China - Week 50 (8/9-11): Getting Back on the Horse and Upcoming Plans

In my personal battle with inconsistency and lack of committment to projects I have noticed that the largest obstacle for me is re-starting my committment to a process once I have fallen off the wagon (so to speak).  I messed up a bit on Thursday and didn’t follow my plan and ended up staying up late, which caused me to sleep in late on Friday and sort of botched my plans.  However, I realize that this is just part of the process.  I messed up after 3 days, but beating myself up over it i...Read more

China - Week 50 (8/8): The Daily Routine

I’ve started settling into a regular routine now. (Well, as regular as 2 days can be, I guess.) If I manage to do the same thing tomorrow I can almost call it a “spree”.

I wake up at 8:00, shower, get ready, open up the blinds and let in the sun. Then I get some breakfast, check my e-mails and blogs and do some Chinese listening study. Around 10:00 I head over to the gym and get in 45 - 60 minutes of cardio with stretching, head back home, cool down with an episode of “Friends” and then take a shower and eat s...Read more

China - Week 50 (8/8): Increasing Productivity

This week (all one day of it so far) has been pretty productive so far.  I set out on Sunday to plan out the rest of the week a little more carefully and so far (again, it’s only been 1 day) things are going well.  But first, let’s talk about Sunday.

As I mentioned, I went over to Jia Jia and Cameron’s to help them with their laptop.  That thing is kinda messed up.  The optical drive doesn’t work so I can’t load any software on it, and since I can’t load drivers, etc., I can’t fix the wireless network wh...Read more

China - Week 49 (8/5): Various Updates

Recently I’ve been having a bit of a lull in my feelings of self-determination and motivation.  Today it sort of hit an apex, but I decided to sit down and hash some things out in my journal and now I’m feeling much better about what I’m doing and where I’m going.  Regular self-evaluations can be invaluable at times.

At this exact moment, I am at home and it is 2:00 a.m.  Cameron and Jia Jia are here hanging out.  We met up earlier around 11:00 p.m. at the Coffee Bean in Xintiandi to hang out and converse but af...Read more

China - Week 49 (8/3): Apartment Epilogue & Updates

So, to let everyone know what happened with the apartments, I have been in talks with the landlord of the highrise building (I’m going to refer to it as “999″ from now on, since that is the address of the complex) and we’ve come to an agreement and will be signing the contract tonight.

Originally the landlord wanted to circumvent the real estate agent and sign a contract directly with me, but after thinking about it this just didn’t seem like the right thing to do.  Without the real estate agent...Read more

Jinan - Day 4 (11.16): Filming Wushu and Tech Gunk

2006.11.16 - 22:10

china. shandong. jinan - hotel room

I managed to drag myself out of bed and into the shower this morning. For some reason the hot water isn’t as hot these past 2 days as it was when I first got here. Hopefully it’s a temporary thing. Also, it turns out that, while they were quite yummy, t...Read more

Jinan - Day 3 (11.15): Will YingWen for Wushu

2006.11.15 - 22:50

china. shandong. jinan - hotel room

Amazingly my body only took a day or so to adapt to waking up at 6:30 in the morning. It must have been that 12 hours of sleep I got the other day. After waking up, taking a shower and getting some breakfast in the cafeteria I chatted online with some friends...Read more

Jinan - Day 2 (11.14): Hao Jiu Bu Jibbengong (Long Time No Basics)

2006.11.14 - 22:20

china. shandong. jinan - hotel room

After a quick breakfast of dojang (soy milk) and dumplings in the hotel’s cafeteria, I got myself ready and made my way to the wushu guan for the morning practice with Li De Hua. As usual, I was one of the first ones there (it takes me much...Read more

Jinan - Day 1 (11.13): A False Start in Shandong

2006.11.14 - 6:47

china. shandong. jinan - hotel room

I just slept for 12 hours. I felt like I was coming down with something last night so I probably needed it. I woke up a few times during the night and felt super groggy and out of it, so I probably managed to fight off a possible illness. Good thing too, sinc...Read more

China - Week 48 (7/30): The Great Shanghai Apartment Hunt

This past Sunday I went apartment hunting. As I've never gone apartment hunting in China before I enlisted the help of a local Shanghai friend, Wendy (whom some of you might remember), who had scheduled an appointment with a real estate agent located in the area where I wanted to move.

But before I get into the details, let me provide a quick FAQ of the questions I hear the most ...

As I have mentioned before (hereto after stated as "AIHMB") ...Read more