These Past Ten Days

It’s been a long time since I last wrote a blog post. I’ve been at Nongda (Agricultural University) for over 10 days, and a lot has happened. Before I went home, I had thought about writing this article many times, but now that I’m actually writing it, I don’t know where to start… I’ll just write whatever comes to mind.

September 3rd, Registration Day

After arriving at Nongda, I walked through the main building to the registration area, where I met my class advisor, Yang Laoshi (Teacher Yang), who is a bit on the heavier side. He’s a first-year graduate student, only four years older than me. I have a soft spot for people who are a bit overweight . Then, a sophomore senior led my dad and me to buy bedding. When we arrived at the dorm, I sent my dad off and started setting up my own little world. Our dorm room has six people, each with a combination bed that has a bed on top and a desk, wardrobe, and drawers below. After some struggle, during which I made many mistakes, such as using the bed skirt as a quilt cover and the pillowcase as a towel, I finally got my bed sorted out.

Now, let me introduce my roommates

Wu Yu Tao is from Xingtai, Hebei, and looks a lot like my middle school class leader, Li Fan, and also a bit like my high school class leader, Song Xin Fei . Basically, this guy and I are always teasing each other, haha, but that’s a story for later.

Ren Li Xian is from Gaomi, Shandong, and is a hometown buddy of the writer Mo Yan . This guy is very honest, but has a frightening amount of muscle. Luckily, he’s half a head shorter than me. Despite his muscular build, he loves literature and speaks in a very refined way. I’ve had several arm-wrestling matches with him, and the result is always the same - I end up feeling defeated… One evening, I forgot to arm-wrestle with him, and he said, “Don’t you want to experience the feeling of defeat again?”

Wang Yue is from Tianjin , and this guy has a special talent in certain areas… but I won’t say what that is to avoid being indecent. He has a great voice, though. At first, he left our dorm because his leg wasn’t good and he couldn’t climb up to the top bunk. But after a few days, he came back and we changed the bed to a bunk bed. This guy always brings a lot of excitement to our dorm, and every day, he and I team up to tease Tang Bang Yan.

Who is Tang Bang Yan, you ask?

He’s a super silly guy . Wang Yue and I have found evidence of his silliness - he actually put a sticker on his water card that says “water card”, and he has a similar sticker on his meal card… it’s not like he has many cards to keep track of. But despite his silliness, he has his moments of glory - on the night of September 29, 2006, he became the leader of our dorm. That’s a story for later…

Wu Feng Jun is a brother from Dalian, and he doesn’t talk much. When he does speak, he has a strong Dalian accent that makes us dizzy. But this guy never slows down when he talks… actually, he often says surprising things, but sometimes I just don’t understand what he’s saying.

Haha, everyone is very laid-back and united. Remember our united dorm 0641! We’re also members of the 0641 Card Collection Society - if you want to hear more about that, wait for my next post…