Rediscovering Eden
Who am I, that the Lord of all the earth
Would care to know my name
Would care to feel my hurt
Who am I, that the bright and morning Star
Would choose to light the way
For my ever wandering heart
Not because of who I am
But because of what You've done
Not because of what I've done
But because of who You are
I am a flower quickly fading
Here today and gone tomorrow
A wave tossed in the ocean
A vapor in the wind
Still You hear me when I'm calling
Lord, You catch me when I'm falling
And You've told me who I am
I am Yours, I am Yours
Who Am I, that the eyes that see my sin
Would look on me with love
and watch me rise again
Who Am I, that the voice that calmed the sea
Would call out through the rain
And calm the storm in me
Whom shall I fear
Whom shall I fear
I am Yours
dailies
Tuesday, September 09, 2008
Backlog
-10:05 PM
3rd September 2008
My estate!
My block!
God’s creation at my estate.
Today we took a cab to 北京中医药大学（东校区）to buy textbooks. That cost 44 bucks. Apparently there was the subway which would have cost 2 bucks + some walking or the bus that would have cost 60cents. No hot water is provided for the locals in the hostel so they actually have to queue for hot water. They also have to go to another building to bathe. The 3rd picture is my dinner at the school hostel. It cost 4 RMB.
4th September 2008
Today we woke up early and went to the Bank of China to set up our accounts. Good thing we went early because the crowd came in after us and because we were foreigners, there were a lot of administrative procedures and the process took quite a while. I had to key in my PIN at least 10 times because I had to confirm a lot of paperwork. The bank manager commented that our spoke mandarin better than some of the local PRCs and thought that we were Taiwanese. I’ve realized that SM and I naturally would speak with the PRC accent when we are speaking to the locals. Hmm.
We went to Carrefour to get supplies and food and on our way back, we bumped into Doreen, Freda, Chen Chun, Pansy and Minyee. They were with an estate agent and were looking at apts. SM and I brought them to the nice eatery/restaurant next to our estate. After that, SM and I went back to cleaning the house. We’ve been cleaning since day one but our progress seems to be very slow and the dust sets in very quickly as well.
We called in the maintenance people in the afternoon because my window couldn’t close and her trap-mosquito thingy that is attached to the window was loose. We had wanted to tighten all the trap mosquito thingy but the maintenance guy said it was not necessary and if we did so, we had to pay 20 bucks. So, in the end, we just fixed SM’s mosquito thingy and my window (which wasn’t spoiled, it just required A LOT of strength to close that I am not going to open that window anymore) for free. We also called in the broadband guy to fix the line. No activation fees were required because our estate already has the network or LAN (is it? I’m not sure of the terminologies). My router is coming on Sunday and then we will have wireless!!! YiPPeE!!
5th September 2008
We went to北京中医药大学（西校区）for the opening ceremony of our course in BJ. This time we tried the subway-looks like our MRT and I was playing with the Colour Accent function of my camera. Many people commented that SM and I look similar and asked if purposely wore the same colour. But we didn’t! There was mad rush to hand up the million and one paperwork including temporary residence permits, passports, application forms, 3 one-inch photos and 2 two-inch photos, pay money and yada yada. Many of us were cutting our passports to fit the sizes they wanted and so some had only their heads in the photo etc. Ha.Prof Alex Law also flew in from Singapore and tried to open his speech in mandarin before finally switching to English. Our class rep, Joanna spoke too and she spoke really well. I think she garnered the loudest applause.
After that, a group of us went out together. On our way, we passed a bakery and we saw Dutch Lady milk ! Finally a brand we recognized and it tasted the same as the one in Singapore!!!
Patriotism.
We went for dinner at McDonalds. The set meals over here are different from that of Spore. All of us used a coupon that was found on the floor. Me, MX and JJ shared a combo meal that cost 33 RMB.
We went to IKEA where I saw this really cute dog!! I wanted to buy but decided against wasting money cos I’m running low on cash already. SM said the dog look dumb but dumb dumb dogs then look cute wadd. Hee.
We cabbed home thereafter and an interesting conversation took place in the cab. The cab driver commented that though our mandarin sounded good, we did not sound like BJ people. He asked if we were from the South cause we were more soft-spoken (I think many people are going to puke*) and so we said yes, we are from 福建. He started to talk about tea and products made in福建 and SM and I were smoking our way through. We didn’t know whether to say we are year one or year four. Saying year 1 will sound weird cause its as if the university offers a 2 year degree programme but saying that we were year 4 students will sound like we don’t even know the place we have been staying at for presumably 3 years. The cab driver also said this whole string of words so quickly; SM interpreted it as he thinks we two are twins while I interpreted it as he thinks we are from different parts of 福建. We didn’t clarify just in case he spotted more loopholes. Heez.
