The last 3 days...

...have been not bad at all. On Monday I went to 101 with Anna, we had food & read books at the bookstore. Also discovered "Jason's," a store that carries lots of international brands. Finally, European & Japanese candy is at my fingertips, plus normal North American food. I suspect any to all food pickiness problems I may have had in the past might disappear upon my return. Just keep me the heck away from tofu. :P

Tuesday was my day of rest. I am pretty sure I didn't leave the house the whole day. Unfortunately the MSN conversations to be had were few as people apparently go to bed on Monday night so they can get up on Tuesday. Go figure. I'm sure I accomplished something. Oh wait, I did. I wrote that essay thing that Rotary wanted and sent it in, but of course fucking Ivonne's computer has some totally weird encoding. Like, the emails she sends me are always in Unicode, so I think I sent it in Unicode, or whatever it was I got it back garbled. I don't see why she wants things emailed, but whatever. Also I tried to de-virus the Zhangs' computer, but it is pretty thrashed. I killed some, but there are a lot. Lots & lots & lots of Trojans.

Today I got a nice email back from Paul. It was in regards to my earlier letter he wrote some flattering things. I also read the unhappy news that no-one will be representing RI district 5020 (Vancouver Island &c.) next year, because their candidate pulled out. Sounds like someone either reads my blog, or had the balls to walk away when they didn't get their first pick country. That reminds me, still need to go to Japan, and by extension still need to stop sucking at Japanese. I also want to learn German; I am shamed/awed by the ridiculously excellent English commanded by the many Germans I have met (Nico, Flo, annA, Chris, Lisa, Katy &c.) and I am like "I know... some German words. Look! airplane!" haha

In the morning, I went with Scott, his dad, & Flora--a university friend of Scott's from Taizhong--to play pool at a Gongguan pool hall. We had to teach the girl, but Scott's dad & I lost two close games by them getting to the 8-ball first. I sunk a few good ones, including some 3-in-a-row plus other shots the Texans found highly improbable. I still suck though... we don't even talk about the droughts where I don't hit anything for like 20 minutes straight. I had a good pineapple-shrimp-curry fried rice thing for lunch, though it was a bit expensive. Did I mention Scott's dad is awesome & was picking up the bill most of today?

We went to the electronics thing near Zhongxiao Xinsheng that French Alex told me about. It also has lots of anime and manga. I need to go looking about again sometime, though I already have a lot of consumer electronics. We returned to the hotel to meet up with Scott's mom. Scott & his mother decided they needed naps, so we the non-sleeping men read newspapers in the lobby. Eventually we moved onwards toward the dinner invite location from PP Medicare (Scott's counselor).

It turned out to be at the same place they held my birthday party: Edelweiss' classy restaurant/British porcelain dealership. With an address & closest MRT I was able to navigate there no problem. The food was great, conversation was fun, and Edelweiss showed up after a while so I learned where the meeting will be on Thursday. Hooray. I also got a free poetry book from Medicare. It's kind of neat, modern & more free-verse like. When I got home I had the opportunity to talk to Amanda (the Zhangs' daughter) on exchange in Germany for a while. Seriously these people call way too much.

You'll hear more about Amanda later, as she is returning very early and we will be living in the same house for the last 20 days of my exchange. This should prove interesting (finally someone almost my own age with which to hang out!). Her English is also not that good as, shafted by Rotary, she didn't go to an English-speaking country. Unfortunately, Sue Su, who is now in the Nanoose Bay area, will not get to meet me (by far the most Chinese-speaking member of my family) as we take off on the same day. Such is life.

Thanks for reading, and write a comment if you must. Anyone hear of any violent conflicts around the time of the Rutherford fair? Tell me about it. Oh and rock on. [1 hr 30 minutes] K out