Squareface @ 31°North

Back at UBC I was learning Beginners’ German from a German PhD student whose lessons were quite fun and engaging. Even though he was unsure of certain grammatic rules, we always forgave him because beads of perspiration would form on his head even in the midst of winter. Our German textbook introduces grammar step by step and we were just getting into past tense. Learning was in short sentences. I was already struggling with so many rules to remember and vocabulary to memorize, but I managed to get by with pastel colours.

Here in Fudan my classmates are done with grammar rules and usages. My current textbook is filled with PASSAGES and during today’s lesson I was completely lost when the teacher read the passage and the class started analyzing sentence structures. Usages and grammatical rules are briefly reviewed in Chinese and I can’t really follow. There’s way too much I need to catch up with, and I’m not sure if I can handle learning a 3rd language with my 2nd language in such a short time. What is 第1-4格respectively? And then there’s 强变化动词，不规则变化动词 (irregular verbs?)，不定式 (indefinite?)，现在时(present tense?)，过去时(past tense?)，完成时…

I am so dead.

If you had to decide between receiving free classes and accommodation for 2 years, and a chance to further broaden your horizons in Canada for one semester, which will you choose?

I’m crossing my fingers that I won’t even have to choose. I really hope the teachers, and the scholarship committee will let me have my cake and eat it.

It is said that under the scholarship regulations, students who 休学 (suspend their studies), will have their scholarship revoked. However, the scholarship committee never met a situation whereby the student suspends her/his studies after obtaining the scholarship for an exchange programme.

The teacher at the FSO knows I am very flustered over this, as I dropped by her office too many times today, and the past week. I hope that helps to make some kind, sympathetic decisions though.

Update: All is well now. I will forgo some portion of the scholarship for next semester while I’m away, and then receive the scholarship as per normal after I get back.

Thank you teachers.

I’m taking a break from blogging religiously. I decided that since there are other aspects of my life that require time off, maybe I should just take time off everything other than studying for my last 2 exams next week, as well as packing for the big move on Monday.

So here’s a post about perhaps nothing in particular, but with some pictures to share! Not as enticing as Celine’s Taj Mahal and all, but I hope it’ll still interest you! Haha.

Man hard at work

The view of Fudan’s Foreign Students’ Office (affectionately known as the FSO) amidst some shrubs

Bicycle dumpster found just next to FSO

FSO

I heard from Shaina that during her time (2005), they had to keep looking at noticeboards like this one in order to get information. Fortunately such info is placed on their website now.

No more classes! Too fast! Too fast! Time, wherefore art thou haste so?

CG said I very “arh” with my Close Reading teacher, Professor Lu, so yeah here’s to show you how “arh” we are (Flickr images are blocked in China):

Professor Lu, Vanessa (Shao Feng), and me (please notice the condition of the classroom):

I’m gonna miss her thought-provoking classes.

As CG pointed out, this is the earliest I ever got to view my timetable for the next semester. I only received my course selection book TODAY at Fudan, when my timetable for my exchange programme at UBC was already up since…*shrugs*

I’m going to try taking 5 modules at UBC, for fear of not being able to transfer certain modules when I’m back, and then not having enough time to complete my remaining modules. I love long weekends, and tried to squeeze my classes into 3 days, making my timetable look like this:

Readjusting the classes gives me a 5-day week like this:

It doesn’t look any better, does it? But at least I get afternoons off on Monday, Wednesday and Friday. Only 5 modules and the timetable looks packed. Suddenly I miss my Fudan timetable and classes…and the fixed 2 hour lunch breaks and 1.5 hour dinner breaks. Hmm.

Because I’m defeated by inertia, and have only filled in the cover page (containing my name and student number only haha) of my Marx paper, I have decided to just post some pictures to entertain whoever may be reading.

You’re supposed to laugh.

Okay, and now to share with you a class lunch picture:

Having sichuan cuisine

I must learn how to pose for pictures from them. (And that’s my teacher jumping!)

