Chapter 2.

So for this installment of #TheStoryOfMyLife (thanks One Direction), I’ll talk about what’s happened in the last few days. First of all, I have already written the first half or so of this, but I was feeling salty because it somehow deleted when I was basically done so I ignored this for a little bit. Looking back, it’s been about a week since I wrote, (yes, I did have to look up what I wrote). Also, I mentioned this before, but I'm writing my dates as day, month, year. Just to make sure we are all on the same page here!

14/8/2017- MONDAY- I'm currently wracking my brain trying to remember what the heck happened on Monday. Clearly, it made a huge impact on me. After looking through my texts and pictures on my phone, I realized that on Monday, I slept in super late and chilled. Caleb woke me up around noon and said that he was going to a place that sold a bunch of fake watches. I fell back asleep (because why not and jet lag). I woke up a bit later and tried to get some laundry done. Caleb kept on texting me on his way back to my place saying how much jet lag was kicking his butt and that he was going to fall asleep on the metro. Once he got back, he was SUPER excited about all the fake watches he bought. Apparently, there was an 8 story building filled with different stalls of "the coolest" watches ever. He ended up buying 3 watches and told me all about them. I currently have no idea about any of them, except that one of them was a mechanical watch? Don't know if I'm right or not but oh well. I ended up using some of the groceries that we had bought the day before to make some spaghetti! It was solidly decent. Not the highest quality ever, but I still rock at cooking (I know I sound overly confident).

