Just Say No.

To Drugs, Sex, Alcohol. And the Tug of War Team. Ok, so I have this teensy weensy problem. Whenever the hall council people from Lishung (the hall I live in) come up and talk to Caitlyn and I, I tend to volunteer us for random things. They are seriously the sweetest people in the world and they ask so nicely, I truly have no idea how to say no. I also don't understand exactly what they are asking us to do sometimes and occasionally just nod my head and blissful ignorance. Well, this time I may have accidentally signed Caitlyn and I up for the tug of war team. Yes, my winning obsessed hall has a team for this and practices. So, I have now been well versed in the art form that is tug of war. At home we just pull on the rope and go. Here in Hong Kong, this is serious business.


Today I witnessed the Hong Kong Marathon. SUPER COOL. It made me miss running like no other :( I'm not even sure if I was witnessing the half marathon or the marathon finishing, but all and all I just completely wanted to be out there. I don't know how my parents stood at the finish line for so many races for four years, seriously, it's soo loud and you just stand there. Ahh I wanted to be running. Before the race though, Caitlyn and I got to take a picture with the President of our University who was super excited to meet us :) YEY! Since PolyU had an official team for the marathon we got to stand with a bunch of the other kids from the residence halls with PolyU tambourines (which I stole one. SHHH), those little inflatable sticks, and wear really really really awesome FREE T-Shirts! Now, as an NC Student, it is obviously my goal in life to get as many free t-shirts as possible. But, this one goes beyond all expectations. It's a really nice dri-fit Nike like running shirt. I am beyond impressed. Plus, it says PolyU Running Team on it. It is probably going to be one of my best souvies


I could really use to do some homework.
Haha seriously, I actually have a lab report due on Tuesday as well as a quiz and a presentation tomorrow. It's so hard to get in the studious mode though when you basically feel like you're on vacation. More importantly, I went to some old temples yesterday! Very culturally enriching.... would have been better had it not been raining and it had been about twenty degrees warmer. Have I mentioned lately that they do not use heat in the buildings here? I think they should mention that somewhere on the application.


Since my last blog I have accomplished many things including, but not limited to,wearing eyeliner, hiked up multiple mountains, ran a mile finally in the hall gym, and had about a thousand meetings for the group projects that I am involved in. I've discovered that instead of going to class, here at PolyU we just have group meetings for all of the semester long projects that are involved in every single class. I really am capable of doing work on my own, but here it is definitely all about group work.


In my global fashion marketing lecture we talked for basically two hours straight about Chinese culture and I must say I learned a lot about why Chinese people act the way they do and why this might seem odd to those of us who aren't Chinese. They have this big thing about "face culture," meaning that it's very important to appear the status you aspire to be. Therefore in China, it's more important that everyone on the street know that you are carrying a designer bag than it is for you to actually have a good quality bag. They're also huge about gifts... apparently for every festival. Thus leading to my next subject -
It's apparently necessary for men in Hong Kong to buy their date massive flower bouquets for American Valentines Day, Chinese Valentines Day, and every day in between. It is also necessary for said date to carry these flowers around for the entire evening. Perhaps the more flowers you have the more "face" you have. Anyway, when you're trying to navigate your way through the streets and around H&M and you have to trip over all of these couples with holding the florist shop in their hands you tend to get annoyed. Especially when they walk slow.... and proceed to make out on the moving sidewalks in the MTR station. I swear I'm really not trying to whine here...but really? Valentine's Day did include a nice reception for the International Students where wine and free refreshments were included so I can not complain. 


I have so many things that I am planning to do and so many things I have already done.
The end.

Congratulations on surviving your first international medical experience

So, after being achey as hell on Saturday, having a runny nose and cough since Monday and then waking up yesterday with my eye stuck shut and it being totally red, I finally decided to haul my butt to the health services here at PolyU this morning. After being told by an Asian nurse that I was too skinny after taking my height and weight. Not to make a cultural stereotype, but seriously? look at your people. They are all WAY skinnier than me. It was an interesting experience but in the end here's the diagnosis....
I have some sort of conjunctivitis in both of my eyes. Which in case you're not a pre-med major means I have pink eye in both eyes. Seriously, that stupid ass thing that every kid picks up from kindergarten. Yeah, I got it while I'm a college sophomore studying abroad in Hong Kong. Seriously, Lame. There are about a billion things I would rather be doing than writing this blog because I'm going stir crazy sitting in bed. At least when you get it in kindergarten all you miss out on is a coloring page and how to spell "cat." I, on the other hand, could be hmm shopping right now, sitting on a beach somewhere, climbing mountains, or otherwise enjoying myself. But, no, I am typing this blog wearing one of those ridiculous masks that makes me look like I have SARS. 


I am a terrible patient. 


