Post the Ninth - Routine

Wow, it's been a while, hasn't it? I still have loads of pictures to post, so I'll get to those, I promise!

Chinese New Year was pretty good; I got a miserable cold for most of it, but it was really nice to just relax and do things at my own pace. Most people went on vacation; a lot of the girls here went to Thailand, but I just hung out with whoever was here. It was really nice to sleep in and just go out at night. I watched Scrubs and Chuck, which was fun. I also got the chance to really know a couple of girls.

A couple of the things we saw was the Chinese New Year Parade; it was a bit of a let down, but the floats and things were quite nice (I think it was because we were on the other side of the parade and the floats didn't come down our way). But the thing that I will never forget were the fireworks. We saw them from the Avenue of Stars, and even though it was super crowded (there was all sorts of crowd control; the area was divided off at different points and no one could get through), it was AMAZING. Totally blows July 4th out of the water. I have never seen a display so beautiful. The crowd all 'ooh'ed and 'aah'ed together, like we were little kids, but it was fantastic. Words cannot even begin to describe.

We also ate out rather frequently. The most memorable restaurant was a place called "Modern Toilet". That's right... the theme was the bathroom. There was a wall of light up urinals, and the ceiling lights were in the shapes of piles of dung or plungers. The seats were toilets. I kid you not. They had themed lids too (mine was an American flag, haha). The drinks were served in urinals and the food was either in a toilet or a bath tub. DESSERT WAS EPICALLY BIT. They served a mound of chocolate shaved ice covered in tiny sweets and chocolate sauce/ice cream with coffee jelly in the center. On the side was a tiny cookie with chocolate sorbet (think PAR ice cream) in the shape of... well... shit. Very fun.

Now I'm back to school, where everything is getting much harder and the students here are crazy smart (I think the professors are part crazy too). But I'm still really happy to be here. I look around me and really, there's nowhere else I want to be.

So from Hong Kong, good morning.