15/8/2017- TUESDAY- This day was one of the most exhausting and long days ever. I think I woke up at about 10 am and attempted to get Caleb out of bed. He kept on saying "just a little bit longer and I'll get out of bed". We didn't end up getting out of the apartment until after noon. While I was waiting on him, I made some yummy peanut butter oatmeal (this may become my favorite breakfast)! Before we left, I looked up the directions to IKEA on my phone. One of the most frustrating things about this day was that my phone quit working in a lot of aspects that it had previously been working in. So that meant, no data, no international calls, really nothing that I needed. I had these downloaded directions and we navigated the metro successfully to get to IKEA. Once we got to IKEA, we had planned on eating lunch. In American IKEAs there is this delicious full cafeteria type restaurant filled with deliciousness. In the Chinese counterpart, the only " american" food was a hot dog. Not even a good hotdog. But it was okay. So we had lunch and headed into the realm of the awesomeness. Caleb had never been to an IKEA before, so this was a totally new experience for him. We wandered through looking for the bare essentials that I believed I needed. While doing so, Caleb kept reminding me that "we have to carry everything we get back to my apartment on the metro". Sage advice from my little bro. We ended up finding everything in under an hour from when we got into the store to when we got into the checkout, practically a record. Once we got up to get our items scanned, the lady working the register tried to explain to me how this item was so much cheaper if I got an IKEA family card. So I went in search of how to get one while Caleb watched over our stuff. I walked up to the place to get the card and there weren't any people there, just computers with prompts written in Chinese. So we are off to a great start here. I tried to scan the code in my WeChat, however, since my internet wasn't working, I couldn't scan it. There was free wifi, however, you needed to have a family card to get in it. I attempted to explain this to an employee, however she couldn't understand me. I tried finding someone else who spoke English but no luck. So I walked over to the checkout line where Caleb was, as he had been angerly texting me "where are you at". We stood there talking for a minute or so while Caleb was explaining to me that I needed a Family Card to check out at IKEA and "How did you not know that you needed a membership like you do at Sam's Club, they are practically the same thing?!?!" I tried to explain to him how when I had bought things from IKEA in the US, I didn't need a family card. So we came to the conclusion that in China it worked differently. So we both walked over to where the place was to get the cards. I found another person who worked there and asked her how I could get the card since my data wasn't working and I couldn't connect to the internet. She took me to someone who spoke pretty good English and we explained to him the issue and after a few times, he understood our dilemma. So he gave us his card number and stuff so we could connect to the WiFi and we took a sigh of relief. We scanned the code through my WeChat and thought we were in the clear. Emphasis on thought. We got through the prompts to where there was English and we realized that we needed to have our phone numbers entered. So we entered in my American phone number and it didn't work. Then, we entered in Caleb's American phone number. When neither of those worked, we admitted defeat. We walked over to the cash register and tried to see if we could check out our items (which they had kept behind the counter). After waiting for a few minutes, we talked to the cash register and Caleb found out he was wrong. You CAN actually check out items at the Chinese IKEAs without a family card. So an HOUR later from when we had arrived in the checkout, we were packing up our items to head back to my place. On our way home, since neither of us had internet, it was interesting. We had a split at the line where there were three options of how to get on the same line of the train, but going in opposite directions. It took us a good 20ish minutes to figure out where exactly the train we needed to get on was and to board the metro. We finally ended up at my apartment. The second we walked into the air-conditioned bliss of my apartment, we collapsed into exhaustion. My original plan was to drop off the stuff at the apartment and then to run to the grocery store and grab some food for dinner. I ended up chilling for a bit at home and headed out about an hour later while Caleb was resting. On my way to the metro station, I met up with Paul who told me he needed to get some books out of my apartment. I texted Caleb saying that Paul needed to grab some books. Once I got onto the metro, I realized that I had locked Caleb into the apartment so he couldn't let Paul in. And since I didn't have the internet, I couldn't let Paul know that Caleb couldn't let him in. I got to the right stop without any issue to get to the supermarket. However, I couldn't find the right exit. I wandered the area outside of the metro station for at least 30 minutes, while mildly having a panic attack and listening to some awesome music. What a weird combination. I kept on looking and ended up finding a Starbucks that I recognized from before and thought I had found the store, but I didn't. I just gave up on finding it. I did see another Starbucks sign and gave it one last shot. I had found the supermarket. It was super busy. I was extremely exhausted and just wanting to get home with food for dinner and some bottled water so we wouldn't get sick from the tap water. [When you move to another country you shouldn't drink the tap water because of your body not being used to the bacteria in the locally sourced water and you don't know the filtration practices of where you are living.] So I got the stuff and went to check out. This entire time of shopping, I had been wearing my headphones so I wasn't listening to those around me. When I was checking out, I had to take them off to listen to the cashier, which when you don't speak the language is difficult. I went to the area to bag my groceries (in China it costs extra for the bags to be included for your groceries, so most people carry reusable bags and pack them themselves, like me!). While I was exhaustedly packing, I noticed a white person. In America, that would be just a normal day, but here in China, I don't really see anyone who looks like me regularly. I kept on looking at her and her daughter and we ended up chatting for a few minutes. I found out that she was from Germany and in China because of her husband's work. I told her that I had just moved to Guangzhou a couple of days ago and she wished me luck. It's funny how the little moments like that make such a difference. It was literally like a breath of fresh air, where I felt acknowledged and understood for basically the first time that entire day. Completely rejuvenating me. I packed up my groceries and made it home without any issues. When I got off the elevator at my apartment, I ran into Paul and let him into my apartment to grab some books. I also found out that Caleb had been asleep for the 2+ hours I had been at the store. So it all ended up working out. Caleb and I ended up making pasta and cooking some chicken with it. And then we crashed.

16/8/2017- WEDNESDAY- So this day was filled with a lot of chilling out. There was also a lot of laundry being done as well. Caleb and I were both pretty tired and slept in decently late. We then spent most of the rest of the day with him on my laptop watching videos and me on my iPad reading books. Ideal day. When it started getting late, Caleb went to the store. He took several grocery bags and my big backpack that can hold a lot of stuff. So he carried about 10 liters of water on his back and the rest of the groceries in the other bags through the chaos of rush hour metro traffic. It took him forever to get back. But once he did, I made us some Chicken and Broccoli with Rice. Yum. I also completely made up what I was doing. Basically, I steamed some broccoli and added a bit of soy sauce to it. Then I sautéd some chicken with oil and soy sauce and salt. Mixed those two together and let them simmer. I also made some basic white rice. It was pretty good, just a bit too much soy sauce. But I made due with what we had. Just your basic chill day.

