If you know me you know that I hate living alone so when one of my good Chinese friends said she needed a place to stay for awhile I offered mine. If you are not a foreign teacher living in the hotel like Jordan or Ariana then the school gives you an entire townhouse all to yourself. This means that on the second floor I have a completely unused second bedroom and bathroom.
I am absolutely thrilled to have Qin Chen as a roommate. Recently, Ken (teacher from last year), wrote a really nice mini-biography of Qin Chen on his blog if you are curious to know a little more about her. Most of the time I hardly even know she is living here because she has to work so much. She leaves for work at like 7am (before I am even up) and gets home at like 8pm at night. Most of the time she even has to work on Saturdays. I don't know how she does it - the long hours and the extra work that Chinese managers require of fresh graduates is maddening to me.
Not only now do I have some to hang out with and watch girly movies with (we watched Pretty Woman last night!) but she is also patiently helping me with Chinese. It is also fun to notice all the tiny differences between our lifestyles due to growing up in different cultures. For example, she likes to snack on vastly different things than I do. She will bring home: blueberry milk tea, dried fish, spicy chicken feet, dried noodles, odd crackers of sorts and flavored watermelon seeds. Qin Chen is one of the most generous people I know in China and is always giving me her food and urging me to try new things. I'm trying and I appreciate the effort, but I usually fall back on the old favorites of potato chips and oreos.
Some other interesting differences are that she is on QQ (Chinese instant message/chat program) way more than I am, she showers at night, she washes her underwear by hand, she only drinks hot water or hot tea/coffee and she has a lot less free time and time to relax than I do. It's also really fun when Qin Chen brings friends over to hang out. Recently Zhen Zhen has been hanging out a lot and this weekend Carrie is staying over as well. I told her that she should have some friends move in during the two month break in January and February when I will be gone traveling - I am sure she will host some wild parties in my absence.
Hey, very interesting blog. Why do some teachers stay in a hotel and some stay in a townhouse?
It's what's available and whatever you prefer. Both places have their advantages and disadvantages.