MykalTofu's Crazy Adventures

Hasaam: SUPERBOY?!

2010-04-23T11:05:00.002+08:00

Hmm. So I uh, somehow found myself auditioning for this show called "快乐男声: SUPERBOY" on Sunday ... I heard about it at the last minute, and went to support Josh (who blew them away and they automatically decided he should go through!) but after a sort of a joke was misunderstood by one of the Partyworld™ people I found myself filling out the forms and being gawped at considerably.

Highlights? Urm, got nervous. Also it was a warm building. Also I've never stood in front of TV lights before. Bottom line? I sweated and froze up in front of effectively millions of people - we can be sure that footage of me WILL be shown when this episode is broadcast because:

a) there were no other white people anywhere, and I spoke almost entirely in Chinese with them
b) when they asked me to sing a second song, in English perhaps, I froze and couldn't think of one because of nerves. This was of course, hilarious as they took it to mean I couldn't sing in English. Then when I butchered a random song that popped into my head I confirmed their theory, but it was more because in my head I was thinking "FUCK dude you're sweating a lot!" rather than my singing normally being QUITE that bad ...
and c) I got through too. This would have a lot to do with a) in my opinion since b) should really have gotten me kicked outta there right away - and I could see them struggling with it. They pretty much said they weren't impressed by my singing but instead by my interest in their language and culture, it moved them they said and they'd like to reward me with the opportunity to learn more. IF I make it through the next round of elimination, it's a free trip to China for meeee to be on TV more. (Notice that I don't include Josh in that 'if'. I am 100% certain he will go to China and finally start being famous and stuff!)

So this week began with me feeling pretty silly for the terrible singing and wondering why I'd sucked so much. I did have some explanations that SEEMED reasonable - lack of preparation, I'd just been sick, I got nervous cos I'd never been on TV before, blah blah blah - but I couldn't accept them. All of them were silly, I decided! The bottom line is, as Josh kept telling me on the day, I simultaneously try too hard while not opening my throat to actually make sound efficient noise. I soon decided that this could be reworded as "I'm not sure if I can really sing and I don't want someone to think that I can't, or that I'm wasting their time."

OOOOH let the healing begin and stuff!

I came to the aforementioned conclusion because I have noticed the quality of my singing diminishes quite a bit whenever I am aware of the possibility of unsupportive/annoyed people hearing me. I can sing to Josh, Neo, Xia Xue, Daniel, and maybe one or two others. But even placing a recording device in front of me and switching it on seemed to tighten up my throat, even if I didn't feel consciously nervous. Weird, huh?

In the words of the great Barney Stinson, "Whenever I start feeling sick I just stop being sick and be awesome instead." I made a discovery! If I let the frustrated angry little man in my head loose on the sooky one that thinks too much, I get a sensation that goes somewhere along the lines of "fuck you Michael, I know I can sing so bugger off I'm gonna go sing now". This has worked in front of the recording devices, and while knowing that my housemates/their guests/ladyfriends are eating in the next room. So far nobody has complained, but nobody has said anything nice either ... hmm ... oh well, I've noticed an improvement in the recordings of myself. (Also, I suppose this proves that other thing I've long suspected - that people have their own lives which don't always centre on making comments about or even noticing mine at all.)

You see, I have no choice but to actually sing as well as I can next week or whenever it is Round 2 is (we're still waiting for the call). Because I suspect that out of the top 50 in Melbourne, even without nerves, I am probably still ranked #50. They're recruiting in Sydney too, and Malaysia, and the States. They WILL find another white guy, probably one who can sing properly, too. One with a bit of stage presence or whatever. Once that happens, I don't even have a flimsy gimmick to get me by. So I assume I will not be going to China with Josh, but the memory of that awful audition is all I need to spur me on. No way are my 15 minutes of fame going to be all about the fact that I screwed up ONE Ben Folds song that nobody's heard of.

Also, below is one possible song choice that X2 suggested I try. I actually like it quite a bit and even translated it this morning. Hopefully anybody who watches the clip isn't further disappointed by my attempts to emulate it.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FhBlhQh9fws

春泥歌词

漫天的话语
纷乱落在耳际
你我沉默不回应
牵你的手
你却哭红了眼睛
路途漫长无止尽
多想提起勇气
好好的呵护你
不让你受委屈
苦也愿意
那些痛的记忆
落在春的泥土里
滋养了大地
开出下一个花季
风中你的泪滴
滴滴落在回忆里
让我们取名叫做珍惜

迷雾散尽
一切终于变清晰
爱与痛都成回忆
遗忘过去
繁花灿烂在天际
等待已有了结局
我会提起勇气
好好地呵护你
不让你受委屈
苦也愿意

漫天纷飞的花语
落在春的泥土里
滋养了大地
开出下一个花季
风中你的泪滴
滴滴落在回忆里
让我们取名叫做珍惜

那些痛的记忆
落在春的泥土里
滋养了大地
开出下一个花季
风中你的泪滴
滴滴落在回忆里
让我们取名叫做珍惜
让我们懂得学会珍惜

Spring Soil Lyrics

Endless words
Scatter around our ears
Silent, neither of us respond
I draw you near
Your eyes are red from crying
Our path is long, neverending
I always tryto summonmy courage
To cherish and protect you
I won't let anything bad happen to you
I'll do this through the hard times too
Those painful memories
Fall into the spring soil
To nourish the earth
And they'll blossom next year
Your teardrops in the wind
Rain down into our memory
Let us call this the thing that we treasure

The fog disperses
Finally it all becomes clear
Love and pain both become a memory
Forgetting the past
All theblossoming flowers glitter on the horizon
Waiting for something that's already happened
I will summon my courage
To cherish and protect you
I won't let anything bad happen to you
I'll do this through the hard times too

Sweet words twirl through the whole sky
And fall into the spring soil
To nourish the earth
And they'll blossom next year
Your teardrops in the wind
Rain down into our memory
Let us call this the thing that we treasure

Those painful memories
Fall into the spring soil
To nourish the earth
And they'll blossom next year
Your teardrops in the wind
Rain down into our memory
Let us call this the thing that we treasure
Let us understand how to really treasure this

Brace Yourself For Incoming Hasaam!

2010-04-06T08:53:00.004+08:00

It was an action-packed breakfast ...

Well, honestly, that phrase popped into my head while I munched on my muesli and I just wanted to try it out. Nothing exploded, no Jehovah's Ninjas lept from the shadows to kidnap my wife, it was all in all a pretty standard breakfast.

Apologies, that wasn't building to anything either. I'm sure it could be labelled as some sort of clever literary technique, though!

"I'm back!" blogs always tend to go sort of meta, don't they? At least for me, they do. "I haven't been blogging in AGES, I'd like to reflect on WHY THAT IS ... " It has occurred to me that such reflections are not overally INTERESTING and leave me little room for creativity, as my life and imagination tend not to revolve around the fact that I didn't feel like taking a little snapshot of my mind and posting in on the internet for a while. Although, now that I've put it like THAT ...

I used to write GOOD. How do I know this? Cos 6 or 7 years ago when I was in high school (saying THAT makes me feel old) I used to write all the time. Assignment? Write the first thing that pops into your head and fix the grammar. Pissed off? Write a stream of gibberish, sometimes it would even rhyme! Bored? I would just instinctively scribble down whatever popped into my head. Later I could turn it into an essay or a short story for English, whatever.

The key word here being instinctive. I never thought about how unusual it was to write so damn much and to just enjoy it. I never realised how good it was for me psychologically to have such an expressive outlet. Just like the way I never noticed how physically fit I was back when I rode my bike everywhere (also mostly high school). I just did it, it was awesome, and the positive consequences of my actions would just sneak right in there without anybody patting me on the back for it.

What was I getting at? Oh yeah, the quality of my work in high school. I used to casually say it was relatively good - you know, good considering my background, good considering the fact that there were only 5 or 6 people who even CARED about doing really well in my year level, blah blah blah etc. But last month I moved house and yesterday I finally emptied out my old desk drawers and cupboards at my folks house. I saw some of my old work and you know what? It was JUST GOOD. Well thought-out, cohesive, entertaining, and clearly some effort had gone into it. Just as clearly, I had obviously been enjoying myself.

After I got to uni, I was so daunted by the notion of being surrounded by academics who used words just as big as I did that I naturally assumed I'd been a big fish in a small pond all through high school. I quickly forgot the fact that I got 100% for every single English SAC I did in year 12, instead choosing to focus on the aspect of my personality that saw me suffer a completely unexpected panic attack in the exam (for the record, this left me with a 35 raw for English, so that was one helluvan attack I reckon!) ...

I don't understand this habit of mine where I focus so hard on how much I suck. Actually, I don't suck. Not, "I don't suck 'that much'" - as it turns out, based on what I flicked through the other day, I clearly have the capacity to fully kick arse.

So I didn't get insane marks across the board in Japanese but you know what? I'd only MET three or four Japanese people in my entire life at that point and most of what I knew I'd learned over a couple of months reading books from the library. I moved on to straight Japanese manga and proceeded at a very slow but steady pace.

There's no reason I couldn't have just kept going with that, but then I got distracted. I got THINKY about everything. I met all these people who were much better than me, who'd had more experience and blah blah blah and while I was truly in awe of some of them, I don't believe I really drew on them that much for inspiration. No, they became excuses. "I'm not as good as him because I've never been to Japan" eventually became "I won't be any good UNTIL I go to Japan" and I poisoned my self esteem just a little more each time I gave it any thought. Eventually all I knew was the fact that I wasn't very good at stuff. And I stopped enjoying what I was doing, because all I could think about was how I wasn't very good at it.

Looking at my high school work, it almost felt like it had all been written by a completely different person. Of course I'm biased, but I felt like the person who wrote all that was kind of cool in his own strange little way. And he was going places. He did what he loved, he helped who he could and none of it ever held him back because he didn't get distracted easily. Once something was in his mind it would stay there until it was sorted out, simple as that.

This week's revelation was simple: There's absolutely no reason I can't be as straightforward as I used to be.

Breakout

2010-01-19T07:41:00.001+08:00

Enjoy this moment
Oops, the moment is past
Get up, breakfast, shower
Oh now I’m late for class
Now that this shift’s over
Might go catch up with friends
Keep an eye on my limits
Make sure I get some rest

Need more hours in the day?
Need a motive that lasts
Maybe I need some more moments
Oops, those moments are past

For today I’ll play safe
No possibilities
In this way, suffocate
But tomorrow I’m free!

I’m resting up now
So that later I’m fast
And then maybe catch a moment
Before the moment is past

Whoops, no, there it goes
Sun’s already down
I just can’t believe I’m taking this lying down

Build it up build it up
All this pressure on me
Never had a torch
Never thought I could see
So I’ll knock down these walls
And let out the crazy
I’m just thumping my chest
Know who I wanna be?
In the cold in the dark
I’m as warm as I need
Not afraid, I’m not smart
Cos of this energy
And I shouldn’t fear these voices when the voices are me

厌恶女人德哈萨姆V女权主义的哈萨姆 - Chauvinistic Hasaam

2009-11-01T08:47:00.016+08:00

前些天我在工作 - 你惊讶了吗？那，那天我们不太忙，一位上级的女人告诉我，“如果女人统治世界的话，天地就没有战争。”
我并不能相信我听的。我对她发笑了。她好像不介意-还沾沾自喜地笑。
我说，“请你等一下，你是认真的吗？你的主要点是不是，女人从未打架？没有男人，世界上都有和平？”
她耐心地回答这是肯定她的主要点。所以，我没办法，不得不纠正她的错误。

I was at work the other day - huge shock, I know. Anyway, we weren't too busy that day and one of my female superiors commented, "You know, if women ruled the world, there would be no wars."
I couldn't believe my ears, not even a tiny bit. I burst out laughing at her, but she didn't seem to mind - she just kept standing there, smiling all smug-like.
I said, "Hang on a sec, you're serious? So your main argument is, women never ever fight? Without men, the world would be a peaceful place?"
She replied that yes, yes indeed that was her point. And so I had to tell her why she was wrong.

“一位男人对另外一位男人生气的时候，没有秘密，大家很快知道！要么他们马上战斗，要么不会再一次聊天。可能是女人不喜欢对抗，但是你们一定打架的次数至少是我们男人的一样！

"If a guy's pissed off at another guy, there are no secrets, everybody soon finds out! Either they beat eachother up immediately, or they don't talk anymore. Maybe women don't like confrontation, but you definitely fight at least as much as men do!

每周我们国家与有另一个国家交战。上周我们恨俄罗斯，这周俄罗斯我们的最好朋友！下周我们再恨他们，而澳大利亚的政府告诉我们，‘在俄罗斯，她们现在散布谣言，她们说我们杀婴儿！她们说谎使我们的同盟国对我们翻脸！我们不会容忍她们的罪行！！！’然后我们在交战状态中。

Every week we'd be at war with another country. Last week, we hated Russia, this week they're our best friends! Next week we'll hate them again, and the Australian Government will tell us, "In Russia, they're spreading shit about us! They say we kill babies! They've turned all our allies against us with their lies, we're not gonna put up with their crimes!!!" And then we'd be at war.

外交也会是灾难性的。澳大利亚轰炸一下俄罗斯，俄罗斯轰炸了我们，终于这两个国家商定谈判：
“黑。。。澳大利亚，我们还是朋友吗？”
“妳说什么？？？俄罗斯，淡然我们还是朋友！！！”
“真的吗？只是，啊，那，有国家说妳们对我们不高兴了。。。”
“得了吧，我们怎么对妳们生气吗？哈哈，别傻了！”
“好了。但是，为什么妳们轰炸了我们？”
“啊？！谁说我们轰炸了妳们？我们没有，我们从未且不会轰炸妳们拉！”
“噢。Ok。对不起，我们真的不好意思，澳大利亚！”
“不用不好意思，俄罗斯，这只是一个很大的误会！”
“我们同意，非常高兴我们都有机会澄清！”
“我们爱妳们，俄罗斯。”
“我们也爱妳们，澳大利亚！”
*大家咯咯笑*

Diplomacy would be a disaster, too. Australia'd bomb Russia a bit, Russia'd bomb Australia a bit, finally we'd agree to negotiate:
"Hey ... Australia, are we still friends?"
"What are you talking about? Russia, OF COURSE we're still friends!!!"
"Really? It's just ... well, some countries have been saying you're not happy with me and ... "
"Come on, how could we be mad at you? Haha, don't be silly!"
"Sure. But, why did you bomb us?"
"Huh?! Who said we bombed you? We didn't, we never have and we would never do that!!!"
"Oh, okay. Sorry, we're so embarrassed, Australia!"
"Don't be embarrassed, Russia, this was just a big misunderstanding!"
"We agree, oh we're so glad we had this chance to clear it all up!"
"We love you, Russia."
"We love you too, Australia!"
*Everybody laughs*

两个政府会回国，告诉她们自己的国家：
“那个（别的国家）是个婊子！她们假装不知道谁轰炸了我们！她们肯定知道，大家知道她们是轰炸了我们的！”
澳大利亚对美国，英国这么说。俄罗斯对中国，韩国这么说，等等。
英国可能说，“我们不要在妳们两个国家之间做出选择。为什么我们都不能只再交个朋友？”
澳大利亚会回答，“我们以为妳们是我们的朋友，妳们怎么说这个问题都是我们的错？！”
过了一会儿，澳大利亚和俄罗斯忘了她们的争端，再交个朋友。但是澳大利亚还对英国生气了。我猜当时澳大利亚和美国可能会轰炸英国。”

Both governments would go back to their own countries, and tell their people:
"That (other country) is such a bitch! They're acting like they don't know who bombed us! Well of course they know, everyone knows they're the ones who did it!"
Then Australia as a nation would say the same thing to America and England. Russia would have a similar bitch-fest with China and Korea.
England might say, "I don't wanna have to choose between you girls. Why can't we all just be friends again?"
Then Australia would reply, "I thought we were friends, England. How can you say this is all Australia's fault?!"
After a little while, Australia and Russia would forget all about their dispute and be best friends again. But Australia would still be mad at England. Probably Australia and America would bomb England then."

我的同时不同意。她说，那种女人不存在。俄，没关系。我知道我说的是真的！

My coworker disagreed. She said, that type of woman doesn't exist. Ah well, doesn't matter, I know what I said is true!

Hmmm ... 其实，我的"Followers"都是女人。。。我不知道是否她们觉得这个帖子是可笑的？其实我的主要点不是“女人不如男人”。。。只是“女人不是比男人上级”，哈哈。。。这是“平等”真的意思，对吗？

Hmm ... actually my "followers" are all women ... I don't know if they'll find this post funny or not? For the record, my point isn't "women aren't as good as men" ... it's just "women aren't SUPERIOR to men, haha, we're all equal, right? =P

Hasaam's Rant of Epic Proportions - 哈萨姆抱怨得太多

2009-10-28T09:18:00.000+08:00

今天早上有人发短信把我叫醒了。我不介意，收短信使我感觉很好，我真的需要人爱。（其实我不知道这是否一个严重的问题，我不应该觉得似乎一直需要人的赞成。。。那,可能是我喜欢收她的短信,我喜欢她把我叫醒,这是可爱的事情,对吗?呵呵。。。）

Today I was woken up by somebody sending me an SMS. I didn't mind, getting SMSes generally makes me feel pretty good about myself, sad as it is I seem to thrive on the idea that people like me, or that I'm important to them somehow =P I've been wondering if this is a serious problem, maybe I shouldn't depend so much on other people's approval? Oh well, at least it means I didn't get angry, haha.

然后我吃早饭的时候，读报了。在The Herald Sun上我看到，很多Facebook Users不高兴。为什么？因为Facebook再改变布局。这问题不是值得报导的吗？！我当然以前有说过，"The Herald Sun不是真的报纸，我对那些以THS为有分量的报纸的人感到惋惜"，但是那些人看到这个报导之后怎么继续相信THS是个可靠的新闻来源？！

Then I read the paper over breakfast. In the Herald Sun I saw that there are a lot of unhappy Facebook Users out there. Turns out they don't like the fact Facebook changed its layout yet again. This problem is NEWSWORTHY?! Of course in the past I've already said, "The Herald Sun isn't a real newspaper, I feel sorry for people who consider it to have any depth at all", but this is a new low even for them. How can those people continue to think of The Herald Sun as a reliable source of news?

它随便地拿明星的事情当头条新闻。。。显然THS和东周刊或Women's Weekly一样！！！我知道很多人不介意，很多人继续觉得The Herald Sun是澳洲的最好报纸。我的父母亲，弟弟，奶奶是那些人之四。为什么我们都想茫然无知？为什么我们不想学世界事务？为什么我们只想听说Wayne Carey后悔他之前作的，现在他写了一本书？与此同时世界有很多问题，没有人知道怎么办。只是因为我们都不想成熟，假装我们跟有问题的人没有关系。我们想相信别人的问题不该干涉我们的无聊生活。
所以我有点伤心，我再也不会读The Herald Sun。

It often treats celebrity affairs as headline news material! Clearly it is no different from East Weekly or Women's Weekly. I know lots of people don't care, lots of people feel the Herald Sun is Australia's best newspaper. My parents, little bro and Nana are four of these people. Why do we want to be kept in the dark like this? Why don't people want to learn about the world? Why do we just want to hear that Wayne Carey regrets what he's done in the past, and now he's writing a book? Meanwhile the world has real problems, and nobody knows what to do about it. Just because we want to stay as children and pretend we're not connected, that other people's problems shouldn't interfere with our crappy boring lives.

So I'm feeling a little sad, I will never read the Herald Sun again.

^^

哈萨姆不是无聊！所以，无聊的肯定不是哈萨姆！ Hasaam Does Not Suck. That Which Sucks Is Not Hasaam.

2009-10-20T20:14:00.003+08:00

哇。。。我最近有头疼。。。上个星期我的想法变成非常奇怪。不管什么语言，这是很难解释。我的脑子里有设置很多"路障"。。。我觉得，大家跟我一样。但是，由于某种原因，看来我的路障比较复杂。。。那，这上几天，在我的脑子里发生了很多事。有的这些"路障"我破坏了，有的我新设置了。我不知道怎么解释，但是我觉得我的想法很快改变。

我意识到了另外另外一个事：我想写在博客上的时候连一个事也我想不到。。。另一方面，如果我跟有的人讲一会儿，我不能停止产生看法！可能是那个跟我讲的他们不想一天听我胡言乱语。。。可能是看我的博客的你们不想每次看我再说："那，我是有点不舒服，哇，我的中文还是差的！为什么我的水平还没有提高了？！" 结果我会在这里开始胡言乱语。

So something else occurred to me - whenever I'm sitting here wanting to write a blog I can't think of a thing, but on the other hand, if I talk to somebody for a little while, I can't STOP coming up with opinions! Now, it's possible that these people I talk to don't want to hear me talking shit all day ... it's also possible that you guys who actually read this don't want to come here and every time be faced with "Oh I'm not feeling that great, gee my Chinese still isn't very good! Why aren't I better at Chinese yet?!" So I will now start talking shit right here.

今天我在图书馆工作。今年，我没有作业，没有课。另外每年，我觉得我有某种目的 - 准备有的旅行，选择我想去哪个大学，等等。。。另外每年我没有担心钱的事。从我小时候一直说，"常规生命不够。我想去旅行，帮助人，有大冒险！"。。。去年我工作努力，做出牺牲，仔细地打算我的旅行。最后，我没有失败了。其实我做出还有一个牺牲-我回国了。我不后悔回家，我很高兴有机会在Josh的第二十一岁的生日聚会唱歌，跟我的朋友玩。。。但是我还是觉得无聊。最近好像我多数时间在图书馆工作。我变成有点严厉的人。有的星期我甚至不出去玩。只是工作，工作，工作。。。然后我回家，上网，看电视，睡觉。。。如果我喜欢我的工作，如果我觉得通过在图书馆工作我帮助人，那我都不介意。但是，如果图书馆没有我和我的同事，没关系。顾客只需要学怎么看懂指示牌。现在他们有我们和指示牌 - 他们平常选择我们的原因是因为他们太懒惰。我不想用一生帮助懒惰的人！！！

Today I worked at the library. This year, I haven't had any homework, or class. Every other year I've felt like I had some sort of purpose - preparing for some trip, choosing a university, etc etc. Every other year I never worried about money. Since I was little I always said, "A normal life is not good enough. I wanna travel, help people, and go on big adventures!" ... Last year I worked really hard, made sacrifices, and planned my trip meticulously. In the end I didn't fail, not really. I just made one last sacrifice - I came home. I don't regret that decision, I'm so happy that I could sing at Josh's 21st and hang out with my friends ... but I still feel so bored. Lately it seems like I've spent most of my time working at the library. I'm becoming a lot tighter. Some weeks I don't even go out at all, it's just work work work. Then I come home, go online, watch TV, go to sleep. If I liked my job, if I felt that through working at the library I was helping people, I wouldn't mind at all. But, if me and my coworkers weren't at the library, it wouldn't matter. The customers would just need to learn to read signs. At the moment they have both us and the signs - most of the people who choose us are just too lazy to read a sign. I don't wanna spend my life helping lazy people!!!

