Moving sucks

It's three weeks before I leave 中国/China, but I've already managed two rounds of packing stress. First was the frantic last-minute helping Ariel get her stuff together, immediately followed by packing my own stuff and moving.

In China it's common to pay three months rent in advance. This advance payment was due for my apartment on June 1. On May 26 my roommates decided to tell me that I either had to pay all 3 months up front and risk losing three-fourths of that if we didn't find someone to take my room after I left, or I had to leave immediately.

To be fair, since I'm never at my place communication can be hard, and I perhaps unreasonably assumed that I could just pay the extra 3 weeks and they would deal with the rest. On the other hand, cell phones do exist and I told them a month ago that I'd be leaving June 21, so they had plenty of time to spring this on me. Ironically I paid for the room for 8 months, and the only time I really needed it was when I was kicked out of it.

Fortunately Justin's roommate left on June 1 and that room was open for a month, so this problem was easily solved. Don't know what I would have done otherwise. It's twice as expensive but nicer and more convenient to classes, so I consider myself lucky.

Yesterday being the first day I've been able to relax in awhile, and my first internet access in awhile, I went overboard with about 9 hours of reading news and blogging about the contradictions in the American economic elite. 汉语/Chinese class continues with ever more exciting lessons on Chinese holidays. I also tried going back to 한국어/Korean class, but they were too far ahead of me and the teacher wasn't very good, so I guess I'll pretend to myself that I'll do it on my own.

Now that I have access to a computer with foreign language capabilities, expect my exciting primer on Korean food soon!