my free space!!

    I have been at Renmin Women's Univeristy for about one week. I arrived at Renda on 31th,last month by myself. It was rainning hard that day,luckily i only got one small suitcase^_^. I saw my ex-roommate at Renda on that day, i live on 6th floor,she lives on 11th floor and my another classmate who also graduated from Xiada lives on 10th floor. The dorm is not as good as i imagined, no air-conditioner,no fan,and no seperate bathroom in the room. I have three roommates now and they are all very nice people. Tonight is the third day i stay at dorm for the night. I usually go home since my home is not too far from Renda, it only takes about 45 minutes by bus and 15 minutes by subway. Since i have the free Olympic pass, i can jump on the bus and the train for free, that's also another reason i go back home frequently.

   Right now, i feel like the graduate study life is not that easy as i thougt. My school is very strict since we do not have too many students compare with School of Public finance and finance.  There are only 8 students in my department and we have about 8 teachers, which means one student gets one mentor.  My ex-roommate and classmates who study at School of Public Finance and Finance are better than me in some way. Since they have lots of students in their department , their teachers are not too strict to them. 5555. My mentor asked me not to go home and stay at school ,the other day,and even asked me to go to some PHD classes.... I thought that i do not need to learn anything related to Maths during my graduate study, but i was wrong. Now i have to review my Econometric book,and go to advanced classes of Econometric, Macroeconomics, Microeconomics and Statistics. My timetable for this semester is almost full from monday to friday, i will have classes in the day time from Mon to Fri. SIGH!

   Right now , i am still adjusting from my summer job, i miss all my friends and coworkers that i worked and played with during the summer.

   The paper wall of my desktop is the group picture of ILUKA Macdonald staffs with party costume.

   My Ex-boss of Iluka company, lauren, will coming to Beijing soon, and i really looking forward to see her again in Beijing. I will have to skip some classes to go for a lunch or dinner with my ex-boss this week.

   Tomorrow is dark Monday, i will have class from 8am to 10 pm for a whole day....

   Maybe now i should see a horrible movie to spend the night.

   BTW, renmin university of China should change its name into Renmin women's university of China. There are so many girls at this school, and compare with the students at Xiada, renda's students are not pretty or handsome as Xiada students///

Macau is the first city i visited in my graduation trip. I and my mum took the bus to Zhuhai. That's the first time i took the bus which you can sleep on it. The bed was confortable, but i did not slept very well because my mother put all the Hk dollars and macau dollars in my bag. I had to keep an eye on the cash. I woke up sevral times at night and then felt asleep again.

We got to zhuhai at probably 6 am in the morning. The bus stop is super near the custom. It was like 6 am early in the morning, I thought there was maybe only a few people waitting at the custom.,but i was wrong. When i walked to the custom with my mother, there was like thousands of people waitting at the custom in line. People were divided into two line: Macau residents and Non-Macau residents. The custom would be open at 7:30. We waited for a while. THe people around us were talking in cantonese all the time, my mother frowned and said to me:"I do not understand what are they talking about,it's like being to another country". I laughed, i was delighted cause i think Cantonese is very beautiful and hearing those people speaking cantonese is enjoyable.hehe.

We passed two custom-mainland custom and Macau custom. Then , we got to Macau!!!!!!!!!!!!

Because we did not have macau coins which were needed to take the bus, my mother and i had to buy something near the custom in Macau. There was a bakery store near the custom, we went into the store and want to buy some bread for breakfast. People there were speaking Cantonese and my Cantonese speaking sucks. Also, i was very nervous that i felt like i can not speak a single word in Cantonese. I said to my mum:"Let's find a bank and change for some coins.". There was a bank near the bakery store. I went in there and spoke very very standard and decent mandarin slowly to the gard. Obviously, he did not understand a single word. I was so disappointed. Then, i spoke english to him, he finally got it and told me that the bank only exchange money and they can not give me the coins. I and my mother had to go back to the backery store to solve the problem....

