Week 1

wow, where to begin.......
Well the plan was not to fall asleep the night before my flight. I needed to adjust to China's 12 hr difference, but that did not work out well for me. I ended up falling asleep without an alarm clock set! I woke up at 5:30 while my flight was at 7:25! No time to shower, just throw my clothes in a suitcase and drive as fast as possible. got there at the nik of time to find out that my carry on suitcase was too big. I never had a problem with that before!So I tried to stuff my carry on into that example size box, but it didn't work, so I went to the terminal entrance anyways to try to get away with it
that did not happen...they were just as strict. They told me to check my bag...so I had to run back due to time. Instead of checking my bag for 130 dollars, I bought a duffle bag from continental for 30 bucks and transfered all my things into it and left my brand new carry on luggage there. At that point it was too late to check the bag anyways. Finally made it through security and to the plane where they had been excpecting me and I boarded right away :) The flights (Newark & Shanghai) were ok, I received special vegitarian/vegan food that was actually pretty tasty!
After arriving to Shanghai going through customs and picking up my luggage, the next step was to find out how to get to Hefei...Not as easy as it sounds. even the help desk (one of the only people who spoke english) did not know how to help me. So I walked to the long distance bus station at the other end of the terminal. Of course they did not have a bus to Hefei...The man that was in the elevator with me translated it for me :) Nice guy. He then told me that he that he had an hour before his bus left so he would show me the other bus terminal to Shanghai city center and hopefully it could be helpful for me. As we were walking we both realized that it was going to be an impossible feat for me. Nothing is in english and everything was so far away...not to mention that due to the 1.4 billion people in china, it is necessary to book all train tickets days and sometimes weeks in advance...so the train was not a good idea. So he took me to the ticket counter to get a flight to Hefei...well what do you know...they were full...so he helped put my name on a waiting list, so if someone cancels I could take their place. I wouldn't be able to do it w/o him...since the ticket agents did not speak much english and i did not know my options. So I thanked him so much for his kind help. He then asked if I had chinese money. I said, "yeah 200 yuan, thats enough right?" He says, "you know I was in your
situation before and I know how you feel, so take this". He hands me 300 yuan ($50). I couldn't take it, he has already been so kind and helped me so much. He refused to let me not accept the money so I was very greatful for his help.
I guess not so many girls travel solo here in china because of the difficulty and language barrier. Before we parted he bought me a phone card for the phone booth incase of emergency since my iphone first had to be unlocked before I could use a sim card. He must be a saint! I did not know the cards existed or could not even read the machine if I tried. I am so lucky! I find help in every situation when I least expect it and by not even looking for it. so now I sit here at the airport waiting to see if I can make it on the 9pm flight to Hefei...if not, I will have to sleep here..Not the first time LOL

Yes! They had a flight for me
I arrived at the school at 11:30 at night. Some Indian students meet me outside where the cab dropped me off luckily because the dorms get locked at 11:30 for the evening. Since I came so late, I had to bunk up with some of the other indian girls. I got a room the next day, registered for school and paid for my classes. I also learned that because of so many late students, that we will postpone classes until October 25th. One of the international student helpers took me to the bank to open an account, out to lunch, dinner and grocery shopping where I bought a bean/vegetable/fruit cooker/juicer. It's the coolest little kitchen helper…very popular over here. Things are so cheap here! My lunch was less than $1, dinner 0.50 cents, and groceries $5. I even bought a water cooler/heater for my room. It's like the Zephyrhills ones that we get back home, except the system was free with the purchase of a 5 gallon water jug which was only $1.06!!!
The exchange rate is falling, so the school ended up being a little more costly than expected, but still affordable. My room is in a great location and it overlooks the school's lake, which is gorgeous! It has a path built from one side to the other and a Chinese looking little pagoda in the middle…very romantic (. There are 2 different kinds of rooms; 4 beds in a split room with one bath and large kitchen, or a double room with 2 beds to one bath and no kitchen. I got the latter, but I am alone in the room. I am thinking about getting rid of the 2nd bed to make more room in here. I just have to pay double for having the room to myself which is not a big deal (it's still only $100 per month plus electricity and water). I don't really need a kitchen, there is a canteen (where I had lunch) on the 17th floor, two floors above my room and a general kitchen on my floor that we can use. My internet in my room only costs 50 Yuan per year ($7.50)! Right now I am drinking flower tea for healthy beautiful skin. It has chrysanthemum, rose, jasmine tea, and red date in it. Very yummy! So far everything that I ate today has been typical Chinese greasy food…I am going to have to start preparing my own food. I meet some Indians that signed up for the program and they cook Prasad (blessed food). I may cook with them or just use my new bean/veg/fruit cooker/juicer to prepare liquid food.

The school has 16,000 students
4 University hospitals
A gym, yoga classes, a class that teaches how to use nunchucks, a track, basketball court, table tennis etc. I will probably use the gym, yoga and def the nunchuck class LOL.
The research center next to my dorm is world famous. The Dermatology department published many research papers in nature genetics and various other important scholarly magazines and I might do an internship there in the lab on my free time.

From the 4th-6th is sports day where all the students participate in doing a sport (mostly running and sprinting). I might do the 100 or 200 meter sprint. Apart from sports day, the international student office has been really excited to have us participate in a big festival held on yellow mountain each year. There are only 10 selected international students from each of the 12 universities in Hefei. I am one of the 10 selected from my university. For the festival we are required to race up the 1800 meter mountain for a prize, perform a dance, sing and participate in other performances in front of all the international students. We practiced our dance today...well tried to choreograph it. Can you imagine the diverse range of ideas we had for our dance...We are coming from areas all over the globe(Africa, India, America and Jamaica and trying to make a dance to the wakawaka song sung by Shakira for the World Cup). We decided to sing the song "we are family from AMU university....and we are the world, we are the children bla blah...And as for the 3rd performance, i might do 24 step Tai Chi if I have enough time to practice it. All of our travel to and from the mountain, accomadation, meals and costume costs will be funded by Anhui province, so this is kind of a big thing here in China and they take it very seriously....this should be exciting!

All this excitement about the yellow mountain festival and we haven't even started out classes yet! Its gonna be an interesting 4 yrs here...I can tell :)