Fashion & travel: April 2016

12^th December to Jan 10^th

So I’ve been really behind with this….the highlights: internship work with Swartzkoff crystal pearls 珠子my bosses son loves me, the dad is American, his English is better than Chinese, his Aunt who is the 2^nd boss in Nicole Zhang was correcting his Chinese one day, he loves batman and came in on a Thursday looking for me to discover I wasn’t there and wanting to return haha. I dyed my hair and my boss was telling me she often did the same, she once had a perm and even had dreads when she worked in Dior, her bossed loved her so was ok. More trying on of the new designs. Turns out I’m taller than I thought, 165cm-ish! We had an official let’s get this started day, were we did whiskey shots, I had 2, it was strong, I felt a tad light headed; my boss said I should have more haha. I then had some brandy later that night as was leaving Rebeka to the airport.

Saw a Chinese guy walkng along shaving…china live eh? Least he wasn’t in pjamas.

More tests and final exams (spending about ¾ days studying in my room highest overall results though and got Shakespeare for my speaking exam topic 莎士比亚) Rebeka’s leaving do, including shit clubs, a stolen iPhone and nearly a fight. Learning some Chinese songs, and seeing some cool Chinese movies in class, the best being yedian 夜店 I nearly died laughing 笑死了

NICOLE ZHANG

teaching (hating my Thursday night class they made me come early to teach them as they didn’t think I was prepared, I thought each class was 1 chapter…its 2 pages and 2 students, with terrible English. A rougher probably poorer area, I love my class with Amanda, and my adult class. My teenage student doesn’t seems to be a bit introverted and not a huge personality 内兄 I asked her to tell me something about her week, anything new, anything interesting in class, convos with friends, she gave me nothing ‘nothing interesting’ groovy…still love my Sunday classes the kids have a lot of energy and personality, hope I can stay longer with them, plus I get on quite well with some of the other teachers, one of them remembered I liked game of thrones and leant me his encyclopaedia book on it for I had something fun to read, Sooo nice!! Will really miss my listening teacher she was really good and got on really well with us all telling us we were her favourite class and I could actually believe it! The Laos students hooked up and became a couple, the girl was pretty but she did have a sort of light moustache and the guy had intense hedgehog hair, but whatever floats your boat, they are happy and its cute, it does appear that most of the south east Asian students date fellow south east Asian students, but from living with Nhi (who left as well and I miss, getting me a lovely present and a 4 page spread for my travel book 游记 #love peace justice and a perfect travel ticket collecting book she found in Beijing and knew was for me, she’s such a sweet heart, I hope to see her again in either Europe, shanghai or Vietnam! ) This is what is common and you don’t date a lot, it’s still quite traditional in many respects. Miliya, Kiyo, and I had a lot of fun in class joking about in class, often hanging with Kat and Ninji too, a sort of unofficial group. Plus the odd finish guy who used way too much English, and liked crazy art. The really odd American guy who we think was gay and into cosplay decided to learn Japanese, went to japan and America for ages and never returned…he came in once with silver hair, and often sports silver sparkly metallic jeans with a chain of stars and often a star t-shirt – along with a weird walk and rodent like habit. Each to their own I guess. The Koreans don’t speak much and when the do it’s into themselves or just in Korean. But they get the grades…it’s annoying. One is big, often eats, plays games and wears a face mask 口袋 sometimes it may as well just be a class of the 4 Europeans plus Ninji and Kiyo as we are the only ones who talk. Plus the other Mongolian girl sometimes I guess.

Christmas was different to say the least….unexpectedly Stan cameto shnaghai we went for drinks and shisha on the Wednesday in Barbarossa. Got a slight gypsy/ eastern feel to it 吉普赛/中东感觉 a lot of foreigners, situated in peoples square 人民广场and for anyone who has been in shanghai and has been through this metro station, will know it’s the most annoying hectic one there is, with several interchanges, try to avoid at peak times if you can that’s for sure!

