Wo de fangzi

So I'm finally getting settled in my new house and I love it! My new address in China, if you didn't get my email, lost it, or just want to copy it again, is:

610065,中国,四川省,成都

四川大学教务处215办公室

Sarah Widder

I live in a 15 building complex with security guards out front. All the buildings are pink. I live with another girl from my program named Laura and an administrator from Chuan Da (an abbreviation for Sichuan Daxue, it's like saying UW) named Li Juan. It's Li Juan's apartment and we are renting our rooms from her. We have a kitchen, a living room, a bathroom, a patio and a balcony. My room has a big window and a big bed and a closet. The closet looks big, but I only use a small part of it. I don't have that many clothes. I bought the sheets at Hou You Duo (means good and many in English) AKA Trust-Mart and i think they are very bright and fun. We have all hardwood floors which is very nice too. And we have a washing machine outside on the patio and we hang clothes up to dry on the balcony. The complex also has a little garden and a swimming pool and a basketball court, but it's nighttime so I can't take pictures of those. The part that is the most different is the bathroom. Yes, we have a squatty potty. If you don't know what that is, you can try to look at the picture. It's basically a like an empty toilet bowl set in the floor that you squat over. Sometimes they are not that nice and it is literally a hole in the ground or some sort of concrete through thing. But you always squat to go to the bathroom in China. Also, the shower is just a shower head in the wall. There is no curtain or anthing, it just sprays on the floor. It's no big deal, but it gets the floor all wet and then it gets dirty from all the dirt on our feet. I also really like living with Li Juan. She is a great resource and is really nice. We speak Chinese alot at home and she helps us alot. She also gives us chances to practice, like in the morning she'll ask us where we are going or ask us "what did you do today?" at the end of the day. It's really nice because it's alot less pressure than just speaking on the street and I get to try to use new words and say things I don't quite know how to without worrying as much about saying it wrong. She also has shown us how to take the bus and lots of other things. It's also nice because the house came completely furnished. Most apartments in China come "furnished", which means they have a bed and a refrigerator and a microwave and a TV and maybe a desk or a table, but not much else. Li Juan already has bowls and chopsticks and a wok and a couch and everything we would ever need. Plus we have really nice wireless internet too, already set up. It's a little farther away from campus than most, but Laura and I are going to buy bikes on Saturday at the stolen bike market and then we can bike to school instead of taking the bus. On the bus it take about 20 minutes or so in the morning, because it is rush hour, so it takes about an hour from the time we leave our house to walk to the bus, take the bus and walk to class. Biking should be much faster because the walking part will be shorter and it's only about a mile and a half or two miles to school. The bus just stops alot on the way there. I know the stolen bike market sounds bad, but it's not. It's really where you have to buy your bike if you don't want your bike to get stolen and end up there. Plus it's way cheaper. Well, it's getting late and I have a little homework to do before I go to sleep. I'm going to get up early tomorrow and try out the swim club they have here too. It meets from 6-9am every morning all year, but its an outdoor pool so we'll see how that goes.