Sunday, September 11, 2005

A Short Interaction to Illustrate Why I Love China

Me: I can't believe it's so close to the middle of September.
Donny: I can’t believe we're so close to being detained for not having a residence permit.

Living in China cracks me up. There are all of these laws hanging over my head - much more so than in the U.S. - and I’m just living with them like they’re nothing. They’re immediately relevant to my life, too. If I don’t have that residence permit by the 25th, I’m getting thrown in jail if there’s a surprise check. I’ll be fined when I get the residence permit, too, if I get it late.

The school is supposed to be aiding us in processing the residence permit, but they keep telling us to go away and come back at later dates to turn in the rest of the forms. The most recent date I received to come back is the 12th, which is tomorrow. Hopefully they’ll take my forms and money then. I’d rather stand in line for a few hours to get that taken care of than get thrown in prison.

Though, actually, today at lunch we were discussing how our wooden slabs of beds are not even as nice as beds in prisons in the states. People get some kind of mattress in those cells. They don’t know how easy they have it. I’m telling you – China’s got me ready for anywhere.

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