17/8/2017- THURSDAY- If you haven't picked up yet, Caleb and I are both night owls. Like hardcore night owls. Jet lag only exaggerated this. But we woke up late and started getting things together. Today was the day that Caleb left me. So he was panicking about how he wasn't sure how long it would take for us to get to the airport on the metro and all the other details. He was also packing his bag while doing so. We decided on leaving my apartment at 7:30 pm so that we didn't arrive too early, but also had enough wiggle room if there were a lot of people on the metro. HINT- there weren't many people. So we went to the airport and I helped him get his ticket and we said goodbye and took a picture. It was one of my most difficult goodbyes. It was when I was actually alone. My family was now thousands of miles away from me. I put my headphones on right after and started playing some Taylor Swift. Taylor Swift is my emotional music. When I can't stand any of my emotions, or things get hard, I play some Taylor Swift. Fearless is my favorite album, but I didn't have it downloaded so I ended up with 1989. Still some solid stuff. I rode down the escalator and fought the tears that threatened to fall down my face. Made it down to the metro entrance and was really struggling. I got on my train and sat down. I stared at the ceiling willing my tears not to fall. There were only 2 times before this where it really was hitting me what I was doing. When I said goodbye to my sister before heading to the airport, I actually cried a bit. On our flight from Moscow to Wuhan, as soon as we took off, I started silently bawling. I was totally overwhelmed. I also started doubting myself and what I felt lead to do. I wrote on my phone to Caleb who was sitting next to me and we started to talk for a bit. I just really wanted to hug my mom. I made it through to the supermarket and leisurely collected my groceries since it was about to close and empty and I had the basic idea of where everything was. My cashier was super nice and knew a lot of English so that was great! I made it back to my apartment and made myself my ultimate comfort food, Fettichini Alfredo. I made my sauce from scratch, but they didn't have any parmesan cheese for the sauce at the store, so I substituted that for the ambiguous "pasta" blend. It had gouda in it. It was a weird flavor but was strangely satisfying. I stayed up super late video chatting with Esther and my mom and texting a couple of other friends. I went to sleep at the sunrise.

18/8/2017- FRIDAY- Since I had stayed up super late the night before, I slept in exceptionally late. It's really difficult to communicate with everyone back at home when they are all 13 hours behind me. Yesterday, (i.e. Friday), I was looking at my laundry room and discovered that Caleb had forgotten some of his stuff, a hoodie and a pair of jeans and underwear. I actually texted him right before I found it that "it would be funny if you forgot like your socks or underwear here" but he left other things as well. I straightened up my apartment a little and got into the swing a bit of what life is going to be like. I also got a text from Ms. Daniela that she had arrived in Guangzhou and that we were going to be going somewhere at 10:30 and I needed to leave my place at 9:30 am. So I went to bed earlier than I had and ended my quiet night.

