Goodbye Germany, Hello China!

During my last week in Germany I

Had Italian ice-cream,
Had coffee and cake at 4 o'clock in the afternoon,
Spent about 2 hours waiting for various trains,
Went to an oldtown beer festival,
Watched the Germany-Scotland game in said oldtown's pub
and Played Doppelkopf.

In short, I had the essential German experience.

On Wednesday I got up at 4:30 (joy) to catch the train to Frankfurt Airport. Got everything checked in and ready to go, and of course I still had 2 hours to spare. So I decided to have the fanciest cup of tea ever served at an airport. The teabag was made of silk and lace.
The flight to Helsinki was pretty uneventful, except for the fact that every stewardess spoke to me in Finnish only to realize that I don't understand a word of their language (actually not completely true, I recognized the word 2 (kaksi) because of Minna's excellent teaching skills).
Then at Helsinki airport there was the first sign of what life in China might be like. Four women travelling together had brought a tiny kettle in their carry-on baggage and were making tea in the waiting area. They were obviously instant best friends with everyone else waiting for the flight.
On the flight I had a whole row to myself, since the flight was not fully booked and there was noone sitting in row 47. For those of you that don't know, the number 4 is very unlucky in Chinese culture. Sadly, even though I could lay down, I didn't get a minute of sleep. It's safe to say that I was pretty knackered when I arrived at Xi'an airport. I got myself onto a bus with what felt like 100 Chinese people that would bring me into the city center, which it did. Right at the station I got quite a nice welcome, there were about 30 Chinese women dancing together. I got a lot of stares as well, guess I'll have to get used to that.
Then I made my way to the campus, at this point I was so tired, I just wanted a bed. I walked onto campus and was greeted by the morning school ritual being blasted from speakers at every street corner. It goes like this:
Yi, er, san, si, wu, liu, qi, ba. One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight.
Er, er, san, si, wu, liu, qi, ba. Two, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight.
And then it goes on, and repeats itself at different speeds for about 10 minutes.
As I was walking down the busy campus street, I found myself falling into step with the music. A tiny burst of panic, am I becoming part of the machine? After earning a few puzzled looks, I then finally arrived at the International Students dorm. I registered, got my key and at last I got to my room. It's a double bedroom which I'm sharing with a girl from Lithuania. The bathroom and kitchen are shared with the whole floor. So far I really like the dorm, there are a lot of students here that can help me with my problems. Most of them have been here for a while, so they know what to do, where to go etc.
A girl from Pakistan took me out to lunch, where I almost fell asleep sitting down. Then we went to buy a SIM card, what an experience. She wasn't very fluent in Chinese, so I had to do all the talking, not knowing at all what the pieces on a phone are even called. Anyway, it took about half an hour, five minutes of which were spent, translating "Three G" to "San G". In the end I got my card though, if any of you want to know my Chinese number, send me an e-mail. My German number is out of service for the next year.
I spent some time in the afternoon walking around on campus and found some very nice places to sit and relax. Afterwards it was time to go to the International Students Office to finish registration. Unfortunately the girl who helped me didn't speak English at all and spoke Chinese very quickly, so communication was a little difficult. Anyway, I have to go back to the office tomorrow to get my student ID and other fun things.
That's about all I have for you guys right now. I'm not sure how I feel about living in China, but for the moment I feel very very foreign. Kind of like a game is being played that I don't know the rules to yet. My instinct is to try to fit in, but that seems virtually impossible, seeing as my looks already make me stick out like a sore thumb.

Chinese Word of the Day: 冰箱 bingxiang refrigerator, of which we have none in our dorm.

Pictures to follow :)