After living in China for seven months, things start to become the usual. I was talking with my mom the other day and I was telling her, oh I didn't feel like going out yesterday so I ordered food in. She was shocked that I could actually order food in so easily. Everywhere in Beijing delivers food to your door, including McDonalds. The biggest key is to know your address in Chinese (Thankfully I do!) I have gotten use to the idea that I can have anything I want basically delivered to my door, except mail! (If I want mail I have to have it mailed to work!)
You also get excited over the smallest things in China. I went to the grocery store the other day and they had dole bananas. You don't realize how delicious a dole banana is until you don't eat one for seven months. Any type of western food in the stores gets you all giddy inside. Knowing you have a bag of Doritos waiting for you in your bag, is sadly very exciting. Planning your day around a trip to Burger King is also very sad. (Not that I have done that....)
Even finding western clothes is tricky. I went to the mall the other day and they were playing Footloose and Kiss Me, old songs from the 80's/90's. Good songs but old. Then I go in the stores and realize that a lot of the clothes in the stores are from the 80's and 90's. Now Beijing is not the fashion capital by all means. People wear the weirdest things here. Shorts with black tights, fur baseball caps, high heel furry boots, orange furry vests, fifty housewives clothes. Needless to say finding Western clothes is not easy, I will probably come home wearing the new Beijing/China style and think I am normally dressed!
There are many good things about living in China. I think one of them is the excitement over small things. You get excited over blue skies, warm days, someone holding the door for you, a guy helping you carry your suitcase down two flights of stairs, someone running after you to give you 1 rmb you dropped on the floor, and clean toilet seats.
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