Back at Home

"Nous passons le temps de la journée à oublier combine le temps passe."

(We pass the time of day to forget how time passes.)

-Hipolito…Amélie

 

            I've been back at Kaili now for about a month.  When I first arrived back, I was expecting to have to clean up the mess I'd left behind in my apartment.  The night before vacation, I had an electrical fire and got to fulfill my lifelong dream of pulling the pin on a fire extinguisher.  Unfortunately, covering half of my home in anti-fire powder was not part of my fantasy.  To my surprise, none of the mess I had left was there when I got back.  Instead, it was somebody else's mess that welcomed me home.  Apparently, the apartment above me had also had some sort of fire, but they decided to put it out the old-fashioned way – gallons and gallons of water.  The water came through my ceiling and soaked my apartment thoroughly until the apartment below me noticed the leak in their ceiling.  By this time, my floorboards had warped, my bed was ruined, and the paint on my walls had peeled off almost entirely.  Luckily, my school had some cleaners come by and fix what they could.  I guess the workers felt like they weren't adequately paid however, because they also swiped my leather gloves, a 2012 calendar, and a bottle of rice wine on their way out.  All in all, I'm glad they cleaned the bulk of the mess, and I only had to sweep up the newly fallen paint chips, replace my broken water heater, and put new blankets on my bed.

            After dealing with the initial problems, I just got to relax for 3 weeks while waiting for school to start again.  It was so great to spend time watching movies, studying Chinese, reading books, playing basketball, and waiting to get hungry enough to eat my next meal.  Since coming to China, I'd been spending almost all of my time trying to 'make the most' of every minute.  It was nice to simply sit around and watch time pass for a change.  Naturally, problems arose that I had to deal with: hunger, tiredness, or my kitchen being so cold that my olive oil freezes in the jar.  I dealt with these problems in stride and just continued with the next movie on my movie list.  Life has enough little quirks without your neighbor needing to flood your house with water.  I'm glad I got to clear my plate before classes started again, I'm rested and refreshed for my second semester.