Outsourced

Day 1

Terry was supposed to meet me at the Pudong Airport in Shanghai, but it turns out he never actually purchased a plane ticket. So he wasn't there to pick me up. He did however, have a plan for me to take a bus to Hongqiao Airport and then take a taxi the rest of the way to his home. I attempted to speak Chinese with moderate success to the taxi driver, who seemed to understand what I said, but I didn't understand most of what he said back. Terry's mom says he overcharged me for the taxi fare. Terry bought a ticket and should arrive on wednesday night.

Although the day was pretty crummy up until I actually got to Terry's house, his mom took Hoshino (who had arrived the day before) and I out for a nice dinner. There was some glutenous rice which was really good, and I tried some fried "nine belly fish" which wasn't bad.

Day 2

Hoshino and I took a bus into the outskirts of town, where there were several malls and places to shop. The first thing I bought successfully ordering in Chinese on my own was a bottle of Coca-Cola (yi ping ke kou ke le). Hoshino got a Sprite, which appears to translate into "snow jade". We walked around for several hours, but didn't buy anything else. We made it back to Terry's house alive.

Day 3

Hoshino and I have tried watching television, but I have no clue what the people are saying. So far we've found what appears to be a Chinese Idol, where a guy was trying to sing "Smelly Cat" from Friends. There's also a music video channel that seems to play the same few videos over and over. One channel was showing an episode of Everyone Loves Raymond -- dubbed in Chinese. Ray talks fast.

We've eaten dumplings two days in a row since Terry's mom left on a business trip and his dad has been out on business and is due to arrive tonight. Since Terry is also coming tonight, they were supposed to come back from the airport together. They should have been here by now. Terry's dad just called and said he couldn't find Terry at the airport. I wonder if we should eat something or wait. It's almost 9 pm here.


My parents seeing me off at IAH.


It was raining and gloomy when I got there...


... and I had no clue what was going on. This is me on the bus to Hongqiao Airport.


I thought these buildings looked cool with the vertical hole down the middle.






The traffic here is totally worse than in Houston.


Everybody loves Engrish!