The China Southern Airlines stewardesses are all in love with me. I can tell by the way they furtively glance at me as they pass by and by how as they pass me my glass of orange juice they hope to brush my hand with theirs. However, what makes it most obvious is when their big green eyes look into my brown ones and they ask me "rice or noodles," they suddenly can hardly speak Chinese at all. Here is me holding them close to my heart, as they made me promise!

But the reason that I was on a plane at all was to visit a certain Ms. Christina Liao! (So there, MEIV--China has at least one benefit!:) She is in Lanzhou, China and has, if I do say so myself, a fabulous apartment/dorm thing. If she could somehow extricate the fact that it's China's most polluted city, she might be completely set. But it was a great time visiting her, she taught me Chinese chess and then beat me at it (which I am glad about!), and we even had blueberry milk tea to go with a lot of conversations. I hope to see her again, maybe in February.


Bamboo flute. My proficiency has not been increasing as much recently, mostly due to the fact that I have not been practicing. But as a man newly finished with class (only review and exams to go) I intend to redouble my efforts. Which would have me praticing at least twice a week. For your viewing pleasure, I want to present the Infinitely Talented Li Laoshi and his suspicious looking apprentice, Zongke.All in all, I have slightly less than two more weeks, then I'll be home to relax, visit, and mostly watch football. I have not seen a game since last January, so it's getting desperate. Zongke, out.