Wow That Went Fast….Or Did It?

Hope everyone had a fun Turkey-Day. I had a blast myself. New favorite tradition: after you gorge yourself on a million different types of food til you can’t stand up, go get a Chinese foot massage! On Thanksgiving seven of us did that and it was marvelous. I basked in the hospitality of friends of friends, and ate more food than I have in months. It was loads of fun. The next day I headed off to Shanghai bright and early. Had a lovely time chilling and sleeping and eating. Went to the plant and animal market and took this picture of crickets and locusts…apparently people use them as pets…


Oh, and then I saw this and couldn’t resist posting – have you ever seen so many ducks lined up at one time?


When you’ve been doing something for a limited period of time that is very challenging, it is inevitable that at some point you begin the countdown to the last time you do X, or the last time you do Y. Guess by going to Shanghai I inadvertently set off my own personal countdown clock. Not til I leave China, but until I move out of someone else’s house and go out on my own again…oh, and did I mention my husband’s coming? J Hopefully the time will go fast…just 9 days until I leave the program and head out on my own, and Doug shows up in 11 days.

Tomorrow I go talk to the people at Lotus to give them feedback on my experience and let them know what I think they could do better. So I decided yesterday that I should look back on my time here and figure out what I accomplished, what I could have done better, and whether I met my goals or at least did what I could given the existing circumstances. All in all I think I did well. However, I think the more I’ve learned the more I realize how far I truly have to go to be at a level that I would like to be. I really need a year here to get my language up to par. We’ll see how things play out in the next couple of months as to whether I come back or not in the Spring and set myself to learn more and make more progress.

Well tomorrow I play badminton with my tutor. I expect she'll wipe the floor with me.