I pointed to one bread and the old woman asked me how many do i want to buy. I was about to say "Two" in Cantonese, but suddenly, i could not remember how to say "two" in cantonese. I was so nervous, but i still remember how to say "one" in Cantonese, so I said "ya ge". SHe understood it!!!!!!!!!!!ha. She gave me one bread which looked like sandwish, i gave her 10 Macau Dollars,she gave me back like 7.5 Macau coins. I was so happy. My mother was waitting me outside the bakery store. When i walked out of the store with only one break, my mother asked me angrily that why i only bought one. I told her i forgot how to say 'two' in Cantonese. She said unhappily:"Why not use your fingers say two???!!"

Ha, i forgot to use my fingers. Okay, i said to my mum, you can go into the store and bought another bread using your fingers to tell the seller how many do you want, i would wait you here.

My mother went in and came out soon. She bought the most famous bread in Macau called "Zhu Pa bao"!!! I was so jealous. It's more delicious than my sandwish. 5555

Anyway,our purpose was get coins and we made it.

We took number 3 bus to get to the downtown area in Macau. Because i made a mistake, we got off several stops before the stop we should get off. We had to walk 3 stops to get to the downtown area. My mother complained a whole way about that....Finally , we got to the downtown area where most of the tourist spot located. When we got to the downtown it's like 8 am. I went to the waterson to buy something and we met a salesgirl who can speak mandrain very well. My mother was very happy and she said she felt like home. SiGH and SWEAT.

We went to several churches and the Post office. Lots of Catholic Churches in macau. When we walked into the biggest Catholic Church in Macau, people there were praying in Cantonese and Portuguese. My mother sat down and i went to get some books, most of the books were in Portuguese which i can not understand. Then a old lady came to me and spoke Portuguese to me. I was like ......What are you talking about ???!!! I told her i do not speak Portuguese in English. Then, she began to speak english to me.Her english is very good. It's really impressive that old people like her speak such good english, like native english speaker. She said to me that all the books on the right side are in Portuguese, the english ones are on the left side. I thanked her ,took  a english book randomly ,walked back to my mum and sat down. 

 

累了，详情请见下次分解啦

 

Today, the weather really sucks, it's rainning like hell. I also catch a cold.

I miss out my lunch today cause i was so pissed off by the express company, after 4 day, i finally got my new Ipod. Sweat!

After i got my late dinner and went back home.  I turned on my laptop and  wento into my friend's music blog,xiaonei,facebook. I looked at my high school classmates pictures of graduation ceremony, i suddenly felt time passes quickly. Those familiar faces and those people around me when i was in high school are graduating from college. On my good friend's music blog, he just put on some pictures of nanjing in where he studied with some really touching music. He is beijinger too, and will leave nanjing soon. Obviously, he loves nanjing as the same as i love xiamen.

MY mother is comming on Sunday night. We had a promise when i first came to xiamen 4 years ago. The promise is : My father sent me to Xiamen and my mother is going to pick me up from xiamen to beijing. Time to leave....

I can still clearly remember the scene when my father and I came to xiamen. I arrived in xiamen later than other students, cause my father was extremely busy with his business. Before the plan landed, i looked down xiamen through the window, and saw lots of red beautiful houses and seas. To me Xiamen is like a tourist resort at that time. After the plane landed, my father played a trick on the guard at the airport which was extremly interesting. He used some military manner when we came across a beautiful woman guard at the airport. I did not know what does that manner mean but the woman guard immediately very alart and salute to my father and I . I was quite shocked but my father was laughing after we walked by the woman guard. Then my father told me what does his gesture mean.

My first lunch in Xiamen is Yummy seafood. It's so delicous. The place is near Thai consulate. I will take my mother there to eat too when she come here.

I get to the zhangzhou campus at night. My roommate and best friend was waitting there beyond hope. WHen she saw me at dorm, she was super excited cause she thought i would not come and she did not want to leave in the dorm by herself. Haha.

