Hi, my name is Kerry

Right now I have to much to do. More than I can handle really, and that is why I have no time to update the blog. I am doing it now because I find it relaxing and I've noticed that my blog has some readers. Thanks for reading by the way! I really do appreciate it. Near loved ones got a bit worried that I have been away for a couple of days now. Sorry for making you worried, but I have been and am still very stressed and busy. But, I am also having the time of my life!

We meet many interesting people here almost every day and I have received many business cards. I have understood that these cards are quite important to have here for a foreigner, even if you don't do any business. Armin and I decided to print a bunch of cards. Even if I like a clean card I wanted some symbol on it. Ruru picked bamboo for me because in China it symbolizes honesty and rightness. When I told my friend Jonas about this he said "two attributes that suites you well!". Thanks Jonas, it really made me happy! Here is a pic of the result:

The name on the card says Han Kai Rui, which is my Chinese name, and is pronounced Han Kerry. Han is the surname and refers to my Swedish surname Hansson. I changed it from Lee to Han recently.

"Excuse me, can I have a photo taken with you?" is a common question

This Friday Armin, Emilie, Vincent, Helen, Charles and I went to a school to hold a presentation due to a request from James, our student coordinator. The school is teaching English to Chinese businessmen, students and others. As always we were informed with a very short notice so it was very stressful to assemble information and create presentations about European economy and culture. Celine, Emilie and Vincent did a great job doing this. I was part of it but can't say I provided much, my head was to slow that afternoon and felt useless and I hate doing a bad job. Anyway, we were picked up by a guy named Echo and he drove us to the school in a brand new Jeep. Vincent and I held the presentations for the audience of about 25 Chinese people with different backgrounds. Vincent did a great job as always. He presented 90% of the information himself. I got a bit stressed when I noticed that the audience did not pay much attention to us so I thought it seemed like a waste of time. During the talk afterwards I understood that it was because of their poor knowledge of the English language. They simply did not understand what we were talking about. I really did enjoy the discussions afterwards and a girl even offered me a part time job. Will find out more about it tomorrow but it seems interesting and the pay is extremely good. I really need the money because I am probably going to Greece this summer and the plan is to visit Tibet before that.

When we finished the job James drove us down town to what he said was going to be a party. He assured us that he had no idea what was going on, but in fact he planned the whole evening him self. The cars rolled up in front a huge karaoke-bar and we were shown into a nice room. On a table inside the room we found lots of beer, wine, snacks and many different types of fruit. This was mostly welcome because we had no food since lunch and the time was about 20:00. It was so nice to enjoy the flavors of dragon fruit, litchi and watermelon along with a glass of red wine mixed with sprite. Yes I know, it sounds awful but it was not to bad, in fact it was kind of refreshing. The night went on and we played games, drank, ate and had a good time. A few hours later we started so sing karaoke. I just had to participate in a few Abba songs, and "Somebody told me" by The Killers will never sound the same again. After loosing a round in a dice game I had to taste duck tongue as punishment. I know, it sounds terrible but it was OK. The taste was not too bad but the consistence was not inviting at all. After a few hours we were served typical Chinese food such as dumplings and a soup. Oh I love the dumplings! We had a great time until about 02:00 AM when it was time to head home. It is not that late to be China. Most parties starts around 23-00,  but we were exhausted because of the intensive day and partying the night before.

Need to run. We are having a cooking session in 15 minutes. I have been whining about learning Chinese cooking since I arrived here, and now Helen and Linh fixed a cook who teaches us a new dish every week. This will be the second time today. I don't really have the time for it but my stay in China should not be all about work and study. Will probably brief you about the sessions in a post further on.

Tomorrow I will have a meeting to check out the job offer I got this weekend. Update will follow when I know more.