Nao le ban tian

To both my amusement and my annoyance, the good ol' Chinese government Internet censor has started blocking my blog again. I can still access Blogger.com to post, but it won't let me view the blog in its public form, nor do I have any method of reading the comments. So, please continue to post comments (it makes me feel so happy and important!), but be aware that I won't be able to read them for a little bit, so if it's anything I should know before I go back to the States you might just want to drop me an email or Facebook or whatever.

Speaking of Facebook, I've posted our homemade skin whitener commercial there, but for those of you who are not Facebookly endowed, I got a Youtube account for the sole purpose of putting it in this blog, so I hope you're happy.



We are pretty much amazing. Can't you see why I'm sad to leave these people? I just realized today that I only have 11 days left in China! As much as I'm excited to get home and see everybody, I also really don't want to leave. I'm so happy with my friends and my teachers and my classes and my neighborhood and my general life in China, and there are so many things I realized that I need to squeeze in before I go. For one, I have to get the ding dong Indian Embassy to finish processing my visa so I can have my passport back, since I can't register my new residence without my passport and it's the law that foreigners have to register all changes of address so the government can keep track of them. We waiguoren are tricky like that. I called the Indian Embassy the other day, and had a conversation along the following lines:
"Hello, I've got a question about my visa"
"Okay" [pause, unintelligible comment to another person in the office]..."Sorry, there's nobody here right now"
"But you're there! I'm talking to you"
"I'm afraid you'll have to call back tomorrow morning"
"But...but...ah, whatever"

That wacky Indian Embassy. I'm sure I'll get it out of them eventually, but I'm going to be a busy busy girl for the next 2 weeks. I made a list of all the places I still have to go (Summer Palace, Women's Market), things I still have to do (eat scorpion, get acupuncture), and things I still have to buy (Beida T-shirts, more pearls). On top of my touring/shopping schedule, I will no doubt be having a couple of farewell dinners/parties to work around next week, not to mention figuring out how to pack all the stuff I've bought in this wonderfully cheap country.

Note: If you were wondering, the title of this post means approximately "hustle and bustle for a long time." It's pretty much going to be my life theme for a lot of the immediately foreseeable future.