Padd Solutions

Spent half the day trying to get my damn money that I'd had transfered over from the UK. The money was originally sent to tide me over until pay day, but it took so long to get the money, it's almost pay day now! The irony being that the money was at my bank the day after it was sent, but for some reason they don't know if you actually want them to put it into your account (desipite explicit instructions to do so.) So I went down to the bank and said "Yes, please put the X dollars into my account."

So they did.

Literally.

I had American dollars sitting in my Chinese bank account. Unable to get them out in Chinese yuan, and the bank didnt even have enough US currency to give me the greenbacks. Then I needed to fill in a form to get in converted to Chinese money, and of course then I needed my passport; which I don't have because it's been sent off for my residents permit, etc, etc, etc.

Eventually I got my money, and all is well in the world.

Found quite a nice restaurant for lunch, the owner brought some turtle soup over to us which was quite nice! I didn't think I'd like that at all!

After that we went shopping with my new found fortune. I just went around buying all the stupid looking small things I'd wanted to try, but felt bad borrowing money from Tim to purchase. As you can see below, I spent wisely.

That thing in the pink packaging.... powdered pork meat. I'll let you know how that goes down. So far I've only tried the things in the green box, but they get two thumbs up.

In the evening we bumped into our skater friends again and did another few hours of skating. I borrowed a guy's skates and lent him my shoes. He seemed over the moon at my genuine DCs, hahaha. Eventually he had to go home, so I got my shoes back and he got his skates. The remaining skaters frantically phoned their friends looking for another pair of skates for me to borrow, they wanted me to go for a high-speed skate all through the streets of Weinan.

This sounds incredibly awesome, but stupidly dangerous. Natually I told them I'd join them for that on Friday. :D Can't wait.

Off to Xi'an for my Aston training tomorrow. I'll be staying in a hotel there overnight, but I have a feeling that I'll have internet access there! (I'm currently writing this from said hotel.) But, as always you'll have to tune in tomorrow to find out how all that was.

Cya! :D

We went for a walk determined to find a new restaurant and found the nicest ribs evar. Mmmm... the meat just fell off the bone and was super tasty, even without sauce. Chinese people really don't seem to "do" sauces. You don't really get chicken in Satay sauce, or ribs in BBQ sauce. I guess that's maybe more of a Cantonese thing.

In the evening we met up with our skater friends, but there were only 3 of them this time. I tried borrowing one of their skates, but they were just too small, I had sores on my feet after only 10minutes.

Fun fact of the day: The Chinese invented Ice Cream in about 2000BC.

My new gang:

^ This is where I list there names from left to right. Can't remember / pronounce any of them. :(

The day started with a demo class by Rob. After that me and Tim started walking around town to take photos.

We eventually started taking photos of some kids roller blading, they were really, really good... anyway, I wanted to talk to them, so Tim totally sucked as my wingman, and left me to go say "hi" on my own. Between them they spoke about 10 words of English, but through a lot of miming and a lot of awkward pauses, we became introduced. Immediately they wanted me and Tim to join in with the skating. Tim's feet were too big for any of their skates (Chinese people have tiny feet, I had the skates from the tallest guy.) Tim didn't seem upset by his bad luck, and instead opted to laugh at me for the rest of the afternoon. 

^ Backwards one-footed slaloms

^ Erm... backwards no-footed slaloms!

^ Ain't no thing

^ One of the guys trying to teach me

^ More bad attempts from yours truly

^ Me and my new instructor / friend

^ Wooooosh, check me out

^ and backwards too!

^ Boys got skills

^ Gettin' funky

^ two thumbs up

^ Shamone!

^ There were some pretty good beats playing throughout!

^ Awwwwwwww!

^ Kapow!

^ A seriously hot chick.

^ Lots of people just stopping to watch

^ Combats seem to be the order of the day

^ Everyone was better than me... even the girls :P

They were pretty keen to hang out some more in the future. It could be interesting with the language barrier. We've already asked their name and their age... from here on in, the questions get hard!

The night finished with Tim and Aya around here watching a DVD. Around midnight they left to go back to their place... only to find out they're locked out! So, they just returned to my place... I'll let you know how comfy my sofa is tomorrow!

Hmmm... that's really all that happened today.

So, what about you guys? I love my blog because I get to tell all of you at once what I've been upto, but I never get to hear what ya'll are doing. So, send me an email or leave a comment letting me know how you are, and what's new for you.

Oh, and if you feel cheated by the short length of this blog post, check out this article:

Its a very interesting read that summarises the state of China quite well. It's about the billions spent on buildings in Beijing, and how they're now all just sitting empty. For example the Bird's Nest stadium that was built for the olympics has just one event scheduled this year, yet the stadium costs $9,000,000 a year just to maintain.

Oh... and I totally just found my lens cap! It was in my bag all along. Well, now I have a spare :P

Oh, and because I don't like blogging without a photo... here's a picture Aya took of me that looks like I'm trying to poop!

What a nice image to leave you all with. :)

Oh, and I just noticed how much I say "oh,..." :P