Welp...

For anyone who hasn't heard yet, I am no longer in the glorious people's republic. I have been in Canada for about 2 weeks, and there is a good chance I'm not going back anytime soon. Reasons for this are long-winded, complicated and vary depending on who you ask, so I'm not going to go into a whole lot of detail on here. We'll just say that I'm not happy about it and my displeasure has been made known. The fact is that I'm here whether I like it or not, and I now need to focus on what's next. Here's a little update though.

I was basically given less than 48 hours to pack up my life in China. I didn't get to say goodbye to anyone or wrap up any of my business. I was planning on moving into a new apartment on December 1st. The big 2 month holiday was coming up. Friends were coming to visit, then family, and we all had wonderful plans. My Chinese was improving rapidly, and I was making some great friends. This hurt. This hurt BIG. A lot of you know that my basic life philosophy is based on thinking that the people in my life and my relationships are more important than basically anything else. I cherish you guys, deal with it. Having to just cut ties on such short notice is likely going to haunt me for a long long time. So, I have overcome a lot of the emotional trauma I was going through a couple of weeks ago, but I'm definitely still dealing with random outbursts of sobbing and tears, although these are increasingly less frequent too. I owe my friends and family a gigantic thankyou for helping me through this, for your shared outrage, your words of encouragement, your patience and your understanding. Just amazing. I hope I can be there for all of you when you need it like you were for me!

So, what HAVE I been doing? Well, my first stop when I got back to Canada was Vancouver. I hadn't been planning on stopping over, but when Brig said "clearly I am going to come see you at the airport even if it's only for 30 minutes" it occurred to me that being in Vancouver and leaving after 1 hour was ridiculous. For reasons yet unknown, the school wasn't super happy about me stopping in Vancouver and actually tried to forbid it. Fortunately they relented at the last minute after I told them I had already purchased an alternative ticket to Toronto for a few days later. I figured "What does it matter where I am as long as I'm not in China right? Isn't that what the big deal is about anyway?" Anyway, I went to Vancouver. I didn't do a whole lot. I went to Whistler because Charlene insisted on taking me, and I'm glad she did. It was wonderful...everyone tells you about how pretty BC is, but as a stubborn and proud Ontarian I guess I've always brushed it off haha. Vancouver was perfect...exactly the adjustment period I needed before confronting Ontario, Toronto, and U of T. Plus, I got to see Brigitte and meet all these people I've heard all about but have never met. AND I got to see Main and Hastings in real life, which was exciting because I'm a big Canadian social sciences nerd and have read SO MUCH about that corner!!! SO RAW!

After Vancouver, I came back to Toronto. In chronological order: saw parents, saw Hridi, saw U of T (blech), saw Lisa, Lauren and Ray (And Hridi again), saw Abby and Tzazna, moved in with Abby and Tzazna, then saw as many other people as was possibly possible. This week is kind of a blur of me dealing with emotions and a couple of surprises and trying to wrap my head around being in Toronto and having to deal with the logistics of paperwork and stuff I had to do. It was good though. I have great friends. Unfortuantely my return has coincided with end of semester crunch time and everybody is all stressed out and busy, but we managed to work around it. Yesterday Dad picked me up and we stopped in Waterloo to see Robert. Quick Robert update (since about half of you will want to know): in the middle of exams, still taller than me (first thing he pointed out actually), has a job in SARNIA next semester (isn't working with any relatives though), still gets confused easily, did a dumb thing in the car and bent one of the rims, turns 21 on friday, has JUST discovered what a hair straightener is and what it's used for and is totally blown away by it. The usual.

I'm now back in Clinton where it has been snowing for like a week straight. I am trying to unpack my stuff (it sucks) which is going slowly. First of all, things in my suitcase still SMELL like China. And some things in the suitcase haven't been worn since China. Memories and stuff. Additionally, mom's house is already full of my stuff. I have 3 rooms worth of stuff, because I usually have 3 rooms at my disposal (dad's, mom's, with me). So I'm taking things out of my suitcase and have no where to put them. The drawers are ALL full. It would almost be better to just leave it in the suitcase until I move somewhere new (which is probably going to happen). Everybody should be home for Christmas soon, so Clinton isn't so bad.

