Tuesday March 29th, 2011

Dear reader, I must declare that nothing exciting happening today.

I went to class. Then, I came back to the room and Skyped home.

Then, I went to one-on-one, class.

I then proceeded to have a meeting with the new director. This is the only thing of interest that has occurred today. The old director has returned to her hometown; she is going to have a child soon. The new director is one of the 5^th year teachers from the program, and she is quite a little feisty thing. She is also very young in comparison to the other teachers at the program, not more than 28, by what I wager. I would imagine that she was chosen to direct the program due to her ideological purity and general businesslike demeanor. I would also surmise that she is a member of the CCP, and that is her ticket to becoming the new interim director of ACC. I’ll have to let you know more later…

Then, I returned to the room and applied for some more internships.

Bally.

For supper, I rode my bike down to the dumpling shack. The team of four was just sitting down for supper, and they invited me to eat with them. The team consists of Mr. Li, his wife, his younger sister, and his sister’s husband. li is their ringleader, and the chief businessman. I like his wife; she is very sassy. His sister and her husband are much quieter, but both have a good sense of humor. Her husband always offers me ZhongNanHaoi cigarettes, which I smoke with a grimace. It would be impolite to turn them down. I gladly accepted their offer of supper, and ate some pickles bamboo shoots, spinach, sautéed onions and rice with them. I was drilled on my Chinese and American culture, and I asked them about live in their home province of Zhejiang. I would like to visit their province sometime, and it sounds very interesting.

While we were talking, Li got very serious and said, “we’ve had some problems with the police.” It turns out that the police have been going to other shops in other neighborhoods demanding bribes from the storeowners. If the people don’t pay up, then the police will demolish the building and take whatever furniture and tools you have inside. One of the neighboring cooks ran over at one point and said, “I just talked to someone up the street! The police are making their way this direction.” Li closed the door to the dumpling shack, and turned off the dumpling steamer, hoping that the police wouldn’t stop by. We ate the rest of the meal tensely, but it appeared that he danger had passed. Who knows what would happen with the family at the dumpling shack.

Studying.

Sleep.