Whose sister is so thoughtful it hurts?

That, would be my sister. Check out the spread below of the awesome goodies my sister sent me in a care package, only the best thing I've received in the mail, ever.


FOOD! She sent me food! I know this is going to sound ridiculous, but I was actually really really craving that microwave cake thing. If you didn't know, I have a majorly soft spot for super disgusting processed junked food; I'm kinda obsessed. So tonight for dinner, I had mac and cheese, canned tuna salad, and hot chocolate. Mmmmmm. I'm going to save the cake for a special occasion.

My sister is way thoughtful. I mean who would read an email from me saying, "It's so cold here and my skin is so dry that my hands are actually starting to crack and bleed," and think, "Send that woman some hand cream!" And who would webcam with me, see a disgusting cold sore on my upper lip, ask, "Ew, what's that on your lip?" and then send me some ScarZone! to reduce scarring on my lip. And who would send a portrait of themselves, in fact the same portrait that covers our entire refrigerator back at home? Yep. Only my sister. :)

Oh yeah,. I forgot to include this in the photo, but I also got different kinds of Chinese medicine with post-its on each one. Each of the post-its had things like, "Mom says buy this for colds," "Mom says buy this for sore throats." That's right, my mother sent me Chinese medicine from the States, to me in China so that I can show the packaging to someone in a store to buy it for me.

Are we noticing a pattern here? Yes, my family thinks I get sick a lot. And it's true.

They also love me a lot, which makes me happy. And makes me miss them a lot.

I'm sick.

Here is the food I eat when I'm sick in China (which is pretty much the same food I eat when I'm sick at home).


This is preserved duck egg and pork porridge with green onions. Super yummy stuff.


This is some more fried leafy green vegetable.


And here's a moon cake that Joe gave all of us. This one was bright green inside. I like the lotus paste and seed ones the best. Also I stole some green tea from the office, so now I can really enjoy the mooncakes.


And now I'm going to post pictures of my room here in China. (If you're on facebook, these are the same pictures).


Here's the view of my room from the long hallway (coming from the front door). The room is a double so it came with two sets of everything, including full sized beds. I pushed the beds together and now I have one massive massive bed.



That's a giant closet cabinet thing. There's so much space, and I didn't bring very much stuff. And that's my wall of pictures. Those are the same pictures I had in my Clark I room during senior year.


We made a trip to Ikea, and I bought this pretty bedspread which just brightens up my day. No more sterile-white-hospital-sheet look .

That's my desk and the hallway leading to the kitchen and bathroom. I posted a map of China and a map of Beijing. Yay for internet access!


Here's my tiny tiny kitchen. Tiny refrigerator, tiny stove top (with no oven), and tiny sink that emits nasty foul smells. And those are tiny croissants on top of my regular-sized microwave. I haven't used my stove yet. I'm a little scared. There's a sign in Chinese in my kitchen, and I haven't figured out what it says yet, but there are a bunch of exclamation marks on it.


That's my shower, with exposed pipes.



And there's the bottom half of my shower. Yep, I just have a shower curtain separating my shower area from my toilet. So that means that every time I shower, the entire bathroom floor is soaked with shower water. Sounds pretty nasty, but you get used to it. And this is pretty typical of Chinese bathrooms.


My sink area and more exposed pipes.


I'm actually loving my accommodations. I don't really mind living in a dorm room (even though we were originally promised actual apartments). I'm just glad I have my own space. I feel like such a brat talking about how I need to have my own room, especially considering that Chinese college students live in dorm rooms with 6-8 people.

Picture Time!

So while walking on the overpass to go to my subway stop at GuangBo Xue Yuan, I saw this donkey in the middle of the street. What it was doing there, I have no idea. But it had a pile of food it was nibbling on, and a snazzy little outfit too, so it's gotta belong to someone. I've seen it a few other times around campus. Maybe you can pay to feed it?


This is at the south gate of ChaoYang Park. This was the day when we were going to see Nine Inch Nails at the Beijing Pop Music Festival (obviously inaccurately named). But we waited so long for my friend Clay to show up, that by the time he did, we were too tired for the concert, so we spent about 20 minutes selling/scalping our tickets.


This was our first night out in Sanlitunr. Pretty lights every night of the week, aggressive people practically dragging us into every bar tempting us with drink specials and cheap hookah.


Here we are outside Worker's Stadium, getting ready to go to Mix. As you can see, there's an Outback Steakhouse, though I hear it's pretty awful. And Vics expanded, so maybe we'll go there next time. P.S. we got those roses at dinner at this awesome Chinese restaurant called Berena's Bistro.


One of the staff people Joe got all of us a box of mooncakes for Mid-Autumn Festival (which is coming up on Tuesday). The mooncakes were soo yummy!


Mmmm.... my favorite... leafy green veggies. This looks like spinach, but it's not. Apparently it's called youmai cai, and it's just as yummy!


Xiaolong bao! Super yummy stuff. These dumplings, along with the leafy greens above, make for the perfect meal. Another great comfort food.


This is a stand at the night market in WangFuJing. That's right, it's sea star on a stick, and apparently centipede on a stick. But all this stuff is pure novelty meant to get a rise out of the tourists.


And here we are at the famous Beijiing roast duck restaurant, Quan Ju De, at WangFuJing Street. They carve the duck right in front of us at the table. I've had roast duck 3 times already since I've been in Beijing. And I am loving the stuff. The restaurant's so fancy that the chef doesn't even breathe on the food (hence the face mask, haha).