Surviving Classes: Week 1

There were some things I meant to put in my last entry that I forgot.  Here they are:

If you can't read the note, it says, "Hope you'll like it - Elaine" -- she left me breakfast one morning!! She is absolutely the sweetest girl in the world!  (and, for the record, I did like it.)

On the topic of food, another thing I wanted to mention from our trip was the single most unpleasant thing I have eaten so far.  It was a small fish, about the size of, I don't know, a tampon.  Of course the head, skin, eyes, bones, etc were still intact.  And it was frozen.  And covered in some basically barbeque sauce.  My instinct (as trained by my dad, who always told me as a kid that if I want to know if something is good, "there's only one way to find out") was to give it a try in case it was a really superb delicacy.  And then, something in my brain said, "Are you crazy?? This is a fish popsicle!! There is nothing more horrible and disgusting sounding in the world!"  I ignored this voice.  Instant regret.  I swallowed the one bite I took (the head) with much effort and vowed to never be an adventurous eater ever again. 

Also, I was walking up the hill to my dorm the other day and I noticed this sign:

Houston?? Rice University??

I still don't know what it says or why there is a sign about Rice on my campus, butI thought it was pretty neat and worth sharing.

Also, an interesting difference between the US and Taiwan:  here they have coffee in cans!!  Served from a vending machine!! hot!!! I have never seen hot things in a vending machine in the US (at least never a real classic one like this), let alone cans of coffee.  I had one today; it was quite good.  Yesterday I thought I was getting one but after one sip I discovered it was actually peanut rice milk.  What a shock!

View from the Elevator

Yesterday was beautiful.  Look at the landscape I see every day!!  Haha, I'm just kidding, this is the landscape I see every day that it's sunny.  So actually I only saw it that one time.  But still, so beautiful!  Hen piao liang (漂亮)!

Afore, while showing me around the campus last week, pointed out a tall building on campus.  She told me that, legend has it, that building is haunted.  Many people have committed suicide off it and their ghosts remain, blah blah blah, and if you go in there when you are too stressed out, you might commit suicide too.  I assured her that I would steer clear of it, ESPECIALLY when stressed out.  The next day I found out that every single one of my classes is in that building.  Oh.  Okay then.

Despite Afore's warnings, so far my classes are all going fine.  The teachers are better at English than I expected.  Yesterday I had Industrial economics and competition policy, and it was really interesting when we went around the class and said our names, majors, and what countries we're from.  Since it is an English-taught course, it is mostly made up of exchange students.  And at least 10 countries were represented!! It was amazing!  We had several from Germany, Spain, Korea, a few from the US and from Mexico, some France, Canada, Japan, etc etc etc.  It was very cool.  My other class the night before had a similar breakdown of nationalities.  Today, when I walked into my International Finance class, I got incredibly nervous when the classroom was fully of chattering Taiwanese students.  "Is this International Finance?" I asked, tentative.  The girl gave me a puzzled look, and then understood and nodded.  There was no possible way that I was in the right place and this was an English-taught course.  Until the moment the teacher actually started speaking English I was continuing to doubt myself.  But, fortunately, I was in the right place and it was in the right language.  This class was very interesting for a number of reasons.  For one thing, so far it seems the most translatable to Rice - like it would be an econ class I would take if I were still there.  And I know I shouldn't be, but I am still amazed that they teach the same things the same way across the world!  Maybe not everything, but the professor did casually say "as you all know, Y=C+I+G" (which, of course, it does in the states too), and there were drawings of Edgeworth boxes on the board behind her.  I thought that was pretty cool.

Another interesting thing (which has actually been true in all my classes, but especially this one) is sitting there as an American.  This may not come as a shock, but Taiwanese economics classes mention the US a whole lot more than the US economics classes mention Taiwan.  In one of my other classes, the professor mentioned "the current global recession that was triggered by the sub-prime mortgage crisis in America," as I slumped in my seat.  Today was worse.  

What the Taiwanese learn about America

I know that is hard to read, but it is a figure reading "US Capital Account and Net Foreign Wealth" with a sharply down-sloping graph charting the world's biggest debtor, America.  I found myself feeling embarrassed the whole time!  Like I wanted to make excuses for my country to these people!  And I definitely avoided making eye contact with anyone around me.

Also, as this professor went over the syllabus, she introduced our main assignment for the semester, a group project and term paper.  I dreaded the group selection process, seeing all these chattering friends surrounding me, but figured I could ask the professor to stick me in with some unlucky group.  Just as I was damning myself to being the leftover reject, I was approached by not one but two students inviting me to join their group!!  (see video).  Whether it was out of pity or something else, I felt very lucky and it only reinforced the feeling that every single person in this country is incredibly sweet and caring.  Once we were dismissed, a complete stranger from the class offered to lend me her umbrella since she saw I didn't have one!  We got to chatting and she invited me to hang out with her and her friends and teach me Chinese, so hopefully we will all be hearing more from her in the future!

I am starting to accept that I guess I do stand out here.  Although, as previously mentioned, there are plenty of international students, I have yet to see a single fellow redhead on the campus...  Will definitely keep my eyes peeled and will report back with updates.

Last night we went to the movie theater and saw 愛, or, ai, or, Love.  Thankfully, it had English subtitles, but it was a very sweet Taiwanese chick flick about Love.  Basically a Taiwanese Love Actually, minus the Christmas stuff.  It was very cute and a lot of fun, but I don't think it improved my Chinese the way karaoke did.  There is nothing like karaoke.

No class tomorrow!  Holiday on sun-tues!  Five day weekend!!

To those Rice students approaching spring break: shut up.