A few weeks ago it was my Thai friend’s birthday, so she invited me and some other exchange students over to her host family’s house for lunch. After lunch we drank tea in the traditional Chinese way. I had never experienced a Chinese tea “ceremony” (I’m not really sure you could call it that), so it was an interesting experience for me. First the tealeaves were washed, and then tea was poured over the tea set a few times. The tea set consisted of a pot, cups, brushes (no idea what they are for, as they were not used), and they all sat over this box type thing which had space at the top for tea to drip down into. After all of that washing and tea spilling, we finally drank the tea! Fun fact: black tea is called “red tea” in Chinese.
Later that day I went over to my other Thai friend’s house, and she cooked some Thai curry. It was actually the spiciest thing I’ve ever eaten, but it was of course still delicious. Her host mom then showed me their oven and was like, “Tomorrow you come over and make American food! We have an oven.” So then the next day I was eating lunch and I got a call from her daughter who told me, “I heard you’re coming over to make potato soup. Meet me at the bookstore.” Shopping for American ingredients was an interesting experience. We had to go to a Japanese grocery store, but we were able to find everything after looking for what felt like ages. Then we returned to their house and I made baked potato soup and cookies. They both turned out decently. The soup was a little bit burnt, though.
A few days after that food experience, it was my host brother’s birthday. We didn’t really do much except for eat noodles and cake. Chinese people eat really long noodles on their birthday, which symbolizes a long life.
At the beginning of December I FINALLY (after three months of waiting) got my school uniform. I had heard they were coming in the first week of December, and so one day after a friend and I finished eating lunch he turned to me, mouthed, “Let’s go,” and we were off. We then explored a part of the school I had never been to, and finally ended up in some random space between two buildings next to a really old, beat-up van. There was this gigantic crowd surrounding the van and a guy selling uniforms. I am now wearing it, and it is gigantic, ugly, green, yellow, and white.
I also started playing badminton the first Friday of December. One day after school I was about to go home until one of my classmates approaches me and goes, “Let’s go!” I had no idea what was going on and my classmates just kept saying, “Fifth floor. Fifth floor!” After about five minutes we ended up in the attic of our school, which I had no idea existed. There are a bunch of badminton courts, but it has to be the weirdest place to play sports. Now every Friday I have badminton class after school. Chinese people are INTENSE when it comes to badminton. I’m already at a disadvantage because I can’t really understand the teacher’s instructions and tips on how to play well (I really need to study badminton vocabulary!), but even if I did understand, they’re all so good that there’s practically no hope for me anyway.
I got a haircut two weeks ago. I was way way overdue to get one (I hadn’t had one since before coming to China in August). When I got to the salon, they put my coat into a locker and gave me a key. That was really different for me. The only other differences were they washed my hair before and after the cut, and the wrapped my neck in toilet paper (any ideas why? I have no idea).
Christmas is coming up, and so I hope to make a post about Christmas in china within the next week. Until then, Happy Holidays!
