Bedlam at 698 (China)- Chapter 3- First thoughts

1st Day!

I wake early, after a surprisingly good night’s sleep, eager to get to the school early and see what was in store for me. I get taken to the head office and a new girl shows me around the whole place and then I get told to go and buy a phone. So I needed to get my money changed. To what I can only imagine as to keep an eye on what I am spending and what on, I have to have my passport and fill in a long ass form before I can get the money changed, it took about 2 hours. Then the girl had to go back to the school and I am told that I start teaching 8.30am the next day. On reflection I think about the school and how I only saw one other male, the cook.

So I want to go and do some shopping and see Nanchang city centre, it took me about 2 hours to find, I feel great when I manage to buy an internet cable and other things by my self. And after a while I decide to sit down for a bit. This is when I have enough.

While finding the city centre I walked through the not so nice parts of the city, the back street shops where people try and drag me into there house, I have no idea why! Everyone is staring at me, one guy fell off his moped because he was looking at me. But while sitting down I was a standing target. 4 or 5 people gathered around me at once and started tugging at my clothes poking my nose and rubbing any part of my skin they could see, mainly my face. This was too much for me for one day. Music on, head down, fast walk home.

Shit im lost. Right find the massive bridge and go over the river I should be fine. While standing on a corner a moped pulls up to me, what the fuck, leave me alone! But then he tells me to get on, ive been walking for around 5 hours today, im fed up and I just want to get home and get on the net and hopefully speak to some friends back home. So I hop on, point to the bridge in the distance and and we shot off. The way people drive hear is nothing short of hectic, a horn is more important on any sort of vercal than a steering wheel. Over the bridge I tell him left and then right thinking this was my street. It wasn’t, not to look like a twat I told him here would be fine. 20rmb (£2), I think I got ripped but it was an experience, the taxis in Nanchang range from a big wheel barrow to a new Honda accord. It was another hour before I got home, I tried to use the internet and it didn’t even work. I feel asleep sitting up, then woke up at 5am to the flashes of lightning and thunder, and then couldn’t get back to sleep as thoughts of what the hell im meant to teach tomorrow creeped into my head.