THE Lowly Peon

china: first [third?] impressions 
23 January 2008, 5:13am

so here i am in the middle kingdom for the third time. this time, however, is vastly different from any visit i've made before— i have no set return date (though do NOT tell the chinese government that... i had to show them my credit card to prove that i could buy a ticket home, and convince them that i was going to leave in less than 60 days). i arrived here in hangzhou after a nightmare of a trip, totaling roughly 53 hours, including several hours spent in line, about 3 hours on runways, 2 hours on highways, and nearly 20 in the air.the apartment is fantastic— way better than the one in houston. there's a nice pool in the complex, gardens all over the place (pretty ones... much like the chicago botanic gardens' japanese gardens, for those of you from chicago). there's a nice workout facility as well. my apartment has a beautiful balcony, as well as the necessities (wifi, heat, water, in that order). it's great! i hope to post some photos of that soon.all in all, it's been great so far. i haven't had much time to explore, as i arrived late monday, worked tuesday, and then fell asleep at 8pm (yikes!). but i hope to do some tonight, and then on saturday, daisy and i are headed to downtown hangzhou. i'm very excited!sidenote: i decided i shouldn't take any time off work to see bjork with maggie33, though i'm still gonna go see her for a few days in korea. yay!anyway, i hope to post some more about little details, but for now, i think that'll do. keep in touch! i'm GTM+8 (so 14 hours ahead of CST), and i'll be skype/chat-able a lot. yay for china!