Taking off....soon

I am currently taking a break from packing for a quick update.

Tomorrow I leave for New York City, Friday my flight is at noon and arrive in Beijing 1:50 PM China time and 1:50 AM EST.

I will be staying with a family that is friends with my professor for a few days, while I get settled and look for an apartment. I am really excited about the opportunity to live with a Chinese family and see how they live.

In terms of my school, all I really know for sure is that registration is August 30 and 31st. After that, I don't know anything else about it that isn't on wikipedia or found through a google search. Their website is awful and of no use unfortunately perhaps because the school isnt a popular one among westerners.  At least from what is available online.

Here are some links if you want to take a look. The last link is also a great forum for anything China-related and is where I have spend many hours!

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/University_of_Science_and_Technology_Beijing
http://en.ustb.edu.cn/
http://oice.ustb.edu.cn/en/internationalstudents.asp
http://www.chinese-forums.com/index.php?/index

Thats all for now. The next post will be from China, whenever I get internet access!

Indescriptionable

Now less than two weeks away from my departure, I have come to realize that the planning, preparing and packing are the easiest parts of this move, especially when you consider I can only pack two suitcases. Consider, when I went off to college I probably filled up a whole car or two. Altogether, you quickly figure out whats important and what is not.

Really the most daunting part of this whole thing, as I have come to experience it seems to be of the idea of"the move". The sheer magnitude of this move only hit me when I realized that I have to pack ALL of my important possessions into two suitcases, had to buy a one-way plane ticket and that I am moving somewhere where I know three of 1.3 billion people! Its very mind-numbing at times, yet thoroughly exciting and exhilarating at others. I hope that everyone at some point in their lives gets to feel the way I am feeling.

And now that I have shared this with you at 4 AM EST, I can attempt to clear my mind and get a good night sleep!

Hello An Introduction

Hey everyone. This is my first blog entry about my move to China.  I intend to keep things as up-to-date as possible with many pictures (with my snazzy new camera) and posts about my activities. If I remember correctly, my last blog about traveling to China received much criticism from my parents about not posting enough so I will attempt to rectify things in that regard this go around.

A few of my many interests includes politics and sociology, and so I predict this blog will have a fair bit of both. But obviously I intend to include much about my personal life, experiences and schooling.

In case anyone has lived under a block or is reading this for the first time, I am moving to Beijing, China for two years on August 27th. The first few days I will be staying with a Chinese family (thanks to my amazing professor, for whose guidance I dont think any of this would be possible) and searching for an apartment to call my own. The purpose of this trip is for me to master the language of Chinese, or at the very least become fluent in it. I have been studying for a year or so but I am one of those people that needs the constant, day-to-day immersion to learn a language.

I will be studying at the University of Science and Technology Beijing, not my first choice, but I was awarded a Chinese Government Scholarship, so I cannot complain, and they picked this school for me. I am looking forward to beginning my studies and adventures in China.

Stay tuned for more to come...