signs that i've been in china too long:

1. i really enjoy the taste of oreos dunked in water

2. i’m no longer worried about holding my breath for so long in a public bathroom that i pass out and fall face forward into the latrine

2a. when i saw a latrine overflowing with, uh, fragrance and beauty, i merely shrugged it off and added my contribution. (seriously, these things are large holes dug in the ground. how many tens of gallons of s--- smelling foulness would it take to fill one up? i think even andy dufresne wouldn’t be able to bring himself to crawl through one of them.)

3. saying the sentence ‘please pass the meat…no, not the dog meat’ is second nature to me now

4. i don’t have enough fingers to count up how many days occur between showers…sometimes not enough toes either

5. when in public, instead of setting fire to my ears, i now merely ignore the music of kenny g

6. i’ve developed baojing vision (which makes berkeley vision seem like 20/20)

6a. at one point i found myself attracted to a girl with frizzy orange hair who was wearing striped pants and a bright pink puffy jacket with pepper-colored fake fur lining

7. i watched the highlights for almost every single candidate on the nba.com all-star voting web site, including primoz brezec and zydrunas ilgauskas (i drew the line at any of the golden state warriors)

8. when dancing, i don’t automatically feel like one of the top 3 least cool guys on the floor

9. i had to wake up at 3 am to listen to the cal-usc game online, and then only had time for a one hour nap before teaching my morning classes

9a. it wasn’t until halftime that i realized i hadn’t put on my glasses and that i’d been staring at the computer screen from three inches away for an hour and a half (ok that has nothing to do with being in china)

10. i spent part of christmas eve huddled over a pile of coal in the dark, with an iv needle stuck in my hand, and was more worried about if i’d downloaded enough Christmas music than the potentially fatal sanitary conditions of the local hospital

11. when xujun’s dad brought out a bottle of strong brandy for Chinese new year’s, i was so happy to see someone drinking a liquor other than baijiu that i gulped down a cup (and immediately passed out)

12. halfway through a lunch meeting with the headmaster, i realized that i hadn’t shaved in a week and that i was still wearing my pajamas

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about three weeks ago, my buddy xiaoyong started worrying that he’d be single and lonely for valentine’s day, and vowed to devote the next few weeks to its prevention. of course i was glad to see he had his priorities straight. anyways, fast forward to 12:01 am on february 15th, to my living room, where i sat watching Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind with xiaoyong snoring on the couch next to me, after a full day spent in each other’s company. yeah…each prayer accepted, each wish resigned.

i walked around town with xujuan, xujun’s sister, for a bit tonight. i was feeling a bit melancholy, not cause of valentine’s day, but for a variety of reasons, and i couldn’t begin to express them in Chinese, so she told me that when she was young, she always felt a lot better after pouring all her secrets into her doll. so i ranted and rambled in English to her for a good fifteen minutes, with her not understanding a word, and it made me realize how long it’s been since i’ve had any kind of significant or meaningful spoken English interaction. i talked on and on into her deaf ears, and was able to put some subconscious feelings and thoughts that had been bothering me into words for the first time.

i think it’s a rare person who is able to prevent spiritual or mental stagnation when placed in any kind of isolation, and an even rarer person who’s able to create and flourish with only his own self to bounce off of. it must feel so refreshing to be able to be that self-sufficient.

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