I've been sick this week. My Dad came to Shanghai on Thursday, and brought me along during his business trip at Hang zhou and Tong Li. So yeah...back to why i'm sick....I wore a polo out to this trip cuz it was bright and sunny during the morning (30+ celsius around here already).....I'm guessing I caught a cold cuz it suddenly started raining late afternoon and it got real windy at night (I continually resisted putting on the coat my dad offered me..haha)....or then again, it could also be due to the 2 bottles of red wine I had over lunch and dinner (DAMN Chinamen!!)....
But yea, being sick here in China is not fun at all. Unless you have the money to hire a private doctor, any other such medical help around here would probably do me worse than good....excluding the fact that I may contaminate other diseases and viruses at the hospital or ward, theres a good chance I will already get even more sick from waiting forever in line....
I feel like i've grown/matured/become more experienced since I arrived Shanghai. My study abroad is so worth it. Not only have I learned the language, more about the culture and other very factual entities...I've gotten to learn and realize a lot more about who and where I stand among this world.
I feel like I've been taking my surroundings and contempory lifestyle for granted over the years (and I think I will always do so). Having visited more rural areas like Yuan An (where people still live in caves, and nearly everything they own is made of twigs and branches), learning about the wages of the peasants in China, or maybe even going out with the local or other international students at Fudan really makes me realize how fortunate I am. It really puts things into perspective. The lesson I've learned, however, is not that I'm lucky though...its that I should be thankful for what I have and go make the best of the best of what I have been blessed with. (man, I starting to sound so religious...)
As I've been saying many times over the past couple weeks...you really don't need to have been to India to know what Nann bread is.....i mean, sure....maybe you dunt even have the resources to try it, its still not an excuse to not know what it is. I really don't know what to say sometimes. I may sound like Mr. Know-it-All, but I can't believe how uneducated, unexperience, ignorant some people are in this world. Its like, some people have no adventurous characteristics within them. They're satisfied with their life, their world, their friends, their routine.....they aren't curious about what type of lives other people around them are living.
On top of my belief that everything in this world is based on your perspective on it (how life can be great even during sad or non-eventful periods or how life can be miserable and gloomy even when you have the world under your feet), there are also plenty of things that can be learned around us depending on our perspective of it. Some things are obvious some others may not be. Letz say...... a trip to the local 'xiao long bao' restaurant for some xiao long......ok, maybe I just think too much, but over a simple trip like this for me.....I could look upon this event culturally, economically, from a business point of view, from my point of view (a foreigner), a local customers point of view, etc... The possibilities are endless when you use an experience like this to contrast and compare it with your previous experiences.
A tiny little thing like my name...'Erik'....and having been sent me to starters (an english kindergarten) and a chinese kindergarten at the same time really reveals a lot about what my parents were thinking when they were younger. 'Erik' with a 'K' is quite a bit of a twist for a Chinese family, and sending me to a German Int'l School is definitely also not a very traditional chinese either. Its like, my parents had set me a path different than a lot of other kids before I was even born. And only through these sort of roots, I can trace back out how and why I've gotten to become who I am. Its crazy. Things you don't realize until you grow up.
My cell got stolen today. Boo hoo. I lost all my numbers. I don't even want to mention how, why, and where.
I'm leaving back to Hong Kong next week!!! Ahh, I miss home. I can't wait to get back and get some real cantonese food. The sweet and strong taste of Shanghainese food is really driving me nuts. I can't take it everyday. But yeah, before I settle in, I'll be making a trip to Singapore and Malaysia(business field trip with Dad again!!)....can't really say much about that right now...maybe after I go (uh-huh..like i'll have the time to blog).....after that, its back to NYC (yes yes 2nd Ave 5th Street....you kno where the joint is....haha)....and then last of all, final destination, senior week at back at friggin Baltimore for my Hopkins graduation (did i ever mention Bill Cosby is the speaker?). Its gonna be a crazy month. And i'll be skipping school here in Shanghai all throughout this time.
~~~ Jurassic 5 - Thin Line (feat. Nelly Furtado) ~~~
its the small things we churn out in life...that makes it interesting
- Erik
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