Xmas eve in class was good or 平安夜 we got cute Xmas socks from our dislikeable comprehensive teacher and the traditional apple 苹果 I don’t know why it’s traditional but hey, an apple is an apple! And the 袜子were cute. We got the teacher presents of chocolate and a card each too, they were very touched. Later that night I went on my traditional Xmas eve night out starting off with the mulled wine of course! This was a success. She got me the cutest Rudolph for bed too! Who I obviously named 卤豆腐 lu dao fu - Chilled with a load of people in Jimena’s room along with more wine and Mexican tequila by the time I met Stan I was a bit gone. We went to some place called UVCA not the best, full of late to middle aged, door fee and expensive, not an exciting atmosphere, for those trying to impress, and feel hipster with the vinyl covered wall (cool but I think more could be done with the place, the feeling needed some oomph) I don’t think we left till after several baileys around 5am, I lost my phone but being the old age P.O.S that it is it wasn’t nicked and I got it back (if I started with a Christmas tradition I may as well continue, no, just needed the west coast cooler ha) the next day we got my fish at xiwang lu, upper cheap tropical bad boys. – he got me a full on tank and a turtle who I obvs called Capt. America,

the chinese obsession 羽绒服 1 metro ride

I met up with Simba who I met at Rebeka’s party on the boxing day and we went to an outdoors xmas market was decent, some hilarious stand-up comedy at it

And New Year’s was also a random one. Only one of the guys form the October holiday could go in the end, as the others had exams so it was the Korean looking one Peng Ge 鹏哥who could come. He joined myself Kat and Miliya for drinks in Perry’s having already drank mulled wine (after nothing would worked hot plate wise we used the microwave, we also had some German schnapps) Perry’s was packed out we had no seat and they were not doing shisha or free drinks, Miliya got us some tequila shots, I had a bucket, there was dancing, Jimena and Mike came, I did the countdown outside with the girls. Miliya brought some kick ass sparklers from Taiwan 仙女棒 bumped into orkan. Simba also came since he knew I’d be there, everyone left early, bar me staying out till 5 again. skyped my mum drunkenly a 5am my time haha. And began my wonderful studies.

BRING ON CHINESE NEW YEAR 春节

Exams over, back to work, visa applied for, orange fish killed (all the fins eaten) and one of “the 8” just disappeared blaming the turtle…..will soon get a new roommate and then I leave at the end of the month. Met up with Lance my Chinese friend for coffee, he gave me a lovely Xmas present! Birthday soon, itching to get out of shanghai and do a bit of travel, least will see some good mates when I get home, plus Malik, Rosie and Lola will visit Belfast china buds! . And got in contact with some N.I expats thanks to Yvette who works for the BBC again back at home, looks like there are about 30 or so in china, mainly shanghai. Awesome! Into a4 next semester….scary bics. Still think my Chinese sucks, especially when I am in work. No idea how I will move forward in my career….let’s just see how things go I guess?

Monday 11^th January – 17^th

Creative week in work, experimenting with the pearls and wire, made some interesting jewellery, even with the pliers though it was a bit sore on the hand, making earrings, rings, necklaces and bracelets. Im not too sure what direction im meant to be going, just got to experiment and see I guess.

Typical teaching days, had a random lesson with Amanda who explained what “yellow” was 黄色 is a dirty word. Associated with dirty things like porn, she got some in japan for her boyfriend haha.

Chilled at Jimenas on Saturday night watching a bit of an indian movie called kites, and chilling with her and radia.

Work on my birthday…woo hoo. Cathy sang me happy birthday and had some lovely messages and phonecalls from friends.

got some lovely unexpected presents. Lance invited mirijam and I to come to his when we are free. How sweet. Also, I found out that his dad is the owner of an international mannequin factory! Score. Connections connections eh!

The turtle has eaten 4 of the tiny fish and I exploded the heater while cleaning as im an idiot 鱼加热器a fish tank is surprisingly hard work!