What's next? The school hasn't really given me a good answer on this one yet and my main contact there is on vacation until January. I would like to get some answers from somebody sooner than that, but it may just simply not happen. I would love to find another job outside of Canada, but that generally doesn't ever happen once somebody comes home. There is a good chance the replacement job will be in Toronto or Ottawa. I am trying to push the school to find me something new sooner than later because I don't want to just be hanging around. You shall be kept posted about this situation.

So that's that. Details will be shared one on one if you should so desire! And I'm sorry to anyone that I didn't see and all the people I haven't responded to and stuff like that. Things are finally just starting to normalize now, so I should be able to talk about this stuff more now.

I'm working through it, I'll be okay eventually. Thanks again everyone!

Not About China

This is something I'm thinking of submitting into a little competition thing. Let me know what you think. BE CRITICAL!

Roommating is a tricky business. When you live with a person, you learn a great deal about them in a short amount of time. Sometimes roommates are soul mates, and problems are few and insignificant. Sometimes a roommate can turn into your worst nightmare. To further complicate the situation, you can never tell which it will be, regardless of whether your new roommate is your best friend or a complete stranger. And then to exacerbate the situation, you are often locked into a contract which legally binds you to this person for a certain extended period of time. Since I moved out of my parents' houses a little over 3 years ago, I have had a number of different roommates and experienced the gamut of situations. I plan to continue to live with roommates for a few years still, even though I know people who think it is time to strike out on my own. I think these people are crazy. Why would I want to live alone, isolated from difficult interactions with the world? I would go mad from boredom, this is a fact. I appreciate my alone time, but living alone just seems like a sentence of perpetual boredom. I like people, even if it takes some work to get along with them. That's what the world is, right? Finding creative ways to get along with people that are difficult to get along with? Trying to isolate yourself from them won't help, instead I strive to develop effective coping strategies.

One of the biggest issues between roommates is the issue of cleanliness. I have been on both sides of this coin, depending on if there are any slobs bigger than myself or not. First year university is probably an interesting experience for many people. At my campus, in my house, four complete strangers moved in on the same day. Some houses had six people. Naturally, for any reasonable group of people, there is a grace period of a month or two. In this time, we all let things slide that may irritate us in the name of making friends. Letting things slide gradually becomes bottling things up, and eventually something hits our trigger. I think first year university is extra difficult because it is everybody's first time living away from their home. This is significant, because in your parent's home, the rules are de facto and non-negotiable, and have often been in effect since before you can remember. The problem lies in every home having different rules, and every individual living in my house of four having different ideas about what was common sense and what was simply illogical. In this situation, I was not the biggest slob, and found myself sided with my roommates who couldn't stand the mess. In hindsight, I have some regrets about the way we treated this girl because I worry we may have ganged up on her and been meaner than necessary. My only excuse that I was young, inexperienced and still on my 'big-fish in a small pond' high (this has since subsided). This experience did help me understand that we all have different ideas of what an acceptable level of cleanliness is, and like all things, is more a case of difference than one being better than the other. Although I may just think this because I am also capable of becoming the slob in this situation.

