Time to Go

And be fabulous and make art.

A Good Day for a Walk

It was a good day for a walk, and just generally a good day overall.

Still getting in my 10,000+ steps per day. I’m seeing some results too, which is nice.

Some good things are starting to be habits now. I don’t know how or why they are sticking, but they are sticking. I might skip a day, but it’s rare. I guess it’s not striving for perfection, but consistency.

Dumplings for Breakfast

Today, through one of my school contacts, I got to meet the dean’s son, and to have breakfast at a place near my apartment.

My contact warned me the place wasn’t too elegant. But I said I didn’t mind; there were lots of Mexican places that didn’t look great back home, but the food was really good.

The dumpling place was very popular; people lined up to get either pork or veggie dumplings. You had to walk through the kitcthen to get to the dining room, so that was interesting. The dining room was a bit deceptive; there was another dining room off to the side, so it was much bigger than I expected it to be.

The dean’s son was a very pleasant young man. He spoke about some trauma he had experienced in the past. After breakfast, my contact took me back to my apartment and I told the young man to keep in touch. He explained he wasn’t very social, and I said I understood.

The whole experience was really nice on a beautiful day.

The Lost Art of Conversation

I think it was on Facebook recently, that I saw a short video that summed up dating now as well as in the 1700s.

Whoever did this video had a sense of humor. It showed two guys sitting on a couch, one saying to the other, “I wish to fornicate.” A footman (servant? butler?) brought oil portraits of young women, where one of the guys dismissed them for some reason or another. Of course, the woman with large breasts was chosen.

So a raven was summoned to send a message to the fair maiden. Took months. And when she unrolled it, all it said was, “hey.”

I had to laugh, because every so often, I get messages from men that have the stunning range of, “hey,” “hello,” “hi,” and occasionally, “what are you wearing?”

No joke. Here’s a string of messages I got from some guy years ago:

I hope we can video chat soon

hey gloria

how are you

I’m sorry to hear that

I’m sorry to hear that what are you doing today

That’s nice. Can I ask what are you wearing

Hello

hey

What are you doing right now

Hello

good morning

Good morning

Of course, if you talk about sex, it doesn’t get much better, but it seems that once you get guys on that topic, they can string more than two words together.

Why aren’t people into dating anymore? Well, it’s kind of obvious.

This Week’s English Corner

We played Talking Hearts and one of the questions was what do you miss about last year?

I didn’t answer it, but I thought last year, we didn’t think things could get any worse.

Joke’s on us, I guess!

Sixth Tone For What’s Going on in China, in English

Every so often, I’ll go to Sixth Tone, an English-language paper that has interesting features about China.

For example, a few years back, there was a student who tried living for free for about a month. She hung out in fancy hotels and made do with sneaking into places. She faked being rich. Not surprisingly, this was an art student’s project.

Another article was about elderly people getting into video games.

And a more recent article was about how divorced Chinese women are searching for other divorced Chinese women for support. They share chores, cooking, child care duties and basically provide a safer, cohabitive space for themselves and their children. I had my students read this article and also Judy Syfer’s satirical essay, “I Want a Wife,” written back in 1971.

If you’re interrested in reading the articles, the Sixth Tone one is available here:

https://www.sixthtone.com/news/1017507

Syfer’s essay is available here: https://www.thecut.com/2017/11/i-want-a-wife-by-judy-brady-syfers-new-york-mag-1971.html

But you can read it for free here: https://msanaknudsen.weebly.com/uploads/9/3/6/8/9368722/i_want_a_wife.pdf

Another Tuesday…

Tuesdays go by very quickly, and today was no exception. It was interesting to see how the exercise in instructions turned out. Students had to fold a piece of paper as per my instructions, without knowing what it was going to be. Most of the classes got it, especially after I went throught the process again, with visuals.

But my last class of the day got it right from the start.

I’m sure a few of them thought by the size of the paper I handed out it was going to be some origami animal, but no, just an ordinary paper airplane.

That air raid siren during my first class this morning was a bit of a shock though. A student sent me a message saying it was just a practice drill. But with the war in the Middle East, anything could happen. It made the last half hour of class a bit of a problem. Lecturing was impossible. And they didn’t give precise times for all of the air raid sirens. It would have been nice if they had said they were going to go off at 9:43, 9:55 and 10:00, but no.

I know it was practice, but still a bit unnerving.

Walka, Walka

I did 14,063 steps today. A gorgeous day to walk, too.

A Nice, Productive Sunday

Good weather, grocery shopped, exercised, and read out on the balcony too. But a bit tired. And relieved.