hurrdurrrr... wrong room number.

Kristin Kay room 727
104, Building No.2, Zijin Digital Park, Zhichun Road,
Haidian District, Beijing, ChinaZip code: 101900
 
let's try that instead.

my address.

Kristin Kay room 272
104, Building No.2, Zijin Digital Park, Zhichun Road,
Haidian District, Beijing, ChinaZip code: 101900

just in case anyone wants to send me a letter or some trail mix :)

three weeks down, five to go.

i actually said something in our meeting on friday!! woohoooooo!! :) i also got bumped back to second on the ping pong ladder... but i'm getting a little better. maybe.

friday night we (the girls) decided to have a movie night. we invited everyone, but as usual, it was only us. they had this idea to use a conference room at microsoft to project the movie onto a screen. great idea! but those of you that know me well know how much of a rule follower i am. i was slightly freaking out that we were going to get in trouble!! but we didn't. we watched mulan :) and it had a whole new meaning to me. such a strange and wonderful opportunity. how many people can say they hang out in conference rooms after hours in microsoft and project disney movies onto the screen for movie night? awesome.

this morning i skyped with my family :D:D:D so happy to see them and hear their voices! and bonus: both aunt ruth and cousin ruth were there! then i skyped kathryn too. let me know if anyone else wants a skype date :)

today (saturday) we (the girls+ryan) again went out on the town all day long. first was silk street. it is run by the same people as pearl market, but there are more clothes and shoes and less pearls. they are still aggressive sellers and you can still bargin. for lunch i had authentic chinese dumplings and they were so hard to pick up with chopsticks! it reminded me of the scene in kung fu panda where he is learning kung fu by chasing slippery dumplings around.

i think i managed to spend less than $100 today. i spend all my money on the weekends and none during the week. $100 isn't bad for what i bought: a marc jacobs purse, a set of white and blue ceramic chopsticks for my mom, a chanel watch, a gucci watch, five dvds (the bounty hunter, remember me, nine, the book of eli, and young victoria), two wooden fans, dinner at kfc, two taxi rides, and some groceries at walmart. i think that is it. let me know if any of you want anything specific.

after silk street we went to a park behind the forbidden city called jingshan park. it has a hill in the middle made out of the dirt they dug to put the moat around the forbidden city. it seems like we always pick places with lots of stairs to climb. anyway, the park wasn't free, but it was still really pretty. and it had a surprise inside... dinosaurs!! lol it had animatronic dinos everywhere. so we had fun taking pictures with those. it also had the tree where one of the emperors hung himself. there was a fantastic view of the city at the top of the hill. i took pictures, but they don't do it justice because of the smog. 

after we hiked back down the mountain, we went to houhai which is like a really nice bar district. the first thing i saw was a starbucks :) and i took more pictures! the street wrapped around a beautiful lake and we walked around for a while. 

i'm still alive.

so i haven't blogged in a few days. yes allison, i'm still alive :) the only thing of note that has happened over the past few workdays is that i have clawed my way to the top of the ping pong ladder. not sure how long i'll stay there, but i'll enjoy it while i can.


work is chugging along nicely this week. we have another meeting with our industry mentor on friday that we need to be ready for and then our mid-term presentation a week from today (wednesday). gotta use my awesome powerpoint skills to make this thing nice.

just to review, my summer verse: Psalm 73:25-26
Whom have I in heaven but you? And earth has nothing I desire besides you. My flesh and my heart may fail, but God is the strength of my heart and my portion forever.

venti caramel coffee frap please :)

asian karaoke is no where near as nerve-wracking as american karaoke. instead of singing in front of a large room full of people you don't know, you are in a small room with people you do know. it was like sitting in a large booth watching tv and singing songs together. no one ordered alcohol and it was quite fun! i went to sleep around 2:30.