I have never claimed to be a neat-freak. I readily admit to being a bit of a slob, but I like to think I keep it contained. I'm not so much dirty as I am messy, and it's important that people understand the difference. I bathe regularly, and when I clean I SCRUB. I don't like dirt. I get rid of it. But, I have a tendency to leave my stuff lying around. I can't get it out of my head that putting things away is a waste of time because you're just going to use it again tomorrow. Leaving things lying around SAVES TIME. Okay, also, I am lazy. But nobody has been able to convince me that being a neat person should be higher on my priority list, so it remains thus. I am aware that when sharing a space with someone, it is considerate to keep your junk clear of the common areas like living room, kitchen and bathroom, and I try to comply with this policy. One problem I seem to frequently encounter is the issue of dirty dishes. I DO my dishes, just not as frequently as some people would like. Dirty dishes almost feels like a sensitive topic to me, that's how serious it can become between roommates Maybe I was spoiled by the dishwasher when I was growing up, but I just can't motivate myself do do dishes unless it's pertinent. This may disgust some people, but this generally means that I have run out of dishes or I can no longer see the counter because it's covered in dirty ones. When two people with this attitude get together, things can turn ugly, and I mean literally ugly, not figuratively ugly. We were slobs, but we knew it, and we tried to clean before having company over. And it was wonderful. I'm sure there were fights between us but I honesty can't remember a single one of them. This situation is rare. What is far more common is someone like me living with someone who doesn't like to see dirty dishes all over the counter every morning. Due to my stubborn nature (I think), it has taken me a somewhat long time to figure out that the OTHER person is the normal person in this situation and not myself. I have managed, in my current living situation, to wash the dishes almost everyday. It is difficult to tell if this is because I have matured in the past couple of years or if the pressure and uncertainty of living in a foreign country where I don't speak the language has reduced me to a spineless yes-(wo)man who will do anything for an English speaking friend from a familiar culture. I'll decide on that later. Either way, I have realized that in order to be a good roommate, I need to try to be less of a slob, particularly in common areas. My room is my business, and if anyone tries to force me to clean it that's a whole different story of territoriality and individuality that would make me sound like an insane person. The point is, all of my roommates have demanded different levels of cleanliness, and ultimately, it is an issue that requires compromise from both individuals, but the slob in the situation can make it easier by acknowledging that it is more difficult for the clean person to give up being clean than it is for the slob to give up being a slob. And this is coming from a fellow slob. It's just easier...just do it.

I'll explain what it's for later.

In other news, I am moving this weekend. Much closer to school and work (cough) and the bars (cough). It has some furniture, but lacks a fridge, oven and washing machine, so I might finally earn some of that IDS street cred that my friends in Africa have been harassing me about. Or I might just go buy them. The next couple of weeks will decide.

Missing everybody!

Christmas

This is what I want for Christmas. If you've never met my family you may think this is presumptious and slightly selfish. If you are my family you might leave a comment like "Well it's about time! Christmas is only 6 weeks away!" See, I'm not doing this for me, I'm doing it for them. Here goes.

Item 1: Send me food! Unfortunately, most of the things I really really miss are perishable, but if you could send me candy (chocolate bars in particular, anything with caramel or nuts or peanut butter in it) awesome. Other potential food items include:

arrowroot cookies
peanut butter
jam (if anyone sends me homemade jam I might cry from happiness)
icing (like for cakes)
maple candy
anything pizza. ANYTHING!
instant noodles (SO KIDDKING...there are tonnes here haha)
This may not be a thing that is legal...so you should probably look into it first. I would be ecstatic if I could get my hands on a Rickard's Red or Keith's or Mill St. But sending that may not be a thing that is legal. So find out first.


Item 2: I would also love some recipes for some things:
a) those caramel square things that I keep being told only involve crackers and caramel and are delicious.
b) pie, please send me pie recipes, PLEASE. I may need you to send me that stuff you use for the crust
c) easy bread recipes (I might ask mom to bring me a bread maker machine because I'm a total wuss that can't go a year without half decent bread)
d)basically any recipe that is delicious and easy and doesn't have a lot of ingredients. Send it to me please.


Item 3: I have some places for you to donate money to. They are fantastic. I highly endorse them. And anything to can give them helps me help them. Perfect present.

1. Shem Women's Group http://shemgroup.org/

Work with rural Tibetan women to empower and educate in their communities. Really well organized and operated.


2. Pentok https://omprakash.org/partner_profile/p/182

Pentok is similar to Shem, but they focus on one village, and they have an overall goal of actually building a school in this village and encouraging girls to become educated. Also a great organization.


