so things are getting a bit better, im beginning to shake that initial homesickness that i expected. Jane is becoming a good friend of mine. Jane, is the other woman that works for portia, she speaks absolutely no other languages other than mandarin and well my latin based linguistic knowledge is not helping me here at all. She is cool though, its funny how much you can say without saying anything at all. so far all i can say is hello, thank you, how are you, youre welcome, fruit, water, and the chinese slang for boobs, I know this becuase natalie remarked that i have nay-nays...I told her she would one day too and to cherish it while she didnt :)

anyways....Im realizing how incredibly frustraiting it is to not be able to communicate effectively with others, Im also realizing how much i love everyone i left behind, homesickness will do that to you. I cant eat anything really except for white rice and veggies and stuff but i dotn really mind im just eating very healthy. Today is teh first pretty day it has been in a while. I think Jane realized ( jane is her "american name" her chinese name is incredibly hard to remember and pronouce) how bored i was yesterday sitting inside myself wondering what my texas friends were doing, and so, today she asked me in a thick accent if i wanted to go to the park with her and play. Of course, i responded with the utmost of enthusiasm! So here I am all ready to go to the park, when somewhere between pudong and nanjing i realized what she really meant to say was "do you want to go downtown with me and buy knockoffs" so thats what we did. We played, in the knockoffs. really good knockoff i might add, i was tempted but didnt buy anything, however, leigh, breathe easy, i will bring you something as i promised.

Im hoping to make freinds here soon, that is my biggest concern. I think with the coming weeks i will hopefully know my way around and such. It feels good to have chinese friends though, it makes me feel special, untouristy. I like to notice that the people who pass us are surprised that jane is who i am walking with since i am the only person without jet black hair and milky white skin as far as i can see. It feels strange to be the alien, but also kind of cool for a reason i cant explain. Also the best thing about chinese food so far that i can tell is table manners, forget western table manners, the messier and louder the better. Its really fun to be in teh presence of stangers in which time you are trying to be polite and knowingly eating your food like a 3 year old. Its fantastic, hopefully a habit i will not bring back to the us. :)

anyways, thats all i got for now, ill update later.

missing you all more than you know

j