USA, USA, USA

This is the first time I've ever used a blog. I'm glad that's out of the way.

I never understood the purpose of a blog until I met a poet whilst on a 45 mile bike ride. I got to talking with her about how she's visited Mongolia and China and hitchhiked across America. She really was quite interesting. Often times, I try to look intrigued in conversation with strangers but only because I have to. But this poet was really one of a kind. I admire her desire for adventure.

Anyway, here I am blogging on a blog about China but I haven't even mentioned it yet. Well, that's because I'm not in China yet. In just a week I will be leaving for Beijing, China with my dad. After numerous emails and countless times of attaching my resume to my letter of interest to about a dozen publishing companies and newspaper corporations, I finally landed an internship at the Foreign Language Teaching and Research Press. For a couple of days we will be lodging at my father's friend's place and we'll see what we should do from there.

The other thing I'm planning to do there is start up an English class for students in elementary school. I hope to familiarize myself with some of the locals, so much so that they feel comfortable sending their children to me to learn English. And I mean, why not? An American student is traveling to China who hopes to teach children English from the goodness of her heart. Come on now.

At this point, I haven't started packing or shopping for this 6 week trip which is poor planning on my part. I'm pretty sure I'm just daunted by the fact that I have to pack for a whole 6 weeks. How do I even start?