The Past Week

This week has been rather uneventful, hence the lack of updates. On Sunday I went with Zoe to meet with one of the other Canadian CCSEP recipients. Unfortunately she was the only one who could come (some were out of town and others either didn't check their email or didn't reply). The dim sum place is huge and is open 24 hours. It's the building on the right in the picture with all the lanterns and the Chinese-style architecture. The big weird black building next to it is some sort of club or something...it definitely made for an odd contrast right next to the more traditional style dim sum place.
When we arrived we found that the entire second floor was in use for a wedding, so there was a waitlist for a table. The restaurant provided chairs, sunflower seeds and tea for the people waiting. The guy with the broom's job was simply to constantly sweep the area...very boring I'm sure.

While waiting, we saw two kids get into a fight. A boy and and a girl...perhaps siblings but we weren't sure...were playing. The girl was maybe 7 or 8 and the boy quite a bit younger. Maybe four or so? I guess the boy somehow poked the girl in the eye, perhaps intentionally but I wasn't watching them at that point. The girl was infuriated and started screaming insults at the boy. The boy's dad came over and had his hands on the boy's shoulders, but was just watching and kind of laughing as the girl angrily pointed at the boy and told him off. I couldn't understand everything she was saying, but it was obviously very mean and eventually the boy got so angry his face turned red and he lashed out and tried to kick the girl. The dad held the boy back and then picked him up and moved him away from the girl, so that he was now standing next to one of the dishes of sunflower seeds. The girl soon walked over and again began to point right in the boy's face and get angry at him. Eventually the boy got so angry he grabbed a fistful of sunflower seeds and tossed them at the girl. It didn't even phase her. Eventually the two were separated, but it was kind of amusing and bizarre watching the entire situation.

Once we got into the restaurant, the dim sum was really delicious! Unfortunately I didn't think to take any pictures inside. After we were finished I went home and just worked on homework for the entire rest of the weekend. 

Other than schoolwork, I did make an outing to Ikea to buy a lamp and a few other things, but other than that I have just been really busy with my studies. 

I did take a couple pictures of the dorm lobby. In this picture you can see the service desk (no one is there, but you can see all the time zone clocks behind it), and the guard who stands by the front entrance. There is someone there 24/7.
There is a little, overpriced shop to the left of the desk. The hallway to my room is on the left side of the shop and you can barely see it in the picture.
Today (Thursday Oct. 9) I went with Zoe to a shopping area by the Beijing Zoo. I bought two new pieces of clothing: a jacket and a comfy hoodie.
Here are some pics of the comfy hoodie. I paid 40 rmb for it:

Here's the jacket which I couldn't seem to capture properly in the pictures, but you still get the idea. I paid 68 rmb for it. I also tried on some super cute leather shoes that cost 200 rmb (no bargaining possible) but I didn't buy them....although I'm kind of regretting that now.