回家吧啊

Well I’m back and I didn’t post once on this blog during my year in China, and for that, I’m sincerely sorry.

But I did post a few blogs here and there on a different blog I created for my family to keep up with me! Now I’m not under any illusions that y’all want to spend your precious time reading about my past adventures, but I’ll link you to the blog anyways, just in case ;).

twelvehourahead.wordpress.com

(Yes twelvehoursahead.wordpress.com was taken, what can ya do?)

I’m gonna get back into reading and whip out a few amazing book reviews by the end of the summer and I hope you’ll be able to join my on my reading adventures since you didn’t get to experience China with me!

I missed updating this site and I hope to connect with y’all again!

Kisses. xxx

{Update: I’d love to hear what everyone has been up to, so give me a pow and a wow of your year! I’ll start, my wow was that I met so many amazing people in China and got a 4 on my Chinese AP exam and my pow was that I had to return to America}.

I’m Going to China?

In an extremely odd turn of events I am going to China. For nine months. China.

I never expected that I would ever want to go to China for school. Of course I always dreamed of doing a study year abroad some place where people have sweet ass accents, which I guess China has, but I was thinking more along the lines of a British accent, you feel?

Anyways, if any of you who followed me a while back remember (which would be shocking) a post I made after I got back from Chinese camp, that’s where this whole adventure started. I went back to school and ended up doing superbly in my Chinese class (everyone was really shocked and I felt chill as fuck). Somehow, I got the idea in my head that since I was doing so well that I might as well just go to China. You know, once you have a basic beginner’s knowledge of a language you’re ready to take on anything, right?

So I applied and miraculously got in and the rest is history.

Hopefully, over this year I will have the time to get on here and update with the odd book review or share an awesome experience that I just can’t contain anymore!

I hope everyone has had an amazing year so far and if I may ask, are any of y’all traveling abroad or in the past have you done something similar to what I’m doing? If so, please contribute to my lonely comments section!

Kisses. xxx

Sorry I Was Using HG2G On A Vogon Ship

So, I obviously wasn’t chilling on a Vogon ship, but I was drowning in an avalanche of homework and despair. So, yeah.

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I recently began reading the second book of The Hitchhiker’s Guide series by Douglas Adams, The Restaurant at the End of the Universe. And I realized that I never reviewed the first book, The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, which is a shame because it was the epitome of entertainment.

 

The story originated as a radio comedy on BBC Radio 4 and soon became a staple for the station. Obviously, it’s popularity rose enough for it to be created into a series. It’s one of those series that has a crazy fanbase, bordering on a cult phenomenon.

 

The series revolves around Arthur Dent. He is your average, everyday protagonist whose high school yearbook professed him to be “most likely to end up living in a hole in the Scottish highlands with only the chip on his shoulder for company.”

 

His only worry in life was protecting his home from demolishment, until his dear friend Ford Prefect reveals to him that he is actually Ix, a Betelgeusian from Betelgeuse 5 and that the Vogons are about to blow-up the Earth to make space for their new hyperspace bypass.

 

Ix luckily has a way out of this seemingly hopeless predicament and uses his Electric Thumb to hitch them a ride on a Vogon ship. They soon are joined by Trillian Astra who turns out to be a girl that rejected Arthur’s attempts at flirting at a flat party and a depressed robot named Marvin.

 

Trillian and Arthur are resigned to their fate of living in space for the rest of their lives and go on the adventure of figuring out what the meaning to life is. Which is the number 42 according to Deep Thought, the most powerful computer in the universe.

 

This book was absolutely hilarious in the most cynical way possible. The characters were perfectly developed and I can’t resist a depressed robot. So, if you are looking for your daily dose of dry humor why don’t you hitch a ride with Arthur Dent and Ix?

用中文怎么说 I’M BACK!

So you might be confused as to what the squiggles in my title mean. Well they are Chinese for: How do  you say…. in Chinese?

I’m sure this means nothing to you, and seems totally irrelevant to anything going on right now. But, it basically explains how I spent my summer. I went to the bustling metropolis of Poultney, Vermont to converse in Chinese and ONLY Chinese for a whole month.

During my Chinese adventure I resided at Green Mountain College, which has the legacy of slaying their campus oxen and serving them in the dining hall. Don’t worry. That was before I got there. 

Meet Bill and Lou. The campus dinner.

One requirement of participating in the language program was staying true to the Language Pledge, which basically stated that we couldn’t speak, listen to, write, read, think, or breathe in English.

I could deal with all of those conditions, except for one. And I don’t know if you can guess it but, it was reading. I didn’t even consider following that rule. I had contraband stashed throughout my dorm room; books behind dressers, in drawers, in my laundry bag, my suitcases, and between my bed frame and my mattress.

Every single time I heard something outside my dorm, I chucked the book I was reading at the time behind the wall of my study carousel and pretended to be sleeping. I have to say that there were a few close calls, but in the end all was well because I got to read some amazing books this summer.

Reviews soon to come.

Kisses. xxx

 

Chill Peoples… We Aren’t Dying Today

Hooray! Hooray! The end of the world has been postponed!
Hergé

How I felt when I finally finished my last exam.

The Best King of Therapy

“I have never known any distress that an hour’s reading did not relieve.”
― Montesquieu

I Have a Severe Mental Illness

“Stress is nothing more than a socially acceptable form of mental illness.”
– Richard Carlson

I’m just going to post quotes about stress when I have the time.

Procrastination is Key

“To achieve great things, two things are needed: a plan and not quite enough time.”
― Leonard Bernstein

This is basically how I deal with my school work. I’ve got a great plan and idea and about 2 days to do it out of the week I had.

ARGABLARGBLARG

So just yesterday I had an ecology test, a Chinese quiz on 120 characters, a mini-lab due, and two newspaper articles due. And they were all assigned last Friday. That is two days to do all of that. GAH. And today I have another newspaper article due, Chinese quiz, English rough-draft due, and a math project due.

And it continues like this for the rest of the week while adding on a six-page Monoculture vs. Polyculture paper. FML.

If I only had my ID this is what I would be doing right now.

I will not be posting for the like rest of the school year because my life is effed right now and I think I might die of grade and exam anxiety.

Anyone else feeling this way right now? A good way to relieve the stress is to just put off the work and watch 30 Rock. Well it doesn’t put off the stress, but it make you laugh sooo I think it’s a good plan.

Kisses. xxx

Ghosts don’t ha…

Ghosts don’t haunt us. That’s not how it works. They’re present among us because we won’t let go of them.
– Sue Grafton