Mid-Week Blues

I feel like I waste so much time on Facebook, Blogger, AIM, MSN, and YouTube. Those are the big culprits...others include, Hotmail, Gmail, MSN and other myriad sites that provide free videos/movies/music for me to download or streaming video. I planned on avoiding FB and AIM/MSN altogether today but alas around 11:30 PM, after I ate my delicious chicken curry stew I got for 50 kuai at 7-Eleven, I couldn't resist anymore and signed on to Adium (pgrm for Macs that puts both MSN and AIM in the same dialog box) and then logged on to FB. I mean I can only read Mountains Beyond Mountains and listen to iTunes for so long and then I have to find other means of diversion (I don't have a TV in my room and I don't feel like asking my neighbor for DVDs anymore bc last time he got his panties in a twist bc he said I got fingerprints on them).

This novel is finally getting good though (I stayed up till 3 AM last night partly bc I couldn't sleep but mostly bc the chapters on the American trained soldiers, who deposed popularly-elected Haitian president, Aristide, and the TB stuff was really interesting). I never knew American foreign policy in Haiti was so fucked up (publicly denouncing the military junta but at the same time covertly supporting them). Also, the MDR Tuberculosis in Peru was really interesting. I thought it was really interesting that Farmer wrote a book or article asserting that AIDS didn't reach N. America from Haitian refugees but the other way around. He states that American and Canadian sex tourists brought AIDS to Haiti. So far the only drawback is the way the author (Tracy Kidder) portrays Jim Kim...like he's some pathetic lackey of Paul Farmer, he should check some of his undying adoration for Farmer and stop panning everyone else around him. He's a great guy no doubt, but he's not a god nor a saint.

For lunch we were going to go to the Chinese medicine soup place again but it was closed so we ended up going to the local hole in the wall (I go here all the time...it's good and really cheap-today's meal was only 68 kuai, average cheap meal near Shida is 120-200 NTD). I got 12 boiled dumplings (shui jiao) and a dan hua tang (egg drop soup). I went here again for dinner and got what Maru got-the niu rou xi fen (beef noodle soup but w/ dong fen/xi fen or thin, clear vermicelli noodles instead of the regular thick, white noodles).

After class today I went to Yonghe to see my grandma and got help on my duan wen (essay and accompanying questions). Then we went to the Vibo ( or wei bao-cell phone company) office and worked that shit out. It'll take a week for them to send me the hours I spoke last month.

So today I went to Judo but the coach or student leader of the club didn't even show...it got really boring so I told the girl that I was leaving bc I had something to do. So I went to gymnastics...but it was already past 8 PM and most ppl had already left. So then I was frustrated and bored and not ready to go home to study for my test so I decided to run on the track until I saw Brandon playing b-ball outside, so I decided to join him. I shot around w/ someone's basketball until this guy pulled a muscle so that was my opportunity to play. It didn't get really fun until later we played against these guys from Mongolia bc they were really good. I thought they were Japanese at first bc I couldn't understand what they were saying but they told me they were Mongolian. One of the guys was around 6 ft 3 and pretty agile. He also could shoot pretty well which is rare for a person of his height...he made about 90% of his shots from outside the paint and of course he made nearly all his layups, even with Brandon guarding him and Brandon is around 6 ft 1 or 2 and pretty good. I pulled a calf muscle guarding one of the Mongolian guys.

So Brandon tried to convince me to get a palm pilot in Taiwan. It's 6,000 NTD or 200 USD and the Chinese dictionary program is called Pelec Dict.(?) and costs 60 for the basic and 100 for the better one (more characters). I think I might go buy it but I still have some reservations about dropping that much cash at one time. He said it's the most worthwhile investment he has ever made in his life though and he doesn't regret it one bit.

Shit I've wasted too much time online again...it's nearly 1 AM and I still need to cram some more.

I'm really looking forward to Friday--Katie Liwen said she's going to take us to Yong Kang Jie to eat tang bao/ xiao long bao (steamed pork dumplings)-not at the really famous place but at a cheaper place in that same area.

Also, I think it's time I finally go to the unpaid internship...I'll shoot an e-mail out tomorrow afternoon. I might also decide to start tutoring English. I feel like a bum...plus I'll feel less guilty about spending money if I start earning some disposable income.