china!

i just returned to hong kong yesterday evening after two weeks in mainland china. the first week was with the other etas, teaching (sort of) in a middle school just outside of guangzhou. it was really great to experience guangzhou from such a different side. the first time i visited (2 1/2 months ago) i saw the city as a tourist. this time, i got to see it as a teacher (sort of), spending a lot of time in primary schools and secondary schools. we didn't teach as much as i would have liked, but we did get a chance to teach a middle school class, and we did a few other presentations for larger groups on the united states (woooo). our group caused quite a stir at the school, but i think our impact was ultimately positive. after every class, we'd get mobbed by middle schoolers asking for our contact info, and occasionally our signature. it felt really great to be back in guangzhou, and the group did remarkably well together (although it felt more like study abroad than a work trip).

after the other etas headed back to hong kong, i took an overnight train to hainan, and spent a week in the town of sanya. sanya exists solely for tourism, which unsurprisingly, gives it a very strange vibe. the weather was beautiful while i was there, although sitting on the beach on december 21st is certainly a strange experience. i met another fulbrighter (john) randomly while there, who is living in the city of kunming, in yunnan province. he and i got along really well, and i think i'm going to visit him sometime in february or march. i didn't do a whole lot in sanya, which was great. highlights included a visit to hilton's beautiful private beach, eating lots of seafood (which is sadly all imported since china overfished the waters around hainan [sidenote: this blog could be much more cynical than it is]), and an adventure into the central mountains of hainan. john's mandarin was excellent which allowed us to meet many more local hainanese than i would have been able to on my own. it also was an inspiration to keep working on my mandarin.

dadonghai beach

the only photo i have of me from the trip. i hope my three faithful readers aren't offended by the topless shot...

speaking of mandarin, i'm still working on it, although it's slow going. i made the big decision yesterday to stop trying to learn traditional characters, and switch to simplified. in mainland china, a majority of chinese characters were simplified during the 50s and 60s to help improve literacy. the only places in which traditional chinese characters remain are hong kong and taiwan. i had hoped to make traditional characters happen, but it's just proving too difficult. hopefully this switch will help my writing. at this point, i know about 150 characters, but those are mostly simpler ones. as they get more difficult, the difference between traditional characters and simplified ones gets more pronounced.

my parents arrive in a few hours! it's been almost five months since i've seen them, the longest time we've been apart since i studied abroad in senegal. we'll be in hong kong together until the 30th, and then we're going to the philippines (cebu) for five days to relax on the beach.

it was really nice while in china to find that i missed hong kong, and was anxious to return. it made me realize how much hong kong feels like home, and how comfortable i have become here. it's still a pretty crazy, difficult, exhausting place, but my living situation is really comfortable, and i'm starting to feel like i have a really good feel for the city.

i hope everyone has a lovely holiday wherever you are in the world! to celebrate, here's a present from me to you, with a little help from yousendit:

um tom - caetano veloso