19/8/2017- SATURDAY- TODAY- So I had to wake up a lot earlier that I have been today. I was up by 8 am. Nothing too abnormal for normal adults, but as you can see, I've been honing in on my teenage days (aka sleeping at weird times). It also, to be fair, has been a week since I arrived in China, so I could easily blame it on jet lag. But this morning, I woke up (after hitting snooze a couple of times), grabbed a shower, made myself some oatmeal with peanut butter, attempted to brush through my wet hair (almost made it all the way, but when you've dyed your hair as much as I have it doesn't like being brushed while it's sopping wet), brushed my teeth and hurried out the door. I met up with another teacher from my school who lives right across the hall, Ms. Linda. I still don't really know how to navigate the city super well, but I'm making progress. We walked down to a bus stop that was a bit down the road and waited for our bus. Because of being raised where there is no public transportation, it's interesting for me to figure out how the bus system really works (and not knowing Chinese doesn't help me at all). While we were waiting for our bus, we weren't paying enough attention to what bus was where and missed the bus! Ms. Daniela (I think she's my boss, but who I've been in contact with this entire process) was on the bus that we missed so we could head to this ancient harbor. She ended up calling Ms. Linda and let her know we did miss the bus. But thankfully there was another bus running the same line just a few minutes later than the other bus. If we would have missed that bus, it would have been 15 minutes until the next one! We rode the most stop and go ride I have ever been on. Chinese bus drivers are insane. I literally had to brace my legs and hold on to the railing bar thingy attached to the ceiling of the bus. We arrived at the harbor and Ms. Daniela, who had arrived earlier than us, had drinks for each of us. I got a bottle of Coke (the cola kind, not really a fan of the other... hahaha). We started wandering the harbor area. While we were walking, Ms. Daniela and Ms. Linda were explaining all sorts of things about the area and culture. We went into a little restaurant and they ordered some food for us. So we got fish balls and ginger milk. Not really a fan of the fish balls, the texture was rather revolting, I just kept on chewing thinking "okay, I can swallow this now, but wait there's more soggy, gelatinous, fishiness in my mouth." Not my thing. The ginger milk was pretty decent. Over the last 6ish months, I have really gotten into ginger beer (non-alcoholic, of course) so I've become a fan of ginger. However, the second the ginger milk hit my mouth, I went from "oh, this is good" to "DANG! this is spicy!". My facial features totally gave me away. Afterwards, we went and wandered some more. It was an overwhelming array of goods. Everything smelled so different than I'm used to. I saw a lot of fish lying out on tables covered in flies. I also saw an assortment of live animals. I automatically assumed that all of the animals that were alive were just waiting to be cooked. I saw some kittens in a cage and quietly asked if those cats were for pets or..... I was immediately reassured that they were for pets along with several of the other creatures I had seen. Wheew. We ended up walking around and seeing a bunch of random stuff. I just enjoyed talking to Ms. Daniela and Ms. Linda. On our way out, we stopped at a mango place. EVERYTHING they had was mangoes. Mangoes are my favorite fruit. So I got some mango ice cream with mangoes on it. #heaven We got onto the bus and rode back into the city. Once we got off the bus, they found us some bikes to rent and we went to get me a Chinese phone number. It took a while, but I finally have a Chinese number! So great! We tried to get me a bank account today, but they were closed. Oh well. We came back to the apartments and Ms. Daniela and Ms. Linda came over to eat some food. I, however, when I left this morning had no idea that I would be having anyone over. My archenemy of chores is doing dishes. So I had the monstrosity of a week's worth of dishes that I planned on doing when I got back in my sink. I also had my dining room table covered in random stuff that hadn't found a home yet. So I cleared it off and we all ate and hung out for a while. Once they left, I started cleaning. I put on some Ed Sheeran and faced my foe. I filled the strainer with sparkling cutlery and assorted dishes. Once I did that, I began mopping. To be fair, I didn't really have all the necessary supplies to do any of this until later and then my brother was here and I wanted to spend time with him. But now my apartment is much cleaner. I also tried to call Verizon to cancel my phone plan. They weren't open until 9 pm my time to take my call, which was super annoying as I found out 3 calls later. THEN, I didn't have my PIN number to access my account to cancel it. I was, however, talking to the SWEETEST lady. She reminded me of southern sugar or peach pie or something. Super kind and nice. I tried changing out my SIM to my American number, but it didn't work. SO I had to change back to my Chinese number and was finally able to get it canceled. With this surplus of time, I was able to write this much overdue blog post and talk to my sister (who just moved into her dorm room).

WELL, there is so much more that I will be telling in the next installment of my new life chapter in Guangzhou, China. You are loved and catch you on the flip side!