K guys, thanks!

Enlisting your help

Does anybody recognize this writing, or know someone that might? We are trying to figure out what it is an where it's from. Thanks team.

Mary WOULD do this

Well, this is going to be candid. And embarrassing, but ya'll need to hear this story, because in a month or so it's going to be on of those stories that I bring up ALL the time. SO here goes.

On Saturday night I met one of my friends at a bar and proceeded to drink way too much. Just indulging in the culture mom! Anyway, left the bar, got in a taxi (apparently), and got home. This is when the problems start. We have a gate. Everywhere has a gate with a guard. I'm pretty sure it's more for the purpose of watching the residents than protecting them, but whatever. Usually when they lock the gate, the leave just enough space for a person to squeeze through. However, due to it was apparently super late (3am?) the gate was locked tight. I was in no state of mind to try to be climbing any gates (almost certain death), so I panicked. Drunk in China locked out of my house!? Not good. I called both my roomates and luckily they didn't answer (3am!), called my friend (who's fault it was I was so drunk in the first place) and started to kick the gate. Because apparently I decided that the best solution to this problem was to try to kick down the gate. KICK DOWN THE GATE! Geez. A security guard finally appeared to open the door. My reaction was "OH CRAP; CHEESE IT!" but instead I just said "I'm so sorry, thankyou, I'm SO SORRY" and ran up to my house. Nothing came of it until just a few minutes ago, when my roomates came back from dinner to tell me "the security guard just yelled at us because you broke the gate". YEAH. OH CRAP RIGHT? So I just ran down to apologize and see if he wanted me to pay damages, but he eventually told me not to worry about it. I still got the charm you guys. Awesome. But yeah. Close call. Gonna try to avoid anything like that next time. I managed to ask in Chinese what I should do if the gate is locked and he said just to knock until a guard comes. So now I know.


Uh so yeah, also, school is good. Good enough that I could speak Chinese to this guard (WHAT UP!?) And I'm going into the office again tomorrow. Very nice. And I am probably going to start working on my thesis proposal sometime soon probably. NO promises.

That's this week's story.

PS- I had a terrible hangover the next day.

Mopey Mary

I think everyone who does one of these placements experiences moments in which they go "holy crap I miss Canada" (or anywhere else they may call home). I mean, even with all the flaws, we really do have it good. Not once in Canada have I had to think to myself "hmm, I wonder if this person is a government spy trying to trick me into expressing my dissent". Or "I wonder if it's safe to take a picture of this, or to keep it on my computer, or to put it on the internet". Or "I wonder if that man in that car is there to watch me." Or received phone calls telling me not to come to the office for a little while because of "some problems". Or stuff like that. It's weird.

In addition to this kind of tense atmosphere in which I am paranoid about making connections with anyone who may be questioned because of it (for the SOLE reason that I am a foreigner and all my radical freedom loving ideas need to be quarantined from the Ts, because apparently indigenous people would never come up with these ideas on their own...sigh), one of my good friend's little brothers passed away in a car crash in the Clinton area on the weekend. If you've ever been unable to get home when something tragic happens then you probably understand how shitty I feel about it. Being separated from all the other people who feel shitty about it is just the worst. My friends are great and they'll help each other through it, I just wish I could go home to help them too. Sigh.

On top of all this, it was Halloween. I haven't missed a Halloween in EVER, literally. I have never missed a Halloween. Until now. And everyone's costumes were AMAZING this year. I mean, spectacular, clever, original. The works. So I'm mopey about that too.

Here's what's good: I am starting to pick up the Chinese. I can understand some of the conversations I hear. And I know how to ask certain questions now. It's getting closer, I can feel it.


Well that sucked. I'm sure things will blow over soon and I can't get back on track with work and stuff.

PS- if you have no idea what I'm talking about use Google. It is your friend.

It's been a while...