没关系没关系。。。我很快去马来西亚。然后，我会开始准备我下一个大冒险-明年我打算从我在Cranbourne的家到Gold Coast坐自行车！我不说谎，这个事一定会发生！下一个帖子上我说关于我新的计划。

Ah well who cares ... I'm going to Malaysia soon. And then, I will start getting ready for my next big adventure - Next year I'm going to ride a bike from my house in Cranbourne to the Gold Coast! I'm not lying, this will definitely happen! I'll talk about my new plan in the next entry ;)

哈萨姆的决定 - The Call of Hasaam

2009-10-11T20:33:00.003+08:00

It recently occured to me that I only know of one Chinese person who reads this - okay, 2 if you count Amanda but as far as my brain knows she's white - and apparently there are a handful of people who do check this blog from time to time. I doubt they cared too much but I'm sure being greeted by more and more gibberish heiroglyphs every time you did happen to check would have lost its appeal over the last couple months, so I will now endeavour to keep this as a bilingual blog - at least for the moment. (The problem with blogging in English is I am tempted to allow my native babble to dominate my vaguely timid and stuttery Mandarin persona and defeat the purpose of practising - this paragraph illustrates the point. The advantage is I am then faced with the challenge of TRANSLATING this paragraph, and, having said that, I slap my forehead with a resounding, suspiciously moist-sounding thud ... I'm not helping myself AT ALL at this point ...)

为什么我这么说？！哇啊，我的英文说法是奇怪得连以英文为母语的人也不总是看懂了！！！我怎么翻译？OK OK 我试一下。。。但是你不要预料我逐字地翻译，如果我的英文的意思和中文的都是差不多一样，那就行，对吗？好了，我最近意识到了，除了一个人之外，读这个博客的你们都不会中文呢？我不算Amanda是中国人，我其实觉得他是个白人。其实我以前没想象人读我没有意思的博客。。。可能是你们不在乎我用不用中文，但是我是个非常体贴的人！我知道你们跟你看不懂的汉字越来越没趣吧！所以，从现在起我在这个博客上力求用两个语言。。。问题是，我用英文的时候用复杂的句子，俚语，等等，是我的母语，当然都是太容易的。但我的中文还不是那么好，所以我不能翻译所有的那种内容。那个上面的段落证明我说得对呢？哈哈。。。我猜这个也是件好事-为了提高我的中文水平，我肯定需要向自己挑战。。。这个真的不是逐字地翻译呵呵。。。但是我翻译了所有的主点，对不对？那个最后的英文句子是太笨的！为什么我写下了那个笨的句子？？！没关系，我放弃！

哈萨姆的周末

2009-09-20T16:55:00.004+08:00

上个周五晚上我开车去了Neo的家,呆在那里两天。前天早上我们两个联系那首周杰伦的歌-稻香。Neo弹了吉他，我吹了笛子,唱了唱。我们为Josh的第二十一岁的生日聚会打算让他惊喜。其实，我跟三四个人打算了给Josh几个惊喜。

一是，他的最好朋友不能来。我告诉他应该提前拍摄自己的演说，所以聚会的时候大家还能看。
二是，密密地接触了很多他的朋友，告诉他们Josh的女朋友需要钱买特贝贵的礼物。
最后，我和Neo学了"稻香"。

在澳洲的文化里，二十一岁的生日是非常特别的。虽然十八岁的生日之后可以开车，喝酒，等等，但是我们认为只有二十一岁了才算成年人。所以二十一岁的生日聚会平常会是比较大的。一二个好朋友需要演说。其实Josh要求我演说。我不知道我该说什么，但是我没有怕。我只想，我和Neo的表演应该让他们都笑。我想对了，哈哈！

哦。。。我们表演之后，我喝醉了。。。喝得太多。。。我其实不能动。我觉得有一点不好意思，但是我很少喝醉。第二天，我身体还好。非常高兴我喝酒的时候又喝太多水！

还要哈萨姆

2009-08-24T21:56:00.003+08:00

我想再用中文写一下！

最近我工作比较多。。。所以我当然省了比较多的钱！但是我还没有太多的钱，我最好继续工作。。。哇~，我还买不起新车。虽然我不想买新车，我现在有的车好像几个月内报废。如果我能坐自行车去工作，坐火车跟朋友玩，等等，就一定没问题。但是，有人意外地不能来工作的时候，我需要很快去那里。而我的大多数朋友的家从火车站太远了！我不喜欢依靠朋友给我搭个车。。。没关系，我现在有车，现在有钱。十一月我去马来西亚，已经买了机票！我希望这辆车该报废之前我省很多钱。然后我能开始再旅行。下次我去旅行，我想工作一下。旅行的人常常教英文，或者在酒吧工作。有的人在青年招待所工作。

我想知道: 为了取得经验，该不该在澳大利亚找这种工作？我不知道这是否重要的。可能会有趣！

最近我发现了世界上有两种人。第一种人想了解别人，提高自己。他们觉得通过知识找到幸福。我是这样的人。我们都是互相依存的。当然我们应该互相帮助。

第二种人只想有东西，不求上进。很多这样的人非常聪明，取得成功。我不知道是否他们的东西真的让他们觉得幸福，但是我讨厌这种想法。如果你以为需要有东西让你觉得幸福，你就一直想拥有东西。如果你不能拥有想拥有的东西，你怎么办？

然后生活变成比赛而有人肯定会输。我知道大家有幸福是可能的，所以我受不了这个比赛。我们都已经有脑子。为了找到幸福，你只要脑子。当然我也想拥有东西。我希望有一天只想知识。

我的愿望就是我们都尝试互相了解，尝试互相帮助。我愿望大家关心大家的幸福。这是最嘁哩喀喳的办法！

你觉得我的愿望是不可能实现的？我知道。这是因为太多人太怕输。这是真的"irony"。

Hasaam Cops A Fizzle

2009-08-18T20:25:00.003+08:00

Have I mentioned that people fascinate me?

Today in the tea room at work there were 3 of us at the table. Somebody happened to notice a pile of Christian pamphletts when I sat down in front of them. On the front it didn't say much more than "Jesus something something" and it had a picture of a dove on it. We assumed a patron must have given them to another staff member, who probably brought them around back. This outraged to both of them. One of them said it was "absolutely disgusting" and the other said she would like to throw it out. "That is so offensive," was another line thrown out there. I told them not to throw them in the bin. I think the most important thing in a situation like this is the intention of the religious person - in other words, it's the thought that counts. Somebody who believes that God loves us and Jesus saves us wanted to pass on something they felt was very special, it's as simple as that. From their point of view, they were offering us the best gift of all, and they didn't even know us. Isn't that sweet? Also I just generally disagree with disrespecting any object that has value placed on it by other people, whether that's spiritual or financial, whatever.

I didn't really get a chance to say anything even remotely like any of that, though, and it probably wouldn't have gone down well. I just asked "what's wrong with it just sitting there?" and The Lady Who Picks On Me primly announced, "Religion is a matter of personal choice and we shouldn't have to put up with it being INFLICTED on us." She practically spat when she got to that word, "inflicted". I thought, holy crap it was just sitting there, you guys wouldn't have even noticed if I'd sat somewhere else! Inflicted? I mean, you could just not look at it, somebody else might appreciate the gesture, it's not like somebody was following them around demanding they convert ... =S

Why would this upset them so much?

What fascinated me further was the fact that I knew there was no way I could ask my question without my head getting bitten off. Because at some point I mentioned that I'd gone through 12 years of Catholic schooling the first lady assumed I was Catholic (which I find amusing because once a priest recommended an exorcism for me when he found out I was going to a Buddhist Temple). So she would have assumed I was being blindly defensive. The Lady Who Picks On Me had made her Big Bold Statement with such dramatic and aggressive flair that I didn't think I would get any sense out of her even if she didn't choose to get offended.

If I had asked them to justify their attitude and behaviour, I'm sure they would have become quite defensive themselves. But they really didn't make any sense to me. I genuinely just wanted to understand, but I'm sure they would have just assumed I was judging them and/or trying to change them - that's how most people seem to react. Why do people need to be so attached to their senses of self that it hinders our ability to have objective, constructive conversations? I get so confused trying not to upset people over trivial things - that's why I sometimes maybe come across as a bit of a pushover. It is near-impossible for me to predict when somebody's going to be upset over something that makes no sense to me whatsoever, and I still can't work out what's a reasonable problem at least by convention. I can't prioritise this sort of thing, it ALL seems frivolous to me.

I asked my parents about the whole thing over dinner, they thought it was fair enough (my Dad being the reason I got baptised Catholic) because people shouldn't have to be pressured or something. But, again, I totally fail to see a source of pressure in this scenario. My brother walked in at this point and goes "ohhh yeah cos THIS GUY never gets upset about ANYTHING" - I'll admit I found this frustrating because once again, it was an example of people's defensiveness totally getting in the way of my understanding. Why did he have to assume I was judging them? Why does everybody do that? I spot a failing in my ability to interact properly with another person and have figured out that the reason is because of a particullar difference between my way of thinking and theirs. Then I seek to understand it. That's just logical! I am aware that this seems like a defensive reaction in of itself, and while I love irony like that usually, it's actually a different, even better kind of irony - the fact that people keep making that assumption is yet another failure of mine to interact properly, so I will probably obsess over that too until I find a way to avoid the problem.

Anyway, my parents quickly grew weary of the topic on the grounds that I didn't need to care about every little thing, but I insisted that I had no emotional investment in this, I was just really REALLY interested because I could not understand it. They told me I didn't need to understand everything. I found that statement amusing because I didn't really understand IT, either. Then I said we didn't have to talk about it anymore, seeing as how they were clearly getting frustrated and that was just one more thing I didn't quite get xD

And that's my story. Oh by the way, does anybody want a pamphlett filled with stories about how Jesus saved various people in modern times? I've happened across a bunch somehow ...

激动的哈萨姆

2009-07-21T23:27:00.003+08:00

今天早上，我看了一份在Monash大学图书馆的工作。当然，我立刻申请了。我真的真的真的希望我得到这份工作。

因为我在Casey-Cardinia的图书馆工作大概五年，我觉得自己经验丰富，受过的训练使我能胜任这份工作。（其实这个是我在申请上填写的，我也相信是真的。）我认为我跟这份工作一定没有问题。

首先，在Monash大学图书馆那个薪水比较高，位置很好。因为我有很多在Monash的朋友，所以如果我在那里工作的话，就有很多机会遇到几个好朋友。当然，最重要的是这份工作是份全日工作。我厌倦每天等等工作打电话，讨厌浪费时间。

是理想的！

昨天晚上我约了Lily出来，他在墨尔本三四个天，我非常高兴她告诉我。我们两个爱讲故事，有奇怪朋友，问不寻常的问题。Oh, also他也爱素菜，特别喜欢豆沙 ^^ 所以，我们在日本第一次结识的时候很快交朋友。但她是阿德莱德人，所以没预料再见面她。

我们散散步大概一个半小时，终于到了唐人街。然后我们找到了一个饺子饭店。我们吃的不太好吃，但是我不介意因为也非常便宜，而且跟Lily谈谈很好玩儿。

那，现在是早上三点差一刻，我最好去睡觉吧！

哈萨姆

2009-07-19T19:39:00.002+08:00

我觉得我的中文还不好了。2007年我开始学，但是我相信我的水平似乎我学了一年以下。。。说不定我只是不够耐心。不管怎样，为了提高我的中文水平，重要的是不停的练习，对吧？所以我决定用中文写有的entries。有的时候我上网试试读中国人的博客。不幸，如果我不认识一个博客的作家的话，我就对那个博客没有兴趣。而且，我注意力很容易分散，最近我不知道应该做什么。

我看我的朋友。他们大多数都是天才。有的是艺术天才，有的是音乐天才，语言的天才，等等。有的人非常可爱，还是聪明，健康的。因为他们知道想做什么，不会想太多，没有我优柔。

这个entry不是关于自怜，只是我知道的。我不是天才，也不是蠢材。我当学生的时候，我不得不学习，写文章，动我的脑子想想！看来我不上课，我没有动机。为什么？我是不是因为害怕了？可能是的，我害怕很多东西。但是我不害怕失败。所以我不相信害怕让我浪费时间。现在，我既没有特别的目标，又我的生活不太固定。每天，如果我不上班，我想，"hmm,今天我做什么？"，然后平常决定上网几分钟，看我的email，等等。几分钟变成几个小时，我觉得太不好意思。因为我每天不知道是否图书馆会给我打电话求我工作，早上十点半前我只等等。最近如果我不上班，就下雨,我的车不开，我弟弟看电视（还是睡觉）。。。所以我上网。其实，我有至少一个目标：找更好的工作！哈哈。

Hmm这个entry有点乏味的。Oh well,下次我不会谈谈我sooky的事
=D

Are We Here For The Ride?

2009-07-13T12:34:00.003+08:00

Payday tomorrow!

Half this was written a few nights ago when I was very tired, the other half last night when I was uhhhh intoxicated ... one bit in particullar was clearly written by somebody not totally sober, and I encourage you to say that part aloud at a nice speedy pace =P

***
If we're not running then we're falling cos who's running this gig?
I was wondering if we're stalling but a lifetime is big
Big enough that the little things don't matter so much
But the biggest thing's still little so there's no need to rush

And we tearing inspiration from the fabric of life
With distorted observation that we say gets us by
It's a sort of real sensation but it's sort of a lie
Like when they taught us we could make it but they never said why

Words are taking too long, give me a thousand in one!
So we trippin on vision and we wanna try
Breakin free from our prison to see what that's like
Shut our minds up and listen, our senses run wild
While you make big decisions we just here for the ride

Start with nothing end with something - something something
Start with nothing, end with something something - something somethi ...
End with something something ... something something ... someth ...

All eyes on to John, now it's begun, he starts with nothing something something
Something nothing something
Something something nothing
Nothing something nothing
Nothing nothing nothing???
[Fingersnap]
Ideal.
Maybe John has just won. But figuring that out is half the fun.

So you skippin on trippin, eager to defy
Takin life and enlistin, til there's nothing outside
Bound in materialism, force the passion to hide
But we don't rate these decisions we just here for the ride
Lyrics have limits, they can't say it all, so let's stock up on rhythm and breathe out our souls!

It's a just a means to an end but I don't believe in the end
So nothing starts with nothing finished and I won't even pretend
Pretend the answers are there, that it makes sense or it's fair
Fair enough but if you bluff it you might think that you're there

And we picking up the pieces from our own shattered minds
Reconstructing all of these in a new grandoise design
Sort of hoping it releases something that helps us find
All the pieces we were missing on those days we were blind

So we trippin on vision cos it keeps us alive
Sometimes bound in the prison where there's nothing outside
Shut our minds up and listen, forceful passionate strides
Your decisions in the backseat cos I feel like a drive

What Goes Up Must Hasaam

2009-07-09T12:07:00.003+08:00

Countdown: 183

Goal: $7500
Current Funds: $1800
$5700 to go!

Ahhh the ponderings. Car wouldn't start yesterday. Dad caved and let me drive his after ranting for a while about how I shouldn't have let the petrol go as low as I did (we've noticed it happens most when I'm lower than a quarter tank). It was very frustrating because it made me 10 mins late for work, and so I didn't have time to drink coffee. This is probably a good thing because it would have been the 8th day in a row I'd woken myself up with it, but instead had a grumpy little shift filled with withdrawal symptoms. Today it still wasn't going which cost me a coffee again, only this time it would have been coffee with Adila, so I grumble a bit more. An hour after I bailed on her I tried it again and of course it started as if nothing had ever been wrong, so I hurried to the servo and filled her up halfway. The plan now is to get her somewhere where they can help her, or at least tell me to give up hope. I'll do that Saturday, not now, because my shift starts at 5 in Endeavour Hills and I can no longer drive there - don't wanna leave now and can't assume it'll start for me later.

So I looked up some information on the good ol' metlinkmelbourne.com.au. It's gonna take me about an hour instead of half an hour to get there, but during that time, perhaps I'll read something, write some stuff down, or just get some pondering done. I'll be out in the open air, I'll have to actually walk to the station and so on, it'll be good for me, it really will. In fact, I've also decided on Saturday that I'm going to fix up that crappy bike J'Mak sold me (crappy cos I basically killed it through overuse and subsequent neglect), that'll be a project and it'll force me to be more active. What do I do with the extra half hour I save by driving to work? I'm usually online, facebooking, watching TV, never anything useful. Instead I will exercise, and save considerably on petrol money! I am hoping my car will turn out okay, because there will still be problems if it's not - wet weather is not ideal for bike riding, in fact it's downright insane, good thing today features a beautiful blue sky or I'd probably be feeling a lot bitchier about all this!

Between the bike and getting the car fixed, I may get flung back to triple digits on my savings, hopefully not filling up on petrol so much will make some difference, but this really is just even more incentive to get a real job which sees me working set hours, maybe even full-time. Or else, maybe it just means I'm ever more likely to be looking for a job rather than a good language course in China next year =P

***

Pondering helps. Activity helps. Existential quandaries? Less helpful =P

Farewell Hasaam

2009-06-30T10:36:00.002+08:00

Countdown: 192

Goal: $7500
Current Funds: $1900
$5600 to go!

Some of that money is almost definitely going into my car. I'm not so keen about that, but Logan's dying I think. Had a nice lil nothing week, filled with silliness, from hanging out at Paul's place doing nothing special to going to Jeremy's 21st which was packed with drama students and the music played all night was almost entirely showtunes and musicals. They were all very nice people, but then, who else would Jeremy be surrounded by? He's such a genuine guy. Oh yeah and I jammed with Neo Sunday night, we practiced Rising Fighting Spirit way too many times, now we can sort of play it okay, but anything we record it on is subsequently destroyed by the higher, slightly more shrill tones Marcello produces. Apparently Neo called his guitar Zion, but he seemed less than enthusiastic about the name =P

Monica and I declared a contest to see who could serve the most annoying, stupid and/or selfish person in a 7hr shift on Friday. She was at an Optus shop in The Glen while I went to Narre Warren. Subsequently I had the best shift I have ever had in Narre Warren after 4 and a half years. I didn't even get so much as a FROWN. I even somehow fixed the horrible printer by myself, which nobody had done before (it's brand new so we'd always have to call tech support a.k.a. Rowland). Everybody was freakishly patient and relaxed no matter what happened. Instead of sooking about how the printer had taken her money and not printed her work, one woman told me "oh don't worry about it there were bound to be teething problems ... " a middle eastern lady whose only words to a coworker had been foreign swears was smiling and saying "thankyou" repeatedly to me after I served her! One guy approached me and asked, "Where's the complaints box? Nah, just kidding, this place is great I love it!" That ACTUALLY happened. It was nuts. Some of them even started going the other direction, sharing heart-warming stories about how their son won an OAM for his work helping the blind and such. It was unbelievable! And so I have decided to publicly declare what I have always in my heart known - I am the Prophet of the Irony Gods.

***

Got in touch with Kris The Awesome German, he studied in China for about 4 years I believe. I asked him about universities in China. He's recommended me a place in Yunnan. Having crunched the numbers I'm guessing to stay there for one semester would set me back around $AUS3500, so I'd bump that up to $4000 to be safe - this includes school fees, accomodation and daily expenses, but not the transport to get there/insurance/travelling after. (And of course it's dependent on the $AUS not getting any weaker or the RMB suddenly getting way too strong ...) I am going to seriously consider this as an option for next year.

Speaking of options for next year, I also mentioned to Kathryn in a bit of an offhand way that I had a desire to do volunteer work. She's also quite keen to check that place out so I might do a little asking around (i.e., Maxine who's going there at the end of this year, Monica who already has - both of whom for volunteer projects, Aunty Shoba/Eugene for some local tips and perhaps to find out if there's anybody I could say hi to over there). We've tentatively agreed to aim for January/Febuary, in which we would like to do some volunteer stuff and then wander around checking the place out.

***

Just last night I watched an Andrew Denton thing where he was interviewing people who suffered from mental illness. Within the first 5 minutes I was taken back to my high school days. These people had heard voices, saw things, suffered from bouts of paranoia and delusion, run around screaming in the street and recieved no help, loathed the side-effects of medication and many aspects of the mental health care sector. The most striking thing for most people who watched this I think, might have been how articulate and self-aware many of these people being interviewed were. These were, of course, people who'd admit that they were sick and needed some sort of help, but to somebody who hadn't given their sort a chance it would have been really eye-opening to listen to them speaking like fairly normal people who'd simply had horrible traumatic experiences, caused by a glitch in their own minds.

I felt like I'd closed my eyes and turned my back on my own experience. Yes, I sorted myself out early, it was only about a year or two that I'd been "sick" and I even managed to keep passing until Year 12 where I got decent marks, with the help of many many wonderful people. I had never become the guy in the street who mumbled about the people that watch him, but for a long time I was worried I might. My absolute number one fear has always been that I might one day end up recieving ECT - shock therapy. I broke down in school many times in Year 10 and a few in Year 11, the biggest being when I ran headfirst into a locker before homeroom and started screaming gibberish at a bully. Then there were these ridiculous rumours about the other crazy stuff I'd supposedly done that went around and gave my paranoia the perfect environment to fester in. I also began to develop theories about extra-dimensional beings who were controlling my life by writing a book about me, all the little dramas that went on were clearly for their entertainment. And I always felt so lonely, I wished I could find somebody who understood what I was going through, or that I could myself understand. Very drama, very emo, yes.