Anyway, my father was quite useless on housework, i did all my dormwork by myself, my father was just sitting on the chair at my dorm, having cigarets,looking at me and thinking of his business i guess. The second day after i arrived at zhangzhou campus, my father had to leave cause he was so busy which was really sad for me casue it's the first time i had been away from home to another strange town. I wanted to cry but i stopped myself from doing so....

Tired now, going to take a shower and maybe keep writting it whenever i feel like to write.

MY thesis defence yesterday went well. The teacher's first comment was : bu cuo!. i am the first student he said bu cuo. i was kind of released after hearing what he said.Then he asked me four questions, but before he asked me questions, he said i can choose not to answer them cause those questions are difficult for a undergraduate student to answer. I answered two of his four questions. The teacher is nice, and he is a new teacher. I met him at zhangzhou campus when i was a freshmen and when he was a PHD student at Xiada. I think he still remembers me after a few years, cause he kept looking at me on thesis presentation day even if i was not on the stage. My classmates are not that lucky, one of my classmates who is also from beijing was almost driven crazy by the teacher. Ha, he said the teaching was so annoying and strict. One of my good friend, she is in the school debate team. She was questioned by the teacher, but since she is a good debater, she used some debate methods to get through.

I went to a beach party yesterday afternoon. It's really fun, it took me half an hour to find my friend's house which is near and actually on the beach. It's such a nice house!!!! I hope i can have such a nice house in future. we played ultimate frisbee and american football. I like ultimate frisbee!!!! it's really fun though the sand sticked on my feet. ALSO, we BBQ at the court of the house, the cucumber is really good. It's a pity that my friend Matt did not bring his gitar to the party or we would have more fun. I left the party early cause i have a appointment in the evening , the other people watched a film at night i think.

It's so relaxing to stay at the beach and having fun with friends. I think  i would definitly miss xiamen and the people here if i leave here.

I am going to enjoying the rest days in xiamen, cause i think if i come back to xiamen in future, like after one or two years, although it would still be xiamen, but the people will change and everything will be different. 物是人非啦。

 

 

I just realized that today is a new day and also my thesis presentation day.LOL

right now, i am waitting to take a shower becaue it takes time for the water heater to heat up. I just came back from EC and met a couple of good and old friends there. It's really fun to talking with my old and good friends.

Tomorrow will be a busy day, thesis presentation in the morning--party in the afternoon--maybe clubbing at night. ha, or drinking at night. After tomorrow, i think i will be free of college study but i still need to work hard on my GRE. I made today's gre plan, but did not work on it, since i was working on my presetation for almost a whole day/

Hope today everything is well!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

 

After the interview, i bought a ticket directly to Fuzhou, my mother asked me why. I told her i want to go to fuzhou for a 2 day trip, she agreed and asked me to buy some Comb which is famous in Fuzhou.

When i got on the train , the british HR called me and asked me to go to the second interview this Friday. When he called me the train had not left beijing station yet. I told him that i can get off the train immediately before the train left, but he told me "Do not get off the train , Gillian, I will contact with you later, ok. THe pay will be 80 DOllors a day". The salary is charming to me, but i am not sure what does "contact with me later " mean. I can not go to the second interview and HR told me that to contact to me later. Maybe i can not get the job, that will be sad. /

 

Anyway, i got to fuzhou this afternoon. The city is like xiamen, but i think it's not as good as xiamen. My hotel is in the downtown area and near several government departments. It's a nice and good hotel, i am so proud of myself since i booked it on internet in advance with a cheap price.