During this period last year I was really vexed running around house hunting in the vicinity of school, going to agent after agent, viewing house after house. Out of the many places I saw, I fell for my current one-bedroom apartment. Maybe in more than one sense of the phrase.

There were cheaper alternatives, but there was something about this place that I felt at one with, and so I signed for it, despite certain disagreements with the landlords (husband and wife) before the writing up of the contract. Sometimes I have silent resentment towards my landlords — providing me with cheapskate furniture, making me pay for telephone line and internet cable installation, and there is always renovation going on, so staying at a newly-built place entails this major bane. However, credit must be given to my landlords for running over when something is wrong, and for keeping their word for various stuff. They probably accumulated good karma for that, and have been blessed with a baby girl.

Moving was a laborious undertaking, and I have friends to thank for making it undaunting. Thanks CG! It wasn’t a one-off thing though, I made many trips to and fro before everything was over at the new place.

This was only the first batch.
Here’s how my single-room dormitory looked like:

The move: from Fudan University’s Foreign Students’ Dormitory to a one-bedroom apartment (my current bachelorette pad) in 怡福苑.

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Unpacking was onerous, but I have to thank Sam for making the task easy. It was overwhelming though, it took us an entire day to set the apartment in place. And the toilet choked. It was an experience I hope I will never have to endure ever again in my lifetime, one that I will not elaborate here, but I’ll disclose that it involved hands in plastic bags.

From zero to hello:

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For the past year, this apartment has housed people of different nationalities! One Malaysian, one Italian, one German, four Singaporeans (soon to be five). Close friends, acquaintances, parents, and strangers have all paid a visit to my humble abode for the past year, and now it is time to say farewell.

Come tomorrow, potential tenants will be viewing this place, inspecting and considering whether to occupy the space that has been my sanctuary for the past year.

Okay, bad news first. A classmate who is in several of my classes is suspected to be diagnosed with TB (tuberculosis). Everyone from his class has been contacted to go for an X-ray check-up at the school hospital to make sure it hasn’t spread to any of us. I think that was a good move on the faculty’s part. Thumbs-up for Fudan (or at least the College of Foreign Languages and Literature)!

However, I have the most throbbing headache over a mandatory module of Fudan’s syllabus, VB (Visual Basic, a programming software). Mid-term exam is tonight. My friend, Grace, and I have tried to stop whining about it and really practice, and we can only hope for the best.

Prof. Dr. Roman Herzog Bundespräsident a.D visited Fudan University yesterday!

He spoke about the main problems with European Law Strategies…or more accurately, “Hauptprobleme der europäischen Rechtspolitik”.

I wasn’t aware of his visit until the day itself. My class was notified the previous day that we were to miss our core English class to attend a talk, some talk. I would have brought my camera with me if I knew!

German majors, and somehow only my English class were told that our attendance was mandatory, and later revealed our roles to be space-fillers.

He seemed to have a constant frown.

He spoke German, so although there was a translator who did his job after every paragraph or so, I couldn’t help falling asleep.

I (supposedly) enjoy a one-week break every May due to China’s national holiday to celebrate Labour Day. The formula to be able to have a 7-day holiday works such that we have to replace certain days on the weekend before the break so that we can have 7 consecutive days of holiday.

So, the 7-day holiday is set to be from 1-7 May (Tuesday - the following Monday). 1-3 May are the designated public holidays, and so we have to make up for the loss of precious work/study time on 4 May (Friday) as well as 7 May (Monday), which will be dutifully compensated on 28 April (Saturday) and 29 April (Sunday). In a nutshell, on the last weekend of April, I will have a Friday, Friday (actually Saturday), Monday (actually Sunday), Monday.

Though I won’t be here after the second Friday (Saturday) because I hope I’ll be meeting Sam in Hong Kong by then. Heh.

The notice is official, so I hope there won’t be any surprises (a euphemism for last-minute amendments).