I have now been prescribed FIVE different medications. I swear, they hand pills out here like candy. They gave me pink ones for my cough, white ones for my fever that I don't have/acheyness, yellow ones for my cold (these ones may cause drowsiness!), as well as eyedrops obviously and eye ointment. Now, my eye ointment says to apply a thin layer to affected area. Am I seriously supposed to put ointment on my eye????? If anyone can answer this question within the next 7 hours or so, let me know....


Besides being sick, I was rather enjoying myself :) 


We're finally back in classes off CNY (Chinese New Year) break. I got to see the parade which was extremely dull. I mean, I like parades, but this was really crap. I really expected a lot more. The fireworks on the other hand were FANTASTIC. They completely smoked up the entire sky and probably caused a year's worth of air pollution, but they were soooo shiny :) Absolutely lovely


I bought an amazing pair of hot pink sunglasses last night that I absolutely adore for like 8 bucks last night (bargained down at the Temple Market). Still addictive. Yesterday, I went to the Avenue of Stars yesterday and saw a massive statue of Bruce Lee which was an extreme let-down for one) because the box holding the clue from the Amazing Race was no longer there and two) we couldn't find a statue of Jackie Chan. Not finding Jackie Chan is really depressing from an American's point of view because he's really the only star I know of from HK, but apparently all the locals basically think he's a big jerk. I got the feeling from a local that he's kind of a horrible husband and father. So, apparently, they don't really feel compelled to build a statue in his honor.


This week has actually been somewhat full of classes by HK PolyU standards. This meaning that I've actually averaged more than a class a day haha. I'm still getting used to the lack of lecture time. I turned in my first lab report for Coloration and Finishing Technologies yesterday so hopefully that get's a good grade. The teacher is very sweet and apologizes for having poor English all the time, so maybe he'll give me an A just because :) The lab was on the effect of enzymes, stone washing, de-sizing, and softening on denim so it was actually kind of a cool report. I love textile labs. I survived my first presentation here on Monday in Retail Buying tutorial. Our project was to forecast the trends, design concepts, colors/fabric, etc for Fall/Winter 2011 for the mass market segment. My group was made up of Caitlyn and I, a girl from the Netherlands, and a girl from Sweden so it was sooo cool for us to all come together with our ideas. I was really really happy how it turned out and the work we did. I forgot to take pictures of the mood boards, so hopefully I'll get mine back when she finishes grading it. I'm not sure how well that's going to go, as the teacher seemed to applaud the local students' copied and pasted from style.com work more than ours. But, we shall see.


Hopefully I will be feeling better by tomorrow and can maybe do some things then :) In the mean time, I will just be catching up on youtube hits and facebook statuses....

HK > Macau

So, after being in Macau for a few days I feel this inequality is a nice summary of how I feel. We heard that Macau was like the Las Vegas of Asia so we decided since we have the whole week off of school we should check it out for a few days. So, we booked a hotel that was very reasonably priced, booked two nights and went off to Macau.
So, nothing in Macau is in English. Also, nothing seems to open before noon. Once everything does open, nobody seems to do anything by play blackjack. Seriously, we were at a bar at a casino at like 11:30 with a totally awesome live band and everything and there was hardly anyone there. They were all out playing blackjack and slot machines. It made me so sad :( It was a really cool bar though and they sang some awesome American tunes :) which made me super happy. Too bad everybody else missed it. I've personally come to the conclusion that I would rather not gamble because that money could be spent on clothes and handbags (something I appreciate MUCH more). Cause here's the thing about shopping - even if you spend a ton, you at least get something in return. Guarantee. When you gamble, you might get something in return, but probably not. Shopping > Gambling
Caitlyn and I did manage to ride the city buses fairly well. They did stop and unload the entire bus a few times, but we just found our way to another bus. In our minds, we did pretttty dang impressively. For the most part, we just really walked around and looked at things that we could find because well that was easier said than done. We went to this really gorgeous hotel/casino that actually had a fake river running through it with GONDOLAS. On the record, I totally would rather go to Italy and ride in a real gondola, but this was pretty impressive. Oh yeah!! And we went to this random fisherman's wharf place and we were sitting there taking pictures with this MASSIVE group of Chinese people comes up and every single one of them wanted a picture with the two American girls. Seriously we probably sat there for like 10 minutes while they all came up and individually took a picture with us. It was my trial run at being famous :) Absolutely hilarious. Sweetest damn people.
So as a whole, we came, we saw, we sort of kind of conquered Macau. Or at least, we tried. 


I'm still on break from school, which feels really weird because normally on a break this long I would be totally home by now (but obviously, I am not). I've heard that a lot of things close these next couple days so pray for me that I don't die of starvation. We have some fruit, ramen, soup, and granola bars in our room so if all else fails, I think we'll be ok. Tomorrow is a huge parade for the CNY and on Friday there are FIREWORKS :) :) I super love fireworks


Happy Chinese New Year everyone!!!!!!!!