The morning I went crazy in front of everyone, the school called my therapist - they'd already had their eyes on me because the rumours had actually started a little bit before I majorly flipped out. Later I was told after the vice-principal told her what had happened, Jeanette immediately replied, "and I bet he didn't lay a finger on anybody." I found this touching, to say the least. I realised that what was going on with me could have been much worse, while I sometimes freaked out there were still times I had my whole mind, my whole awareness. It was around then I started going to Yun Yang, and I found myself becoming more and more self-aware, and learned about how to issue more self-control and assert my personality over the crazy. I learned not to blame myself for the afflictions I couldn't help, but still take responsibility and work on working with them. It took a very long time to do this properly. My own experience combined with the Buddhist teachings led me to consider many other aspects of the human experience to be "afflictions" too - for example when so-and-so is angry, that's not *who* they are, it's something that's taken over them at that point because they hadn't reached a level of understanding/control which allowed them to control it. Just like I never wanted to go crazy, I doubted people really wanted to be unpleasant for no reason, and so on.

I think as I got better and better at getting people to think of me as "Mykal that weird guy who wouldn't hurt anyone" as opposed to "that nutcase I can't understand", I started to distance myself from these past experiences. I've become less patient and more easily thrown off balance because I'm no longer angry enough to want to prove anything, and I was happy simply thinking I was not so crazy after all, instead of appreciating what that really meant to me when I was trying to convince myself of it.

My experience was really a series of near-misses, I had episodes but every story I've heard about people flipping out has been 100 times worse than mine. I'm in the middle, between the crazies I wished I could know and the normals I wished I could understand. I just got mini-episodes, I suppose. I think that any sort of mood swing that affects a person's judgement/self-control is like an even minier ep. If I can keep that in mind, I'm sure my compassion and respect for others will increase - the fact that I've forgotten this part of my past is probably the reason I've been lacking in it a bit more these days.

Hasaam Abruptly Recalls Own Definition

2009-06-23T22:39:00.003+08:00

Countdown: 199

The week was dull and empty and I continued to wonder what I was doing with my life etc etc etc.
Friday night I was about to go to sleep when I got a phone call from Adrian, apparently he and Patrick and Jason all felt like a "scavenger hunt" so I drove over there to find a list of silly dares, helped come up with a couple more and watched them assign points to each one. Then I got paired with Jason and we agreed to rendezvous back at 3am (it was about midnight at the time). Dares included:
Commit Mosery (apparently this is the legal term for the act of exposing oneself to a blind person. For some reason, nobody went for this one).
Go to another state
Glad wrap some fool's car - me and Jason did this to Adrian's car, and of course by the end of the night found they'd used the same wrap to cover mine.
Get breathalised - the plan was simple: go to the copshop and explain to them we'd been at a party around the corner and wanted to make sure we were right to drive home. But apparently they need to have "reasonable cause" or something, which makes no sense to me. We failed.
Climb a tree 10m high - we combined this one with "T.P. a tree" and "sing humpty dumpty while wearing a condom on your head" to much success!
Have a shopping trolley battle - combined with "spit from 20m up" by doing both at Fountain Gate shopping centre. Mooned nobody on the way out, since this was also on the list, but it didn't quite count as a combo.
Oh I'm also missing a little hair from my right arm cos I got it waxed, that was an easy 25 points!!!
By far our proudest combo was "buy a stranger dinner" and "take a sexy photo posing on a stranger's car". We achieved this by approaching somebody at the drive-thru (remember this was 2:50am) and explaining the whole game, summing it up with "so basically, if you allow me to pose sexily on your car I will pay for your meal. How much is it?" The driver, who had three piercings in his left eyebrow alone, replied in quite a mellow tone, "sure I'll help a couple of fellas out. It's just 9 bucks."
Adrian and Pat beat us essentially by doubling up on many dares which we didn't - most of the time they did each in separate locations and so forth, so it wasn't as dodgy as it might sound. Their sexy poses involved being shirtless. One dare was to "egg the other team". Me and Jason, being as paranoid and cowardly as eachother, rightly suspected an ambush at the last minute at Adrian's house. So we showed up shoeless and topless to ensure we didn't get too messy. About 2 eggs were thrown at us and we sure felt silly!
The next 2 and a half hours were spent debating the points system, some of the points allocated to some of the dares just seemed silly. Also, although Jason and I loved the idea of making interesting combos, Adrian was not happy with our method for acknowledging them in the score, which involved multiplication, and frankly did seem a bit excessive.

It was a lovely wake-up call. Then I went and hung with Bobbi in Pakenham after work the next day, and as usual we chatted about travelling and I had a severe allergic reaction to her lovely cat.

Last night was the Youth Interfaith Dinner Thingy. It really was a fantastic evening, the weirdest part being that I got to see the Mak-K-Babs guys again! Apparently they've always been followers of the Baha'i Faith, and they remembered me as their most loyal customer who they "slipped free souvlakis to every other day"! Haha, we hugged and I told them that, even though it was a coincidence, I basically stopped eating meat when they stopped selling kebabs. Oh and also I had to give a speech to everybody about "How my personal dreams and aspirations compare to my faith beliefs". I was actually quite happy with what I wrote, but was disappointed with my presentation, I'm still doing a bit of that awkward staring at my paper thing, but it was definitely an improvement of the sheer terror I'd experienced in China, or the pissweak effort of my 21st ad-lib failure (the highlight of which being "thankyou mum and dad for being very naughty 21 one years plus nine months ago"). As I'd hoped, I learned a bit about different faiths, Mormons and Baha'i in particullar, there was excellent food and warm company. Andrew Williams got up and did an acapella of a couple songs that matched the theme of the evening because he didn't think he'd need his guitar (how could he NOT have expected them to invite him to sing?!) The Mormons were represented by their choir, who were very good too and some lovely Sikh girls sang their version of hymns in another language (sadly I've forgotten what it was) while playing traditional-looking instruments that sort of resembled a conga and acordion. Edmund and Chewy were present, Edmund enjoyed himself enough that he stood up when we were all asked for "suggestions to improve nights like these" and rambled for about 5 minutes while everybody laughed at his standard chatter (including "your food was so good, and the potatoes were huge, I had like three and now I truly understand what pregnant women are feeling when they have triplets inside them" and a story about something silly that happened on their table) and some nearly cried from laughing when all this amounted to was "oh and so yeah I think it'd be good if we played some games or something." ... I think this was funnier if you were actually there.

And then of course, I had a lovely picnic today in which I ate avocado again for the first time since that awful experience I had about 5 years ago. Oh and got to spend time with Adila, who taught me not to be afraid of spiders by sharing vague details of an old Islamic parable about how they saved Mohamed! Good on them =]

Now this is what I'm talking about. It's funny how in a handful of days, I spent some time with at least one representative from school, uni, the Temple and even the library (although I sort of prefer to put Adila under the header of "awesome random") and got a handy reminder of how awesome it is to just hang and/or do stuff.
The first two reminded me through experience of some simple things that I've been trying to tell myself for weeks now - that there's plenty of fun to be had at home and stuff to get done, and that the world is huge, parts of it can come to you, but it will always be there when I'm ready and able to go check it out - and it'll never be too late, so if I gotta chill another couple hundred days, no biggie at all.
The interfaith thing gave me the usual spiritual euphoric sensations and all which are quite uplifting as well as the confidence boost I enjoy from successful rapidfire exchanges with strangers, but because of that speech, I was forced to actively think again about what I believe and how I live it out. What I said was honest, if a little corny at points, but it definitely sorted my head out and I'm finally feeling 'normal' as I thought I was supposed to after graduation.
As for today's picnic? Well, it was just good. It was simple and it was nice, clean fun ^^ Sort of a nice chance to give my freshly-formatted brain a little test drive. In other words, I feel like I got a lot more out of the day thanks to all of the above, which is definitely good because there was plenty to get out of it!

You'll Go Hasaam If You Keep That Up

2009-06-18T11:42:00.002+08:00

Countdown: 205

In the old days where I was striving to get as many shifts as possible with the good ol' Casey Cardinia Library Corporation so I could a) survive away from home while studying and b) save for a massive holiday, Tracy, who I consider my work-Mum, would hear whispers of people complaining about me and pass them along so I could stay one step ahead. In the old days, when I wasn't really sure about what needed to be done, her tips were quite helpful. A few people who used to complain that I was useless etc got turned around, and a couple whiny bitches were left. I indulged my curiosity/amused myself by pandering to their egos etc, felt proud of how I could outsmart them and 'trick' them into respecting me even if I couldn't just appeal to their sense of reason directly and fairly. Anyway, I thought those days were over but apparently there's still a couple sooks making petty complaints about all the horrible things I do and it's costing me shifts. Workplace politics are silly. I have a guarranteed 3 hours at Narre Warren and only because Tracy stuck up for me. I should have another 3 but they were off the table before Tracy heard people were sooking about me again. The weirdest part about this whole thing is, I was still in my little hazy can't-wake-up mentality up until the point where I heard about this bullshit. I think it was the fact that it was something small and petty that really did the trick.

It was an attack on my pride of sorts, me being told I was missing out for really ridiculous reasons, somebody suggesting that I was something that I wasn't, all that kind of childish stuff. "Stuff this, I don't have to let idiots push me around, I'll kick all their arses, figuratively" was the basic thought process I believe I underwent. The rest of the shift went really well, I felt confident and I suddenly regained my ability to properly engage anybody I served as if they were a real person again, something I've lacked since my self-esteem took that massive blow a month or so back.

Come to think of it, I always seem to accomplish the most when somebody tells me I can't do something based on the idea that I personally couldn't handle it owing to some sort of weakness in my character. Apparently I'm very proud of my character =P

I doubt myself a lot, I question the point of pretty much everything these days, I spend a lot of time afraid especially around people because I just couldn't understand them. All that used to keep me going and seemingly confident was the idea that if I was more useful, people could depend on me. If I could help other people, then that would provide some sort of connection with them, it definitely seemed like I was understanding them. As wanky and pretentious as it sounds, I could pull myself out of the stupidest mood if I thought somebody needed me. But lately the problem is I've started to feel that I hadn't really accomplished anything, and that the idea of really connecting with and understanding people was outside of my grasp. Again, rationally speaking, this is all very silly, but I suppose I was struggling to get my mind to run on any semblence of rationale. Underneath it all, nobody really runs on common sense or logic, but some people have a foundation that's a lot more simple than mine - I'm not being arrogant here, I think that's a lot more sensible, too! Wanting as much out of everyone as I did was too big an ask, I was always setting myself up for a fall there. I forgot I do have some simple base urges of my own, grounded in curiosity, competitiveness and pride. When I doubt myself and somebody suggests there's something wrong with me, I believe them, and often become shy/self-conscious as I do everything I can to correct it. I'll quite readily believe that I'm not really all that great. But when somebody suggests I am a lesser person because of flaws I don't have/I do, but no more than anybody else - I get this massive surge of self-righteousness as my brain lights up and reminds me of just how awesome I am =P I won't accept that I suck THAT much, either. I too strongly believe in the ideal that we all have potential to be as awesome as anybody else underneath it all, I suppose.

So there you go, that problem's nearly completely solved, after far too much build-up. All it took was a wanker or two. Soon I'll be capable of feeling like I can do good in the world again xD

Blog Blargh Hasaam So Soon?

2009-06-16T15:14:00.002+08:00

Countdown: 207

Monetary Goal: $7500
Current Funds: $1,400
$6100 to go.

It's too soon to tell whether the unnoteworthy increase in my savings is indicative of the way the rest of the year will go, I barely got any shifts last week. Got woken up in the morning to be told they want me to work 6-8pm tonight, and I said yes like a sucker. It's making me consider the second job thing a bit more strongly. Had a good 8 hours in Pakenham yesterday, they were pretty nice and odd people there. Will have to remember to bug Bobbi since I'll be in Pakky on Saturday too.

Sitting around the house doing practically nothing makes me wanna leave sooner, and in theory it wouldn't be too hard if I lined up a half decent job or something to just pay for insurance and airfare and just bail, but I think there's an important lesson for me to learn before I do anything silly like that, and as I keep saying a big part of it has to do with patience.

Been feeling a lot more detached from people these days, possibly related to the idea that getting stuck on a certain type of person slowed me down and held me back. I think this is a silly mentality, but there may be something to take from it. I shouldn't let people affect me too much - and that's not to say I've been sitting around the house crying through my eyeliner, I just haven't felt like going out or doing anything. It's like I'm waiting for something to happen ... I'm used to enough things just happening to me and never really needing to take much affirmative action. Between high school, work, uni, work, temple things, fawning over some girl, etc, there's only ever been so much in the way of gaps between for me to go out and actually live life or whatever. Now that it's all gone and it feels as if I've run out of ideas ... seems a little silly considering I'm yet to really get creative. Going overseas at this stage would be just another way of imposing some sort of structure on myself to make things happen. And yes, I'd get lots of living done too, but why should I let myself feel like there's no life to be lived here? That's just childish, narrow-minded and silly.

Drama used to be a good way of fueling some sort of passion. Fear and drama and concern for others. But I'm a little bored of drama, it just burns me out and achieves very little. Fear has done nothing but hold me back and doubt myself as well as those around me, and worrying about how to get rid of fear has also proven to be about as pointless as chasing my own tail. Experience would serve far better to give me confidence than trying to rationalise, it always has. As for worrying about other people ... I'm thinking there are better ways to go about it than the ways I do. It's hard. I think I'm doing the right thing most of the time, and it seems to work out okay at least half the time. But it's as exhausting as it is energy-boosting. All that's left is humour, and the fun stuff. I should get onto that instead of sitting around wondering about what to do with my life, I think =P

Gotta wake up ^^

Golden Hasaam

2009-06-11T21:59:00.002+08:00

Countdown: 212

Location: Cranbourne. Still =P
Monetary Goal: $7500
Current Funds: $1,127
$6373

Starting Over

Well it took a while but I finally woke up. I think the brunt of the emo is over and I'll finally get on with the whole life-living thing. Yeah, it's none of your business (heck I'd probably explain it to anybody who could be bothered asking directly if you didn't already know) but there was a little bit of a bump in the road, I had to come back home to fix it and then I took my sweet time getting over stuff. Now I've promised Nana I'll be home for this Christmas so there's little point skipping the country with my minimal fundage only to turn around abruptly once again! I also figure I'd like to get some proper New Year's stuff done, oh and I intend to be in Melbourne for the Ben Fold's concert I now have a ticket to. And I owe somebody money. Oh and my car needs something done to it but it keeps not having problems and then having different problems so I have no idea what'll happen with that ...

So! Next year will involve some sort of overseas charity work, an excuse to check out Yun Yang Si in Taiwan for a little bit but mostly English teaching in ... well, I haven't decided yet. Japan or China. There are pros and cons for both, I suppose. I have 200 days to sus out details, anyway, so I'm in no panic as of yet.

But as for the rest of this year! Well ... I have no idea, actually. I'll have to get a TESOL Certificate thingy, just because it'll mean I can get a better teaching job next year.

I would like to get involved in some sort of charity thing, but I don't wanna overload myself like last year to the point where I can't do anything relaxed and fun. I might have to get a second job, so I'm gonna wait until Semester 2 starts at the unis and see what shifts I get before I start hooking onto extra commitments.

Yeah this is a bit dull but hey I never said I'd be interesting, heh. This blog entry is just sitting here to remind me to get my arse into gear. If I think of other things I need to get sorted out, I'll post them too for my own benefit.

The countdown is to January 10, 2010. I just felt this was enough time to properly recover from whatever I happen to get up to in the Near Year, but hey maybe for the sake of it I will leave on this day. The financial goal is just something that I think is more than reasonable for me to expect of myself to be able to put aside in that amount of time if I actually get my arse into gear.

Oh and I've been cooking a bit lately. Generally speaking, I'm pretty pleased with the results!

Penultimate Hasaam

2009-03-06T08:58:00.004+08:00

Day: #117
Funds: Y8500
Towels lost: 3
Shoes/sandals gone through: 4 pairs
Single Awesome Hat Lost: 3-5 times (ultimately left in Fukuoka, I am SO SORRY Temple People Who Gave It To Me I LOVED THAT HAT BUT I TOOK IT OFF BEFORE EVERY MEAL LIKE A GENTLEMAN)
Languages shat all over: 3 (including my own)
Times I got sick: 4
All-nighters pulled: 7 (most of which were the fault of Monica and her inability to concentrate on an essay!!!)
Halfa-Sleeping Pills Devoured: 8
SIM Cards Now Owned: 4
Laptops Massacred: Just one, but boy did he deserve it!
Brilliant Plans Formulated: Okay I have no idea haha I'm not so bad that I COUNT all of them
Old People Confused/Amused/Entertained By My Presence/Antics/Attempts To Speak Their Language/Inability To Follow Their Crazy Old People Accents: Far too many
French People Met: 6 and a half
Germans With Freakish Language Skills Met: 2, one with a more authentic Aussie Accent than me and 1 who could speak English as well as me without ever having lived in a Western Country and Chinese as well as Joy thanks to having lived there and studied properly and solidly for 2 years.
Australians Met: Way more than in Australia
Those From Adelaide: 2 (bwahahaha)
Vegetarians/Vegie Sympathisers Associated With: Maybe 4 or 5? I can cook now!
Number of Signs with 'Joy' included in them seen: More than the number of breaths I've taken in Japan
Vending Machines Encountered: Only slightly less than the Joy-signs
Scams in Shanghai Evaded: maybe 7?
Pairs of pants/jeans destroyed: sadly, both of the ones that I brought from Aus.
Insane Multilingual Conversations Had: Chinese-English-Japanese, done to death. German-English-Chinese, 2 or 3. French-German-English, 2. English-French-Chinese, 3. Japanese-English-Korean, 1. Aussie-English-German, 4 or 5 times (Awesome Chris was keen on slang!!!)
Number of times I have shown foreigners the Sam Newman Street Talk in Cranbourne Clip on youtube to illlustrate the point that I'm not a good representative of my hometown: 3.
Number of times I watched that clip just out of homesickness: Ok that didn't happen haha.
Number of times spontaneously announced, "I figured it out!" and REALLY meant it: maybe once a week?
Michael is as good as home

Ok kiddies, set your alarms!
Flight leaves here 8:20pm local time (10:20pm for those playing at home)
I arrive at the Gold Coast at 6.10am and leave there 7.55am, so no time for stuffing around
Assuming I don't screw that up, 11.10am arrive at Tullamarine, where my dependable sister and My Lovely had better be waiting for me cos they said they would! My mobile battery is dead, so it will be a couple hours before I get home and charge it properly. Most of you will not get hellos without welcoming me back first, and even then replies may not be instantaneous. I do miss you ALL after all, and you know, Joy and members of my immediate family will be actually AROUND me for the first time in nearly a 1/3 of a year. Also, I'm going to visit my Nana! Hooray!~

Tokyo was is and will probably continue to be awesome. I am sad to leave it behind. Which is why there'd better be A HUNGRY JACK'S VEGIE BURGER WAITING FOR ME so I can forget about all the various combinations of sugar and chocolate that I'll never see again.

See youse soon

2009-02-28T18:08:00.002+08:00

Oh yeah, and Shannon's gone, left today. I will miss her. Now I have to cook for myself again =P

Hasaam Desu Ne~~~

2009-02-28T16:04:00.002+08:00

Day #111
Funds: Y25000
Michael got snowed on again. And is in desperate need of Rudd Money.

So I paid all my accomodation off and splurged a little on stupid presents for some of you but not most of you, unfortunately my budget just cannot accomodate for that sort of thing. Also, I lost a little bit of my savings to uh, clubs and bars and cafes and random things you have to go to say you can say you went? I did a handstand in said club, and some random guy clapped and gave me bananas. This made me very happy. But yeah now I can afford food for the week, the trip to the airport, and maybe one more little something. This was very well timed. If I planned on staying, I would have not bought presents, and then I would have taken up one of the jobs I turned down and survived quite comfortably until my next paycheck, by also working in a hostel for free accomodation. So in my mind, I'm very pleased with how my plan worked out, all the possibilities were sort of accounted for, even surprises. I already have a couple plans for when I get back, ahah. If I learned anything on this trip it's that I gotta be able to go with the flow more, and although I'm unable to really turn my brain off, the way I'm thinking has been sort of changing bit by bit. My plans are quite different now. ^^
Me and Shannon have mostly been hanging out with hostel people, and I'm fairly certain I've waffled about how cool those guys n girls are. Way too many of them are from Aus though, we have pretty much invaded this country. I think it's probably because of our holiday season being so different to everyone else's, but also we are a bit closer. There have been lots of really cool personalities pretty much all over this trip from start to finish, and I keep getting excited about writing stuff these days, all these different characters keep popping into my head already half-formed ... will have to do SOMETHING with them, won't I?
EVERYONE'S language abilities put me to shame, it's woeful. I've pretty much interrogated everyone I've met on how they got so good, what they do to practise, and all that stuff. Shannon'd tell you, she was there for 90% of those conversations, probably bored her silly. But I now sort of have some ideas about how to go about kicking arse back home. Most of these guys have gotten so good at their second language that they can be spoken to by native speakers totally normally, but I'd say only half of them have actually spent a large amount of time in the country whose native tongue they kick arse with. I think I need a fairly decent computer to accomplish some of my ends though. Ah well we'll see what happens.
Saw Maxine, which was cool. Maxine was on the Shanghai program with me and the rest of them, and we were actually both talking about riding the same Ferry into Japan (she's been here before, her Jap is really really good) but we both found cheaper flights from other places anyway. We tried to find eachother using Facebook, but the fact that I don't have a working phone in this country really hindered our ability to organise anything. So ... me and Shannon went for a walk last Sunday and randomly heard somebody yell "Michael!!!" I think this is Pure Awesome. We basically bumped into eachother, randomly, in TOKYO. (Is Tokyo the biggest city ever or top 3? Whatever, made my point =P) Maxine spotted me because I was a) white and b) in a t-shirt, haha. It made me wish that we'd never discussed Japan even in Shanghai, because bumping into eachother like that was totally unrelated and would have happened anyway. We hung out for the day and went up Tokyo Tower and stuff. It was good fun.
Oh yeah and Ghibli Museum was awesome. Studio Ghibli is basically Japan's Disney (you may have seen Spirited Away, Howl's Moving Castle, something like that), and the place was kind of small, but pretty much awesome in every way. It walked us through the basic processes as well as being contained in a really weird building that really did capture the vibe of one of their movies. My favourite doowhacky was this round table, that had a bunch of statues on it, each one identical to the last except it was in a slightly different pose. Then the strobe lights came on the table spun around really fast and it looked like every statue had come to life! I stared at that thing for like 20 minutes. Actual 3D animation, I mean, come on!!!
Saw a Japanese Scienceworks kinda place too. Digital gadgets galore! Erm there were a bunch of TVs set up with cameras on em so when you stood in front of them you could see a bunch of special effects happening to you on screen, like shooting fire or whatever. Oh and one that was supposed to run on facial recognition software so little anime-style cartoons would appear around your head depending on the emotion you expressed. That one didn't work so well but the idea itself was kind of cool, I'm sure they'll get it right someday. After all, they're JAPANESE.
Beyond that there has been AMPLE eventy-type goodness, thanks to Shannon I've been like, a Super-Tourist, and I couldn't begin to name all the places I've been and seen. That's what cameras are for though, and that's why Facebook is nice. Shannon got far more photos and actually knew what places were called and famous for and all that, so much sure if you are interested you check out her Japan albums too. See most of you quite soon!

