Day 10 - New places and bright lights

Finally, the 10th day of our time here in Wuhan! Some sort of milestone for me, I suppose. Had a whole day off today to work on our Work Breakdown Structure and Statement of Work for our OIP movie due in the near future.

Was able to wake up late today, no alarms, no deadlines, no rush at all. Ah, finally a day where I'm actually well-rested. I invest too much time on this blog. No other choice though, if I want people to be able to relate to what I'm going through everyday while I'm here!

Anyway, I ended up waking at 11.44AM while the roomies had risen early to finish off their projects. Thank god Group A was willing to finish everything at one go last night.

Left for lunch at 12.40PM with my usual meal buddies Eliza, Michelle, Eudora and Houngsheng. Was looking for a new place along 旅大街today, and decided to try a restaurant two doors away from our usual 柠檬乐.

Happy Kitchen!

Elaborate menu cover! Me like.

Houngsheng and the comidically small kettle.

In Happy Kitchen, the layout is exactly the same as 柠檬乐. You write down your own order and they give you a huge bucket of rice. Great strategy for the guys who are huge eaters.

Tried some vegetables, pork with black fungus, tomatoes with eggs (becoming a staple food in every meal we have in Wuhan) and potato with roasted pork. Tasted way better than our usual 柠檬乐! Nom nom nom.

Went back to the dorm after lunch and worked on my blog some more. Around 6.15PM, brought some of the others down to Happy Kitchen again for dinner. Almost everyone agreed that food is better there. Plan: Succeed!

Decided after dinner that the weather was almost perfect for setting off our wishing lanterns we bought a few nights ago. Problem was, Zhenzao and some of the other guys were still out at Walmart with the local students, and we all had to wait for them.

Nicholas the Spiderman who's afraid of spiders and Momo. Momo is posing like that supposedly because he's holding a peach (momo in Japanese is peach) is his hands. Hmm.

Michelle and her wishing lantern.

2L04 kids!

Eliza, Diyanah, Sheila and I got so bored, we wandered into the guys' room to bug them. They ended up ignoring us. Here's why:

The guys (Yuchuan and Nicholas) in their natural habitat watching...

....a Hongkong Drama.

(You'd think they'd be doing more manly things, but apparently not)

The others finally came back after 10PM, but we had to hurry with the lanterns before the building got locked down for the night.

Lotus seeds from Mr Chia.

(Agnes) The things you do to get your wishes to Chang E.

"赵家俪

心想事成！大家都平平安安！"



Personal Reflections:

The wishing lanterns were really fun. They apparently send your wishes up to Chang E (goddes in the moon) to be granted on Mid-Autumn's Day. Since it was raining during the actual Mid-Autumn, we could only set it off today before we left on a three-day river cruise over the weekend.

We almost didn't, though, since we were taking a long time trying to open Eliza's room after they closed the door on all their keys. The problem ended up being solved with a swipe of a card.

Makes me remember how unsafe our dorms actually are, especially with the local students barely five metres away. The other night when the girls were practicing the dance out in the corridor, they got so rowdy and actually took stools out to sit and watch us in the corrider. Creepy.

I guess security is another important thing not to be easily taken granted for. Speaking of which, I'd better go double-lock my doors now before I head for cloud nine. Goodnight!

Day 09 - First Day of Autumn

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Woke up early today to a whole new season in Wuhan! Sheila the roomate and I have been counting down to this day since we've brought nice clothes (ah, girls) along just for this. Anyway, the cold weather will always be better than hot and humid weather in my book.

Got dressed and headed down to class. The winds were crazy strong and it was super nice, in contrast to the sweltering heat all week thus far.

Headed out to the supermarket during lunch, and discovered our shoes all muddy and dirty from the rain puddles.

Clockwise: Eliza, Eudora (?), me, Yuchuan, and Nicholas. The Dirty Shoe Circle.

In the unmerciful cold weather, we Singaporeans huddle! This is what happens when you only have one brolly.

Whiteboard outside the local students' side of the dormitory building.

“中秋，国庆。双节快乐!”, which translates to: Mid-Autumn, National Day, Happy Double Festivals! Found this heartwarming, for some reason.

Eliza finding it unbearable under the umbrella with the rain and strong winds blowing through 旅大街(Lu Da Jie).

Rushed back after having noodles with some classmates for dinner. Some of them initally wanted to have their own food, but I insisted to eat together since it's Mid-Autumn's, and here in Wuhan, we're the only family we have. The food didn't turn out to be too good, but the company was great, as usual.

Rushed back to celebrate Mid-Autumn Festival with everyone else! I think we initially had big things planned, but got cancelled due to the rain. Had the celebration in the corridor instead, which isn't quite bad, honestly.

With Jo the neighbour!

Zhenzao and the local student who's been around to bring us everywhere, Yang Tao.

My Bossman eating the wrong food.

Michelle and Eliza (who was tip-toeing heh heh).

With Eudora, one of the nicest people around.

Nicholas, who had to stoop really low to take this photo with me. T-T

He's actually from my primary school too! What a coincidence, heh.

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Personal Reflection

One of the best things I love about Wuhan, the seasons! I often travel only for the change in seasons, just to experience them. Autumn and spring are my favourite seasons; not too hot nor too cold. I wonder if I would love it more if I came with the next batch though, I haven't ever experienced snow yet.

I guess I'm just slightly more paranoid about natural disasters now that the season's changed and it's raining more frequently. I didn't ever have to worry about that when I was in Singapore, but you'd never know here. Just hoping for the best, I suppose.

Today's Mid-autumn festival was great! Mid-Autumn has always been about reunion, and having mooncakes and tea while enjoying the bask of the full moon. Now that we're in Wuhan, all I have are literally my trip mates, and my trip leader. The trip mates have been really awesome thus far and they're really accepting despite most of them coming from a single class. I'm pretty sure I don't have to worry about anything when I'm here in Wuhan with them, cos they really look out for not only me, but everyone else too.

So spending Mid-Autumn festival with them is only right on this day of reunion. Sometimes we all have dinner separately or leave for/from class separately too. It was great company on this night where we can't even see the moon. Such a pity. The moon is supposed to be the brightest on this day, but it was blocked out by the heavy clouds. :/ Next few days, I guess.

Anyway, I like that Mid-Autumn is a national public holiday in China. It really does allow students and working adults alike to return to their home village to reunite with their respective families. It's like Christmas, but with mooncake.