joke.). Xbox 360 ftw.

After a while Jesse came online and I was instantly superduper happy.

But it faded away pretty quickly and was replaced with <b>a lot</b>

of sadness. So naturally I started crying. Thing is, everything here

is great. It really is. I love it here and there is no chance I would

like to go home. This place is unreal, beautiful and fantastic.

People are amazing and I do feel very welcome here. But it has really

been draining a lot on my energy. There is only so much one can take.

The changes are massive. At home I have my Kingsize bed, everything

I need, warmth, friends, private space, you name it.

Here I share my room with 3 other girls so there is no private space.

We sleep in the tiniest beds and there is no heat. The shower is...

I don't even wanna get in on that topic.

I mean, these are things we take for granted. It's not that I don't like it here.

This is manageable. It's actually quite thrilling and lots of fun.

It's something else. I don't mind to be honest. I sleep well in my tiny bed.

It's just drastic and different. You need time to adapt.

Dealing with that and to be social to the max all the time,

It is a challenge. Personally, I don't think I have problems socialising,

but I also don't feel like I'm in need of it constantly,

so in that way I may come of as a lonewolf a bit, I'm not sure actually,

but It's the way I like it to be. You know what I mean? I don't have any

problems approaching people or having them approach me.

I don't even want to think about how hard this must be for some of the people

here who are less good/comfortable at socialising in general.

/rant.

So I was saying something.

Yes. I see. I started crying at the internetcafe. Haha.

(well it was just silent tears and some sobs, lol.)

I cried because talking to Jesse made me miss him so much more and knowing

I had to leave soon just made it worse. However, random fact. When I started crying,

Rickys girlfriend started to cry aswell (not knowing I was crying).

so there was like a /cryfest at the internetcafe.

Ricky was so confused because he hated seeing his girlfriend cry.

So he was consoling her and almost started to cry himself, then he sees my with

tears running down my face and it was just too much at the same time so he got

really really confused and sad. Since he's somewhat like a mentor to me he

also feels like it's his responsibility to make sure I have a good time.

Having me cry was probably quite shocking

because I'm very very happy in general and I'm never really sad or anything.

So he sat there consoling his girlfriend through skype and wiping my tears,

repeating don't cry, don't cry to us both, haha.

It must have looked so funny to the others at the internetcafe,

because when I turned around I'd notice lots of chinese people just looking at us

confused as hell. Realising that, I couldn't stop laughing. After just 2 minutes

or so I was happy again. It was such a weird downswing and it came so fast,

but it also disappeared as fast as it came. So I guess thats good, but still.

Can't wait until Jesse comes over.

He said he'd get his visa sorted asap, so thats cool.

I guess it's not really in his hands though because he has to

wait for Josh cuz they're going to thailand. and yeah, long story & not mine sooo..

make 3j55 blog about it if you wanna know about it. :p.

After the internetcafe we went to the bar to meet up with the others.

I bought a beer, but didn't drink any of it, so gave it to Drew instead.

The others had gotten quite drunk by the time we were there.

Or well, most of them anyway. After 30 minutes or so Ricky, John, Drew and

I decided to go eat. (It's always Ricky who want's to eat at night)

So we had noodles. Was really good. After that we went back home since it

was quite late and cuz we had courses early in the morning.

John really wanted to go back on a motorbike so we decided we'd do that. Haha.

It costs you like 3 Yuan for a ride home. It's really cheap.

Me and John shared a motorbike and damn they go so fast.

It's quite thrilling, especially in the curves. My first thought-

"does my insurance cover this if I get hurt?".

Went to sleep as soon as I got home.

Today we got up so early and I was freezing once again.

Because we have no heat. So during nights it gets really really cold,

but the funny thing is, the cold hasn't gone away. So it remains cold

like this throughout the whole day. It's... soo.... baaad.. hahaha.

Can't wait for the weather to get better. In a month it will definitely be better.

The weather wary a lot here. It's always different.

The day I arrived we had sun and it felt like a hot summerday in sweden,

next day.. felt like winter but without snow. Haha. So horrible, but fascinating.

Anyhow.

Today we started our classes, we have a very busy schedule so

we're basically always up to something. My next class starts in 10 minutes and

it's Chinese language. So that will be interesting.

We're also having taichi lessons. whatthefuck? So cool.

But I don't think it's gonna be much fighting since

it's about finding inner peace or something at first?

Okay I have no clue to be honest. I just have a faint

memory of a movie I used to watch with Jessica when we were kids,

it was our favourite and we didn't understand SHIT out of it.

But it was called "Taichi masters" or something.

I'm off to class now, so I'll update laters.

Yoyoyo, late update (since its actually the third while I'm typing this)

but Chinese was soo freaking hard to learn. We got to learn PIN YIN or something,

and sigh... pronounciation is ridiculous. After that we had Chinese culture.

By the end of the day I was dead beat. Just wanted to sleep.

After dinner a few of us gathered around a table to talk when suddenly

John comes down the stairs with a deck of cards. We played a game called "China".

Was lots of fun. We were 8 people and we were divided up in 2 teams.

Team 1 : Ricky, Patrick, Charlie and John

Team 2 : Hughie, Leo, Linnea and Me

I'd explain the game but this post is already super

long and grats to whoever made it this far. After playing some most of

the people went into town. So left was only me, Hughie and Charlie.

We played a weird game I don't even remember the name of.

After a while I told em I was going to the internetcafe and they said

they'd come with. I took a shower and off we went. Rachel decided to

come along. On the bus to town all of them had a change of heart

and wanted to go to the bar instead. I really wanted to go to the internetcafe,

so I could talk to Jesse.

So we all went to the internetcafe where we were gonna stay for 10 minutes.

10 minutes ended up being an hour for me.

Unfortunately I got cut off because the time ran out,

so didn't get to say goodbye. The others left after 20 and I said I'd

come to Lucy's Place when I was done. (Lucy's place is the name of the bar

where all of us hang. The owner is a friend of Rickys so we get discount n stuff.)

Joined the rest of them and seemed to be quite many of us at Lucy's.

We played some kind of "What am I game". Was lots of fun. Didn't really

drink because we had school the next day 8 in the morning and it was already late.

After a while Ricky wanted to go eat (surprise?) so me and Ricky went

to eat noodles at the same noodlebar we were in the other night.

Tasted really good. After that we went back to the bar and from the bar

Ricky and I went to the internetcafe again. (Just for 15 minutes though.

because I just wanted to talk to jesse some more since we got cut off earlier)

After that we walked back home. When we got back, it was really late and people

were already asleep. Didnt wanna wake the girls in my room up so I very

quietly took my toothbrush and toothpaste, brushed my teeth and then

snuck into my ridiculously cold bed and went to sleep. Zzzzz.