Chengdu

Dec. 12
It’s 2:20 in the afternoon, I have just awoken from a mildly chilly sleep next to a Chinese guy who is name is ‘MaoDou’, which means ‘Everything is round’, because he has a round face.
Two days ago I stepped off a thirty some hour train onto a Chengdu evening. The trackside scenery from Beijing to Chengdu is stirring. A healthy part of my melted brain is still on that train I think, bound for the ‘Nam. I don’t know how to adequately describe the Chinese countryside, it is; fearsome, stunning, desolate, beautiful, void, dark, humble, poor, dirty, innocent, polluted, hopeless, marvelous, hard-working. My camera is still broken, and now so is my brain from capturing in its stead.
Chengdu was welcoming, the outdoors was welcoming, people I could talk to were welcoming, I was personally welcomed. “My roommates are all preparing supper for you” I am told.
Yesterday was the best day I’ve had since I’ve been in China. I’m living with my host and their three roommates (one of whom is MaoDou) near the campus of her Arts University twenty some minutes by bus outside of Chengdu. It’s considered ‘countryside’ still, but it’s relatively modern. The area we are living in is populated almost entirely by art students, so it’s really cool. Anyway, yesterday we rented motorcycles and cruised around town. Then in the evening we had a huge BBQ on the roof of one of the student’s apartments. We gathered some stones and loosely assembled them on the marble balcony floor, dropped in some charcoal, and started a fire. There were ten of us hovered around the small fire, which had a makeshift net strewn about it on which we cooked lotus, beef, chicken legs, breads, potatoes, etc. A flurry chopsticks and conversation carried on into the wee hours. It felt very homey.

Dec. 16
Right now I’m in a hostel in Chengdu’s city center. Until now I’ve been hanging out with my host and their roommates at the Arts University, which has been really amazing. I’m so happy to be with a familiar faee again, but at the same time my Chinese is digressing. Hanging out with a translator all day has made me too lazy to try saying things on my own. I can’t wait to go back to Nanning and start learning formally again. I’ve applied for two more jobs in Nanning, both of them are for oral classes.