Hasaam Spinning Around and Around ...

2009-02-20T13:02:00.003+08:00

Day #103
Funds: Y69000 (hehehehe)
Location: Khaoson Annex and Smile, Asakusa Area, Tokyo

Well ... somewhere in there. Tokyo is pretty dense. Melbourne is gonna feel weird and quiet I think ... xD

Michael is pretty comfy, but still kinda knackered.

We broke triple digits!!! Unfortunately I kind of didn't move at all on my hundredth day. My brain is struggling to process everything that's going on because it's all been moving so fast. So ... living in Tokyo is a bad choice haha. It's an awesome place though. Took a chill day in Kyoto and now I'm chilling here for a day - I got more time than Shannon and she doesn't seem to mind wandering around without me here and there, which is lucky. It also means I can use her laptop!

I've made the call, I'm just going to press on with these blogs and when things settle down, maybe I'll catch up on the stuff I didn't write about ... or heck, maybe you can just find out from me directly, huh?

Hanging out with Shannon's been pretty good for me, sometimes she just pulls out the notepad and draws her pictures n stuff ... guess I've picked on up her vibe or something cos I've finally started writing again, little bit by little bit ... just sort of sketchy plans so far but nobody's allowed to read them haha.

By the way, those of you who didn't know, I will be back home March 7th. This is a bit sooner than we all thought, but I'm satisfied with what I've accomplished out here, 100 days is pretty good actually, and I've discovered a few places I could have worked, hostel's take you in for free if you work a couple hours a day for a month, and made a few contacts through which I could have gotten proper jobs, so I know I could have done this. And I've met quite a few cool backpackers in the last couple of days who get up to some neat stuff too, from camping randomly around Japan and hitchhiking to riding their bikes all the way from France to Osaka, having stayed in a number of countries long enough to learn a bit of the language, I've gotten to hear all these cool stories. If I stayed ... well I'm sure my Japanese would improve an incredible amount. But it's possible to improve my Japanese back home, as well as other things.

Tokyo's a cool place btw. Having trouble finding a 'quiet moment' though, this hostel is cheap but it's packed. Sorry for not really giving too many details, especially of late. My mind hasn't been quiet enough recently, so I'm thinking now I've rested properly I should just take in as much as I can in these next couple weeks. Blogs may be really sporadic scarce or maybe completely non-existent until then. I'll just keep seeing stuff and doing stuff and take as much in as I can. In a little while, I'll process it all bit by bit and then I'll make a bit more sense ... But right now, =P

The red circle is Tokyo, the two big cities on the far left are Kyoto at the top and Osaka on the bottom

The Hasaam of Strangers

2009-02-12T09:17:00.008+08:00

Day #98
Funds [ergh. It gets confusing cos it's all in Shannon's bank account for the moment (she gets better rates than me). So from now on, I'm counting down in Yen ==" This is the amount I have left to SPEND, there's actually $1700ish left in my own account that I'm not touching ... Anyway]: Y95000
Location: Well, I'm starting to fall behind severely on these owing to the fact that I don't wanna hog Shannon's laptop and because of the sheer volume of stuff going on. At the time of typing I am sitting in a very nice Osaka Hostel called Lemon House, but you might not get to hear about it until a later entry!!!
Michael is alert, but not alarmed. Japanese people ... so nice!!!

Okay, I thought about this and I've decided that I'm going to have to just bullet point a few of my experiences. I've been keeping a list to make sure people don't miss out on all the fun stuff that's happened but upon typing those last two things in my usual In Brief section, it occured to me that if I just keep letting it all pile up it might lose the whole 'personal touch' thing ... I'll try to fly through it all to get us to today at least.

Kyoto
So we needed to be in Nara late Saturday morning to see Aoi, this meant being in Kyoto the night before, but I hadn't counted on the overnight bus being totally booked out. Because I was keen to see my busy busy Japanese friend with two jobs, I forked over the extra cash for a bullet train on Friday. We got from Hiroshima to Kyoto within the space of 2 hours easily, and it was very comfortable. I'd already gotten over the whole "ohmygod we're going so fast!" thing on the Maglev in Shanghai (from the city centre to the airport), but in all fairness these things cover the whole country while the Maglev runs for less than 10mins per ride.
The following two things must be said: First of all, Kyoto Station is THE most difficult place to navigate through I've encountered. Others have agreed with me (others being Shannon and Lily, who will be mentioned at least once more in this entry). In Japan, there isn't one group running all the public transport, which means there are different platforms for different groups. Some trains are just for the subway and others between cities, and the place itself is also kind of combined with a shopping mall of sorts and a whole bunch of restaurants, spanning 7+ floors, and not all the trains are on one floor. Maps here, like all others in Japan, make no sense, even with my advantage of being able to read more of the names of things than Joe Average tourist (have I mentioned yet that scale is not internally consistent on these things, North is a different 2D direction on every one you look at, not all streets have names, those that do don't always have signs, and numbers aren't always consecutive?!). We managed to basically guess the right exit and press on by foot since the map we read appeared to indicate our hostel of choice was fairly nearby. After 30 minutes on the road I was 100% confident would get us there, I started to get nervous. We stopped to look at a map for a few seconds and this woman pretty much materialised beside us to ask if we were lost. The conversation pretty much went like this:

Lady: "What are you doing here? Are you lost? Don't know where you are? Where are you trying to get to? Where do you wanna go?"
Me: "We were looking for Maruta Street, actually ... our hostel is there ... "
Lady: "Maruta Street? Maruta?! From here? You can't walk there you're out of your mind! You're crazy, it'd take you forever and then a little while! You can't walk to Maruta Street from here it's just too far! Too far, nowhere near this spot, take the bus!!!"
Me [having followed, well, MOST of that]: " ... uhh ... so, we can't walk? More than uh, 10 minutes to walk?"
Lady: "10 minutes? Way more than that! You really have to catch the bus to get there, then it'll be easy! Here, my friend's going to walk past the bus you need, walk to the bus stop with her!"
2nd Lady [having just materialised on cue]: "Yes! I live quite close to that bus! I know it well, come with me, new foreign friend, and I will get you home safely!"
Me: "Ahhhhah. Thankyou very much!"
Lady: "Oh my goodness your Japanese is amazingly good!"

Okay ... well I didn't change the script that much. Shannon will back me up. This is the inevitable effect of standing still and looking confused and white pretty much anywhere in Japan. I would like to play a game with other foreigners to see who can get approached by a friendly old Japanese person wanting to help them the fastest. They ARE keen with their 133+ hospitality skills.

We got to the self-proclaimed "Cheapest Hostel in Kyoto" very easily after that. The place certainly lived up to its name, in pretty much every way you would imagine. 1000 yen a night (best I've found anywhere else was twice that much) provided you bring your own sleeping bag and sleep on a rock directly beneath a heater on overdrive in front of the exit sign which never switches off and above a chronically obnoxious snorer. The guy at the counter was friendly enough, though, but my goodness was that place cheap. We found a really good place to eat though, where they pretty much BBQ'd stuff on a stick for us. It's kind of hard to describe, except the sauces they marinated with were really cool and something about the service/ambiance made it all really cool. It's weird if you go into a place around these parts without people yelling "Irasshaimase~!" ("Welcome!!!") at you.

Ok, ok, so I just detailed a couple more days. Stuff it, I'm still going at a decent pace. A couple more sessions like this and I'll have practically caught up!

=="

XD

Hasaam Got a Minute

2009-02-11T02:18:00.004+08:00

Day #95
Funds: $3200ish
Location: Weeeelllll ... as of this exact moment, Kyoto, but all my stuff's still in Nara ...
Michael has discovered the joys of spontaneity. Also my thoughts are with my Victorian homies and their crisis.

Been having trouble getting access to a stable internet connection, or finding enough time online to post photos or seriously write a blog/send emails. The reasons why will be crazy clear shortly.

Hiroshima
Here I had an epiphany on the first night. I have a certain plan which will be revealed when the time is right. We met some girls from Brisbane in our dorm who let Shannon use their phone charger (she's pretty much out of juice again though). They seemed to be having fun, last I saw they'd well and truly loaded up on pre-drinks and stumbled out rambling not-especially-sincere-sounding apologies in advance for waking us up when they got back. They weren't back by 6am, which is when me and Shannon left that morning, so I hope they're ok ... So yeah the reason we got up so early is cos the backpacker in Fukuoka who pointed me in the right direction bus-wise also emphatically insisted I go to Miyajima (lit. "Shrine Island"), and to do it early so the tide was low. You know that characteristically asian-looking gate thing, yeah there's a nice one of them just a little ways off shore and when the tide's low you can walk underneath, thus assuring your good luck in Japan! Anyway turned out the lot tide wasn't until noon but it was still nice to see the place fairly void of other tourists, made us feel like we'd found something secret and neat. Anyway we went for a walk and kind of accidentally climbed to the highest point of Misen (maybe "Mi Mountain" in English?). After a brief encounter with some deer who attempted to steal my soyjoy bar and eat our maps (ok we didn't have any maps but that did happen to someone else and it was really funny) we saw a sign that kind of sounded alright telling us that a certain kind of shrine was at the end of this path but it didn't specify how far away. We figured that meant it had to be fairly close and since it was going UP a mountain every couple minutes or so would see us winding around a curve. We were convinced that around each curve would be the end, but we were only right once and naturaly we were wrong a WHOLE bunch of times before that. The shrines were a little scattered across this tiny little field and there was no English., I recognised a couple of the names of Buddhas and was able to tell Shannon a little about them at least from a Chinese/Taiwanese perspective. It was cool being there because firstly it was beautiful and secondly it was such a pain in the arse getting there that we really could believe that not so many foreign people had been here. There were shovels and things like that around, so it was obviously still being maintained though. At this point obviously we had no choice but to get to the top since we were well and truly closer than halfway. So after a total of about 3 or 4 hours, we had hiked all the way up and we treated to a lovely view. Guess what we found at the top of Misen on Miyajima? That's right, a vending machine =D Actually, for most people the absolute highest point on this mountain is a convenience store, which is so freaking Japanese it was almost not funny. I made myself feel better by climbing some rocks equal in height to the shop, and some Japanese guys on the shop seemed to think this was great so I posed for some photos of theirs (well actually they just took photos while I kind of made manly gestures at them). This whole experience, as well as getting back, left us basically totally knackered and we ate in, Shannon is quite good with random vegetables noodles and sauce, as it turns out.

Aoi had invited us to catch up Saturday morning, so the next day was to be our last in Hiroshima. I tried and failed to arrange an overnight bus, but they were all full so in order to make it on time we agreed to splurge a little on a shinkansen (bullet train) trip, which was neat in its own way because now I can say I've done it, but really it was basically the same as the mag-lev in Shanghai, only it travelled a lot further distance and was, as seems to be the trend in Japan, a bit more comfortable.

Before that we had to do the thing that everyone has to do in Hiroshima, and that was visit the Peace Park and the epicentre thing. Ms Boltong read the story of Sadako and the 1000 cranes to my class in Grade 3, which was sort of the point at which I decided I wanted to go to Japan at all. Sadako was a girl who had leukaemia because of radiation poisoning after the a-bomb and tried to fold 1000 cranes so she could wish to get better. She didn't make it but her friends finished the 1000 for her and it's been tradition since then to pretty much cake the place with origami cranes. Sadly, this was the point in my journey at which I also realised how much of a better commision Shannon gets than me for withdrawing money and I couldn't stop calculating how much I saved by transferring mine into her account and just getting it from her in cash. Thanks to that it looks like I'll have exactly enough to survive until the time I need to, it's actually like $500-700 I save (crazy, right? don't trust Travellex, they're scheming bastards), and before I was assured of that I wasn't sure if I was going to make it. Because I can get a little fixated on my schemes while I'm sorting them out, I know I bothered Shannon a little bit given the time and place, and I am a little ashamed of myself. When I saw the statue of Sadako I did go quiet and got a tiny bit teary though. They also have the ruins of a building that was directly under the bomb preserved as a reminder, and the list of names of everyone effected beneath a flame that they don't stop burning. That was nice too.

Oh and just while I'm in the mood, I just want to say that I've been following the Victorian fire situation as closely as I can from where I am, it hit fairly close to home at a certain point (the part in Cranbourne touched was much closer to Shannon's place than mine though) and I really am sad for all those affected by it. The number of charity organisations and fundraisers and official international well-wishers springing up is actually freaking me out more than inspiring me, I think because that really hammers in the severity of the situation to me. You're all in whatever my version of prayers is.

This is in no small way the sum of everything I've done since my last entry. I now have a list of stuff for reference so I can just catch up a little bit everytime I blog. Next stop, a brief stopover in Kyoto before being spoiled absolutely rotten in Nara!

A Brief Walk Down Hassamity

2009-02-07T08:00:00.005+08:00

Day #90
Funds: $3600ish
Location:

"Kyoto Cheapest Hostel", on this street in the middle of the page.
Michael's back aches and his legs hurt.

Ahhhh this place is nuts! Love it. The day of my last blog I spent in a deep state of mind in which all my thoughts were slow and heavy and time passed sort of quickly relatively to my perspective. I wasn't stoned, I was just kind of sitting in a MacDonald's with a dictionary and a random Death Note manga, translating pretty much word by word for hours. Dunno what good it did me if any, but it was actually kind of fun and somehow extremely relaxing. The reason for this was, the Maccas was close to where my bus was gonna leave from and I didn't wanna be lugging my luggage around for the whole day. Fukuoka's a lovely place, filled with lots of friendly people (much like the entire rest of Japan it would seem ... ) and it is a crying shame I didn't get the chance to see Miki again. I'm going to call her before I leave and lecture her profusely about sending more regular emails and stuff. The overnight bus was absolutely fine, it was recommended to me by another backpacker who said it was uncomfortable, but I was asleep in half an hour. At 6am I walked a k or so from the Bus Station to the main Hiroshima Station, and searched the South Exit for a "Futaba Book Store", where Shannon and I agreed to meet. Couldn't really find it. Wandered around a bit more, and upon giving up, found it immediately on the North Side. "Hmmm" I thought. "I wonder if this is going to confuse Shannon." Then I went in, bought the #1 GTO, and sat down in front trying to read it for a few hours. It occured to me as I read that Shannon and I had neglected to pick a very specific TIME to meet, even though the place had very specifically been "South Exit Futaba Book Store". This would be problematic as my phone doesn't work in Japan, foreigners can't buy SIMs, in fact I'm not sure they have SIM cards at all anyway. Shannon is on International Roaming but I can't figure out how to make pay phones call those (think you need a special prepaid card of sorts). So I had no way of contacting her and checking where she was. Occasionally I would leave my post for 20-30 minutes (I figured that if she did show up she might wait for that amount of time assuming I'd gone for food or something) to go scout for information. I learned that there were 2 North Side exits from the Shinkansen (bullet train) she'd rock up on, both of which would see her walking straight past the Futaba book shop, causing no problems. But there was one South Side exit, and if she left from there this place was big enough that she might never stumble across our meeting point. Boy was I glad that I'd already told her the address of the hostel I intended on staying at. So anyway on one of my trips I wandered around to the South gate and fumbled through a little chat with the lady who checked tickets. I described Shannon to her as "this white chick with black hair who is this tall and is probably wearing black" and she said she hadn't seen her. I then attempted to explain to her that if she did see this friend of mine, she had to make her go through the other exit by any means necessary. Satisfied with the arrangement of this blockade, I waited at the bookstore for a further hour before going to the information booth and having them make an Engrish announcement calling Shannon Berr (Bell) informing her that Michaer Kerry was waiting for her to come to the Information Booz. When this had no effect, I figured it was safe to assume she hadn't arrived yet. To make sure, I also called the hostel to see if she'd somehow slipped past my elaborate net but she hadn't checked in there yet either. And so I waited some more. Oh and also I called my good friend Aoi's mobile to ask her to call Shannon's mobile and see where she was, but of course Shannon's phone was out of battery at the time so that didn't work either.

I like to think that I'm the resourceful type ...

And so I waited some more. I considered trying to strike up a conversation with the girls working at the bakery opposite the bookshop in order to alleviate the awkwardness stemming from my sitting in front of them doing nothing for hours, but remembered how bad my Japanese is and decided that might just make things worse. Finally, I decided there was nothing to be done but to book into the hostel, hop online and send her a message that way in the hopes she would get that. Once on the tram we passed 2 stops before I saw her in the street dragging her suitcase. So of course I jumped off and ran, forgetting to pay, thus enraging my first Japanese Public Transport Guy. He didn't buy my gibberish apology, but grumpily accepted my money.

Turns out there WAS a Futaba Book store on the South Side as well. Shannon had been there for several hours and probably has a similar story to tell, only without all the brilliant scheming.

And that's my story. This of course was several days ago and a shitload has happened since then. There will be more updates in the near future. For now I have to let others sleep. Just know that at this point I'm actually not in Hiroshima anymore.

(Bottom-left = Fukuoka. Top-right = Hiroshima)

(Black letters: Far left = Hiroshima. Red circle = Kyoto, straight down on the left = Osaka straight down on the right = Nara, where Aoi lives!!!)

Taking the Miki out of Hasaam

2009-02-03T08:32:00.003+08:00

Day #86
Funds: $4200ish
Michael is chilling with the Japs, Korea-phile Yanks, and an assortment of Poms who, turns out, do not seem to be all that whingey.

So I gotta admit, I haven't been the most dedicated little tourist as of yet, partly because I had to recover from the food poisoning fiasco, partly cos Fukuoka doesn't have tons of tourist attractions besides Fukuoka tower (and sorry, the Rialto and Eureka Building were plenty for me, I saw this place from a plane), but mostly because of cash restrictions. What I keep telling myself is I'm in this country for the long haul, I don't have to worry about missing out at this stage, I have to worry about starving before I can find work. I won't be neglecting Shannon's tourist needs though of course, she's part of the reason I've been holding back while by myself. It's also been good being tight because I learned a few things that will save us a bit of cash in terms of what to but for food etc. For example, for the price of 2 decent meals from a cheap restaurant or about 7 or 8 little snacks from something like a 7/11, I can prepare 4 dinners and 3 breakfasts, without even spending all of my daily food budget! To celebrate this discover I went to buy a dictionary, which are generally equivelant to my total daily spending budget, but it turned out they were all one-way and aimed at Japanese people. This means that if you looked up an English word, the dictionary just shows the kanji (the character for that word) without the furigana (how to actually pronounce that word). I don't need that, I can already write a ton of words I don't know how to say in Jap, thanks to Chinese. In fact, many of my conversations with the locals tend to degenerate into me scribbling down characters and them reading aloud ... it's a start.

Speaking of conversations, it's not hard to start one around here. I met quite a few interesting people, (my facebook buddies list is growing =P) except for two guys none of them really speak Japanese at all so when we've gone out places I've felt pressure to ask directions and sort out little confusions, stuff like that is good for forcing you out of your comfort zone. Last week there were a LOT of people on holiday from Korea who were actually American English teachers. It's only a 3-hour boat ride apparently so that's why. So I learned a lot about Korea in my first week in Japan, heheh.

The staff at this hostel have been super friendly, some speak really good English, but others started chatting with me as soon as they realised I could understand them if they spoke in Jap the same way I imagine you would speak to a retarded person. It's actually very encouraging, I feel like I'm just short on experience and vocab, which I'll surely build up over a couple months.

Today was supposed to be the only day I was gonna get to see Miki, but her grandmother fell ill so she had to bail. We'll be looking for more opportunities later but while travelling I'm only going further and further from Nagasaki (where her uni is). This makes me sad, but once I set up base somewhere I'll definitely figure out how to stalk her. It's been 4 years and I'm actually in the same country, little frustrating. But we'll figure something out, I'm not too worried.

Saw some street performers yesterday, super cool! Whoever said Japanese people didn't have any individuality? A chick with an accordion who danced while her partner also danced while juggling and did a couple other things. A dude who made quite intricate characters similar to balloon animals only instead of a giraffe, Mario (as seen on my fb pix)!

The day before, we were greeted by some people who were offering free hugs. I took one instantly, then asked what they were doing this for. Apparently they were spreading "free and love". I decided this really spoke to me, so along with an American girl and a Canadian girl we stuck around for an hour or so. I was probably the most enthusiastic, after learning a couple basic phrases to explain the situation ("furii haggu shimasen ka?" = "won't you free hug me?") I was off! We agreed that even if we were rejected, a smile from a passerby counted as a victory as we would have affected their day in a small way. It was a lot of fun, I was in a good mood for the rest of the day after that.

