Bachelor Pad

So i Guess some of you were interested to see our living conditions. They may not be the nicest rooms but at least they have air conditioning and a proper toilet. No complaints here

Nice Hat

Suzhou (05.26)

Finally, we got out of Nanjing! Saturdays trip to Suzhou started at about 7 in the morning after a long night at the clubs at 1912 (a bar district by our apartment). Suzhou is a small city about half way to Shanghai. Its supposedly one of the most beautiful canal cities in the area, but seems to be experiencing quite a bit of industrialization and growth. While we were there we went to Zhuo Zheng Yuan (the Humble Administrators Garden), the Suzhou Museum, and a very beautiful Pagoda for which i have no name. I am almost ashamed to say this but, the garden was of the most interest to me. Not because of the beautiful landscape, but because of who i met there...and by met i mean followed around for about 30 min. I was taking pictures and looked up and saw the one and only Natalie Portman. For those of you who don't know, she's the beautiful actress from the new Starwars movies. In case you where wondering, she's just as hot in person as in the movies. Ok, back to school now. The garden was amazing. Apparently, it was built during the ming dynasty in the 14th century and although it has been rebuilt recently, retains many of the same characteristics of the original garden.

After the garden we went to lunch which was better than i had anticipated. On the way jfk decided to try to fit in with the culture but instead just came off looking like a racist American. We then went to the Suzhou museum, a recent installment in the city. It was very nice but i'm still not a huge fan of museums. I'd much rather just experience the city in it current state which is actually what we did next. We had about three hours to kill until our train back to Nanjing so a few of us went exploring. When we got away from the main drag we experienced some very culturally rich areas. After we decided that we were totally lost we hopped into some rickshaws and headed towards the cities pagoda. Unfortunately, our request was lost in translation and we ended up at a "massage" parlor". The drivers all laughed as they called the girls out to the cart and made rude hand gestures. I would explain further but I'm sure you can use your imagination. After that fiasco the drivers actually took us where we asked.

The pagoda was amazing but the hike to the top definitely took it out of us. I didn't realize how out of shape i was until i reached the top and was gasping for air and seeing stars. Thats about it for our excursion. The train back was about as eventful as a train can be. Overall it was a good day. I'm looking forward to more excursions like this one. One more week of hard work and then we will have plenty of time to explore! I cant wait.

Views of the Zhuo Zheng Yuan Garden

Just some shots from around the city

The "nameless" Pagoda

Week 02 (05.22-05.24)

Its been raining for 2 days now and i packed nothing but shorts and t-shirts. The weather makes it kinda hard to enjoy the city, but on the bright side, its conducive to work. And trust me, we've got plenty of that. Todays trip was interesting. In the morning we went to the Ganxi House in Nanbuting. It's one of the few remaining historical buildings in the area. Unfortunately, due to the weather, my pictures didn't turn out. I posted a couple below but they definitely don't do the architecture justice. We have another presentation tomorrow for the urban design project we are working on so I'll probably be pulling another all-nighter at the local tea house. I'm kinda disappointed with the lack of time we are allowed to explore the city but we've been told that our final presentation is on june 2nd, leaving us an entire week of exploration in Nanjing and Shanghai(only about 2 hours away by train) and then the following week in Beijing. I cant wait to do some more drawing, photography, and overall tourist stuff. One more week of hard work!

One of the many courtyards at the Ganxi House

Ganxi House rock garden

Ya, its just a tree but but i liked it

Original furnishing from the early 19th century

Week 01 (05.14-05.21)

Hey everyone!

Hope the beginning of your summer is going well…so far mine is going great. I’ve been in China for a little over a week now and there has been no shortage of excitement. Door to door it took us about 24 hours to get from LA to Beijing, Beijing to Nanjing and then finally to our apartments. Sounds pretty bad but I guess I didn’t mind it.

I’ve come to the conclusion in the past few days that China is crazy! I guess I’ll start with the food. We have been eating the weirdest shit! Our first meal we had black snake, some interesting spiked white fish, and some other shit that was unlike anything I’d ever seen in my life. Since then we’ve had eel a couple times, dried duck blood soup, these eggs that they buried in the ground for a year and then fed us raw, some weird duck liver pastries for breakfast, jelly fish soup, pigeon…and the list goes on. You may not believe this but it all tasted just fine. The best part about the entire situation is, the food is totally cheep! I took out 200 Yuen ($25) the first day we were here and it lasted me about three days which is weird because I was spending quite extravagantly. I played for a huge dinner the second night for 6 of my friends and it cost me $9 with beer and everything. My lunch today cost $.75. Its soooooo cheep!!!!!!!

Besides the food, everything’s about the same…hahha! Wait, no its not. I was at the hospital today (don’t worry, I was their for a friend) and it was the most surreal experience of the entire trip. As I sat in the waiting room, waiting for my friend to finish his appointment, I took the chance to observe the interesting group of people which surrounded me. (Mom, you’ll appreciate this) I watched as a woman repeatedly hocked up phlegm and spit it on the floor in front of her, an act I’ve recently learned is very common throughout the country. As this was going on, an elderly man was chain smoking, numerous men walked around carrying their catheter bag in one hand and their penis in the other, and an enraged elderly man yelled at the nurses. To say the least, it was an eventful morning.

While getting acclimated to the city we’ve also been doing quite a bit of school work and exploring. Our project, in a nut shell, is basically an excursive in urban documentation/research and development which we are doing with a partner from Woodbury and a couple partners from the university in Nanjing we are studying at. I don’t really have anything to show yet, but as soon as I do I’ll post it. I hope it turns out good!

Anyway, I’ll do my best to continue posting information and pictures on this blog as often as I can so that everyone can check out what I’m doing. Feel free to E-mail me any time or leave a comment on this blog. To leave a coment just go to the bottom of the page, select "comment" and start typing. I’d love to hear from all of you. Hope you like the pics.

chinese + American students after our first dinner in China
View of Nanjng from Purple Mountain

New housing blocks on our site in Nanbuting

Cipea's Starchitecture construction site

Zhonghua Gate (1366)