Oh so tired!

Chinese people are always busy. Chinese people talk, walk and work fast. But sometimes they need a break, a well deserved break, and they take a nap. One might think they would go home to do so, but one would be surprised. Well, to make this story short, chinese sleep everywhere. I spotted chinese sleeping in the park, in a (full) restaurant, in a store and in a moving bus. Call me stupid, but I find this quite extraordinary.



What else happened during the last week except for sleeping chinese? Well, we had the so called ' introduction-week' that the IFT (university) organised. During the introduction week we got to know all the famous places in Macao. We visited old portugese buildings, squares and churches. We visited the Island part of macao that is called 'Taipa', and more to the south 'Coloane'. This part of Macao is way different than the part where I am located. 'Mainland' Macao is a very crowded place, with almost exclusively high buildings. Taipa also has the high buildings, but it's way more spacious and has more nature places. Coloane is being in a totally different place. the town centre feels like a south european village where time sort of stands still. It's really quiet. However, since mainland Macao is now 'full' it's likely that Taipa and Coloane will soon be full with hotels, casino's and what so. Besides sleeping, the chinese also like to expand...

Since the school didn't start yet, I still feel like I'm on holiday. I'm sure I'm not the only one, since all the other exchange students I've met take it really easy and behave like on a holiday. This includes taking lots of pictures and ofcourse partying a lot. Yesterday the whole group went to a karaoke bar. Karaoke bars are normally regarded as something that is typically eastern. I can now confirm this, since we were the only europeans in the place. It's amazing to see chinese completely feel the song and really go for it when they sing. Another thing that is normal to do when going to those kind of places is playing a dice game. I must say I enjoyed playing that game as well, so I understand that they would play it a lot. Still feels a bit odd to be doing this on a saturday night.
Today me and Jamie went to the biggest hill of Macao, to see how that looks like. We were quite amazed to see that the whole park is actually a public sport centre where people come to jog, play soccer or badminton, and use public fitness machines that are placed within the park. I really start to understand why the locals over here are so thin. The facilities are well used; the hill is a perfect place to work out, and get away from the busy streets at the same time. I think we found our new favorite work out place here in Macao.

Tomorrow school is really going to start. I must say that we start in style with a course called wine studies. Use some imagenation and you could figure out what we have to do in that class. The next two weeks we have to go to school every day, except for sundays. So this means even on saturdays. The 18th of february the chinese, and the whole of Asia, celebrates chinese new year. This means that schools are closed for a week, so we have a holiday again. The idea is to go travelling through China and see if it differs much from what I've seen in Macao so far. I think it does, and that the culture shock is now really about to happen. To be honoust, I really can't wait to see this, and see how far I get without speaking any chinese. With a bit of luck, we have a chinese girl coming with us. This would make things easier for us. I'm a bit worried about the food, since people told me that in the ' real China' people eat anything with four legs, except for tables and chairs. I don't really like the sound of that. I'll just wait and see what crosses my path...

Well, so far so good, I'm going to finish posting for today. I'll try to post something as soon as possible, or as soon as something remarkable happens. But for now,

thank you, bye bye