One other discovery I made which was quite encouraging: a lot of youth hostels will take foreigners in for free if they work 2 or 3 hours a day 5 days out of 7 for free. So now I've got 2 safety nets! Well gotta check out of this place, tonight I'm leaving for Hiroshima. Shannon had better bring fresh news of Australia, cos you guys been way too slack!

Chotto Hasaam ne?

2009-01-29T10:24:00.004+08:00

Day #81
Funds: $4400
Location:

Fukuoka, Japan (near Hikata Station, pictured)

Michael is having trouble with these weird Japanese keyboards

I made it! After wanting to go for far too long and being knocked back everytime by random obstacles, I had resigned myself to the fact that the universe had some sort of issue with the idea of me being in Japan. It was all seeming far too easy this time round, as all I had to do was count down the days and check and recheck my ticket to make sure I knew the right times, it wasn't fake, etc.
So anyway I got food poisoning and in the airport suffered a pretty violent response in which I nearly passed out and turned completely pale. Joy said my skin had never been so cold. With nearly an hour to go I was sitting in the airport lounge mumbling about needing to see a doctor and accepting that I was not going to get on this plane. This pretty much confirmed my theory about the universe, me and Japan, since I've never had food poisoning or whatever (we suspect it was home-made cola that did me in, of all things). After a few deep breaths I drew on my spite towards the universe to force myself onto my feet and rapidly recovered or something. Of course, I was a little concerned that my plane was going to crash or something, since that was pretty much the universe's last shot at stopping me. There was turbulence and we had to keep our seatbelts for the whole hour and a half we were in the air, tell me that's not a little creepy at least.

So like always I'd memorised the directions I got from the internet as well as a few choice facts that were relevant (Japanese streets often don't have signs, etc) and it would have gone mostly without a hitch, except I was a little dazed and confused so I got sort of lost for a while. In fairness though, I've been out walking once or twice already and even just by turning one corner I seem to have trouble tracing my steps back. Landmarks and a vague recollection of what certain characters mean has gotten me back, though. (This is why the map shows the train station I got off rather than the hostel, my sense of direction is still scrambled somehow.) It's still a little confusing because I can understand what a lot of signs mean thanks to my experience in China but that also means I keep nearly speaking Chinese to people ... it's getting better pretty quickly though, in fact everytime I see/hear a word I once knew in Jap it hits me after a couple second's delay and then I've got it again. I can actually feel it recovering with every tiny exchange or attempt to communicate. Spoke to Miki from a pay phone, and that did wonders for my mood as well. She's excited to see me too, and after 4 years we will! Hooray etc!

Oh and in the not-even-24-hours I've been here so far, I've established that pretty much every stereotype about the Japanese is true! People are really courteous, bowing to eachother, not running over pedestrians in their cars, driving on the left side of the road like SANE people ... I walked into a 7/11 and they actually did yell "Irasshaimase!!!" (a sort of welcome, I THINK it means something along the lines of "come in!"), and I am reliably told by other people at this hostel that this happens everywhere. I opened the door to leave, saw a little old lady coming in so I held it open for her. She apologised to me and hurried to get out of my way. People wait for the green man before crossing the street, even when there don't seem to be any cars!!! And of course, everyone is really patient when I'm miming or butchering their language.
Not that the Chinese don't have their own way of being awesome too, (and I learned by hanging out with Joy's family that they definitely have an insane courtesy thing going for them) it's just here feels so much cleaner and safer and nobody's stared at me or gotten cross with me for being a stupid foreigner. Ah well, Fukuoka is one of the quieter big-scale cities, I never went to like Xi'an or Guangzhou, maybe it's more like this there. Maybe Tokyo will be filled with people who are sick of white people too and apply silly stereotypes ... Will get back to you on that.

My hostel is incredibly comfortable, incidentally, and at 2000yen a night it's probably the cheapest I will find. Everything is warm, we have kitchen appliances, fast internet and a lounge room. Also, the toilet is a future toilet. It knows when you're sitting down and the seat warms up right away. I was able to understand the instructions on the arm rest and had a little fiddle ... ahah maybe it's not appropriate to talk too much about the functions. Suffice to say, they involved sanitation and comfort xD

Going dictionary hunting today, wanna get myself all the way up to speed, can't wait to get my hands on that phrase book I insisted Shannon bring with her xD

HASAAM.

2009-01-25T20:03:00.002+08:00

This is nuts. Everything is blowing up. I will not be able to sleep tonight. And my camera is too crummy to handle taking shots of fireworks. The explosions have not stopped since about 6ish and apparently everyone's pausing now to watch some tv show. Me and Joy just came back from a walk. I've never seen so many fire engines!
Everybody is sending stuff into the air, every couple of steps you go. It sounds like I'm in a warzone. I have a headache. I'm loving it. =D

De Ja Hasaam

2009-01-24T12:07:00.003+08:00

Day #76
Funds: $4800ish (actually for a change I DID overestimate my funds - not a calculation error, I simply misread something. How embarrassing.)
Michael is back to where he was 3 years ago. And he brought some cool stuff with his brain!

Wowww I've been feeling pretty good lately ... Not a huge amount of stuff has been going on, and that's partly why I'm in this mood. (Oh yeah well we did go to the beer factory and that was ahah interesting.)

Things were crazy back home when I was working 2 or 3 jobs trying to keep my grades up and squeezing in a social life where possible while trying to plan this whole trip out like a Master Strategist. So far, absolutely everything has gone either exactly as planned, or better, so that part has worked out for me. Problem with micro-managing is of course that I didn't relax nearly enough, was too focused on my goal to really enjoy day-to-day stuff. (I did plan to relax, which worked out some of the time, haha.) I nearly missed out on way too many things, my 21st, for instance, just would not have happened if my family hadn't come together and done pretty much everything for me. I've been really lucky like that to have so many supportive and just generally kick-arse people in my life. And I've been really lucky to have met some more, too.

It's been really awesome to just kick back at a place knowing exactly where all my next meals are coming from, being able to sit back and watch tv, read books and go to sleep not knowing or wondering what'll happen the next day. It's a bizarre feeling, not even caring what day it is. I have vague memories of being like this before I started worrying about earning money so much. I have pretty distinct memories, actually, of swearing to always be like this and to not waste my life worrying about trivial things. I suppose at some point I started deciding way too many things weren't trivial anymore. Is this what growing up feels like? Eugh.

At any rate, in a mere four days I will have finally set foot on Japanese turf and my longest-standing irrational obsession will finally be realised. I am a little worried about my money, but I'll definitely be able to support the holiday phase, since I may not have to worry about accomodation again in March at least it will last through there as well, so that's the point where I will be on the look-out for any ways to get more. Right now the plan is to social network through the english-studying friends I have now to find students to tutor. That could work. Still have no idea if I'll be able to actually SAVE money, though, especially considering the fact I wanna buy so many presents! (Don't get your hopes up guys xD)

The fact I've graduated is starting to sink in. The fact that when I do come home, there'll be no more classes, no more getting up at 4 to deliver papers or sudden phone calls from the library asking me to come in, no assignments due, maybe even no big-deal end-of-the-year-month-long-or-so event ... just me and my family/friends and my books and my brain. I'm looking forward to that almost as much as Japan, actually. Don't worry, Dad, I'm not gonna become a parasite ... well at least, maybe not after the first 2 or 3 weeks back, hehe.

I'm thinking I may give a postgrad some serious thought, something to complement my degree in languages - and of course I'm going to have to put some serious effort into actually improving those languages. I know that sounds silly, but before with all the pressure all I could study was what was put in front of me, and most of it I found irritating or useless. I just wedged it in my head and passed the units. Now I got no excuses, so I really have to back up all of the crap I've been talking and get really good at Chi - oh hang on, I only have 4 days left. Okay, we'll see if I can actually improve my Japanese over the next couple months, and if stuff works out, I'll come back home and work on my Chinese XD If nothing encourages me, I suppose I'll just give up and bury myself in some aspect of linguistics that will confuse everyone to save face and seem smart. Oh well, I'm not gonna worry about that for a little while now anyway. All I have to do is figure out the best way to obtain and retain useful new words! Good luck to me!

Tubby Hasaam Wantsa Skinny

2009-01-20T10:08:00.003+08:00

Day #72
Michael is getting SO FAT!!!

I noticed this fact and felt the extreme need to share it with you all. I have put on enough weight since I left to really bother me. No I did not manage to do the stairs every day like I hoped I would. And as always I refused to leave any plate with food scraps on it because I don't like to waste food. And Christmas/New Year's rolled past, I spent those with white people. It's okay to spoil yourself a little for the holidays! Classic fatty mentality.
Now I've been living with elderly Chinese people who spoil me and always cook more than you're supposed to eat cos that's how courtesy works here, not to mention our holiday season rolling straight into theirs (Chinese New Year next week, "Little Year", the warm-up to CNY, happened a couple days ago) ... I look at my belly everyday and meditate on self-control. The last two days have gone alright in that respect. But I'm still going to have a bigger gut than Miki remembers, and she knew me when I was still running around and riding my bike everywhere! She's gonna LAUGH at me ...

Oh yeah, I'll see Miki in less than 10 days! That's exciting!!! Gonna be in Japan on the 28th, hitting Fukuoka. Haven't seen Miki since Year 12, so a bit over 3 years I guess? Nearly 3 and a half I think ... It's a shame I'm seeing her first thing actually, because my Japanese needs a thorough warm-up and after a month in Japan with their brutal exchange rate/prices I will definitely lose some weight. And once I settle somewhere I hope to maybe get a bike or something.

Ahah, the plans for settling ... well complications have arisen since I decided to try and come back between the Uni semesters. This means that I get Febuary to muck around with Shannon and whoever else, then March-May I wanna be earning money. (At this point, if I can afford to go to Taiwan just for a month, that'd be awesome. If not, a couple more weeks in Japan through June'll do me.)

Most contracts for places I've seen advertised online require year-long contracts and Mr Conscience here doesn't wanna sign one of them knowing that he's gonna skimp out on it. So my new challenge is to see if I can survive working part-time jobs and such. A mate in Osaka says I can crash at his for an indeterminate amount of time, which is awesome, and my friend in Nara (less than an hour away from Osaka) might be able to help me as well. Having checked out couchsurfing.com I'm more than a little encouraged (I will always have a back-up place in the event of an emergency), and depending on how well I do tutoring English, and how quickly my Japanese recovers/improves, I may be able to find enough part-time work to at least survive in hostels and such.

I'm thinking I can definitely get enough for FOOD day to day just by tutoring English (according to my research if I do an hour a day I can afford food) and if I can stick to my plan I will have just enough cash in the bank for my ticket home in the event of an emergency. The challenge is to not touch my savings again after Feb is over.

Oh and another challenge for during Feb: I've decided I have to busk in every Japanese city I live in. Therefore, Marcello is coming with me =]

Can't wait to see Aoi either ^^

Hasaam And A Cup Of Tea =]

2009-01-17T13:51:00.003+08:00

Day #69 [teehee]
Funds: $5300ish - tickets to Qingdao were paid for with the bond from SISU (400RMB) and the ticket to Japan was mostly sorted out by spare cash I had in my travelex account which I forgot to include last count. At least I never OVERestimate my funds, right?

Location: Close to Shandong Road, Qingdao. multimap.com doesn't have snaps of that area for some reason, but it's just a little east from this beautiful spot!

Michael is retarded in the presence of old Chinese people, Shanghainese or otherwise.

This blog wound up being a bit longer than I originally intended, so I've kindly divided it into two chunks based on content for your convenience.
Wow, just looking at the funds again. I've done pretty well in China, although to be fair I've done very little in China except for walking around and looking at stuff. Which has served me well, I felt. I've even got my ticket to Japan figured out! I was really looking forward to catching a ferry all the way, and having seen how beautiful the water looks in Qingdao (blue skies here are actually BLUE rather than a light greyish haze!) it's still a bit of a shame, but the fact is if I go to Japan too early I miss out on Chinese New Year in China, and this way I get to spend it with Joy too. Not to mention (as I have been a bit too much lately) the amount of money I save by flying. Most of the flights I could find were way too pricey (looking at like $AUS1000ish), but as usual Joy and her family fixed everything and just pointing out some Chinese travel people who fixed it for a mere 2000RMB (around $AUS500) after tax.

[The In-Laws]

So anyway my flight out of Shanghai left 7am Thursday morning, practical as I am I reasoned that this meant I would have to leave the city centre around 5am, when the only way is by taxi. I figured I didn't wanna spend that much or risk mucking something up, so instead I caught the maglev one more time into the airport at around 9pm and just crashed in the waiting area. It was very uncomfortable and a couple with the same idea brought their loud kids who did not think sleeping should be a priority over running around under the chairs screaming at the top of their lungs. Oh well, can't win em all I guess. So I fell asleep on the plane instead and dropped a bottle of water on myself, which woke me up again. The flight only took about an hour and a half and was relatively non-eventful, save for the fact that before we boarded I had a little chat with this Chinese guy who has been an International Student at Sydney for a year, so he was excited to meet somebody from Australia. When we got off the plane, he sort of insisted on driving me where I had to go, which was awesome considering the fact that I was totally knackered. He got Joy's phone number and her grandfather's phone number and before I knew it the three of them had called around to each other and figured everything out. I did absolutely nothing. I don't understand how it is that I always seem to be this lucky, but I'm starting to worry that I may be splurging all of my karma. One day I'm just not going to have any good luck left, and I'm sure that'll suck. Hopefully I can just be a really awesome person and try to keep earning it??? Um, Bob was that guy's English name, we swapped MSN details and might catch up in Aus one day, geez I gotta figure out a way to pay him back ...

He literally introduced me to Joy's grandfather, who I just refer to as "Ah Gong" cos that's what Joy does and then left us to it. I wasn't sure how to approach this guy but he was nice enough and just followed him home. They insisted I sit down gave me bread butter and jam and spent about a minute and a half trying to figure out if I wanted it toasted. Eventually I said something like "Oh do I want it more hotter? No thankyou, this is good." and quickly wrote down the new words. They pretty much don't speak English. They think I don't speak Chinese either, and can't get their heads around what I must have been doing the past year I was being taught. Basically, I'm not used to people speaking as fast as them, and they're not used to waiting for really slow responses, like mine, haha (have you HEARD Joy speaking? Chinese or English, when she goes, geez it's like wHOOOOOSH). Also, I'm forever in a state of being petrified of the idea of offending them somehow by doing something "white" or, worse yet, "Mykalesque". Joy seems to think common sense should see me through it all fine, but I'm not too sure what I have and what everyone calls "common" sense are really as compatible as all that sometimes =P

When I DO understand, it's kind of funny, because even then I don't seem to reply fast enough to convince them I know what's going on. Once her Ah Bu ("Nana", but this isn't good Chinese apparently, it's like Shanghainese baby talk) told me "when you're full you shouldn't keep eating, you should stop before you're full." I got most of that, partly because it's pretty straightforward but mostly cos Joy had already said she says this a lot. I nodded because I agreed, and don't really have much in my reportoire right now except for "yes, I agree." and saying that too much makes me feel stupid. Then Ah Bu was all "oh you don't understand!!!" "No no, sometimes I DO understand I just don't know what to say back!!!" She did seem to accept this. I think. Another time she was making soup, so she yelled at me "Soup! This is soup! Michael, do you know what 'soup' is??? SOUP. SOUP! SOUP!!!"

This morning I was offered toast again. I've been trying to write down all the new words I hear every day and revise the most useful ones here and there, so I was ready for the question, I was all "no thankyou, I don't really want toast, just like this is good." She seemed very impressed. "Oh sometimes he DOES speak Chinese!!!" she said, although I totally missed this and recieved it second-hand through Joy.

Ah Gong went on a sort of rant about how my future should go now that I'm a graduate (apparently he just does this sometimes, having been quite successful himself in life). It went on for a while and Joy says this was just the beginning. All I understood was, "First step, be as good as Joy at Chinese at least!!!" I agreed with this much, haha. Could be a little while though ...

Oh and Ah Bu still hasn't decided whether or not I can use chopsticks yet. Joy's Uncle's mates were all pretty impressed and told me no white people can use chopsticks like me. Joy kicked me under the table when I started to reply with "oh lots of Australians can use chopsticks, it's not that special!" I'm not quite sure what Ah Bu's criteria is yet, haha. She was very impressed at first when I picked them up, but when I had a little trouble with an egg of all things she was really quick to say (with what sounded to me like relief) "Oh, ok, he doesn't know how to do it!"

I'm pretty sure they think I'm really stupid and I am a little worried about how that'll affect their opinion of me being the guy chasing their granddaughter, but they're still super nice to me so that's good at least xD Why do I like old people so much? Maybe I look forward to being one of them one day or something, or maybe part of me already is a bit like that =P

They're so thoughtful, set up a bed for me, washed my clothes and making sure I eat properly etc. Ah Gong is such a thorough planner, he's compiled a list of all the things I have to do/see before I leave, and has even organised it into a day-to-day plan to make sure we get as much of it in as possible ... I hope we didn't offend him or anything by taking today off, we're still a bit knackered from getting here and all.

[First Day In Qingdao]

Yesterday was good, we checked out the beach, which is awesome by Chinese standards. Not nearly warm enough to go swimming though, the average temp has been around zero, and if I'm gonna get snow worth knowing about I want it even lower! Qingdao is a lot more like Melbourne than Shanghai though, it's a lot cleaner - the air actually feels safe to breathe, the people seem a lot less crazy about milking me for all my money, there are trees everywhere and yes, BIRDS everywhere ^^ Yesterday I was a little grumpy from lack of sleep though, and I was particullarly sensitive to the staring. There are not nearly as many tourists around here as in Shangy, so they are not as accustomed to white people I guess. There has been quite a bit of gawking.

The market with Joy was ok, but I did get more than a little impatient, her style and mine is so different (apparently I remind her of her mum when we're clothes-shopping). I think she's a bit too nice, she doesn't feel the need to be curt like I do. I just don't like to waste time or seem too keen (Ah Bu later made comments like mine about Joy too obviously wanting stuff and so not getting the best prices =P) Joy was very adamant about me getting a new jacket, as my favourite is literally falling apart at the seams. I argued that I kind of like that cos now I can hide stuff between the seams. But anyway yeah Joy copped a little bit of a snappy rant about how if we were shopping for me I would only do it my way so after arguing with one woman a bit too long about how her goods weren't quite as awesome as she said we marched around the corner, grabbed one without really looking at it after I mumbled in a thick grumbly accent "Yeah, whatever that one'sorite" and Joy told the woman "We're only paying 120, I'm not arguing, usually I only pay 100 but I'm being generous because I heard prices went up. If it's not 120 we'll just go somewhere else where it is." The woman immediately accepted without wasting our time or trying to play us for idiots and I was so proud of my Cutthroat Baby =P (Still though, damn market crash that's at least equal to what I would grudgingly pay for a non-op shop jacket back home!!!)

Oh and we randomly got on a boat and cruised around. Both of us, for 20 kuai! That made me feel a lot better =]

A Let-Down For My Loyal Hasaam?

2009-01-14T14:16:00.002+08:00

Day #66

Michael considered returning that empty-shelled peanut and demanding his money back but then realised to his dismay that this wouldn't work - once it's opened, how can I prove I didn't eat or lose the contents?!

This is the last day in Shanghai ... just been chillin', it's been pretty good for relaxing by myself, totally different vibe living basically in the dead centre of the city as opposed to the outskirts where SISU was ... honestly I'm not sure I prefer it though. Near the university locals tended to only speak Chinese and were sort of used to foreigners being able to speak a little bit, since we were all students and such. Here, they're far more used to tourists, so those who don't feel like they can speak English well just do all these weird hand signals and it takes a little effort to convince them that I can speak any Mandarin at all, haha. Far more Leather Jacket Men offering the usual - "Hello friend! Socks-watches-DVDs-ladies-hasheesh hasheesh!? BEAUTIFUL ladies, very nice sock!!! Friend, just come a-have-a-look look!", but then I have been wandering Nanjing Road (think Burke Street times 100) a bit so I shouldn't expect much else =P

Hung out with Eugene Saturday eve and Sunday arvo. Eugene is the Indian guy from the HK train who spent a year learning Chinese in Taiwan. He's pretty cool and may actually someday wind up living in Sydney, so it's possible I may see him again, which would be awesome. Anyway his gf Rui is Japanese, speaks less English than I do Jap so as a result the two of them converse pretty much exclusively in Mandarin. Saturday they also brought along a Chinese friend called Jin who'd spent 4 years in Japan and spoke superb English to boot, as well as HER friend visiting from Japan who spoke no English or Chinese. So across the table we had me and Eugene chatting in English, which would then be translated into Chinese for one Jap girl and then into Japanese for the other one, or directly from English to Japanese by the Chinese girl. Confused yet? =P My Chinese has definitely overtaken my Japanese, and I found it incredible how I couldn't even remember the most basic of stuff - although some words came back to me when I tried to listen to them, there was no way of predicting what I was gonna understand. They seemed to think it was really funny to watch me trying to say anything, but at least they were nice about it haha. I think after a week or so of practising certain things will come back to me. Anyway it was a fun night. Jin's friend Mikako will be in Tokyo when I go there with Shannon, I may find her again and that could be pretty fun, they were all nice people, just depends whether she has time and if I didn't scare her off =P

Sunday we went to Yu Yuan ("Yu Gardens") which is a massive tourist hotspot where the "Most Famous Shao (Xiao?) Long Bao Restaurant" is located. Shao Long Bao is basically a sort of dumpling that also has soup in it with the food. You dip it in vinegar and try not to pop the fragile skin before you put it in your mouth. (Not too different to wontons, but they're shaped slightly differently and are a lot more delicate.) I'd been told they were awesome, but pretty much all of them have meat in them so I'd never been able to see for myself. This place happened to have vegetarian options, and I am very happy to say that they pretty much did live up to the hype. Then I suddenly remembered a Japanese song and Rui knew it too so we sang a little bit in the street and I think we sorta confused Eugene xD

Monday was a total write-off, and I was glad for it. Barely spoke to anyone or did anything, just read a chapter of this Chinese comic book I bought, wrote down all the new vocab I didn't know (a bit over a hundred words XO) and wrote the last blog while eating far too many peanuts. Oh and possibly pissed Joy off by being half asleep and quite unresponsive when she called, but as far as I can tell we're ok now!

