Finally in Xining

It been a very tumultuous week that we've spent in Xining. It would take to long to write about, so I will share some highlights:

1. Drinking and Yak's tongue. The beer in this city is very warm. Some Tibetan cuisine consists of cold yak tongue and rough cuts of mutton that are more or less fat. It was a rude awakening to be treated to a meal of these two and the warm beer on my second day in town.

2. Cleaning my filth-hole. Ligaya and I have spent a lot of time cleaning out the putrid dirt trap that is my apartment. The last volunteer (I won't name names) felt that to any sort of cleaning for two years or to clean up after herself when moving out was too much work. Everything in the apartment was caked in a half-inch of dust and/or cooking oil. The curtains were nearly black, the walls smudgeable, and the dishes filled with dried food offerings. I threw out so much trash (which was promptly intercepted and taken by Chinese trash-diggers when I took it to the street), and there is much much more. I still have several frightening bras to dispose of.

3. Other foreigners. The foreigners here seem to be in three major groups: a) The tourists and the transient. Not so many of these people, they supposedly clear out when the winter comes. b) Missionary folk. There are very young families all over the city. The adults are shy of 30 and the children all very very young. As its illegal to do their work here, the missionaries are language students or language teachers de jure and convert heathens de facto. I still have not talked to any of the missionaries, but am sure to next week, as they are my teaching buddies! c) ETP people. We've hung out with these dudes a lot, a lot of fun, a lot of passion. They teach for the Tibetan teaching program, and I will be working with them as well, as I will also be an ETP teacher. I get the feeling that they don't hang out with the missionaries very often. Doing cultural preservation work is no doubt somewhat at odds with proselytizing.

That's all for now, teaching starts in only 2 days! Lord help me!