this morning the cleaning lady knocked on our door around 10:30. i somehow communicated that we were still sleeping and got back in bed. allison called me around noon and we talked for an hour which was awesome :) even though i don't usually talk on the phone much. today we went to the olympic green and saw the birds nest and the water cube. it costs money to get in the birds nest and the water cube was closed so all we did was walk around outside and take pictures. it was sunny today for the first time in over a week, but with the sun came even more heat. we got more stares and people taking pictures of/with us today too.



then we went on a hunt for this american restaurant called sizzler. we walked around for a long time through what looked like legit neighborhoods with apartment buildings and kids running around. we asked around and no one knew where the restaurant was. eventually we found it! it was american food heaven!!!! there was a department store and in it was the following: sizzler, pizza hut, mcdonalds, dairy queen, and STARBUCKS!!! i took pictures. and ordered a venti caramel coffee frap. ahhh heaven. they actually had a huge salad bar at sizzler and it was amazing. their meat is imported, and it tasted really good. they were also playing american music! so we listened to hillary duff and jason mraz as we ate. it was a good food day :)

two weeks down, six to go.

so last night (friday night) after work me and the girls ate in the one restaurant in the basement we hadn't been to yet. it was actually really good! it was like spicy chinese food or something like that. then we took the subway to wongfujing which is like the times square of beijing. first we went to this huge bookstore that had at least six floors. we found the imported books and ended up by the math books (nerd alert). this older guy asked us if we were math students, where we went to school, and then he asked us what 1^pi is. ummm idk? 1? he said he was some kind of engineer and really likes to study complex analysis.

after we escaped the bookstore, we wend to mcdonalds cause i was sooo thirsty. when we walked out of mcdonalds, IT WAS RAINING. it hasn't been sunny here for an entire week. constant cloud cover for a whole week! i'm going to be so white when i get home. so we walked in the rain.



we went down this road that is a night market that sells all kinds of things including strange things to eat. jasmine and britni actually ate fried scorpions. not kidding. i have it on video. the scorpions are actually alive on the stick and moving around until you say you want some and they stick them in the frier for you. AHH!! they also had fruit covered in caramelized sugar stuff. kinda like a candied apple, but the sugar isn't that thick. i got one with green grapes and it was actually pretty good.

this morning i slept until around 11 and then we took the subway to the summer palace. it wasn't raining today, but it was still supper cloudy and foggy. the summer palace is where the royalty spent time in the summer because it has this tiny island in the middle of the lake and it is supposed to be a few degrees cooler on the island. it was all hot to me. it was so nice to see some water!! i miss the beach and the lake. when you go in the front gate, you have to climb over a mountain to get to the lake. then take a ferry to the island. the mountain was covered in what seemed like buddhist temples, walls, and watchtowers. when we were waiting to take the ferry these two chinese girls asked if they could take their picture with us. aww first time that has happened! it was exciting :) after walking around inside for a while, we took this random path back over the mountain and i thought we were going to get lost! but we didn't.

responding to comments.

i haven't responded to any comments and that is lame. so here they are all in one post!

Maggie Glass: i'm glad you found the link :)

hannah marie: walmart is soooo different! of course everything is in chinese. i recognize about 10% of the food and the imported stuff is expensive. usually you can find what you need if you walk around for a while. it has three floors and these motorized ramps that take you and your cart from one floor to another, like those motorized walkways in airports that are flat. thanks for all your prayers!! means so much.

Marie: 1. i 'm not looking forward to that again. 2. i need to learn how to ask for bags in chinese. 3. i didn't get a shirt! maybe i will before i leave. 4. yeah i ate all that girl. sooo good! 5. i've only eaten there once and no sickness. but i think i do get sick after eating anything fried here. so much oil. i love you!

allison: yes i got pearls for you if you'll wear them :)

taylor: here's your shoutout! lol jk. umm yes there is a picture of us on your dock. i like that picture :) and i love those people! miss you too. see you in tigertown :)

erin: thanks for everything. i know you have my back :) can't wait to see you again!

john kay: LOL forehead it is.