Tuesday was my last chance to see Miranda for a while. If all goes well for her, she may be off to Ireland soon to study there, which I'm very excited about and I really hope things do work out. There's nobody more deserving than her for an opportunity like this, she's just such an awesome person. We were going to try and record a song together but the cold meant that my flute was way out of tune (the metal contracts and expands very slightly depending on temperature) and by the time I'd warmed the bloody thing up my fingers had gone numb from the cold so I couldn't cover the holes properly. Instead she secretly recorded me singing the Arabian Nights theme from Aladdin after I was so surprised she'd never seen that movie. I sounded terrible xD Sat there listening to her playing a few of her original songs, they're sooo good I can't wait til she gets them recorded and online so I can share them with you guys. Don't ask me why, but there's one I really want Nana Joyce to hear ... I'm really gonna miss Miranda. For a little while, neither of us is going to have a permanent address so we won't be able to write eachother for a couple months either. We don't even know what country we'll see eachother in next, but I hope she can find her way to Australia someday, even though there's very little reason for her to come since our Student VISA conditions suck.

So I found my way back to the same hostel I lived in last time I was here, awesome! I planned to look it up on the internet but couldn't understand the map or recognise any street names, so instead I got off the train at People's Square (sort of like Melbourne Central I guess, but again, bigger and more densely packed) and let my feet show me the way. It was pretty weird, just like how I knew how to get back to the Uni after the first time and knew that area so well. Funny how some things are still hiding in the old grey matter somewhere. The place is as cool as it was last time, and most of the staff speak above average English relative to outside, as well as being really friendly awesome people who started speaking to me in Chinese once they realised I preferred to practise. Except for this one girl who was here last time and remembered me. When I tried to speak Chinese I got two words out before she just interupted me and said "You can speak English, I'm not a very patient person" haha. Maybe I should try and work in a Youth Hostel in Japan ... ?
Oh yeah and some of you may remember me ranting about how I discovered my allergy to cats once I became very attached to a cat in China. That cat lives here. And had babies. Not quite 500, only 3 or 4, but geez they still love me. My whole face pretty much flared up in hives last night, very unattractive, but that TINY KITTEN IS SO CUTE WITH ITS ITSY BITSY MEWLING - *cough cough, AHEM*.

Uhhhhh see you in Qingdao???

Two Hasaam In As Many Days. Woah.

2009-01-12T18:49:00.004+08:00

Day #64
Funds: $5500
Michael has replaced numerous vices with gross over-consumption of peanuts, and regrets nothing. Except for that one that was completely empty. I am NOT getting over that anytime soon.

Hmmm lessee here ... ok we'll do it this way: a 3in1 package for your reading pleasure!

[Trip to Zhu Jia Jiao]

(___________ = 15km, apparently)

So me and Joy decided to stick with the SISU Guesthouse until the 10th cos with the student discount things weren't so bad, and anyway I'd paid for the internet all of January so it would have been silly to walk away. (Then of course as I'm sure you're well aware by now my laptop died nice and proper within 2 days.) We could have easily spent all the time hanging out watching movies or whatever but - oh yeah, the disc drive had morphed into a smart-arse. So we decided we should do something touristy, originally we were thinking Su Zhou, but then Joy remembered some place she'd been when she was little which she assured me was very pretty, and I'd already been to Su Zhou last time I was here, so we went to this other place slightly closer instead. Pretty standard "Picturesque Chinese Tourist Site" meaning lots of photo ops and people trying to sell you reeeeeeeeally souvenir-type goods which might have made good presents if I could have been bothered stopping to really look at them properly. Sorry guys ^^" We rode on a boat and Joy took a couple videos which hopefully we'll find a way to put up somehow, including one or two of Crazy Turtle Lady, who we bought Presumably Sane If Possibly Traumatised Turtles from. Hmmm I could have said all that better huh? Well anyway yes, that was the bottom line. We have turtles now, terrapins if you wanna get anal about it. They are called Red-Eared Sliders (although we call them Bowser and Eddy) are very cute, and surprisingly lively at completely sporadic intervals. They are also, it turns out, so extremely illegal in Australia that if you are caught with them, you cop a $100,000 fine and/or 5 years jail time. So sorry Cameron, I did originally plan to sneak you one home but I'm thinking it's not really worth the trouble ^^" The plan now is to have Joy's Ah Gong (maternal Grandfather) adopt them and we'll visit them when we can.

So Crazy Turtle Lady did explain in great detail how lots of people get away with smuggling her turtles, she was in fact quite manic about the whole thing and all but threw her turtles at us. She insisted we never feed them or put them in very deep water until it gets warmer. I'm not really doing her justice, which is a shame because she had NOTHING on Insane Lizard Man, a merchant with similar wares and a similar sales pitch, only he was insisting we hide the tiny things in our mouths when we walked through. He demonstrated this once or twice. When it became apparent that we were quite happy with the turtles we'd already purchased he then asked us how we felt about "long", which I thought meant "dragon", and so did Joy. Next thing I know he's reached into a hidden bag, pulled this sinister-looking lizard out and thrown it on my scarf. Man that thing was awesome, could crawl upside-down on my arms and everything. They looked fast and pointy, so overall a sort of cross between Sonic the Hedgehog and Spiderman, I think. Awesome. Oh yeah and Zhu Jia Jiao is famous for its rice dumplings (sticky rice mixed with stuff molded into a triangular prism-shape and wrapped in a leaf of some sort). They have lots of different kinds, some with meat, eggs, red bean, pretty much everything. All the ones I sampled were pretty good. =D

[Brief Rundown of Booktown!]
THIS is a bookstore. The sign reads "Shanghai Shu Cheng" or "Shanghai Book City", Fuzhou Road has a couple little ones here and there, then suddenly here it is. The place is 7 floors, each floor specialising in a category or theme and in my opinion, this is something we could really do with back home. I mean, what have we got, a 2-storey Angus and Robertson? Is it A&R again or some other place that has the mini-Gloria Jeans sometimes? This place has an actual proper Starbucks somewhere in it (not that I'm saying we need Starbucks in Melbourne, I was quite proud of us for holding that off as well as we did). They also sell a huge variety of clearly burned PC games, probably legit CDs and a few nifty little gizmos as well as DVDs. But ... unlike some uhh, OTHER book places I may have encountered it doesn't allow itself to become a Timezone clone, hehe. Ohhh and this random pair of adorable Chinese girls came up to me and Joy and asked us if we could sign a book filled with random messages they were compiling from strangers as a birthday present for their friend. We thought this was a really cute idea, hope it wasn't some sort of scam, ahah. They'd gotten a few people to write in their native tongues so I figured rather than bastardise the birthday girl's native tongue I'd just write a heartfelt mini-essay about how crazy I thought her friends were. When I asked what their friend's name was, they said "Rabbit". AWWWWWW.

[The Impromptu Trip To Nanjing]

(___________ = 100km)

On the 10th Joy had to leave Shanghai to go see her Dad's side of the family, who live someplace whose name I forgot but is close-ish to Qingdao, I think. At any rate she wanted to go it alone, I think because she doesn't know them as well as her maternal Grandparents so bringing me might have been weirder. That ultimately suited me just fine as it gave me these 5 days to be alone and do pretty much nothing, something I haven't been able to do for quite a while. Can't remember if I mentioned it or not, but Thursday I'll get on a plane to Qingdao and she'll meet me there in the afternoon. So we got up relatively early to catch a taxi to her uncle's place, he was supposed to see her off at Shanghai Railway Station and saw no harm in me coming along too. The place was packed, apparently lots of people are flooding the long-distance trains as Chinese New Year is coming up and everyone wants to go back to their hometowns to be with their families and everything, it's basically Christmas and New Years rolled into one. So the place was busier than anywhere I've ever seen, and that includes my stint in HK (come to think of it, HK's probably even worse right now ... hmmm). Joy's Uncle kept trying to get something called "Platform Tickets", which for all I know could be the done thing everywhere else too but the point is you need to get em if you wanna accompany somebody all the way to the train itself. They wouldn't sell them to him. Then he sent me and Joy there to act like I was a lost foreigner who needed my Chinese friend's help to find the right train. That didn't work either. So at this stage I wasn't sure what was going on, I just knew that Joy was getting scared she was going to miss her train, and considering the time of year another ticket might be tricky. Joy's Uncle disappeared and this time promptly returned with a man in a leather jacket. We were fairly sure they'd never met before and suspected he'd been slipped a bit of cash or something. Next thing I knew we were following this guy through the train station acting natural and nobody was trying to stop us. I had no idea why. Joy asked her Uncle, "who is this guy?" he just laughed and said "it doesn't matter!" and I laughed too =P "See, Joy? This is the way to get things done!" I chuckled, and probably went off on some sort of rant about how clever and resourceful her Uncle was if memory serves.
We found Joy's train with 15mins to go, and the three of us hopped on, me and her Uncle carrying her luggage. We had a quick look around to figure out where to put everything down and ... well by now you've probably guessed that at this point the doors slammed shut and the train started to move 10mins early. A train lady walked past and Joy's Uncle explained that we didn't have tickets and needed to get off. She politely explained that the train wouldn't stop until the next station, and since this was an express that would be Nanjing. In two hours (as seen in the above map). Joy's Uncle tried to be outraged but then she also politely pointed out that there was no such thing as an express train platform ticket, so it made no sense that we should have even been there. I tried to contain my excitement since after all, for him this was a massive inconvenience whereas for me, I was going to Nanjing! I would see a bit more of China after all! I wondered if it would be possible for me to sneak off, crash at a hostel for a little bit and return to Shangy in a couple of days but then it occurred to me that given the whole Chinese New Year crazy train situation, I couldn't be sure that tickets back would be easy enough to come by and/or affordable. Oh and all my luggage was waiting for me in the lobby of SISU Guesthouse, not sure what they would do with it after a couple days of me not coming to pick it up, so I gave that plan a miss. [Sigh] It would have been awesome though. I did get some nice pictures of Chinese countryside for a change though, as well as some not-so-nice pictures of some demolished houses or some sort of rubble. Perhaps I will show them to you all some day, when I have access to a computer that doesn't have facebook issues. For the moment, they sit on my nifty USB stick. Oh and I have a picture of a sign that says "Nanjing Station"!!! That PROVES I was in Nanjing! Sadly, we didn't even leave the platform, our train going back was already there for us. In case the map doesn't put it into perspective, this is probably the same as accidentally getting on the wrong train at Spencer Street Station (oh, I'm sorry, "Southern Cross" Station) finding yourself in Sydney, and then just coming straight home.

Phew, okay so I think I've covered most eventy-type goodness, at least I got all the Joy-content done for the moment, things have been kinda slow since she left so look forward to a relatively shorter entry about the last couple of days! Ahh who am I kidding, Japan stuff and arrangements have advanced, I'll probably wind up going on some sort of rant about my money situation, exchange rates and how I look forward to going like nothing else. Oh well, you wouldn't be reading this if you didn't enjoy it, right? I mean, it's not like I'm putting a gun to anyone's head, am I???

Fried Hasaam And Eggs

2009-01-11T23:59:00.002+08:00

Day #63

(rough location of my hostel)
Location: Some Internet Cafe on Nanjing Road, near People's Square (still Shanghai but)
Michael has come to terms with the death of his laptop, Simon.

Oh man the amount of getting up tos I've been doing since I last saw my blog has been crazy!!! If I could have, I would have posted about 3 blogs since the last one, I even had the time to do it occasionally, but unfortunately my laptop no longer wants to load windows. All it will do is spit the DVD drive in and out at me, quite disrespectfully, I feel. As usual when I have a crisis which turns my life upside-down for stupid reasons, Joy came to the rescue and together we went and bought a usb that contains 16gb - Simon could hold 20. I also now have a USB that can accept any camera memory card, which saves a lot of hassle loading photos. All up this cost me about $AUS30, it is unclear how the guy on the street obtained these goods =[

The reason photos have not been going up is because for some reason the computers at these net cafes seem to despise facebook for some reason. In fact, my laptop was unusual in that I could access facebook at all, in hindsight a couple other Monash people had similar problems, so I may have to investigate a new means of getting them across the pond. Hmmm I'm thinking I may do a couple entries tonight just to make it more readable for my loyal viewers ... oh who am I kidding, hi Mum and Nana =P (jk I know there's a couple more ^^)

So Joy's Uncle and his lot are the real deal, crazy Chinese politeness is not restricted to religious nuts like my experience may have led me to believe. Before last week, the treatment I've been used to in Shanghai as a foreigner has generally been a sort of attitude that I'm basically a walking cash machine with no brains. I've taken this on board as a half-truth. In all fairness though, some taxi drivers and waiters have been awesome patient with my terrible directions, and in the market if I tell people I'm just following my friends but have no money they'll hang out for a chat too here and there. But anyway!
Joy knew her Uncle, Aunty and cousin. Everyone else was as random to her as they were to me. I struggled terribly following their Shanghai accents - most people put on a standard sort of accent for dealings with anyone but these guys were just hanging out. We had dinner at a restaurant and then a couple nights later her Aunty cooked, but the food was equally good. I've never had such good food in China. They made a point of ensuring there was plenty of vego stuff for me, which is a massive deal because even though Chinese cuisine has more diverse vegetarian (su de) dishes, they seem to be more freaked out by the notion of vegetarianism than Australians (case in point, after I explained that I don't eat meat, one waitress stared for 5 seconds before asking "is lamb or dog ok then?"). Joy whispered tips in English here and there to make sure I didn't commit any horrible manners, and made me promise not to finish every last grain of rice like usual - this makes the host feel like they haven't given you enough, and they WILL keep offering you food until they're sure you've been satisfied.
I decided that one couple at the table were basically the Shanghainese version of Rat and Jenny. Most of you have no idea who that is. If you were at my 21st, you may recall me singing in Chinese. If you're still with me, you may remember somebody yelling, "oy! Speak English!" That was Rat. Anyway this Shangy guy was hilarious but his accent was so strong I had no hope of understanding even basic stuff. Joy can follow Shanghainese but still had trouble because he loved his slangso much. He kept interupting people with bizarre statements that they all seemed to find hilarious and some of the younger guys kept laughing and saying stuff like "shut up none of us can understand you!" Heheheh. He insisted I drink as much as possible and mistakenly assumed I was holding back because of Joy, which wound up with her being labelled "Lao Hu" (= "Old Tiger", apparently what you call a wife who won't let her husband have any fun cos she's too naggy and dominating, kinda like "The Old Ball and Chain" in English I suppose). But he told me not to worry because "And old tiger is just a sick cat when she's weak", so the solution to my "problem" was to hit her, apparently xD His wife was very nice, spoke really carefully and slowly, we had a nice little chat =]

Aw man this blog-stuff is wearing me out. From the top of my memory, here's a list of stuff I wanna get people up to speed on:

Trip to Zhu Jia Jiao
The Impromptu Trip To Nanjing
Brief Rundown of Booktown!
Kicking it with Eugene and Co. (a.k.a. "Trilingual Conversations That Fried My Brain And Exposed Just How Much Japanese I Really Have Forgotten")
Comments On Living in The Same Hostel As Last Time

6 Hasaams Go So Fast

2009-01-03T09:20:00.004+08:00

Day #55
Location: SISU Guesthouse, Countdown!!!
Michael is done. Ball's in Monash's court now. Gimme Graduation!!!

Gotta clean up ... geez this room is in an awful state ... finished the course yesterday. Because we were allowed dictionaries this time the exam was much easier. Although, to be fair, there were no ridiculous surprises in this one so it's possible I could have done nearly this well even without one (ok who am I kidding the mini-essay q's at the end worth 30% featured a bunch of words I didn't know I couldn't have begun answering them without it!!!"

So today's the last day in the SISU Guesthouse. Everyone's bailing really quickly and really abruptly, we've labelled it the Mass Exodus because this place is gonna feel like a ghost house for those 2 or 3 of us who choose to stay here after the student discount is gone. Lots of people are hopping on a train to Beijing today, a handful of others are heading west to find some mountains so they can get some peace and quiet and breathe some fresh air before they head on to Xin Jiang, which is where our favourite Chinese Ethnic minority habituate, the wegar food here is kick-arse so I can't imagine what it's like over there. One or two people are actually just going home in the next two days.
As for me, still one of the least-travelled in the lot of us, I'm leaving the guesthouse with Joy but I'm not leaving Shanghai. Lenny, Sue Kim, Eric and Lian will all be around somewhere over the next couple days and so will I. Joy's family insisted on figuring out my plane ticket to Qingdao and it's less than $AUS100, so I certainly can't complain about that. Depending on how cheap a place me and Joy end up staying in in Shanghai, I may not be online until the 15th, when I rock up in Qingdao. Hopefully I'll have at least another entry in by then though. I just caught a spare moment, Dylan hasn't packed his laptop yet, Joy's in the shower, in an hour and a half the guesthouse people will be checking out our room so I better get a wriggle on.
Oh and today's Miranda's birthday! I'll send her a text soon. (Eric's bday in a couple days too, we'll have to dinner with him)

I'm really glad this course is over. I'll miss the people, I'll miss my teachers and definitely my tutor, who would have been such a great teacher if it weren't for the fact that we had that silly silly curricullum. My Chinese level has barely improved at all. Even my confidence hasn't risen that much because I've actually spent way too much time relying on other students who were better than me, and trying so hard to remember all the useless crap seemed to leave little space in my head for the stuff I wanted to learn. No more though, no more whinging, course is over. I can already feel my Chinese ability improving!!!

Last night I saw a Broadway musical with Joy's family, it was pretty good! I like her Mum, hadn't met her before, and I get a good feeling from her Dad too. Kayson, the 4-year-old brother, is the best. Why can I relate to 4-year-olds so well??? Anyway as a result I missed out on the craziness of the last night, having already missed the craziness of new year's eve. My understanding is, both involved a lot of people randomly hooking up drinking far too much and dancing like crazy. Some of those things I'm not allowed to do, and others I'm not really much good at =P We're all gonna do a brunch thing to see ourselves off though. That'll be soon after we all suddenly lose our rooms.

New Year's Eve me and Joy walked to the Bund from the Guesthouse, that was pretty nice ^^

________ = 1kmish

So I have officially completed all of my prescribed learning. Even if I go back to uni it'll be for a postgrad that'll be something I can finally study in my own way. From now on I can relax and properly enjoy this holiday, without too much pressure beyond the stress that might come from having to survive. On the other hand, it'll be an adventure!!! Yayyyyyyyy! Charrrrrrlieeeeeee!!!

Love you all, will send out new postcards soon I hope.

Merry Jingly and a Hasaam New Year!!!

2008-12-28T10:18:00.002+08:00

Day #48
Funds: Much the same as last time
Location: ditto.
Michael got right into the Christmas spirit!

Argh so ok tons to write about that happened in the last 4 days, fortunately I took lotsa photos this time round ...
So Christmas Eve comes around and we had class as usual. Nothing too exciting there. Then I skipped my tute to practice for the talent show. The fruits of my labour can be viewed here [http://www.facebook.com/video/video.php?v=52132336213&subj=637056881] provided you have facebook. I'll say it went alright, but I could have done a little better. I could have sounded a lot worse though, and reactions from my classmates were overall positive. There's this dude we call Waiguoren (literally, "Foreigner", because he's from Pakenham, loves his bogan accent and makes it his business to stick out as much as possible around here) who just kinda stared at me for 10 seconds before finally saying "you should be busking!" ... that was my favourite comment. It normally doesn't take Waiguoren 10 seconds to think of something to say. I was nervous, as usual, but somehow doing that was easier than my last oral presentation. My theory is I practiced the absolute bejeezus out of the piece I wrote for the talent show, and the oral I'd just finished writing a minute or so before I stood up in front of my class.
When the act was done, I met my tutor from last time! Tutors take us for the last hour of a day, and are generally Linguistics postgrads and such. Mia remembered me from 2 years ago when she saw me playing the flute. I recognised her the instant she came running out of nowhere yelling "MIIIIIIICHAAAAAAAAAAEL!!!" So that was nice. She was like "I teach English at this Uni now!!!" and I was all "Oh. I'm still the same type of student as last time." Hahaha. I never thought I'd see her again. How awesome.

So we bailed on the talent show early. As a result I have no idea if I won anything. I was just SO hungry!!! Miranda came to watch me and had her guitar from something she did earlier in the day, so we brought it with us to the little Muslim restaurant that all the Monash students seem to like eating at so much. Sam bumped into us randomly and had dinner with us. The two of them play left-handed guitar so they had a lot to talk about, the sum of which saw us singing to their music (first a piece Miranda wrote and Sam played "I'm a believer") in said tiny restaurant. The chefs applauded them. =D Having gotten well and truly into the mood, I found some leftover lyric sheets from the carolling night in Miranda's guitar case. From there we paid our bill, and sang carols as we walked back to the guesthouse, and up the elevator. Somebody with a Christmas hat joined in until he got to his floor. Lenny saw us and ran away. He came back shortly with another guitar and joined as for the whole rest of the night! Zara and Adam came out of nowhere as well. Somewhere in the middle of all this I got a text from Monica saying "Christmas time is family time! Come drink with us!!!" but we all reasoned that, going out to not-all-that-exciting clubs with cheap drinks had been done before and hardly appealed to any of us, what we'd got caught up in doing was Christmassy, and had possibly never been done before at SISU ^^
We rode the elevator up and down a few times, getting people in on our act, then we sat around the hall for a half hour or so. Some people joined us, some people filmed us. An American actually thanked us and said it hadn't felt like Christmas til he heard us. Security came around midnight to tell us to calm down and we wished him a Merry Christmas. First time I ever saw a security guard smile here =D
Then we saw Miranda off into a taxi. Now that we were outside we felt like walking and singing again. People in shops smiled at us crazy foreigners and waved back at us. Within 10 minutes 4 random local Chinese girls had jumped out of their taxi and joined us. It seemed like I was the only one of us aware that we'd never seen these people before, the others all assumed one of us knew them xD They feature in photos on facebook also.
So yeah, haha good night that was.

