Playing Catch-up

My friends, it has been forever since I’ve written anything and yet, so much has happened in this intervening time.

The school year has started. The new crop of freshmen has graduated their boot camp training and now sits in classrooms. China has celebrated the first of its major fall season holidays. I’ve taken a trip out of town with some fantastic friends. I have moved into my new apartment and I’ve gotten new furniture.

I’ve made notes of all of this, but have not typed a single word about it. Nor have I been on the email bandwagon for the last three weeks.

There’s a reason for that. While in the old apartment, there was a certain distasteful twist to sitting down and writing. I’ll get to that in a minute. Since moving into my new apartment, I’ve not had an internet connection. In fact, since moving into my new apartment disorganization has ruled the day.

The move was originally supposed to happen in August, while I was stateside. I kept joking to all and sundry that I was not exactly homeless, I just didn’t know where I live. As it turns out though, I did not get moved out of the old dorm until September 23rd, after the Great Rat Romance.

Mind you, I was not in love with a rat. The rat seems to have been in love with me. I first made its acquaintance as it perched on my dryer, staring boldly at me when I entered the kitchen. I grabbed the nearby flyswatter and smacked the dryer – not the rat, for fear that it would catch my swatter with its pointy little teeth and tear it to shreds while it was still in my hand. At the resounding ‘Thwack!’ on the dryer, the rat got a little scared and ran down my dust mop handle to hide behind the washer.

The next day I found my rat friend in my desk drawer. I had to get something out of my desk drawer and saw the rat inside, just as I was reaching my hand into the drawer. Luckily I looked down in time to see that rat brat turn tail and escape. I slammed the drawer shut and was done writing for the day. No way was I going to sit at my desk with a rat lodged just inches from my leg and only a thin piece of composite wood separating us.

Later that night, I heard the rat rattle around in the desk drawer. The noise woke me up from a sound sleep. That was the first time I woke up that night. The second time was when he was running up my leg as I lay sleeping in my bed. I felt a strange weight on my knee and kicked my leg out, only to hear a plump plopping sound as the rat hit the floor and scurried away.

Now I’m horrified! Vowing to not sleep another wink the rest of the night, I stand guard against any more rat incursions… until my eyes betrayed me. I was just downright sleepy! My eyes grew heavy and again my head hit the pillow. I’m blissfully snoozing away, until I head a terrible screech and scratch. It sounded like a rat tango competition was going on under my bed.

Again I turn on the lights and grab what was nearest at hand: my Pedi-egg with handle. Kneeling in the middle of my bed while trying to look underneath it, like a B-movie heroine just before the monster manifests itself. There I am: whimpering, terrified, disheveled and clutching a 12-inch plastic Pedi-egg, as though the rat needed a pedicure more than a slaying.

The sound was not coming from under my bed, as I had originally thought. It was coming from the bathroom, where the rat was climbing the doorjamb. It leapt into my room from a height of 5’, landing approximately 2’ from my bed and immediately scampering underneath it.

That was it. No more sleep for me! I sent Sam a panicked text message and stayed awake the rest of the night, armed with my Pedi-egg in one hand and my broom handle in the other. Every time the rat showed its face I jabbed at it with the broom and it scampered back behind my desk.

That morning, Sam and I visited the Dean’s office to tell him about my horrifying night. The school put me up in a hotel for 3 days, until they could conquer the rat problem. They also hired a cleaning crew to clean my apartment, so that no more rats would feel compelled to call it home. And, they rushed completion of my new apartment so I could move out of that terrible, moldy, rat infested dorm.

I hope you pardon the disorganization of my thoughts. Partly because it has been so long since I’ve written anything and partly because I cannot access the master folder where I keep all of my draft blog entries, I’m having a hard time remembering what I’ve told you and what I haven’t.

Did I tell you that, just days before leaving for the States Sam instructed me to pack up my old apartment because I was going to be moved while I was gone? With just 3 days left before flying out in July, that was a mad scramble. So now I’m telling you: my new apartment was not ready by the time I returned to China at the end of August. My running joke about not knowing where I live was irrelevant. I lived in the old apartment, with mold, rats and everything packed and ready to move for a whole month after I came back.

Moving Day came on September 23rd. The move will be the subject of the next entry, which will include my thoughts on the Chinese concept of ‘move in clean’. So, from August 28th, the day I returned to Wuhan until just a week ago – now being October 14, I have not touched a computer keyboard. Instead I have been living out of suitcases. Or, if you include my stateside trip, I’ve been living out of suitcases for just about 3 months.

And that’s where things stood as far as my accommodations until 3 weeks ago, the day of The Great Move.

Because I really am trying to keep this blog in some kind of chronological order, I’ll finish this entry up by telling you about Freshman Graduation. I can do that much at least, to get the stream of events going again.

As you know from last year’s ‘The Freshmen are Coming!’ entry, posted in October, the Freshmen hit campus a week after the rest of the students do, and they drill, boot camp style for two weeks. This activity culminates into a formal graduation ceremony, with all of the school’s leaders and two foreign teachers in attendance.

This year’s graduation was no less impressive, with some noteworthy differences: it was cold and pouring down rain instead of so hot you could hear yourself sweat. Those poor kids had to stand at parade rest in the rain for 2 hours as dignitary after dignitary made their speeches. The students expressed their dismay by shouting and groaning when a new speaker approached the podium. So much for military-style decorum.

Another noteworthy difference between last year’s graduation and this year’s: instead of some poor graduate losing a shoe, someone lost their hat. And speaking of hats: the kids threw their berets up before the muckity-mucks left the arena instead of waiting till we were all gone.

Immediately following the ceremony, Sam took Victor and I to see our new apartments. WOW! Last year I got a new computer. This year I get a new apartment! And it looks like an apartment, not a converted dorm room! It had drapes already hung, a balcony off the living room and another off the dining room. It had windows and actual rooms, with doors! Oh, yeah: living there is going to feel like a home. Victor and I can’t wait to move!

As he and I walked back to our dismal dorm rooms from the construction site in the pouring rain, I saw a forlorn pile of discarded hats by the entrance of the sports complex where, just hours ago, Freshmen had marched and dignitaries had spoken. That is another difference between this year and the last: the students seem to have less respect and awe for the ordeal they had just undergone.