The China Diary (6 of 10)

I think this was my longest diary entry.  Took up two whole pages, right down to the bottom line of the second.  The picture of the three unsmiling ladies from yesterday pertains directly to the lunch restaurant referenced in the entry below.  My bad.

And I can't spell 'proficiency'.  Other than that, I've been impressed to date with my spelling and grammar from 17 years ago, if not at all with my levels of creativity and introspection.

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Thursday, 23rd March 1989
Hua Ting Guest House
Shanghai

Today I got up and had "breakfast", if you can call it that down in the dining hall.  We then went to a local middle school and saw a couple of their classrooms.  After the school, we went to a local farm and saw the people's house and surrounding area.  After the farm house, we went to a carpet factory and it's amazing at the proficientcy of the workers there.  We then went to a nearby jade factory and it was amazing at the intricacy of the work.  Then we went to a real dump for lunch that had the windows open and had no heating and it was raining.  Most of the food I wouldn't have fed to a dog.  After that enlightening experience we went back to our hotel for a couple hours and then left to a hotel on the other end of city for dinner.  The squid (I didn't know what it was when I ate it) was okay, but quite chewy.  I didn't bother to venture to try the fish head soup.  We then came back to the hotel and Mike and I went to the Sheraton next door and all I bought was a lollipop.  We then came back, did some visiting, and then came to my room, got changed and started writing this.  Not as good as Hong Kong, but not a bad day overall.

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Do you remember those days when it was really cool to fold your jean cuffs over and then roll them up so that they were both tapered AND riding high on your ankle?  I think it was a fad that lasted for about a week.  I was all over it.

Five of our intrepid nine that travelled to China.  That's Julie, Asha, Julie, me and Stan.  Two Julies.  (The father of one of the Julies, incidentally, owned the Denver Broncos.  Circa 1989 of course.  Still may; I've never really given a rat's ass about the NFL.  13 points if you can guess her last name.) And I totally had a crush on Asha in the worst way.  Especially after we got back from China.  I remember I got my hands on her address (you thought I was going to say something other than 'address' there didn't you?  Pervert.)  Anyway, I got my hands on her address and tried to mail her some mementos from the trip, along with a letter, as a discrete sign that I was interested.

I was crushed when the letter came back returned.  And I never made any more gestures of solicitation towards her.  Ran fresh out of gumption.  Piece of advice?  If you want to send a pair of chopsticks to someone in the mail, don't stuff them into a letter-sized envelope, affix regular postage and expect them to get there.  Because you, too, will be crushed when they come back undeliverable.  And all your optimistic dreams of falling in love and having babies and maybe one day getting to touch her boobies will crumble into adolescent ruin when you read those three indelible words:

Return To Sender.

Comments

[Mark]

So there was a reason that you're always around girls in these pictures (apologies to Stan in this case, but I thought he was a girl until I read the caption).

[JuJuBee]

Awww...

We also did that to our jeans. Unfortunately our "trend" seemed to last longer than a week or so. I believe we called it "pegging" our jeans. *shiver*

[Linda]

I remember the jeans fad but was too old to participate that time. It's due to come around again soon.
Tales of unrequited love tear me up. I just can't stand it! Have. To. Go. NOW! *wah!*

[Mark]

Sadly, the jeans rolling-up lasted longer in our school, too. Oh, and most of the guys wore leather Eastland boat shoes. I guess they were called topsiders, or something like that. Anyway, there was some nasty foot odor floating around, but nobody every mentioned it.

[anne arkham]

Hi right back!