Sorry! But really, it's a good thing. It means I'm busy and not bored. Not a whole lot is new either. We have been trying to sort out the work thing because it has turned out a little more complicated than planned. Miscommunication seems to be a big issue with the people I'm working with. In my opinion, it's probably because they are academic types that have difficulty wrapping their heads around logistics, but I may already be biased about that. As soon as some kind of plan is devised for me I will be fine. I just can't understand why anyone would think it was a good idea to seek out an intern if they couldn't even outline a mandate or overall goal for them. I double checked the definition of intern just to make sure I wasn't confused about this. According to the internet, an intern is definitely supposed to have some kind of work assigned to them. So I'm not crazy. As some of you are probably aware, it wouldn't kill me to spend a year here just kind of doing what I'm doing now (not much) and learning Chinese and hanging around and traveling. But that doesn't look very good on a resume, nor will it look very good on my reports back to Students for Development when they ask what I did with the money they gave me to come here. So it really is kind of an important problem that I need to get sorted out. My people at U of T are being awesome at trying to sort this out and I feel pretty confident that something will end up working out.

In other news, Chinese lessons are getting intense. Lots of work. But it means I'm learning it faster. She is making us learn the writing too. Which means I may be able to order food in restaurants soon. Which would be nice. I accidentally ate a HUGE chunk of garlic the other day, spit most of it out, and spent the rest of today and the day after feeling terrible. I maybe know how to pronounce the word now (although my pronunciation tends to be so terrible that nobody understands me) for garlic, so I should be able to avoid it in the future. Also, in a taxi yesterday I actually conversed with a taxi driver for about 5 sentences. I was incredibly excited.

I have friends (only a few)! Yay! Locals. I don't trust the expats here. They all have questionable motives for being in Xining. I am sticking with the locals for now. They take me out and order me drinks and get me on the right bus to get home. It's good. I think that from a combination of the beer being awful quality and the altitude being so high hangovers are much worse here though. So I can't go out and then get up in time for class like I can in Toronto. I also can't skip class like I can in Toronto. I explained the concept of skipping class to some of my friends and they were like "WHAT!? That's allowed!? We would never do that, just not go to class for no reason at all!" I try to tell them at least one thing that blows their minds every time I see them haha. They want to come back to Canada with me.

I have been kind of looking around for a new apartment, since everything I do is on the other side of town. I will definitely have to move by January, since that's when my roomates leave and I have NO desire to be in this big apartment in practically the middle of nowhere (it's like living in Scarborough) without them. I'm not hustling too much though since I really do enjoy their company. It's so nice to be able to come home and be Canadian all over the place after speaking Chinglish all day and worrying about being respectful and appropriate with everyone. Apartments here are incredibly cheap so I am resisting the temptation to get a REALLY nice one just to myself. For here it's very expensive, but in Canada money it would only be like $185 a month. That's so cheap...BUT, I could also live in a less nice place and pay only $60 a month in rent. Whatchya'll think? Splurge? Save for travel plans?

I maybe am getting closer to having a research topic. The problem here is that EVERYTHING that is interesting is also sensitive. I was thinking that looking into how NGOs function in an environment where they aren't really even allowed to touch public policy would be cool. Locals I have talked to think it would be cool too, but my roomate has warned me that it may be too sensitive of a topic. Here, you don't worry about getting yourself in trouble, but rather getting anyone who is connected to you in trouble. They can't call their embassy and jump on a plane to Canada. So I may have to rework this so it's less political. But it's the best idea I've had so far, so I'm getting somewhere (I hope?)

I realized a few days ago that I miss the diversity of Toronto. First it was "I miss seeing white people." Then I was like "Man, I miss black people!" Shortly after I was like "I miss ALL the people" (except the Chinese...there's lots of them around haha). But yeah. I will never again take for granted the sheer variety of different kinds of people in Toronto. I swear it.

My roomate just opened the window and apparently it is snowing. Toque power time? I think so.

Okay. That is an update just so you're aware that I haven't forgotten about Canada. It's long again!