Christmas day, Dylan let me use his computer for Skype, which meant I could talk to NANA and AUNTIES and Mum and DAD and Dude n J'Mak! Hooray! I only got an hours sleep between eve and day so I felt that throughout. We were at an all-you-can-eat buffet place that was built like a crazy elaborate food court. Look at THOSE photos cos seriously, the place had to be seen to be believed. 200RMB (approx $AUS50) to get in and that was all we had to worry about. Well that and exploding. As you all know, I do that sometimes. Awwww my aching Christmas Gut! It was a bit weird eating all that dessert without Uncle Lorry there egging me on though.
The majority of Monash students were there and we all fit comfortably. A girl from my class arranged the whole thing. Good on her! Oh and The Jie Ke (Jack) dressed as Skanky Mrs Claus. He enjoyed it far too much! After we all went back to SISU to try and watch a movie but I fell asleep =[

Internet's Hasaam and Dandy

2008-12-23T18:12:00.003+08:00

Day #44
Funds: $6200ish
Location: ... SISU Guesthouse ... STILL ...
Michael should really get started on the next essay now that the first essay is finished.

Those of you paying attention to my funds track may have become a little confused by some discrepencies. While it is possible to live relatively cheaply in China (Shanghai being one of the pricier zones) my figures so far may have been a tad misleading. Somehow I managed to miscalculate my annual leave, which was a nice surprise since it turns out I UNDERestimated it considerably. I don't think I'm getting any more money from Casey Cardinia though, but still, I'm a couple hundred ahead of where I thought I'd be when I planned this out. I guess, I still haven't bought Christmas presents, and SISU kindly gave us a teeny stipend to cover the rise in cost of accomodation (250RMB each, like $AUS60abouts) of course this didn't cover the huge difference caused by the market crash everyone's over sooking about, so I'm really surprised the money's been sitting this quietly. I've mostly stuck to my 150RMB/day thing pretty strongly, which is easy enough since 20 kuai ("bucks") for a decent meal is about average, and this course has mostly left me a bit too knackered from sheer crappiness.
It's not really an intensive course by design, it's just the year's course at Monash, crammed into days instead of weeks. I have completely lost the ability to sustain interest in certain classes. And the content of our textbook ... ugh. Amanda Chan, if you're still keeping up with these entries, we're doing the exact same texts as you did. I even remember you mentioning an argument with somebody about the silly man who let his woman go to save face.
Mostly, it's the same chapter, over and over. No new grammar, which is what always gets me excited (don't judge me!), even though it's not like we know everything there is to know about Mandarin morphosyntax, just a list of new words. Every (artificial) dialogue in this book centres around the premise that Chinese people are super-awesome, super-polite friendly people who could never directly say anything that could even slightly offend their apparently terribly sensitive friends, and white people are pretty ignorant and come from a fairly empty culture, since all the foreign characters always need basic concepts explained like "the teacher saying your handwriting could be improved means he WANTS you to improve your handwriting!!! He's just too polite to say so!!!" To this, replies the white man in my book, "ohhhh. Shit. I completely ignored that and assumed my essay was awesome. How foolish of me! How wonderfully intricate is this elaborate system of ettiquette!!!"
Have I mentioned I loathe our textbook? The teachers are wonderful though. Our guy is really animated and enjoys making jokes and physically acting out words that he has trouble describing using other Chinese words. My tutor is as adorable as a 12 year old and is really patient with me and all my little oddities. She's more than willing to just sit and have a chat (in Chinese of course) about pretty much anything, so I have brought up absolutely everything I could think of to avoid The Book. Usually I just bring up Chinese culture that I'm at least vaguely familiar with (today we had an argument about whether Qiao Feng or Duan Yu was the best character on Tian Long Ba Bu, Qiao Feng being the manliest mo'fo ever to appear in a Wu Xia drama, Duan Yu being a dumbarse pretty-boy prince who tends to find out an inopportune moments that his current love interest is actually his half-sister). Sometimes I have to go to other extremes, once I found myself singing Qiu Ai Ge (the first song I did at my 21st ==") to prompt her into singing for us and another time played Love For a Thousand Years (very popular Chinese song) on my flute to stall - although to be fair the flute was with me cos I had to go to Miranda's straight after to practise for the Christmas Carols.
Oh the carolling, it was awesome ^^ Photos and locales are together on facebook, it was a good night. Miranda is really good on her guitar considering she's not even been playing a full year yet. Lenny, Sue Kim and Eric came with me, it was Miranda's church group's thing but the four of us Monash kids made up nearly a quarter of the group hehe. Church people are so nice and so much fun around Christmastime ^^
Doing essays with Monica (think Michelle Chew only slightly lighter and classier ... but not by much) is a BAD idea. Combined, we have the attention span of a single caffeinated squirrel. That has A.D.D.. We tend to take several hours to do a couple sentences each here and there. Essays with Lian, however, is a GOOD idea. Her Chinese is really good and she's really good for bouncing ideas back and forth with. Problem is, Monica and my behaviour seems to keep driving her to politely leave us to do her own essay elsewhere =[
So many characters on this trip ... argh I could never do them all justice in a silly little blog. There's something really weird about seeing the same people every moment of every day, it's rare to even get more than a single hour to yourself, even when you sleep there's another guy lying two feet away usually. It's not like people are clinging to eachother or anything, it's more that we just don't want to miss anything. I wish I were capable of doing what Quincy does, which is when he feels like he's sort of had enough, he just ignores everyone and if approached, stares at the floor and says in a vaguely apologetic tone: "I'm not ... socialising" XD
Lots of silly little gossip too. Me and Monica are enjoying the idea that there's rumours going on about us cos we usually hang out and have noticed people noticing. Sunday night we had another failed essay-writing session that saw us in bed at 7am and so we both just gave our essays to Lian to hand up and went to bed ... people did notice and comment on the fact that we both skipped class on the same day, which we find hilarious. (Although the teacher was more focused on the fact that I was probably dying from hypothermia or something, apparently she said something like "Well I hope he puts on a jumper from now on!") I look forward to hearing what certain people are going to make of me when Joy shows up IN A MERE SEVEN DAYS.
Merry Jingly To All! Doubt I'll get another blog in before Christmas, although I'll definitely have more photos put up soon.
Oh and tomorrow's my big night, me n Marcello gonna see what we can do. Starting to feel a bit nervous hehe. Hopefully I'll have that video up for everyone soon too.

I Am Eighty-Hasaam =]

2008-12-07T11:59:00.005+08:00

Day #39
Funds: $6300ish

Sorry, internet problems. Still got em. Dunno when the next entry'll be. Want my damn net back damnit!!!

Ok! Lu Xun Park! All young white people should go to work out there!
Have I mentioned the public gyms? In parks in Shanghai and HK where we would have playgrounds for kids, they have gyms for old people. Some of these guys are insane. Upon seeing myself (in all my t-shirted and sandal-ed glory), Dylan (fairly standard-looking white guy, no disfiguring scars or the like) and Lenny (part EVERYTHING born in Singapore and sporting a mohawk), we were immediately approached. Lenny is a tank. I believe I have mentioned this before. So anyway I was the first to cop it. People here have decided I'm insane for two reasons:
1. I don't eat meat. Asking "does this have meat in it?" never gets an answer, just a confused look. I must always clarify it with an "i don't eat meat" which will be met with an even more confused, slightly horrified expression, but this can all be settled if I then follow up with "so does this have meat? I don't want to eat any meat." (And then they serve me chicken, pronounced "ji-rou" because THAT has no meat/"rou" in it =S)
2. I very rarely wear more than one layer. As you all know I have quite a speedy metabolism or something which results in me sweating like some sort of a chocolate rabbit upon any sort of physical activity, turns out whatever the deal with that is, it also causes me to be pretty warm pretty much all the time. We haven't gotten too bad, just single digits (someone tried to tell me we'd hit zero degrees one time, wasn't sure that was true), but while lots of other people are up to 3 layers, I still can't hack wearing so much. I have practically memorised the conversation where some old Chinese person freaks out and demands to know why I'm not cold then proceeds to tell me I'm awesome or something.
So obviously the 1st one didn't come up but that damned 2nd point was mighty topical for a while. While I got caught up in the conversation, Lenny and Dylan snuck off to try and do some dips n chin-ups etc. This also caught the attention of my new friends. Lenny, massive guy, was struggling to get as many dips in as he could, and he was doing them nice and slow. This guy comes up to him, and is all "Nah sonny you're doing it wrong" then immediately launched into about 5 times as many as Lenny had done in half the time. Then he dropped, all the old people clapped, and he yelled the now immortal words, "WO SHI BA SHI BA SUI!!!" (I AM 88 YEARS OLD!!!) Everyone clapped. Then some guy appeared on the same monkey bars as Dylan. He lifted himself up using only two fingers on each hand and thrashed Dylan in a similar fashion.
I gotta admit, I'm a TEENY bit proud of the next bit ^^ So finally I make it clear that I wanna try some sort of exercise when this old dude maybe a foot shorter than me came out of nowhere and said a bunch of stuff, the only part I really got being "Let's have a competition! I challenge you!" Next thing I know, dudeman is standing on his head, using one thumb and one finger on each hand for balance, as far away from his head as possible (the further away the more strength and focus is needed). So I'm thinking, haha awesome what were the odds I'd get a chance to show off? Then I was upside-down, too. That got a lot of applause actually. I noticed his arms reached out a lot farther than mine. I hoped nobody else did. Thing is, I never tried any fancy stuff before like using only one finger and one thumb for balance, but for those who didn't know I can generally stay on my head indefinitely, until I get bored, so I really wasn't sure what to expect in terms of a challenge. I never lost this game with Mishy or Neo. Then my LaoRival started doing all this weird stuff with his legs, like stretching and kicking them and stuff. I tried to copy him, fell over instantly. The crowd clapped some more and one person tried to console me. Then a second person came to translate from the first guy's Shanghainese into Mandarin. Then I caught my LaoRival with his legs folded in the lotus position (i.e., like a genie, or in meditation). He lifted himself straight up like this and balanced on his hands. I followed suit, and then he started going up and down like it was push-ups or something. So I fell over again and everyone started clapping. "WO SHI BA SHI BA SUI!!!" he yelled again. Then he felt like a bit of a chat.
"How old are you?"
"Aw I'm just 21."
"Wahahahaha! So young! No wonder you suck and are so weak and stuff! Don't worry, you'll get there!"
"Ahah, um, thanks ... How can you do that?"
[LaoRival strikes dramatic tai chi kinda pose and takes a few deep controlled breaths]
"It's qi gong (breathing/energy power)"
[Mykal mimics pose, LaoRival lights a cigarette and starts rambling in between draughts way too fast for Mykal to understand anything past "yeah, breathing control and power is important, oxygen gives us strength"] It was around this point that I realised about a quarter of the old folks at this park were smoking while they worked out like madmen. We left with our tails between our legs.

Had a good coupla weeks besides just that. Lots of fun stuff, some of it in a sort of you-had-to-be-there kinda way. Been studying reasonably hard, even though perhaps my conduct in class may not reflect that and I could be better behaved. My contributions to class discussion (in Chinese of course) have basically centred around how I really enjoy the food that I brought to class and am perhaps eating a little noisily, would he like some, how no sir, i'm not cold, this weather isn't so bad, how i hate wearing shoes so i don't if I can avoid it, and how it doesn't matter what Ivy says to win my heart, she is a vampire, and has no chance with me. Probably just as well I'm sharing the position of Class Rep with Claire, she does all the fun stuff I don't find interesting, like arranging christmas parties and all, while I do lots of interesting things that she might not have found fun, like running around making sure photocopies of revision sheets essential for exam preparation are available to our class more than 30 hours before the exam itself. Our course is quite poorly structured, and matters are made worse by what feels like poor communication between teachers here and home. The Linguistics nerd in me is getting all excited about the prospect of some sort of postgrad centred around studying teaching methods of second language acquisition, Australia clearly needs some work.

And Joy bought a phone. We beened texting!!! She's in Qingdao (to Shanghai what Sydney is to Melbourne distance and direction -wise) right now, less than 2 weeks til she's here ^^ Ok I'm starting to fall asleep. Hopefully I'll be able to post again real soon. Who knows when these damn techies are gonna actually figure out what's wrong with our net connection? Sigh.

Lately Hasaam's Been Underway

2008-12-04T09:35:00.003+08:00

Day #25
Funds: [figure it out later I'm in a hurry!]

So I've been slumming it pretty much, just hangin around campus and the local area while people have been going crazy-touristy. I must admit this time round I've been a little disappointed with people's attitude towards bargaining. We seem to have a lot more 'shoppers' this time around, in that it almost seems like the spending of money is what's making them happy, nobody seems interested in the chase, and nobody wants to believe that yes, absolutely everything you buy here no matter where it's from or what label it has is equally likely to be of horrendous quality - it's not worth paying top dollar for it, just in case it is. People are bragging about having 5 kuai marked off, that's slightly more than a dollar, aw man no wonder the hawkers love us whiteys and try to rip me off all the time, ugh what a precedent some of these guys are setting ...
So yeah while people have been running around checking out sites I saw two years ago, I've pretty much been lounging around, going for walks or doing my homework sorta thing. Nice and simple, relaxing, is goooooood. The only problem is I pretty much don't take photos at all these days, just because I can't be bothered bringing my camera around all the time - I've settled. Whipping out a camera at a moment's notice isn't really part of my series of usual habits.
Oh went to the House of Jazz and Blues the other night, instead of Bonbons. Good call, Dylan! The ambience was very chilled, the music was awesome, and I caught up with this guy I met from the Shanghai Train there too. He brought a fellow student who also went to his Taiwanese Uni and we quickly realised she was Japanese. Cue the hilariously mind-bending 3-language conversation. Eugene and Rui with their awesome Mandarin + Me and Eugene with our native English dominated, but amazingly, there were occasions where I remembered a Jap word or two that Eugene didn't know the Mandarin for, and I tried to use as much Chinese as I could. I can't describe the weirdness of the using Japanese after so long. It was kind of like, you know when you sit on your leg or something for a while and then you try to walk and the blood just comes rushing back to it? It was kinda like that feeling, only IN MY BRAIN. I was even able to eventually come up with the sentence in Jap "remembering all these words feels like flowers blossoming in my mind", that was funny. [この言葉を覚えてるのは頭で花が咲いてるみたい/kono kotoba wo oboeteru no wa atama de hana ga saiteru mitai!] Part of me was reignited I spose, I'm really psyched about Japan all over again, like the way I was years ago. I can't really say or do anything useful, but I got a good feeling about how much I'm going to improve once I'm there.
But yeah, Bonbons = 150RMB to get in, then drinks are free. Drinks are incredibly strong, and water is an insane price. We swung by after to go make sure our terribly drunk friends were okay (didn't go in of course) and helped them taxi home. Monica was a little nuts, and wouldn't shut up about water. I continue to give her shit for this.
Me and this guy Quincy have begun distributing nicknames. I like this very much. I'm still Killer Mike cos that's what they called me for some reason last time, Shaun = Stinger and David = Deadly Dave. Man, we are out of control. Quincy also helped us discover that bread here actually isn't as bad as you might think, and I've been eating SO MUCH LATELY.
The food here tastes nice, but my goodness is it loaded with MSG and sugar and grease. I have no idea how I managed to eat out every meal last time. Me and Dylan snapped the other day and bought Australian-Made Oats (gooooo Patriotism!) and fruit and bread and yoghurt and juice, and having that stuff for breakfast really feels different. I feel all kinds of awesome having dodged the grease lately.
Uhhhh what else? Uh, got beaten up in the hallway. Sort of. This guy Lenny is a little nuts about physical fitness, boxing, martial arts, etc. The other night he taught me a few things to do with grappling, we drew a small crowd outside our rooms as we rolled around the floor pretty much dripping sweat all over, man did we smell bad. But it actually was pretty fun, this guy's a total tank so he had to go easy on me, let me get a few shots in and all that.
My dreams are becoming more vivid again. Lots of colour n stuff. Does that mean I'm sleeping properly or badly? Dylan reckons one night I sat bolt upright, mumbled something frantic in Japanese and stared at him. Then I apparently said nothing to him when he asked me if I'd just had a Jap nightmare, I went to the toilet and came back still ignoring him. I have no memory of this whatsoever, but Dylan can't seem to tell the story without laughing. =S
The vibe here is becoming gradually more high school as we go along. I'm trying to stay mature, last time it was so much easier to do that since I barely knew anybody. This time I'm just gonna have to stay grounded on my own merit/awesome. People are basically good now, few clashes of personality here and there though I guess. We'll see what happens. 1 week = 1 essay. That's doing my head in a little, too, since the material is OH SO MUNDANE AND DRY. More on that later, Dylan's trying to get me to go work-out in the park with him and the oldies. More on that later. Oh and I have a different story about old people in the park, maybe soon I'll just do a whole blog about that XD

Yue Hasaam Yue Hao

2008-11-25T01:25:00.002+08:00

Day #16
Funds: $6150ish

Location: SISU Guest House, Shanghai, China
Michael has developed his Comfort Zone

So it's been a little while, huh? It's been pretty busy and I've been making a point of holding onto my cash and my time as both are precious commodities. Since I got to Shanghai, relaxing has been a priority over going out to do touristy-type stuff, it's a really good thing that I've been here before so I've basically done it all before, a second reason that's awesome is I did it all when the $AUS was worth over 6RMB instead of the measly 4 and a bit it dropped to since the market crash - for those of you playing at home, that means last time I paid $AUS600 for my total accomodation here at SISU (Shanghai International Studies University) last time, and at pretty much the same price this time it cost around $AUS900. Fortunately food is still basically cheap enough that I can still eat insane amounts without feeling it too much wallet-wise (belt-wise may be another matter I suppose). I promised to go up the stairs (18 flights) at least twice a day, and right now I have to do both goes in a row in the morning before my shower since it leaves me a huffing sweaty mess - hopefully this cancels out the constant barrage of rice and ice cream and such, maybe I'll even get the added benefit of being less of a heaving sweaty mess in the future if I can keep it up (oh who am I kidding, damn genes, thanks a lot Mum!!!).
My last night in HK was pretty peaceful, sat around helping Debbie and her friend compose poetry for their English class (it had to follow this god-awful format, so restrictive) and had a nice quiet meal. Nice and relaxing.
On the train I met a guy who caught me trying to speak Chinese with the ticket lady, she didn't quite get my accent and was in a hurry so just assumed I was speaking some other crazy language. Eugene introduced himself with the line "I'm quite good at understanding foreigner's Chinese", heheh. He's this Indian dude who spent a year in Taiwan on a program similar to the one I'm about to embark upon, only it was much longer and so his skills are awesome.
Found Shaun (from my Chinese tutorial back home) pretty quickly, turns out we're right next-door to eachother, very cool. He came with friends so we all hung out for a bit, one guy called Seth is a bit fond of his Lonely Planet and has been ticking boxes since day 1. I believe he'll fit it all in, he doesn't seem to get as distracted by Shiny Things as I do. Anyway this guy had us walk from the Guesthouse to Nanjing Road, which I had never done before since trains were always so convenient in the past. I'm glad he did because I had no idea it was so close! (Okay, 30-40minute walk, but still, not exactly like Cranbourne to Melbourne as my memory seemed to think it was.)
People started pouring in on Friday, which was terrible timing considering the fact that this was the day Joy was here in transit to Qingdao, where she's visiting family for a few months. We should have stayed away from the campus because sometimes people I've been looking forward to seeing count as Shiny Things, so I feel like I may have let her down a bit as I did pretty much intend to spend the day doting on her and stuff. She'll be back at the very end of December if all goes according to plan and I really hope to make it up to her then. We were all very excited and I may have gotten a little bit carried away acting as The Guy Who Knows Where Everything is, but I think it was generally appreciated and I don't think I came across too much as a know-it-all. I showed them a couple of my favourite places to eat as well as the local version of a sort of Massive Kmart+Coles-in-one, called Carrefore. Actually I couldn't believe how much I DID remember, it really was as simple as thinking, "Okay, now I need to get my picture taken for a student card" and letting my feet just take me there. I'm very comfortable here and although bits of the scenery have changed a bit, all the important bits are the same. Just walking around for the first few days was incredibly nostalgic, we made so many memories last time and I'm sure we will this time too.
My Chinese has definitely improved, I'm able to communicate a lot better than last time in taxis and restaurants and I seem to be picking up random words I find incredibly useful (eggplant, corn, pineapple sundae, mushroom, etc etc) a lot quicker than before. I hope this is a good sign and that I will do well in this course. The roads still make no sense (especially the drivers on it) but I'm not afraid anymore!
Finally got to see Miranda again, met her at Church and she saved me a seat. My coursework looks a bit full-on so I might not be able to go every week, but I think I'll definitely go a few more times, it's a nice place. She's a sound technician at a bar/restaurant now! It's called Melting Pot and it's actually quite nifty. It was fantastic catching up with her in person and hanging out like old times. (Miranda was my knight-in-shining-armour last time around, she showed me a lot of interesting places, particullarly quite a few Muslim-run restaurants, one of which I impressed my classmates with earlier.)
And of course, class is starting. Every day I'm meeting new people involved in this program, and I'm getting to know people who were previously just faces, not even names in some cases, much better. Everyone here is awesome, really friendly types, and everyone's here for slightly different reasons, there's a wide range of interests and skills and random knowledge just spread out amongst the groups. The fact that I actually knew people before I left this time has been kind of nice, but it seems like there are tons of people who had nothing to do with my Chinese class who I'm connected with through other means as well - like this guy who just walked up to me today and said "You're gonna think I'm really weird, but do you have anything to do with this Buddhist temple in Narre Warren? You probably don't remember me but I came and checked it out with my Mum once." Absolutely nuts.
My course is pretty intense (hence the name "Shanghai Intensive Summer Program"), but I think it's not too bad. I need to study as hard as I said I would, and I'll be fine. I also put my hand up to be class rep, which is a bit of responsibility but it won't be so bad because two girls in my class also volunteered and one of them drew with me in the votes, so we agreed to share the role. I figure I can make myself useful if only because I have been here before and all that (so has Claire, my co-rep, she was here last year). In addition to that I've started composing the new piece I'm going to play for the talent show this year, I think it's going to be a lot better than last time since I've developed a few new interesting techniques, but maybe I should stop talking like that in case I raise everyone's expectations too high, haha, and I'm going to keep an eye on all the labels of any "water" I drink beforehand so I can be completely sober this time around (last time as many of you already know I inadvertantly consumed a large mouthful of a totally clear and infinitely foul liquid known as bai jiu just a half hour before going on stage).
The room Dylan and I are sharing has already become horribly filthy. This is primarily a result of our joint compassionate nature and the fact that Dylan stashed all the booze in our minibar, so everyone keeps popping in from time to time for some reason. The maids hated Dylan last time, I believe they may hate me this time too. For reasons too idiotic yet mundane for me to be bothered getting into, there is salt and a deck of cards just spread out all over the carpet =[
So yeah, I think I'll have plenty to keep me occupied over the next 6 weeks! Dunno how many photos are gonna make it up, but I think I'll try to get back into the habit.
Mmm ... yeah that should probably do it for the moment =P

(So you guys know, the red circle is Hong Kong)

On Hasaam of the World!!!

