Ocean's 13 and a bottle of water

I haven’t been so good about updating this lately. Usually I’m with people all day long so when I have time to myself I want to spend it doing something relaxing- like watching one of the 7432019874 DVDs I have purchased here in China. The most recent one I’m watching is “Criminal Minds”, a TV show. I can’t say that it’s great but it’s good for entertainment.

Last night Janell and I had Connie and Julie over to our dorm to watch “Ocean’s 13” and eat pizza. The movie was such bad quality, though, that we had to switch to “Ocean’s 11”. Like, really bad quality…Connie said someone had probably just recorded it inside a movie theater. Julie and Connie brought their own food because they don’t like pizza…they didn’t even want to try it! It’s funny because based on recent experiences, we are VERY understanding when they don’t want to try things, but they were just shocked that we didn’t want any of their food (since we had pizza). I passed on the 100 year egg this time.

I had an interesting conversation with Julie yesterday. She's really easy to talk to, and somehow we got into a discussion about the government (or more accurately, the recent changes in China). I asked her how she felt about banned websites- she said that she wasn't sure because she didn't know what they were. I told her some of the subjects that were banned and she knew all about them, but she said that they're banned so that the next generation isn't influenced by them. She said that she really didn't mind as long as they were banning stuff about history only. I told her that I would be outraged if the US government did that, because our culture is all about freedom of speech and individual rights, but that maybe China had a good thing going since it's now possible to learn how to bomb a school or whatever on the internet! I was so interested in this conversation because I think it really highlighted some of the differences between us based on our backgrounds. She also said that the one child policy was really sad for her because she would love to have brothers and sisters, but obviously she understands why it's a policy. I didn't know that Chairman Mao had encouraged them all to have a lot of babies because the power is in the people. I don't think that idea turned out like he planned! Julie said that her parents really liked Chairman Mao at first but as they got older and he was in power longer, they thought he made a few mistakes and didn't like him as much. I wish I could remember all the details of the conversation because it was SO interesting, but I can't right now. I'm just glad that we've made friends who are willing to talk to us about things like this.

In China, they are not allowed to pick their own major. They rank order their preferred list of majors, then they take a college entrance exam. Your major is then based on your scores from that exam and is assigned to you. It's also really difficult to change your major. Some of the grad students explained it to me by saying that someone had to do the various jobs and everyone couldn't be, for example, a doctor. At first, that made a lot of sense to me because there are so many people here, but then I thought about it further. In the US, a lot of people begin school as a pre-med major. They are then able to try it out and if they find it is too hard for them or they don't like it, they are able to switch to another major. In this way, I think natural selection takes care of this problem. Apparently, a lot of university-educated students are now looking for jobs outside their field because they're stuck in a major that they are not interested in. I think a lot of people who didn't score high enough to be doctors ended up majoring in public health. Also, when they are writing their thesis or dissertation, they are not able to choose their own topic. They are assigned a topic by their "tutor" (advisor?). We learned this when we visited the Health Education department and met a professor who had studied at Tokyo University, which apparently has a system much like the US one.

We ate hotpot. That's all I'm going to say about that. ;) If you want to know what it is, you can see it on Google. Professor Zhang took us after we met with him on Friday, and it was so nice and considerate of him. He had a lot of interesting things to say about AIDS in China (skip this paragraph. Apparently, the first epidemic was in the mid-90s and happened through blood donation/acceptance. People would donate their plasma, then the rest of the blood was mixed together with other people's blood. Then, the mixed blood would be given back to them and many people acquired AIDS. The blood is pretty safe now, though. The second wave was in IV drug users. China neighbors the "Golden Triangle" - or at least I THINK that's what it's called. I think the 3 countries are Laos, Burma and Thailand, but I'd have to check my notes to be sure. Anyway, there is a lot of opium grown here so heroin made it's way into China and caused the 2nd epidemic. Also, there is the "Golden Crescent"- some countries in the middle east?- that also border China. I'll have to look in to that one more before I try to explain it. I asked about sexual transmission and he said that it does happen but it is a smaller percentage of the transmission. Hmm...much to learn and hear about. He did say that we were going to visit some rural field sites so that is VERY exciting! We had been getting a little nervous that we were never going to do anything on our internship but meeting with Professor Zhang made us feel a lot better. He is great and I think it's going to be a very interesting summer.

We also went to JingLi street (I think that's the name?) which is where they sell a lot of traditional Chinese goods. I'll try to attach a photo of that area. We went after dinner with Connie and Crystal. Connie was very surprised to learn that we do not eat pigs ears, duck's stomach, cow intestines, chicken feet, etc. in the US! The only thing I can think of that is kind of similar are ribs. Speaking of food, Janell and I had Indian food today and it was AMAZING. I really do like other kinds of foods a lot, I promise! It's just the Chinese is my least favorite. ;) I'm eating it, though, and the fried rice is good. I can also have the following conversation in Chinese:
Hello.
One bottle of water.
How much does it cost?
Thank you.
Goodbye.
Quite proud of myself for that one, lol...hand gestures are also working quite well.

I'm going to try to attach some pictures and then watch TV and go to bed. I am so grateful to have a computer...if I didn't, I'd be watching Chinese TV all day long and not understanding a word.

All in all, things are going very well. I keep wanting to get a dog because there are so many dogs here and they're SO cute, but Janell is more practical and tells me no, which of course makes perfect sense given the fact that we live in a dorm, I'd have to get him/her back to the US, and I have my own precious doggie waiting at home for me. I swear I saw a dog crossing the street today. IN the crosswalk. I am scared to cross the street here, and that dog was walking along without a care in the world.