the purse girls.

Well, it’s been a little more than a week since I’ve left. I feel like I have been here for months. It’s nice to finally be settled in and situated. It wasn’t easy though. We had our own rooms for a week but then we were told that we actually had to share rooms because of ILP policy. Some days are harder than others but we just have to laugh at all these things that change at a moments notice. If we don’t laugh and roll with the punches we will go crazy. So now I am rooming with Kimbo, which we secretly love. It was pretty lonely at night when we were all in our separate rooms alone.

You are probably wondering who “the purse girls” are. That is what my group of girlfriends call ourselves. We aren’t supposed to have clicks here but it is just natural for some girls to flock together and become friends. That’s what the 6 of us have done. We don’t want to make it obvious that we are a click so we don’t say that we are a “group”. Instead of saying, “I love our group”, we say “I love our purses”. Our first night in the city we each bought the cutest purses at the night market. But really, I love these girls. We help each other get through the day and we always end the day with night talks on our rock beds. Every night we end up in tears we are laughing so hard. There are so many funny things that happen throughout the day and we love talking about them. It’s so weird because I feel so close to these girls already and I don’t even know them, except for Kim. It’s fun to tell each other about our families, school, boyfriends, and various stories in our lives. We are already planning our reunions after we get back!

Last night we had a welcome dinner in honor of us with the Headmaster of the school. I was so nervous about the food that I had butterflies in my tummy all day. It’s rude not to eat what they give you so I knew I would have to eat something. And if it was anything like the first dinner we had here I would die. Luckily they made us food that they thought we would enjoy more than what we usually have in the cafeteria everyday. We had chicken legs, chicken wings, steamed broccoli, duck, and fish. It was the BEST meal I have had here so far. I ate about eight chicken wings! My stomach was loving me. The Headmaster doesn’t speak English so we had a translator at the table telling us what he said. The translator’s name was Tim. Lauren and I met Tim the other day when we went to a student’s family’s house in the city. I wish everyone could meet Tim. He is the funniest Chinese man in the universe. Picture the Asian version of Steve Erkle and that is Tim. Haha, so funny. Tim’s translation of English is so hard to understand. We all had headaches afterward because we were trying so hard to figure out what he was saying. He always adds an “er” to the end of most words. “We are going to have a toaster now.” Afterwards we talked about American movies and Tim announced that his favorite movie was "Sleepless in Seattle." I don't think I have ever laughed so hard in my life. Such a character. Love him to death.

I decided I am only going to write once or twice a week…It’s way too hard to write blog posts, journal entries, emails, and facebook comments. So sorry. But I promise they will be great posts! And sorry that I can't upload pictures! But I will keep doing the snapfish thing so you can see! Or go onto my facebook to see pictures because I hacked in!

Zaijian!