There has a valuable stone market near my hotel. I went there this afternoon and got overcharged by them. At first, i went into the market cause i wanted to buy  a string for a xinjiangnese valuable stone which my father gave me as a present. After i bought a beautiful string for my stone, i looked around and saw several "shou shan shi". This kind of stone is very famous in Fujian, but i know little about them. I really wanted to buy one of them and carved it as my own seal. I looked around some stores. At last i bought one small one with a dragon on it for 30 yuan. I thought it was a ok price. then , i found out a more beautiful one at the other store, the price was a little bit higher than the first one. I bought the second one immediately with 40 yuan without hesitation. I was very happy that i got the two stones.

I went to two parks later. THe first one is called west lake park. it's really beautiful, like the real west lake. the second one is called zuo hai park. it's fun there, there has a ski place, a snake place, a small amusement place at the park. IT's relaxing to guang gong yuan. haha. when i got out of the park , i walked into a stone store, and saw a pair of stones looked the same as the two i just bought. I asked the price, it was only 30 for two. AAAAA< i was almost crazy at that time. I think next time i will not buy things without using my brain!!!

Tomorrow i am going to hiking , but i wear my scandles walking around fuzhou city for a whole days today. I went to shopping tonight looking for a sport shoe, but i did not find any shoes that looked good. Maybe i will go hiking barefoot tomorrow. Sigh, hope i will be fine tomorrow.

 

Haha., I finally got back home after 34 hours train. I think i slept almost 30 hours on the train. The trip on the train was great. As soon as i got on the train i realized that the people around me were a group of old beijingers. Iwas  hyper excited!!! I love to hear beijing accent. Also, those old beijingers reflected all the characters of beijingers. Always helpful, passionate,talktive, a little bit stingy and love to boost. Haha.

When i saw my mum, my mum gave me the new keys for home. She told me which key is the gate, which key is to the first door, which key is to the second door...... When i got in front of my home, i looked at those keys, i was totally confused. Finally, i got in to the room after using four keys, so frustrating, my mum usually worries about security, which i do not think is a big problem.

 

In the afternoon, i went to the interview, i got into the office 13 minutes early. It was at their noon break time, there was only a few people at the office, one chinese, two western people(British , i guess). I walked to the chinese girl directly and told her i was there for a interview. The girl asked me to wait there and then gave me a cup of water. I sat on the chair near the door waitting hopefully. Then another british man came in and smiled at me while he was passing by me. I at first felt he was Alister who was supposed to be the HR, but the man did not come back later, so he should be a employee of the company. Then another chinese woman came in, at first sight, i thought she was the cleaner there because of her clothes. Then she asked me that whether i came here for the interview. I said yes. She smiled at me and then walked by as the first british guy. The third person passing by me was a british lady, she looked at me without any face expression which made me nervous.

 

At last, Alister came in and called my name when he saw me. I was really impressived cause he remembered my name. Then the interview began, because Sharon was still out of office. Only Alister interviewed me. He asked several questions about my resume. ALso , as usual, he was very interestd in my education background. Obviously, he has not heard of Xiamen Univeristy, which is so sad to me. I said to him that i only want to apply for the short period job not the long period job since i have got accepted by renmin University. He was happy when i told him i got the accepted by renmin University. Sigh#%$&%^. Xiada's reputation needs to be improved.

The whold interview lasted for 40 minutes. Usually after a chinese style interview , i can judge that whether i get accepted or not, but this one is really hard to say from Alister's face expression and action. I do not think i will get accepted cause he said he will contact with me in two weeks, but then he walked me to the gate of the company and helped me open the door. Maybe that's the british gentleman's action. haha. Anyway, that was my first foreign interview(British interview), it's a great experience!!!

 

I am still not sure when to go back to xiada yet. I love beijing. I think there has more handsome guys and good looking girls in beijing than xiamen. Haha, when i went to renda to find the teacher today, i walked around the campus, i got eye candy.haha. 

Beijing has been changed a lot since last time i got back. The streets are cleaner, more foreigners hanging around, people are politer.

I think i will stay over night working on my essay tonight. Good luck to myself on everything!!! I should go back to nanputuo temple to pray as soon as i get back to xiamen. 卜