2008-11-16T21:06:00.004+08:00

Day #7
Funds: $7250ish
Location: All Over The Shop, Hong Kong
Michael is up way too late!

Ahhh what to write? Well, I've had my train ticket to Shanghai since the second day, I'm leaving Tuesday 18th, may have mentioned that already ... thanks to the fact that I can get up in the morning here and catch people online in the afternoon, I've sort of dumped lots of random feelings about this place on whoever was available at the time, or whoever asked the right 'trigger' question to set me off on a rant about how the roads here make no sense sometimes and perfect sense like I never dreamed of at others, or how even the traffic is polite despite being packed and pushy, or the impossible-to-figure-out code-switching situation (language-swapping), or any one of the many other delightful little paradoxes I've observed in the past 7 days. Fortunately I've been taking as many photos as will fit in the camera most days so I'm sure anyone who's been interested has a rough idea of what I've been up to. A couple days have seen me just get up in the morning, and leave with a vague idea of where I was gonna go, and then stumble around completely at random soaking in as much as my scattered little mind could take for several hours, and since a lot of this involves stairs and hills I pretty much collapse when it's over. Most of these sessions have been followed up with a bit more of a focused trip led by either Debbie or Matt & Nico. Matt is the guy who gave Debbie my details before she came to Australia last year, by a happy little coincidence it turned out he arrived here to see his girlfriend Nico a couple days ago. He's also vegetarian, so knew a nifty little place in one of the buildings (of course I would never have thought to look if I were alone =P) we could go and order literally anything off the menu, which is of course a rare treat no matter what country I'm in ^^ Most of the time, unfortunately, I don't seem to remember the names of the places I go to since I just don't personally find them distinctive enough. I'm pretty sure that's just because I'm still not used to all the crazy stimuli! Besides, it's important to remember that distinctive =/= awesome all the time. Usually it's been not too far from my lil cupboard, TST (Tsim Sha Tsui) is supposed to be 'in the middle of everything' so there you go.
As the Day #6 photos pretty much say, me and Chun Hin caught up and went to see the Tian Tan Buddha yesterday, which was cool.

And here we can see that this statue of Buddha is actually so large that it can be seen from satellite images ^^ It's not too far from the airport, but of course you can see exactly where it fits in by zooming out. You can only get there by chairlift or a pretty massive hike, kinda like to think I wouldn't have minded the hike, but definitely wouldn't have been up to it considering all the other walking I've been doing lately.

This was the closest the map'd let me zoom. But that's where the awesome beach is. More on that from today's photos =]

I'm sleepy ... so I think this'll be relatively brief. Things I learned about Hong Kong so far:

Connex sucks. MTR (their equivelant) does not. Public transport in general mops the floor with us. I've never had to wait more than 4 minutes for any train here, and today was the longest I ever had to wait for a bus - slightly under 20, because we just missed the one before it.
The Octopus Card kicks arse, although I have no idea why they called it that. We were supposed to have something similar last year in Melbourne but it never happened. Basically you load it up with prepaid cash and then you never have to buy a ticket, just swipe your nifty lil card as you walk through and it calculates the cheapest possible fare at the end of your trip! You can also use it at Macca's and 7/11 and a zillion other shops. So the fact my wallet can't carry coins isn't such a big deal here, hehe.
7/11 doesn't rip you off here, usually their products are quite good value. Some supermarkets still do, some quite badly.
There are tons of one-way roads, so many that there are some total intersections where every pedestrian light on every corner turns green at once. That's nuts.
There are arrows on the road telling people crossing the street which way to look. They look very much like the arrows in Australia telling cars which direction to drive in. As such, certain foreigners who may or may not keep blogs keep looking in the complete opposite direction.
People in Hong Kong speak Cantonese as a first language. Many have English (or a slightly altered version of it) as a second language, so that's pretty handy for tourists from an English-speaking country. Unless it turns out they actually speak Mandarin as a second language instead (which can happen for a bunch of reasons). There's really no way of knowing until you try both, so it's convenient if you come from an English-speaking country where you studied Mandarin. Of course, turns out there's quite a few who only speak their mother tongue, which is fair enough. It just takes a whole bunch of awkward lines of conversation to establish which is true for every individual you wish to interact with.
Having both the internet and a tv in my bedroom keeps me from sleeping at a reasonable hour despite my physically knackered body begging for it. Goodnight =P

Pure Concentrated Hassam - And Lots of it!!!

2008-11-14T09:38:00.007+08:00

Days #2-4
Funds: $7400ish
Location:

Osaka Guesthouse, Chungking Mansions, Nathan Road, Kowloon, Hong Kong
Michael is aching considerably all over. In mostly good ways.

Oh FYI guys some of you probably know this already but for the some of you who don't, the maps on my blog aren't pictures, they're linked to the multimap website, which means you can zoom in/out and move around them and stuff, thought that might be handy to know considering how close and far away the frames I use are. Have a fiddle, Mum and Dad. [And if I never utter that phrase again it'll be far too soon!]

Guess I'll start from the start again. Had an excellent plane ride this time round, I was at the back with nobody next to or behind me, so I reclined both my seats and lay down to sleep most of the time hehehe. Once off the airplane and outta customs, I had a pretty straightforward plan based on a handful of numbers and names I'd either memorised or written down such as street names, 'reasonable' room rates, bus routes and Debbie's mobile number - the last of which would do me no good until I got a SIM. She told me before I left to ring her at 12:30 cos her classes finished then. At the time I'd figured well what with showing up at 6 surely I'll have a place by then easy!
Heh. We all know what happens when Mykal says stuff like that, right?
So I go to an ATM only to discover that the $AUS500 hasn't gone through to my international Travelex account thingy yet. Fortunately I'd put nearly $AUS60 through over the weeks leading up to this just to make sure it all worked. Unfortunately I couldn't touch all of it, because HK ATMs only give $HK100 notes as their smallest bit of paper and my total only JUST fell short of $HK300. I vaguely remembered at this point that I'd decided to settle for no less than $HK150 a night (although given the still-declining exchange rate I thought realistically I shouldn't go higher than $HK120), and, having blown $HK30ish on a bus ticket to Tsim Sha Tsui, the place where the infamous Chungking and Mirador Mansions are located, promptly shat myself. Oh well, guess I could survive without food for a day ...
Then I took some nice photos of scenery and such and that was very soothing, then I remembered that I still had $AUS40 in cash in my little belt pocket thingy from my very last paper round haha, and the emergency Chinese RMB I have stashed in my bag that I got from Tian on my bday. So as long as my money was coming in the next day (which it ultimately did), I'd be okay. Hooray for my elaborate network of backup plans!!!
I think to get the full effect of what I accomplished with my accomodation, you really do need to check out a site like hostels.com or whatever and look up any available dorms in Hong Kong. About 75% of them are in either Mirador Mansion or Chung King Mansion, which are pretty much half a block apart. What they're famous for is being quite affordable in an extreme-to-the-max sort of you-REALLY-get-what-you-paid-for-if-you-didn't-get-ripped-off kinda way. Read some of the backpacker's reviews, it sounds horrible. But I'd resigned myself to the idea that I would be sharing my room with strangers, which begged the question of how I was gonna hide all my stuff.
Spent nearly 2 hours walking down the stairs from Mirador Mansion, checking with every place that looked like they had rooms what they charged and offered, and each one was pretty much a rip-off. After reading online and chatting with Bobbi a few nights before I left I was under the impression I could bargain a price down, but I'm not the best at that anyway, and besides that:

The people at the top know that they're the first people you're gonna see, and know that if you're doing the top-down thing, you're probably just trying to figure out what you can get away with and therefore don't KNOW anything, so they don't let you get away with anything and charge as much as they like.
People below the people at the top can SEE you as you walk around in a circle before the next flight of stairs (the building is like a square with the middle cut out, and you can see all the way down), so they know you haven't found a place yet and that you're getting ripped off, so they think they can rip you off too.
Because of this, nobody bought my completely made-up story that I was looking to beat $HK120/night at this other place I'd found.

So I memorised the best deal, which involved sharing a dorm with 3 others and having no internet or place to keep my stuff, at $HK80/night, and decided to check out Chung King Mansion, which I thought was the more notorious of the two. A lady caught my eye at the door and I was going to tell her to leave me alone (since I'd had bad hawker experiences in Shanghai) but she smelled like my Aunty Helen and looked kind of like a random auntie from my temple, so I ignored the gut instinct that told me not to trust anybody in favour of the gut instinct that said "My Aunty Helen's nice!!!" I tried to do the whole acting disinterested/aloof thing that you're supposed to do at the market, but she kept engaging in friendly conversation. Turns out her son studies accounting at melbourne uni and she's Shanghainese, so there were a few odd coincidences (of course I told myself, she could just be making it up to build a rapport, it's so much harder to argue with a sweet little old lady who's acting all nice and stuff).
Anyway she wanted $HK200/night for this single room, and it looked sort of like one I'd actually seen on some guy's blog online who paid $100, so I thought I'd tell her that hehe. Suddenly she dropped the price to $HK130, and pretty much said that she didn't wanna stuff around, that was the lowest she'd go and I could take it or leave it. At first I thought, "oooh so close maybe I can get it to my happy $HK120!" but then I saw that they had an internet cable that would work in my laptop - every single other place had insisted only Wifi was possible, and mines too old and can't hack wifi for some reason. Also the net would be free, compared to me having to pay about 3 or 4 bucks an hour if I was lucky. Factoring this in, I considered myself very lucky. Later, other people assured me that this is a very good deal. Shall I give you a guided tour? =P

Seriously, that's it, behind me is the door to get out =P In theory I could shower while I go to the toilet, how efficient!!! Aaaaand all my stuff is under the bed. The lady even changes my sheets and replaces the toilet paper every day, I know that sounds like nothing to some of you but compared to what I heard about this place that's nuts!

Sorry to dump all of this on you all at once, I've been far too tired recently to type all this up into bite-sized portions. I imagine I'll be less rushed in Shanghai considering I'll have heaps more time but bear with me while I'm here, yeah? So I was thinking maybe you could like, go have a cup of tea, or do whatever else it was you had planned, and then you can come back and read the rest whenever you feel ready. No pressure =]

***

Oh, I'm glad you could make it back! Yeah so if you've been following my photos you know I really haven't stopped moving since I got here. As soon as I'd booked the place, I used the shower and immediately bought a SIM, called Debbie, arranged to meet her somewhere, then hung out until midnight. Pretty stupid really considering how much sleep I needed but hey I haven't seen Debbie for about 14 months and who knows when we'll catch up again? She's got a bunch of international friends from uni so over the night I hung out with an Austrian a French guy and a Canadian, all awesome, and all with awesome accents. I saw a bit of a night market (but had no room left in my camera to do anything about it) and went to a couple little restaurants for lunch and dinner (and dinner the next day). Eating out is pretty much my only option, and I've been having curry for breakfast! Yay!!! The next day, Debbie had class so I went exploring myself, got lost, didn't get the nap I planned to have, then went to some arcades with Debbie and her friends. I estimate half the machines were bishi-bashi mini-games. Those of you who know bishi-bashi know that this is awesome. One might even say ... neat.
Yeah, so the exploring. It's crazy here. Basically I just get lost and take photos until it's getting late and find the nearest train station to get me home. The way it works is just looking in any direction here is like tugging at a thread on a shirt or whatever, only each tug brings out at least 3 other threads, each of which you wanna tug until finally you've completely mutilated your shirt into a ball of yarn. For example:
Yesterday, I got up and thought, 'hey maybe I'll go to Resistance Bay and check that out', so I got on the train to Central (which is on the actual Hong Kong island) where I was supposed to swap to a bus. Then I was distracted by a sign for some shops, then I got distracted by a sign for this ferry which I thought might be fun to have a look at, only I never got there because I'd found something else which excited me just as much, until finally I had walked to the top-left corner of the island (completely the OPPOSITE direction I'd originally intended to head) and checked out a temple that had just popped out from nowhere. And I had no way to get back by foot because I'd turned that many corners based on shiny things that I'd lost all sense of direction. Landmarks didn't help because my brain can only hold so much information and every time I walk back up the same street I see so many new things I hadn't noticed before, so I forget all the other stuff I'd tried to remember when I'd first been there and then I would swear under oath that I'd never actually been there before. Since they're always building building building around here I can't imagine ever knowing the same amount of area as I do in the south-eastern suburbs of Melbourne in any amount of time. So those of you who heard I wanted to put a whole day aside to try and make it around the circumference of HK island, or at least go from one end to the other, sorry to disappoint. It's not that I couldn't cover the distance, it's that I just can't focus enough around here to walk a straight line without stopping to gawp at stuff. Gawp, I'm such a tourist.
I think this pretty much puts it into perspective:
Debbie's hongkie friend KK was the first local not to laugh when she heard I was staying at Chung King Mansions, and I commented on that - "Do you live very far away? It seemed like everybody knew about that place!" she goes: "yes, I'm pretty far away. It takes at least 10 minutes from here." There was no trace of irony there, either. The density of this place is just insane. They just pack so much more per square metre. I would definitely need more than a week just to get used to it, so I'm glad I don't have anything important to actually do here.

Oh and FYI I bought my train ticket to Shanghai, conducted the whole conversation in Mandarin, proud of myself =P And it only cost $AUS100! Hooray! Speaking of Mandarin, there's a whole language situation here that I haven't totally figured out yet but more on that in the next entry, you're probably all sick of me by now hehe

Kiwi Hasaam Gets His Groove Back

2008-11-12T09:48:00.003+08:00

Okay, so I figure the only way to do this is to split things into two chunks, since so much happened these last couple days I can barely keep track of it all ...

Day #1 (a bit later)
Funds: Like, $7985? =P
Location:

A Tiny Slither of Auckland, New Zealand
Mykal wishes he could dance like them kids

Oh man so where to begin ummmm well customs was a bitch. Thanks to my 21st I've accumulated so much random bling that it's a massive pain in the butt taking it all off and then on again hehehe. But turns out my ankle weights contain something that sets off metal detectors. Who'da thunk it, right? They're made of foam spongey stuff!!! When he asked me if i had a knee replacement cos the alarm was being set off by my legs, I snapped em off and the reaction was an immediate "Oh you've GOT to be kidding me!!!" Sorta awkward, really XD
On the plane next to me was a guy who was afraid of flying, and these kids squealing high-pitched most of the way but I watched Hancock and decided that even though it's basically what should be two movies paced out a bit better slapped together, Will Smith does the character so well I couldn't care less cos it's pretty much awesome.
Once I was actually there, I was totally blown away by just how much everyone I bumped into matched the stereotypes. (Well I didn't see any sheep but oh well). Based on 5 hours just wandering around (in case you're wondering the red circle on the map above is how far I got from the airport, I think, before I thought it best to turn around and not miss my plane) I've decided that kiwis are the most awesomely laid back people ever. I'm pretty much the reigning expert on all things New Zealand now. Yep.
I swear to God that in the first conversation I had I got the words "bro" and "choice" said to me. Actually basically every male there says "bro" no matter what, I believe. I wanted to high five this guy for it but opted not to on the grounds that I wasn't sure if it was culturally insensitive, or at least it would have required far too much explaining. The accents here are AWESOME. I've never been to a country where they all speak English too, it felt weird being the one with the 'accent'.
I did have fush and chups for dinner. It wasn't on purpose though, it was seriously the only open non-grocery shop foodery still open (ok besides Maccas but who the hell travels this far for MacDonald's???). There was this gorgeous girl in the shop with her aunty or something and they had a conversation something like:
"So dud ewe wroit a litta tew Sinta? Wots Sinta gonna guve ewe fer Chrustmus?"
"Bubbles ind uh Eastah Iig!!!"
AWWWWW hahaha.
Also over less than 5 ks I saw five different ovals with people playing rugby on it. This place is Malcolm heaven =P. Also caught some kids learning what looked to me like a sort of tribal dance, while others were learning what sounded to me like traditional awesome tribal drumming. Kickarse.
I'd say to the fush and chups ind beck was about 9ks, based on signs telling me how far away to airport was. Not bad, if I keep this up I HAVE to lose to belly, right???
Oh and the shower at the airport. I seem to remember mentioning that in a photo caption somewhere ... anyway after the long walk I was a little sweaty and all so you can imagine how excited I was when I saw that you can have a free shower at nz airport! Of course, they didn't have towels. Cue Mum's "I told you so" - of course, mine wasn't in my carry-bag. So what's a guy to do? I did pretty much the only thing I could do: stole about a zillion hand paper towels from the toilet and took them with me! It worked, why wouldn't it have worked??? It's called IMPROVISATION and clearly I'm gonna have to learn to get real good at it real fast or I'm stuffed (wait til I do my Day#2 entry and you hear all about my money situation XD).
I'm aware that this is quite a choppy entry, I'm clearly still reeling from excitement, so again I apologise to you all. I just have one final New Zealand anecdote, Debbie found it hilarious anyway when I told her.
So I get on the last elevator before that last lounge that you sit around in and wait til they tell you to board (how embarrassing that I can't think of what you call it) and a little old lady and a girl probably my age hops on too. Then the doors close and we all just stand there. Eventually the girl says "I think we have to push the button" and the lady's like "yes, good idea" and we all have an awkward chuckle. The little old lady goes to wait for some other flight on the same floor and me and this girl are there a bit early so I said, "Ah, looks like we got the plane all to ourselves!" and she turns around and goes, "oh? you're going to hong kong too?" "Yep!" I said. Then I yawned, took a long stretch as I sat down, and woke up about 15 seconds later to find the girl sitting a little way aways from me fiddling with her phone in a sort of disgruntled manner. So there you go. That's pretty much how all my social interactions go, quite smoothly until I lose concentration. Joy, you clearly have nothing to fear with me being so far away XD

New Photos

2008-11-12T00:25:00.002+08:00

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=69212&l=48ab3&id=637056881
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=69221&l=13e78&id=637056881

Ok so hopefully I can be bothered typing stuff up tomorrow before more stuff happens and I fall behind ... or maybe this won't cover every waking moment of my life, who knows? =P

A Fresh Hassam, A New Beginning

2008-11-09T22:24:00.000+08:00

Day #1
Current Funds: Roughly $8000
Present Location:

Mum and Dad's, Cranbourne, Australia
Mykal is: vaguely concerned what essential thing it is that he hasn't packed/prepared for yet. Oh well, guess I'll have to wait for that critical moment to find out ^^

So I got some plans. Yup. If you've found this blog then I imagine you've got a vague idea of them, or at least you know I have them.
I have packed my Awesome Backpacker's Backpack™ already, and it only just occurred to me to go on a nostalgic rampage taking photos of this house, but I spose it doesn't matter greatly as I AM coming back. At some stage I will post a photo/rant about just how awesome that backpack is, but not now. Too sleepy. Promised myself I'd post a Day #0 blog but I missed the boat thanks to MSN so this'll have to do.
So, yes, the plans. Well basically they're not too complicated by my standards, ahah. I think I'll just bullet point the basic outline for the moment because I know I've said this whole thing enough times that surely some of you are bored silly of it, but it might be fun to later look at what I thought would happen once I know what actually did go down.

Auckland, New Zealand: 7 hours. Not originally part of the plan, I'm just there in transit for long enough that I think I should go for a wander and take in the famous serenity before I get slammed by the insanity that I imagine will be Hong Kong. Bet I get mugged here, cos of irony and all that.
All over the shop, Hong Kong: 8 days. Just cos I can, and cos I'll get to catch up with Debbie [that'd be the Honky chick who pretty much arrived on my doorstep last year and stayed in my Clayton house through August] and because it's on my list. 8 days doesn't feel like it'll be enough, but I can always come back another time. Besides, Cantonese is way too hard to learn ^^ [there are more than 7 tonal variations on any given syllable that can effect any word's meaning!!! What kind of person would DO that?!]
Shanghai, China: 7 weeks. Completing my degree over 6 weeks, studying Mandarin. 100-odd fellow Monash students in the one hotel/uni dorm. It was nuts last time, although I understand the year I went before was unusually rowdy and insane. Me and Dylan will have to see what we can do about maintaining a general level of insanity if that's true I guess. Oh and I'm just kidding, Nanas, if it turns out Mum/Dad relays this =P I can't wait to see Miranda!
Qingdao, China: 3 weeks. This is where Joy is from. She's going to be in China roughly the same time as me, isn't that neat? And thus a crazy-long distance relationship can be delayed for some time, and when my course is done I can spend the rest of my January hanging with her in her 老家 (hometown), that'll be neat.
Honshu, Japan: 4 weeks. This is where everything starts to get hazy. It's February, can you blame me? Shannon from work will meet me in Osaka early on, and all we know right now is there are several places we wanna check out and we'll finish in Tokyo cos that's where her plane leaves.

At the end of February I hit a bit of a fork in the road. I have promised myself that I will have $1000 at least spare with which to either buy a ticket home, or help me survive until my first paycheck. It all depends on if I have a job lined up. My VISA allows me to stay in Japan and work however much I want for 6 months, so I hope I can use that! If I can find some work, well who knows? ^^

Hmm, this entry felt a little bit dry. Oh well, at least now we're all on the same page. Things will probably get pretty exciting pretty soon. I should sleep. Plane leaves at 11:35am! (Woah, only 9.5 hours!)