12-23-2019

 

Another polluted day today, except I had to go outside because I had class.

I still don't understand what factors affect pollution. I know that winter is generally more polluted than summer because (at least in China) winter = cold = burn coal for warmth = pollution. I also know that nighttime air is generally more polluted than daytime air, I promise I read about it before but I don't remember the science off the top of my head (it's never been my strong suit).

Anyways, I unintentionally happened to take two pictures in about the same location at two different times during the day. In the morning, the air was fine. But when I went out for lunch, totally different story. And it just about stayed that way for the rest of the day.

The picture above was taken at about 11:00am. Not sure what the AQI was at that time, but if I had to guess it was probably less than 100, definitely less than 150.

The picture below was taken at about 5:00pm. The AQI then was probably about 300-350.

12-22-2019

 

Had a much needed extremely lazy day during which I didn't even go outside (just as well since the pollution is terrible)

So, here is another round of vegetable-isms to live by 😁

12-21-2019

 

Tonight was our skit performance! Here is a group picture. We were all in costume but they are relatively thin and we were standing near the entrance to the building so we were FREEZING, hence the coats. 

One of my Chinese classmates added in two other group members who weren't in the picture 😁

 

 The girl on the left is a Chinese classmate. In the middle is my Mongolian classmate.

 

Selfie with another Chinese classmate 

Here is a video of part of our performance!

 

12-20-2019

 

Participated in a poetry recitation competition today (I actually didn't want to 😅) 

The two people in the picture were the emcees. The girl is from Mongolia, she is a bachelor student studying computer science and is in my evening classes. I had dinner with her once, and she seems really nice! I have seen the guy before, but have never talked to him.

12-19-2019

 

 Went to Chinese corner again today! The teacher who led the informal class is in orange. I don't remember if I mentioned this before, but the teacher lived in Russia for some time (I think it was both studying abroad and teaching Chinese there? But I'm not sure).

 The girl on the right in pink is from Mongolia, and the other students are from Russia.

 

Selfie!

The lady next to me in the blue is one of the teacher's Chinese friends, she said she works for a company based in Beijing but recently has been working at a branch in Kazakhstan. It was interesting because today there was a brief discussion on the different sounds/letters in Russian, Mongolian, and Kazakh.

12-18-2019

 

Finally went to the library on the south campus today! A friend helped me find the English books section, not because I want to read English books here, but because I was curious to see what books they had. There's more than I expected, although most of the books seem relatively old. 

Below are pictures from a book of 'Chinese nursery rhymes' that I found intriguing......

 

I think the the translator wanted to use rhyme and rhythm to make the English sound more poetic because a more literal translation of the pig line (which actually comes first) would be something like 'we keep a pig to eat its meat'. 

But yeah, never mind that you need girls to give birth to the boys that were so dearly coveted in older times. Not that girls didn't or couldn't do other things, but you think they would at least think of that!

 

I never anticipated seeing the phrase "saucy baby" in an actual published book.

I have trouble understanding what exactly the last line in Chinese means, something like the baby will cry and wail at the grandpa (because it is a baby, not because it hates the grandpa)?

12-17-2019

 

More wise knowledge from the south campus cafeteria

Bet you kids didn't see that one coming