Oh. It's Thursday!

Wait... when did it become Thursday?! Oh my how time flies. Well let's see if I can get you all caught up on life in China. The last two weeks have been short weeks! Meaning we've had at least two days off each week! It's been amazing. Two Friday's ago, I had a movie night with my friends (we watched Frozen and yes, I'm obsessed with the songs now). Saturday we went out to dinner and had a great time bonding a little more on a less negative level. Then Sunday I took it easy, relaxed, worked out a little, you know... the usual :P Then the week went by. I gave my students a few lessons about the hook up culture in universities and I helped with the AP psych class since they're getting ready for their test coming up in May. My boss gave me the task of finishing the course description catalog for next year by April 30th. Again, WHY IS THAT MY JOB?! Ugh.... Anywayyyy moving on to last weekend. Last weekend was Tomb Sweeping Holiday. It's a festival type of thing where Chinese people go to their hometown or where ever it is that their ancestors are buried and they burn fake "afterlife" money. They do this so that their ancestors will have money to life off of in their afterlife.
It was kind of a neat experience to walk down the street and see all the mini bonfires of fake money on the sidewalk. 
So Friday, I didn't do anything special. I just went to the gym to do my usual work out. Saturday I woke up and Skyped with my grad school adviser which was really nice. It was fun to have someone to share my experiences with and to teach her about all the differences of being a counselor in China. Then I went to Coffee Time to read a little and spend some time by myself. On my way back home I ran into the Linfield crew playing basketball and decided I could use a little exercise. We ended up playing for a few hours and headed out to dinner after that. It was an awesome day but not as awesome as Sunday. Sunday I met up with Jessie, one of my Chinese friends and colleagues. We went shopping from 12:30 to about 2:30 and then spent two hours hanging out at Coffee Time. She really wanted me to see the night lights so we found some other things to do while we killed time. We watched a wedding photo shoot in a Christian church and listen to some people singing. We had dinner and FINALLY the lights came on around 6:30. We took a ton of pictures! It was so cute how happy she was when we decided to go home. She said that she had a great day and I agreed. It was nice to spend time with a new friend and get to know her better. Fortunately that's not where my weekend ended :D Monday we had a holiday! I worked on my lesson plans and created PowerPoints and presentations, etc. It was a productive yet relaxing day.
I found out during the weekend that my friend, Michael, got hit by a motorbike while he was standing on the sidewalk waiting for one of our Chinese colleagues. His muscle is badly bruised but fortunately his bones are ok. He said the bike hit him hard enough for the rider to actually get bounced out of the seat. Then the rider scrambled to collect himself, got back on the bike, and took off. Michael said that he looked scared and we're guessing because hitting a foreigner with your motorize vehicle probably costs a hefty fine. Only in China do you have the chance of getting hit with a motorbike on a sidewalk while you're not moving. RIDICULOUS!
This week has gone by fast and I haven't really had a chance to catch my breath. Good thing tomorrow is a half day and we have two days for the weekend! I'm getting spoiled with these two day weekends. It'll be rough when we have our back to back long weeks next week. But it's ok because we have another holiday coming up May 1-4 :D I'm hoping to go to Suzhou and Hangzhou. Hopefully I can find someone to go with me! If there's anything else exciting that happens I'll be sure to keep you updated. Until then... Laters!