This was another pretty cool night. Bumping into a coworker on the street (a local, from Foshan), we decided to hang out, grab a snack, and peruse the town. In doing so, found a lot of back alleys and cracked buildings, side streets and secluded corners. I could see he wasn't too excited by my child-like amazement with each new discovery, but to me, it was all very new. I am sure in the weeks to come, I will not feel the novelty so strongly. At the end of the night, he drove me back to my area on a motorbike.

While what we did was pretty average in terms of hanging out, the part that excited me was that I successfully made a friend in another language (speaking the other language). This may not be a large feat to most, but to me, every day-to-day task I succeed in, such as negotiating my cell phone plan, getting my hair cut, and doing my banking, makes me feel 'accomplished' in some silly mediocre way. The challenge is twice what it is when it is not in your native language, I realize. This has given me a huge appreciation for immigrants who move to Canada, who still manage to set up a family, work a job, and have a social life. These are no small feats. So, it makes me feel a little uncomfortable when people act socially superior to someone who does not speak English well (back home) or thinks the person is somehow less intelligent because they stumble through their second language. My rule is always this: the day you can speak an immigrant's first language as well as they speak English, then you can complain. But if not, leave the person alone!

My goal is to be able to negotiate smoothly in social situations, in Chinese, by the time I finish my year here. In fact, the other day, I would not go home until I was successful in bargaining my fare (very common here as a life skill) with a motorcycle taxi....here's to hoping the accumulation of life skills continues!

This is a wonderful side street that is a plethora of colour and noise, punctuated with sights one would never be exposed to in North America. Several stands on the side of the street have freshly chopped ingredients to make stir fries right before your eyes. There are small carts selling preserved items or tofu on sticks. Motorbikes weave between passersby. Chickens sometimes walk up and down the streets. I had the "pleasure," too, to learn of a "chicken house." That is, a prostitution den, just steps away. The drone of foreign languages, the sticky weather, the sense of displacement, the anonymity...These are the things that give a place character. These are the reasons I travel.

This summarizes well the nature of the pace of life here. Where I live, Beijiao, is a large production mecca for furniture and 'white goods' (appliances). Each day, there are people on the streets going about day-to-day activity to support the industry. In fact, there are several factories in this city. Having toured one at my company, where I could see "made in China" with my own eyes, has indeed opened them to the reality of labor and export. In fact, many of the workers come from inland China, work to save up enough money, and only travel home once a year, Chinese New Year. It puts all our little cushy North American lifestyles into perspective.

I found this basket of dead flowers to be rather intriguing. It seemed to have been cut freshly from that day. A little rustic, yet contrasted by the modern waste bins in the background