A complete f@#!ing moron

I hereby declare myself a complete fucking moron. Pardon the French, but I do feel strongly about this.

I signed up for Chinese lessons this week and I'm freaking out about how much time I've wasted over the last two years. Ever since I arrived in Asia my strategy has been to pick up languages as I go. The idea sounds nice on paper. Interact with the locals to learn the "real" language and do self study courses. However:

• The locals most likely to want to have meaningful conversations with you (beyond "hello" and "that's will be 20 kuai") are also the ones with the best English skills, and also the ones who are most interested in learning English from you rather than vice versa
• Figuring out your own style of learning gets very expensive as you buy books and sign up for online courses. Not to mention all the wasted time working on texts either too basic or too advanced. And what do you get to show for it? Some notion of independence, I suppose. An oxymoron... how can language be independent?
• Do you naturally strike up conversations with strangers in your own country? I don't. I'm naturally unfriendly; if I'm smiling at you it's because I want something from you. When it was rare that I met mandarin speakers, the language thing would motivate me to start babbling. But nowadays I'm submerged in a mandarin speaking society. I've just got to a point where I view my fellow citizens more as people to avoid bumping into on the street, rather than language partners.

The idea of learning on your own is fundamentally flawed. Now, in my defense I should mention that I did sign up for private tuition in Hong Kong earlier this year. However, I quit after a couple of weeks after I found my tutor was more interested in telling me his life's story in English.

And now I've attended only two classes here in Shanghai. The language institute is called Enjoy Mandarin, I must admit I have no idea how it compares to other schools but there is really nothing I can complain about. And during my fourth group class hour, it suddenly happened. I was sitting there actually conversing in Mandarin, thinking in Mandarin, understanding Mandarin. Don't get me wrong, we're talking about extremely basic Mandarin, but somehow I was suddenly in the language. Why? Because my fellow students are on the same level as me, and the teacher has by now learned my level and so speaks so that we can all understand.

The feeling of suddenly being in the language was amazing. Kind of like when you exercise and hit that point where your body suddenly doesn't feel tired anymore and you feel like you could run and run and run.

Ok so i'm not a complete moron. In two years I've managed to reach up to intermediate level, including learning the bloody characters. But it's not my intelligence that's in question (nor my taste in clothes, which is admirable to say the least). It's my wisdom. If I had joined group lessons two years ago, imagine where I'd be today. I'd probably be fluent. I'd probably have a girlfriend. Today I learned to say "let's calm down and talk about it" in Chinese. How useful that would have been a year ago!

Speaking of girlfriends. The love of my life has reconsidered her advice to me (that I should go screw myself). She's still not listening to any ideas about marriage, kids or Texas. But with my new-found language skills I'm sure I'll soon talk some sense into her.

Great achievements, a three week black hole and some parks

Today is a great day! I have achieved some mind-blowing milestones:

• I've learned the meaning and pronounciation of 780 chinese characters. That's 20 characters away from the official limit of 800 considered 'Intermediate' level. With the characters I know now I can read the comic books of Rin Tin Tin!
• I have fully achieved status of "in Asia". I now have 1) A hong kong ID card 2) a hong kong bank account with a rather useless debit card 3) a one year multiple entry visa to China. I'm, like, so "here".
• I have located a restaurant that serves proper frog here in Hong Kong. None of that brash, spicy stuff from sichuan, nor is the frog drowned in a rice soup. Just a really nice, pungent sauce and they serve the back as well, not just the legs.
  

How wonderful to achieve all this. I feel I deserve some good stuff after maybe not the best time in my life. What happened?

I don't think it's a secret that I have a romantic notion of the "nomad lifestyle". It comes at a cost. I pay through the nose for rooms that are smaller than my suitcase. My insistance on making every decision at the last moment means I get overcharged when travelling- and allways the coolest parties seem to happen yesterday... But, I'm quite happy to accept this: not many people can say they their entire life is contained within a suitcase, or that they could uproot themselves from where they are living and working in 15

The last three weeks been an exercise in enduring the arse end of this lifestyle. It started well. My friend came to visit from Thailand for one night only, and it all felt very jet-set and modern. One night! How crazy! I got a sense of the darkness that was to ensue on my way to meet him at the hotel though. A mild cough. Nevermind I thought. Nevermind that I don't have any immune system whatsoever and am known for being ill in all kinds of ways. Nevermind. Well, that was three weeks of my life down the drain, spent in bed coughing my lugns up with the worst case of bronchitis ever.
Next time I start coughing early during a night of boozing, I'll go home I think.

Of course, I would never have learned all those chinese characters if I hadn't had so much time in bed. Also, I watched the full first season of Desperate Housewifes. What genious!

I did force myself out last weekend- I was about to go mad in that little cupboard of a studio that I live in. I did a park day. Went to Hong Kong park, and to Hong Kong zoological and botanical garden. Hong Kong park is quite amazing, but in the wrong way. It's totally artificial- it's fascinating in a way because it is so unapoligetic. It is obvious that the park designers felt parks should be artificial and that natural ones are just behind the times. So the whole park is full of man-made caves and waterfalls, fountains and sections of grass in regular patterns. And all to the backdrop of the towering sky scrapers. I've attached a photo of what I mean. That's a park, by the way...

The Zoological garden was much more interesting and much more serene. Most of the park was closed off (due to the bird flu maybe?) so there were not so many people. They had some cool birds in big cages, and there was even a leopard there. A bit out of place, but cool nonetheless. I've attached a picture has the leopard in the background, sleeping. And that's me in the foreground. I think you can see I've felt better...