Blue sky. Seriously, I can see the sky!

So yesterday started interestingly. Alongside my normal bread and ham the grandad put out a mooncake for me. Mooncakes are given out around the Mid-Autumn festival as a show of love, respect or gratitude. In the same way that we have mince pies and gingerbread houses etc at Christmas, mooncakes are very particular to this time of year. They are made of pastry with fillings of red bean or lotus seed paste, and some times a salted duck egg yolk. They can be big and shared between a family, or small for just 1 or 2 people. In fact currently in the news is that they Chinese government has banned members of the CCP putting them on expenses, as they can be pretty pricey. I have never liked them, ever since I had one when I visited China back in 2009. I just can't handle them. So I waited until the grandad went into another room, and went and hid it in the bin. It would be too rude to just say I don't like it. So I acted like a small child hiding their vegetables.

I went off to Chinese class under, you guessed it, a bright blue sky. I haven't seen the sky since I left England, but as it rained on Wednesday it cleared away all the pollution.

Little fluffy clouds.

For a depressing comparison, today.

A new American girl called Laura joined Evelina and I. She's spent the past 2 years travelling around Japan and South Korea, she's going to be here for a year. That is a long time to not see your family, and she's only my age. In class we discussed how seeing eye dogs were being refused entry to the subway and buses, I thought it was remarkedly similar to what I read in the BBC news today. It shows that yes there might be a massive cultural difference, but most societies face the same issues. The lesson also inadvertently brought up the issue of literal translation, especially with idioms. Just because you know what each word means, it doesn't mean that you can understand the meaning of a sentence. So when Nick - our teacher - asked us if we 'hurry up' often Evelina and I thought he meant are you often late, and therefore have to hurry. It transpired that he meant do you have a quick temper, which is obviously quite a different question, especially when you work with kids.

For lunch I took Evelina and Laura to Xidan, which is another massive shopping street. We went to a mall where we rode Asia's longest escalator, it goes from the 1st floor up to the 6th. I think it takes 2-3 minutes maybe longer, I'll time it next time.

We then went into one of the first restaurants we saw, there are so many to choose from it could take ages to pick. While the girls had pasta and cheesy paella -yes apparently that exists - respectively, I had a big bowl of chicken ramen. There was a steak on the menu for the equivalent of £6, if only it was the same in Europe. The waitress did bring me a fork again though, which is so frustrating! This time I ate a good 1/3 of my meal, so I don't know if that counts as an improvement or not!

We then just wandered around the various malls, and mucked around a bit until we had to head back to our respective homes. 

Guess which one is Swedish ;)

The subway was as interesting as ever. First a beggar man came on, he isn't the first I've seen, usually I see one a day on the subway including an old couple who were both 'blind'. This guy however didn't have feet, so he skated on a skate board down the length of the train. They all play loud music, to alert you to their presence, and funnily enough they all badger me more than anyone else as I'm Western and probably more of a soft touch. I don't think I've ever seen anyone pay them, and I have no idea how skateboard guy got there as you have to use loads of stairs to get to the platform. Essentially though they are harmless. There was also an old lady who got on, she didn't even try to get a seat, just pulled out a collapsible stool from her bag, and sat down. Genius.

I learnt that the Chinese hate the number 4, 四, as its alternate meaning is death. So in Chinese buildings they don't tend to have floors 4, 14 or 13. It appears that 13 is unlucky everywhere, poor no. 13. 

We picked Leo up by Bus, which was shockingly a lot quicker. Helen had a friend round for dinner, so as well as a bigger spread the grandad brought out beer and his homemade red wine. The wine was disgusting, really sweet but with a really bitter aftertaste. I stuck to beer, but after about half a pint I felt quite drunk. I haven't drunk since I got here, so maybe it's just that. All I know is that when I go and visit Manchester I think even Lyndsay is going to be able to drink me under the table, which is just shameful. The food was really good though, I had to try and de shell a prawn with chopsticks, which was... Challenging. I'm going be so good by the time I get back though, watch out or I might just steal your skittles using my chopsticks. :P