Lots to talk about

Sorry it's been so long since my last post, but now that classes have started it's getting more and more hectic. I promise I'll get better at posting regularly. But now that classes have started I'll make sure to post at least once a week.

But in the meantime I have a good bit to talk about.

Three days ago we took a tour of Shatin, a city near the university. It's known for having lots of malls and shopping centers. It's absolutely gigantic. Not only is it about seven stories tall, but there are other malls in the mall. You can find anything you'd ever need there not to mention it costs $4 HK (about fifty US cents). To make things easier I purchased an Octopus Card (pictured above). You can use it in Hong Kong as sort of a prepaid card for using the subway, taxis, and even certain stores take Octopus Cards as payment options.

But of course the relaxing days had to come to an end as classes started this week. Three hours of Mandarin in the morning, and two more in the afternoon with a two hour break in between. My first class is extremely difficult, but I know it'll help me learn more characters and words. It gets even tougher when we have to do our homework in the evening since it's all in Chinese, even the instructions. The first night everyone was working on the homework together and we had no idea what to do.

My afternoon class doesn't have as much new vocabulary, but it's more focused on speaking. The teachers only speak Chinese during class, so it's definitely hard to understand them sometimes. But in the long run it will benefit me since the best way to learn a language is to immerse yourself in it.

Again I want to apologize for not posting in a while, and sorry for not having any pictures of Shatin. I never have my camera when I really need it. But next time I go I'll be sure to bring my camera for pictures.

And if you read what I posted on Facebook, I had a very interesting experience at breakfast today. They had French Toast on the menu, so I ordered it wondering how different it would be from the French Toast back at home. It turns out in Hong Kong French Toast is a deep-fried Peanut Butter sandwich. I think I'll stick to regular toast and butter from now on.